The recent pay adjustments -Rant

[Grady Granger]

Before reading this, keep in mind that I only have a basic understanding of the economy and that this is all personal opinion.
Being legal at this moment feels like an impossible task financially. There seems to be only two routes that you can take to make any substantial amounts of cash, and that's EMS and PD. I do not mean that PD and EMS do not deserve the money that they get, the pay for both of those jobs is well deserved. What I am referring to is the jobs that everyone in the city can do.

Car dealerships already have employee's, Real Estate and DOJ only hire so many, and restaurants are packed to the brim with employee's. 
Basic jobs like, Trucking, Delivery, and Go Postal, the pay is not worth the amount of time and effort you have to put into it anymore after these "nerfs" of pay. (ESPECIALLY TRUCKING) I agreed that deliveries needed to be tuned down a little bit because it could get silly with the profits. Tweaks were necessary in some cases but I personally believe that job pay was tweaked way too hard. It feels to me like Hunting is the only option to make any REAL money legally at this point in time without a whitelisted job which are limited to say the least. Hunting in my opinion should also be a sport/hobby that you do in your free time, not a main source of income. Having to hunt to grind out that car that you really want in the least tedious method possible is an RP nightmare. Having a single "basic" job that makes way more money than the rest leaves a really bad taste in your mouth; just like the delivery job did before it was nuked. 

The reason I think it needs better balance is because of the rest of the economy, price of cars, housing, food, etc...
A perfect example for this is a trucking run I did last night. I have an un-upgraded hauler, which is the cheapest semi at about 35k, with a trailer it does about an average of 50mph (being very generous) on the highway in a straight line. My trailer drop was 6 miles away, I was hauling a gas tank. For that 6 mile haul, it ended up taking me about 10-15 minutes due to different variables. When I dropped my trailer I received $2,464. I returned back to my garage to place my vehicle which took approximately 5 minutes. In 20 minutes I made $2,464.  A 10-10 at burgershot costs roughly 7k-8k. By that math its going to take me roughly an hour to get myself food for the day. Now I know someone is going to say, "WeLl TrUcK dRiVeRs DoNt DrIvE sUpEr CaRs 4head". Truck drivers also typically aren't homeless and hungry either.

The other jobs in the city could use work in my personal opinion too with a slight pay raise or alternatively dropping the price of other things in the economy instead (housing, cars, and food), I focused my attention to truck driving particularly because I believe it needs the most attention. To conclude my rant here, I welcome opinions and my mind is always willing to be changed. I just wanted to see how the community felt about this also. 

Edited August 17, 2021 by Grady Granger

[Grady Granger]

After posting this, I found another post that was recent & related to the same thing, so id like to apologize for flooding the forums with the same thing. 

[Timr]

31 minutes ago, G.Granger-F.Ferdinand said:

Basic jobs like, Trucking, Delivery, and Go Postal, the pay is not worth the amount of time and effort you have to put into it anymore after these "nerfs" of pay.

GoPostal hasn't been nerfed since the job was released, and trucking was not decreased either

[Grady Granger]

Trucking hasn't been decreased, but I believe it needs an increase. GoPostal to be fair could have been a fluke for 2 runs with bad returns so I will eat that part of the point. 

[D E M 0 N XIII]

Illuminati Confirmed.

-My opinion is that all the jobs from the job center need a full rebalance.
Taxi, tow truck, mechanic & semi delivery, should get more $ hourly.
Deliveries could use some TLC after that slap down. After all, you gotta spend $ to make $ this way...
& I feel like I'm forgetting something...
(EDIT: GOPOSTAL cause I haven't done it at all..)

-Hunting CAN be more than just a financial hobby; for some people living in Sandy Shores, Paleto, or even the homeless camp on the side of the freeway,
I'm sure it could be a full time source of income.

-It's not good when someone new to the city comes in and asks "what's the best way to make money to get started out?"
Then what you hear is "Go hunting" or "Go do deliveries because all the other jobs aren't worth it."

-They're always watching.
 

Edited August 25, 2021 by D E M 0 N XIII

[George Doors]

I do agree that jobs need to pay more. Also take into account that while working these jobs things like crazy locals smashing into you, doing stupid turns. So there’s $500 every so often too for repairs, or $900 if no one is around if you wanna keep some decent speed. None of the jobs from the centre ever seemed worth it to me, mechanic was once good but now the place is flooded with people and you barely make money (this is based on my own experience recently and I’m GMT+1 time zone.) so I avoid that now. 
 

Also, your paying 7-8k for 10-10? Can you please let me serve you cause I’ll make bank. 10-10 moneyshot is $3,500 and that’ll last the average person about 10 hours in game if not longer. 
 

On a serious note though I know it’s not all about money, people say focus on the RP, but where is the RP in grinding on your own in a truck for 8 hours a day to end up with $16,000. 

Edited August 17, 2021 by George Doors

[Lo4th]

The change before last was pretty bad. I usually will do 150 and 150 in the mornings before people start popping in the city. I used to make 33-36k and hour which seemed pretty high but I was speeding around town and risking a ticket. When the change before last happened that changed to about 22-24k and hour which sucked but it was still worth doing. This last change....in my opinion just take it out of the city if that is the way its going to stay. You spend $40 dollars on water/sandwiches and get $50 per delivery. If I do 100/100 I make 2k profit. If I need 1 repair and 1 refuel I am left with 800-1k profit. This is for 45minutes to an hour depending on how you drive. Seems like a zero is missing somewhere like this is a mistake. Because 2k an hour is insane. Gopostal still feels meh I make 8-10k a run which is about 25-30minutes depending on traffic. The last time I did trucking I made 13k an hour. As far as I can tell the point to making things less grindy is to increase the opportunities for RP. The problem is, you are always going to have people who just grind. You will never beat that in an economy driven server. Hurting the people that are trying to make a living day to day in the process to stop the grinders, in my opinion is not the way to go about it. It just make me want to take my legal character and turn to crime since drugs and bank robberies are paying out fairly decent. I don't know whats been going on but the last month or so have felt really hard to make any legal money. 

[UnknownRNGS]

I definetely believe that trucking should get a major boost due to the effort involved behind it

[vDrop]

I mean lets be real.  IRL, usually going legal or doing things legit always takes longer. Most of the jobs being requested for income boosting provide little to no RP to the server. I personally wish all these jobs that are "grinding" jobs, should just go. Think we are passed that stage as a server. 

[lords8n]

 

All I want is a fairly nice car, a house, and to put food on the table...legally. And I cannot currently do that without becoming a fulltime hunter.

[Lo4th]

Its a bigger issue. Fishing for example. $29 for high quality, $20 for Medium $15 for low quality. Everything other than hunting makes very little money. I agree that we should have tons of legal rp jobs. But at the end of the day we just don't right now. There are a handful of restaurants and car dealerships. This is an economy based server at the end of the day you wont stop the grinders if there is something to grind. Some people play differently than others. 

[Levi Bentley]

I think that Sully raises a very good point here. A lot of these jobs in question provide little to no RP and if increased will just encourage grinding. As it is it leaves open the window of having whatever job you choose to be a part of your RP and not just a means to make money. I have also done many of these jobs and I can tell you that a lot of them pay just as much, if not more per time spent than many of the city employed jobs such as EMS and PD.

Yes the criminal life will always pay more, but that also comes with high risk as well as an inevitable criminal record that then disqualifies you from other jobs. I will say that as it stands there are other jobs such as the various restaurant locations that are not generally open on a regular basis for lack of employees. These jobs as well as others involve regular interaction, provide various avenues for RP, and also pay out decent amounts of money. Along with this, there is always the opportunity for coming up with business ventures of your own and creating something from scratch to spark some brand new avenues for RP.

While I know these things can be frustrating, cities are generally structured towards a system that is slow moving at the start and takes your character awhile to get on their feet financially yet provides these jobs in question to be able to hit the ground running and make some money to support yourself in the process. The intention of such jobs should not be seen as a full time job to make all of your money, however a means to start up and be a side portion in your characters overall story.

I can speak from experience that unfortunately if there is a well paying job that can be a grinding job, people tend to abuse it for income and it takes away from the overall RP on the server. Overall it is a near impossible system to balance, but just boosting pay for these types of jobs is not a go to solution

[Razec]

There are loads of possibilities, apart from the structured legal jobs, that you can overtake in order to make some good money. For reasons of META, I will not be saying these here. However, the most profitable jobs come from player to player interaction. There are multiple player made items that have a fluctuating price in the market, giving you a opportunity to undertake competition. As soon as you hop into the city, these items are not that hard to figure out. Check the ad system. Multiple players are constantly advertising their means of survival, which consists of the sale of items with a price that you can decide! It takes time to figure out, however, how the market works, but that's all part of this hussle and that's ultimately what values the work that you do. There are also multiple untapped markets out there, that you must create and add value to. That adds a little challenge to it and makes it a lot more fun. Stop grinding. 

[phvntom]

11 hours ago, Levi Bentley said:

I can speak from experience that unfortunately if there is a well paying job that can be a grinding job, people tend to abuse it for income and it takes away from the overall RP on the server. Overall it is a near impossible system to balance, but just boosting pay for these types of jobs is not a go to solution

This is already happening, and has happened for such a long time. People used to just spend a portion of their total playtime doing the wind turbines because it was the lowest effort job that paid the most money. Drive to A, stand, drive to b, stand, and so forth. 
Currently, every time I log in and play, there are at the least fifteen total GoPostal trucks seen during a four hour period. The nature of "grind jobs" or "scripted jobs" will ALWAYS have a place in GTARP. (You can say sadly or feel however you want but it's just the truth) 

The cyclical formula for a successful economy, enjoyable player/community environment, and longevity of player retention revolves around a system or systems of passive money gains like Universal Basic Income and "job center jobs".

The cycle is as follows: The backbone of a good server is a competent Police Department and an active and happy EMS. In order for the Police to do their job there needs to be a criminal element to civilian life. Boosting cars, processing/obtaining illegal materials, hording guns and drugs, and anything else the server/community allows via scripts and content. Once the criminals are caught by the one portion of the backbone they lose: Their time and Their money. Criminals provided the crucial part of the server with RP and content. Now because they lost time to make money, by getting caught they are at a loss. They also lose money due to fines and restitution.
What can the criminals do when they get out to make up for their losses? They are ex-felons and have a criminal record so they have two avenues. Get the record expunged and go to EMS or PD, or work the job center jobs. So if we take away the "grindy provides no RP" jobs, criminals have one option. Criminals will perpetually be at a loss/disadvantage in terms of monetary wealth. Once out of prison, to recover losses they can go work for GoPostal, become a taxi driver, mow lawns, deliver food, become a fisherman, fix wind turbines, collect garbage, trailer hauling, and tow vehicles. These are easily accessible money making activities for ANYONE to hop in and make that bit of money they need for whatever they need it for. (I have other issues with some of these jobs since they are locked behind a pay wall. Garbage truck costing 45k, Big Rigs costing 50k+) 

(I would also like to point out the other issue players have with monetary gain vs Roleplay. The PD and EMS sector get paid TO ROLEPLAY. Once clocked in their whole existence is to provide roleplay. They don't lose time or money when they screw up, something scuffs out, or the other issues that revolve around monetary and time loss. Criminals operate at a loss versus their "Win rate" so to speak. It's an issue in my opinion but that is for another thread.)

Another way someone can view these jobs is a way for criminals to NOT DO CRIME. They are giving themselves a break from planning a robbery, shooting the arresting officer, robbing another player, etc, etc. This way it gives everyone a break; cops, EMS, and said criminals. Like it or not, money does in-fact rule most of peoples' influence when it comes to RP and mechanics within the server. When criminals lose their time, money, and sometimes their sanity what better way to combat that by clocking in as a gardener and mowing some lawns for an hour or two to RECOVER the loss of money and time. This way they are using their time for the goal of monetary gain. As the Goblins in World of Warcraft say "Time is money friend!"

As an example, I've never fished so I don't know the metrics on time spent vs the reward but by the info provided by Lo4th I have ZERO interest in fishing for the provided pricing scale.

I believe that these jobs are a necessity for the longevity and health of the server/community. They offer an easy way for people to recover their losses, create some form of wealth, and get them back to a comfortable position to then continue why we all log in. To Role-play. You take these away and you will see negative affects roll into the server. 

 

[Ascendancism]

A point that is often missed, people would like to make money as fast as possible so they can afford what they want to facilitate in roleplay. Some people want to roleplay being more than an average citizen. Either criminals with weapons, or some highend accountant with lots of cars.. Either way since all the drugs average out to roughly 30k an hour, I can not agree that being a criminal pays more unless you're talking about chain robbing banks. It is much easier to go hunting and I believe most of the 'gangs' and organizations will agree that hunting is a much better time investment. This is especially important for those who can play a few hours a night, who would like to roleplay but they'd also like to afford a decent vehicle to facilitate said roleplay. Id love to see the drugs have more elements of risk & a higher reward for committing to said risks. It does not pay well to be a criminal over hunting right now.

[ZaxxYs]

I just want to post a quick message to say 2 things: 

1- Yes, legal jobs need to be looked at and rebalanced because of all of the reasons that you guys have mentioned before, its an issue and even tho the players should come to an RP server to RP I also believe that people should be allowed to play and RP HOWEVER they want, you cant force them to play the game and enjoy their time the way YOU want them to, so if they want to grind for a car, awesome, if they wanna RP as a crazy person, awesome, if they wanna sit at the same place waiting for people to talk to, awesome. 

2- I love Razec and Levi for bringing out the fact that the jobs we are referring to should and are beginner jobs, jobs that will teach you the roots of the server and how stuff works, they shouldn't be looked at as a main form of income or as the only thing to do. Like Razec said, the best money comes out of player to player interactions, I can not remember the last time I did ANY of these jobs or ANY illegal robbery and I have millions in my character's bank account, all of that money came out of player to player interactions and businesses, now you will never be able to do this if all your focus and attention is on driving around delivering sandwiches for 3 out of the 4 hours that you play in the server.

So we need to look at both sides of the coin "Do we need the legal jobs to be looked at?" ABSOLUTELY,  "Are they or should they be the only way to make money or the best way to make money?" ABSOLUTELY NOT. 

Much love to you all.  

Edited September 29, 2021 by ZaxxYs

[dylancbrown]

12 hours ago, ZaxxYs said:

I just want to post a quick message to say 2 things: 

1- Yes, legal jobs need to be looked at and rebalanced because of all of the reasons that you guys have mentioned before, its an issue and even tho the players should come to an RP server to RP I also believe that people should be allowed to play and RP HOWEVER they want, you cant force them to play the game and enjoy their time the way YOU want them to, so if they want to grind for a car, awesome, if they wanna RP as a crazy person, awesome, if they wanna sit at the same place waiting for people to talk to, awesome. 

2- I love Razec and Levi for bringing out the fact that the jobs we are referring to should and are beginner jobs, jobs that will teach you the roots of the server and how stuff works, they shouldn't be looked at as a main form of income or as the only thing to do. Like Razec said, the best money comes out of player to player interactions, I can not remember the last time I did ANY of these jobs or ANY illegal robbery and I have millions in my character's bank account, all of that money came out of player to player interactions and businesses, now you will never be able to do this if all your focus and attention is on driving around delivering sandwiches for 3 out of the 4 hours that you play in the server.

So we need to look at both sides of the coin "Do we need the legal jobs to be looked at?" ABSOLUTELY,  "Are they or should they be the only way to make money or the best way to make money?" ABSOLUTELY NOT. 

Much love to you all.  

Completely agree with you, I have done every job possible and there are some flaws that need tweaking but I don't feel like because you decide to RP a fat truck driver therefore you'd never be able to buy a car or buy a house. After all it's not like truckers all over the world are poor, depending on what you're delivering it will pay better than cops in some countries. 
Just an opinion, not saying they should make equal pay.

[lords8n]

Its a government conspiracy.
Keep the people poor and they'll result to crime.
More crime keeps the police fat dumb and happy.
Rinse and repeat.

TRY to RP out a legal venture in this city and the illegal gangs and organizations will come at you and try to force you into illegal actions out of jealousy and lack of creativity.

[Dorkyartist]

I agree with this, but one job that is especially overlooked in the job center is gardening. I cannot express how little pay you get for the work you do, and there is a limited amounts of plants you can care for. Not all potted plants in the city can be cared for, and it would be good to make more plants have the ability to “give love” to with the job. It pays around $80-$100 per plant, but you also have to buy a shovel, watering can, and you have to buy a water bottle for each plant, which is $40 each, so realistically you only make $40-80 a plant. Plants aren’t close to each other either, and you have to drive a lot, which costs gas money. This makes the job overall ineffective. Most people don’t even know about the job Bc nobody does it. I think we could change that by fixing the price! Increasing payment per plant, taking out the use of water bottles, and making more plants garden able would likely help in fixing said problem