Corporation

Corporations are a big part of InfernoMOO life, whether you are an employee, manager or CEO you are likely to be involved in corporate operations often in day to day play. This article will deal with most aspects of corporations.

Overview of Corporations
In InfernoMOO players can join corporations, which are similar to guilds or clans in many other games.

There are many advantages and few disadvantages to being a member of a corporation, the primary advantage being money. Being in a corporation allows you to work 'contracts' for money, whether they are tracking contracts or killing contracts a player at any level in a corporation will be able to earn easy money for what is often simply training their skills. A list of the top 10 most wealthy corporations in the game, and the top 10 largest (in terms of active members) corporations can be found in City Hall (CH on the map).

The secondary advantage is support. Corp members generally help each other out in various ways. You also get the companionship of being able to chat to your corpmates in corp-only channels. Most corps have HQs and other communal areas, which can give access to equipment, medical resources, food and drink and various forms of recreational activities. Many have craft benches and raw materials for making things such as armor and weapons. Some even have clone tanks. Just for the love of Christ, remember to close the door behind you when leaving or arriving, okay?.

Corporate Commands
Several new 'commands' are unlocked when you create or become a member of a corporation, for example:

E.g. c Hello everyone.
 * - This is a chatnet for members of your corporation only, using the syntax.

This is used to privately talk, scheme or whine at the rest of your corp.

Commands associated with this are and  to toggle between listening to the channel or not.


 * - Using this command brings up a summery sheet of your corp's current status, it includes the name of the corp, its abbreviation, the corp message of the day, current corporate cash stockpile, the CEO, a list of managers, employees and inactive employees. The corporate pay rate (this is what percentage of a contracts pay out actually goes into your pocket). And a list of contracts, owned assets and controlled cameras.


 * - This shows a list of all online corp members, how long they have been idle for, their location and their doing message.

For example:

Player              Corp   Idle Area            Doing Dr.Crowley          JI     0s   freedom city    Me, with my portal gun


 * - This brings up a more detailed list of all the contracts currently signed by your corporation.


 * - Brings up a list of all the corporate commands, mostly useful for the CEO as many of them can only be used by them.

Employees
So, you are thinking about joining, or have recently joined a corp.

What is asked of an employee varies greatly between different corporations, but in general the day to day requirements of an employee are fairly simple. If you are low level, your main priority will be to make your character as powerful and experienced as possible. Travelling around and getting travel xp, killing many different things for kill xp, doing jobs and quests are all great ways to get xp early on. Getting your primary weapon skill up, as well as dodge, is also something to work on while your character is new.

As your character grows in experience and skill, you'll be able to use your knowledge to train people who have recently joined. You may want to help in other ways, for example by helping rescue corp members who have died and need to recover their equipment. Gathering items for the corp's crafters to use is also a useful activity for any corp member to involve themselves in.

Overall being an employee can be a very good prospect for many players, especially those who cant be bothered managing or running their own corporations, and would rather an easy way to make money and have some fun. The prospect of promotion to management is always a nice incentive to stay in the corp and stay loyal.

Managers
The role of a manager is more diverse then that of an employee, despite the fact that they really are just glorified employees themselves. A manager is simply an employee that a CEO has promoted using the command and they can be demoted back to a regular employee just as easily with the command.

As a manager you are expected to perform all the functions of an employee but, depending on the permissions your corp has set up, may be gifted with a few more commands. and are probably the most powerful of these commands, but the ability to  and  contracts is also very important. Managers are tasked with managing employees (what a surprise), overall this generally breaks down into two tasks:
 * Ensuring that appropriate contracts are signed and active for the employees.
 * Helping out employees with questions or game play issues.

Generally a CEO will not appreciate a manager hiring or firing employees without express permission, so it is not recommended to do either of these things unless it has been previously discussed with the CEO. It's also likely that you won't have access to the command to fire other employees at this level.

This is possibly the best position to be in if you are a higher level player who wants maximum freedom and money making potential, without the bother of running a corp and the costs associated with it. This is due to the fact that managers can buy and sign any contract they require - if the corp you are in has things set up that way.

In addition to the c chat channel, managers can chat with other managers and more senior employees using the cm channel.

Shopkeeps
The next rung up the ladder is Shopkeeps. These individuals have the power to set prices in the corp shop in the Galeria. They are sually also allowed to remove items from the sales case. They may or may not be the only employees allowed to stock the shop case, using. Finally, they have access to, which shows sales activity in the store.

In addition to the c chat channel and the cm channel, shopkeeps can chat with other shopkeeps and more senior employees using the cs channel.

Board
The level below the CEO or Holder. Depending on how your corp permissions are set up, you have a lot of power and generally are responsible for running the corp in the absence of anyone senior to you. If the CEO or Holders are away for too long, the Board are the first in line to take over the corp, promoting themselves to CEO using. They can also be selected as a 'successor' if or when the current CEO decides to move on.

In addition to the c chat channel, the cm channel and the cs channel, board members can chat with other board members and corp holders using the cb channel.

The CEO or Holder
Congratulations!

Either you have just successfully taken over a corp, been put in the position after the previous CEO has left (assuming you were named the successor) or you have just started your own corporation! The result is the same, you are now the CEO of a corporation.

Being the CEO of a corporation can be the most demanding and most rewarding of all the positions in a corporation, but it does have pros and cons.

As the CEO you have ultimate power over the corp, you can hire or fire anyone, promote or demote managers at will, but at the same time you have to deal with all the problems of those below you, as well as deal with corporate costs that may be associated with any assets the corporation owns.

It is advisable to have at least a few members in your corporation as a CEO, a lone CEO in a 1 person corp is discouraged by the fact that contracts have a far lower total payout and time span when activated in a corp with few active members. Also, running a corp can be a lot of work for one person to do alone.

The CEO can also set the corporations jingle (the song that plays from various corporate vending machines) and the MOTD (the message of the day shown in the screen). Again, this depends on the permissions the CEO has set up, you can just as easily allow junior members to set these motivational messages.

In addition to the c chat channel, the cm channel, the cs channel and the cb channel, holders can exchange vital and important information among themselves using the ch channel eg ch So bored lol.

Pros and Cons of having your own corp
Here is a quick list of some of the advantages and disadvantages of running a corporation:

Pros

 * You have ultimate power and freedom in the management of the corporation.
 * You have a 'private army'; if your employees are loyal.
 * You have access to the corporate funds through the and.
 * You can purchase corporate HQs, which can be used for you or your corp. These generally have high security.
 * You can make a custom HQ using the Matrix.
 * You can buy a Security Console in Weezer Village and use it to monitor your HQ, spring traps, control Security drones, and more.

Cons

 * You may end up with more expenses, buying contracts, paying corporate HQ rents, buying equipment for employees, stocking corp supplies.
 * You have to deal with sometimes very annoying and stupid employees.
 * if you have managers, you can't go idle for 3 days without the risk of a corporate takeover
 * If you start the corp, you have to build it up, gather employees in the first place, pay for corporate expansion contracts etc.
 * Being a CEO can attract unwanted attention from other corporations CEOs and employees, CEOs are generally higher level players, so are sometimes targeted so another player can prove superiority.
 * Your precious game play time may be eaten up dealing with the pathetic problems faced by your employees.

Other Corporate Considerations
A few things to keep in mind regarding corporations:

Money Making Methods

 * Contracts are probably the simplest way to make money, as they automatically pay you for killing certain enemies.
 * If you have a DNI implant and a suitable skill in hack, you can hack gangland cameras for money payout every game day. You as the hacker will receive the same percentage cut on camera payouts as you would for working contracts... e.g. rate of 0.7.
 * Corporations can also rent shops in the Galleria, they can then assign a gangland citizen to work the counter which trusted members of the corp can then stock with goods to sell, the profits from these sales go directly into the corporate funds.
 * Protection contracts for shops - the money from these goes directly into corp funds without any message being displayed when the money goes in or when the contract is lost to another corp. Depending on how much money the shop makes, these can be very lucrative for the corp as a whole. The person who signed the contract doesn't get any of this money in this instance.

Combat/Risks
A lot of fun can also be had in corporate conflict, banding together with groups of players for PVP battles can be highly amusing.

Tougher opponents (such as the Kraken) can be handled by a group of corp members, this sort of thing is generally hard to organize if you aren't in a corp.

Hiring Standards
While a corporation can be pretty much anyone, such as an angry player not wanting to deal with NEWB's crazy contract tax, two players spending all their time in their HQ all day, or just a group of friends, if you want to get some serious money flowing, you may want to consider balancing your active employees between your Brawnies and your Brainies.

This is not the end-all-be-all of what players you may personally want in your corporation, but something to consider if you think you can min-max people.
 * Fighters: These are generally the bulk of your corp, polishing off contracts almost as fast as you can sign them. Specced into various weapon builds.
 * Healers: For patching up the rest of your corp when they take too big of a bite out of a mob. Medic builds, but can also tag Repair, Craft, Scavenge, or Hack for more utility.
 * Crafters: Obviously, these guys are another backbone of your corp, making new things to kit out the rest, stick mods onto weapons, as well as sell in the Galleria. May also go Repair, Science, Scavenge or Hack.
 * Utility: Those that don't fit into other categories, like your dedicated Scavengers, Fishers, Pilots, Hackers, and the like. Not un-useful, but more niche than the other types.
 * PVP Junkies: For those with a bent for fighting it out with another corp/the playerbase at large, consider having a few Locksmith/Sneak/Hackers, for busting into other player/corp housing to snatch that sweet, sweet text loot to farm tears.

Miscellaneous Information

 * Contract value increases based on the number of active members in the corp. This effects the time a contract is active for after signing, and the total payout on the contract. For example, a crackhead contract will have a total value of $5000 with 5 active members and $5500 with 6 active members.
 * A corporation who buys a corporate headquarters in Corpclave will have all its members automatically scanned into the Corpclave gate lock.
 * Soda contracts can be signed and deployed in squares almost anywhere in the world. NPC's and players will buy soda from the soda machine and the player signing the contract will receive a share of the proceeds, depending on how much of a cut the corp usually takes from contracts. Soda machines can break however and will require someone in the corp to repair them back to tip-top shape. Also, some areas get a great deal more traffic from thirsty NPCs than other areas, so choose wisely, otherwise your soda contract is likely to be dropped if it isn't earning any money.
 * Corporations can also rent shops in the Galleria, they can then assign a gangland citizen to work the counter which the CEO, or someone the CEO has given special permission, usually the Shopkeeper, can then stock with goods to sell, the profits from these sales go directly into the corporate funds.