How does your crew split the Coin? Mine usually does as even a split as possible, with some strategic considerations mixed in (we need X amount of Coin for the next Tier upgrade, etcetera).
I think that’s fine. However, this way of splitting things up means no one PC ever gets a major surplus (and no one PC can ever get a comparative shotfall), so there’s no arguing over money issues, and no real engagement with the lifestyle mechanic.
I was wondering if perhaps I should implement a rule of “the one with their actual mitts on the moolah gets the most say in who gets what”, or some variation thereof.
That seems like it could cause friction between the players, as opposed to just their characters, though. Has anyone already tried something like this?
I’ve enjoyed using Devil Bargains to suggest certain characters bogart Coin while on a heist, before.
We had one instance where a player wanted to keep one item for themselves, which was fine, as it was a kind of plot thing rather than simply monetary gain. They used their powers of persuasion to convince another player it was fine for them to take the item.
Other than that, when it comes to coin, we split it evenly. To be honest, I’m reeeally not a fan of the idea of trying to create inter-PC friction by uneven sharing of coin. It’s a fundamental resource of the game in many ways. It’s not just money, it’s downtime actions etc. I don’t think players should be in conflict with each other over who gets more resource. I personally hate that kind of play. Players should be in conflict with each other over matters of principle, over love and honor, over who betrayed who when the mission went wrong. Stuff like that, that is rooted in the fiction. But conflict because one player got more coin, and so therefore has more in game agency… doesn’t strike me as fun. You’re right: the friction is likely to be between the players, not the characters.
Dividing the Coin as evenly as possible has never been the problem in our group, as it was always just kind of assumed that’s how it would be (and so far no one’s tried to pull a fast one on the rest of the group). However, they have had at least one argument over whether everything’s split evenly before or after expenses (like if someone needs to spend Coin for extra stress reduction or healing actions).
Note: How much coin is in your stass indicates how whell off you are, with every ten coin being equal to one dot of a skill (in case you need to bribe or such), so characters can still gripe at each other if, say, the slide has been saving and is at 2 “lifestyle” while the cutter has been spending all of theirs. Mechanically everything is even, fictionally the cutter might think the slide is skimming off the top when he fences things and confront him.
All the fictional fun of thieves distrusting each other and non of the OOC unfairness.
The good news is, the one running the game doesn’t have to worry so much about this unless it affects game play, as the other players can devise their own system for it. A lot of that will have to do with how much the crew is pulling together towards a mutual goal, or just doing crime for cash.
If squabbling over money is where the fun is, dive into it. If it isn’t, hopefully the group will find a way around it. Depends on who is at the table, and who they play.
What do you do when less coin is awarded than there are players in the group?
Nihzlet Have the players talk about where it gets allocated. If your players are moderately mature, this won’t be a problem.
Overall, I think Andrew nailed it.
Typically my players divide pretty evenly with any excess/shortfall going to or taken from the crew, but there is really nothing stopping any of the crew from using the “crew” coin to do downtime actions (even before using their own)… I feel that is a good way to stir the pot and bring in money tensions (if your players want it). Although typically my players are considerate and ask the rest of the crew how and if to spend the crew’s coin.
So your crew is sitting fat with 4 coin, and each member of the crew gets 2 coin off a standard score. Then one player could spend ALL FOUR coin out of the crew, while stashing the two that they earned from the score.