Chapter XII

I need to tell you, dear reader, something.

I have run out of ideas, and to be honest, constantly feeling anger at what I write is not all that healthy, so after this chapter, there will be a number of changes.

The first change is the obvious solution to both my issues.

I will diversify what I talk about. This will still be a guide about the multiverse, and its manifold dangers, but it will not talk exclusively about System universes anymore.

Instead I will also talk about other dangers I have encountered.

But that is not every change I will be making.

I will also stop talking merely about the negative aspects, but instead also talk about the positive aspects. Make advise what you should be visiting, dear multiversal traveler.

I hope that this will help me manage to reach that nebulous word count that bastard wants me to reach.

I hope. I really do not want to disappoint that bastard.

Now, onto the next real chapter.

Chapter XIII

I mentioned once that I wanted to talk about the economics of System based universes, no better time than today, I think.

System based economies are split apart into four general categories.

Those categories are the following.

First, what I call Everything gets more expensive as you go on, even things where it does not make sense, and using cheaper ones is actively harmful Systems.

I think I will not comment on this, and the others, until I talk about them a bit more in depth.

The second type of economic system System affected universes like to employ is what I call, Where does all that stuff go?

The third type is the always popular The robbers are strong here, but we still have a flourishing economy somehow, even if being good at your job means you loose everything.

Mostly a societal issue that one, but often amplified by the system in some way.

Mind control. It is always mind control. When in doubt, and a System is involved, you cannot go wrong with mind control. Trust me on that.

The fourth, and last type I want to talk about today is All prizes are defined by the System, which hopefully calculates an appropriate amount for the work of the merchant.

Well, there is the fifth type, but that are basically normal economics, most likely hypercapitalism, that work as if there is no System. I will not talk about that, and other similar to it. I also have not included it into the original calculation for that very same reason.

Keep in mind that I have definitely forgotten a few types of economic systems that are commonly seen functioning in System affected universes.

So, let us talk about that first type. And yes, I know I have chosen some rather descriptive names, but who cares.

So, back to the first type, which I have called Everything gets more expensive as you go on, even things where it does not make sense, and using cheaper ones is actively harmful.

So, how does that economic system, and I am using that term very broadly in this case, actually work?

Ok. Whenever your power increases by a certain amount in power, often called a tier, the prizes you need to pay for even simple commodities go up by a certain, generally flat, multiplier. I am not speaking here about a want, because you can afford that luxury now, I am speaking about a need, because buying food of a lower tier might actually starve you, or rob you of levels slowly, depending on the extremes.

Now, admittedly, those two examples are extremes, but it is never a fun thing to see.

The food of a lower tier simply does not have all the nutrients you need, or some idiocy like this.

But wait, it gets worse. Even using toilet paper from a lower tier brings its own issues with, and so on.

So, money tends to stay inside one tier, unless someone gets to the next tier, then he takes all his money out of the tier. The ones near the increase in tier have, for a lot of reasons, a tendency to be the riches people inside that tier.

So what will be happening?

Money will slowly, but surely move up the tiers, with the value of money deflating, simply because there is less around, in the lower tiers.

Which is, if you have not realized now, a bad thing.

You need a government actively encouraging, and even forcing to put money back into the economies of the lower tiers.

And I used the word economies for a reason in this case.

While all tiers tend to use a unified currency, at least to some extent, although the value of the coin that is most often employed changes, those economies are almost completely decoupled from each others, with the most common thing to happen being the loss of money to the next tier economy.

The fact that the economies are still using the same currency, and in general the same regulations, means that the lower tier economies cannot do much to prevent this issue, or at least reduce it.

This issue is amplified by the fact that the most powerful, the richest and the most influential are in the upper most tiers, which in turn means that the economic policies that are good for those tiers are the ones that are most likely to be passed.

Which invites deregulation on the lower tiers, because the quantities of money being worked with are not actually that high for the law makers.

Because of the fact that the economy is internally split into multiple different economies, that use a different quantity of currency as their base unit of currency, this has, of course, the effect, that those smaller amounts of currency are, in truth, utterly massive.

Which, interestingly enough, amplifies the natural movement of the sub economies loosing out in the amounts of money they have available, because this invites those at the top to be very successful, because gaming the system, so to speak, is easier at the top, and the lack of regulation makes this very easy.

To understand what is going on, think about if someone were to speculate with the lowest quantity of money available in your home universe.

No one would really care, unless that guy is spectacularly successful.

But let us imagine that someone being of a people for whom that currency is far more worth, which is why they have developed a new sub division of that currency.

But the regulations of what amount you should look closer at is still the same.

Ok, of to the next economic system I wanted to talk about, the Where does all that stuff go? Economic system.

That type of economic system is insanely popular.

So, instead of beginning to talk about the issues with this type of economic system, I thought I would begin to first tell you what you essentially need for one of those economic systems to be happening, then what it is, and finally, after that, tell you why it is completely and utterly stupid.

So, the first thing you need is a quickly regenerating source of an economic good, or of multiple ones.

That source needs to be easily farmable, with fairly little risk and effort, as well as quickly.

In the most extreme case of this type of economic system, that source can be harvested by many different people and organizations at the same time, without any issue.

One of the most common types of sources are dungeons.

So, now you have the source, what do you need next?

You need to have a way to get that harvested material from the source to where it is needed.

And that is all. The System does the rest. How nice of it, ignoring of course the fact that such an economy works, to a significant degree, only because the System says it does.

This type of economic system, and I am not sure if that abomination deserves the title of economic system, generally has two economic systems in one.

The source based one and the normal one. The normal economic system, whatever it may be, is generally not affected by the source based one.

The sourced based one is attempting to sell dirt cheap materials that literally anyone can gather as expensive things to the normal economic system.

Thanks to the System, this works.

So, what are the issues of that type of economic system?

First, the mostly free access to as expensive regarded resources should make those resources cheaper. Considering that a lot of these resources could be used in automating things, kickstarting an industrial revolution and stuff like that, you would expect the standard of living to increase.

This is however, thanks to the System, not what happens.

The System instead ensures that the prize of these commodities remains stable. Sometimes it allows the prize to normalize a bit at the place where it is harvested, but the citizens there never seem to gain any benefits either, so it is also ensuring that the next logical step does not happen.

Well, the next logical step besides hordes of merchants, who come to sell those cheap goods a bit away for tons of money, because the effect, which is allowing these goods to become cheap is not, in general, actually all that far reaching.

This has the dual effect of those harvesting the source being unable to gain the benefits of the harvested good, while those that live outside of the area where you can harvest the good easily also do not get the benefit.

Considering the fact that sometimes the export of those harvesting towns is measured in quantities big enough to supply a few billion people, you need to wonder a few things.

First, what the hell are they doing with that stuff in on a planet that has, at most, a billion people?

And second, where does the money for the merchants come from?

And third, what are the merchants doing with those unmeasurable quantities of money?