queendaze | Businesses & Jobs

Businesses & Jobs

BUSINESSES

Okay, so not all of these are businesses per se; some are simply community establishments. However, the general term we'll use here is "business" so we aren't alternating our vocabulary too much! That said, these businesses are not only for finding part-time employment, they're also places your character can visit for their goods and services.

★ All but the clinic and garrison close at sunset and reopen at sunrise.

There are 7 businesses:

Flower Shop - ideal place to select from a large variety of standard plants and interesting gifts.
Garrison - 24/7; members of the community who hope to provide guidance and protection.
Tailor's Boutique - shop that sells/mends/creates clothes and other cloth-centric items.
Bakery - set up like a cafe that only serves coffee, tea, and desserts (oh and bread).
Clinic - 24/7; supporting the community with access to medicine, medical knowledge, and immediate care.
Library - has a large collection of books on everything BUT the kingdom's history and background.
Weapons n' More - store that sells weapons as well as random tools and junk you can't find anywhere else.

Scroll down to the comments to see an overview of all of them.

JOBS

Your character is likely to be taking up a part-time job at one of the local businesses shortly after their arrival; the queen herself will have previously suggested it to your character, seeing as everyone will require a job in order to receive any a free stay at the inn! Also, it provides a source of handwavy income.

How do jobs come into play? However you want, assuming you choose for them to come into play! These jobs can be used as hooks for "day in the life" threads; they can also be used as hiatus excuses (they could suddenly be working a few days straight!) and whatnot. With each job are many possible tasks a character could be doing: the flower shop could make you hand out petunias, the bakery could have you driving a bread cart through town, the patrol could have you asking questions about suspicious activity, and so on.

HOWEVER, if none of that interests you, you don't have to play it out; you can handwave their jobs happening when they aren't on screen. Tasks are there to help give some substance when your character isn't exploring the labyrinths, and jobs themselves are the logical reason for your character to have a handwavy amount of spending money.

★ Employers are "prop NPCs".

Every business is run by an employer who is an eccentric, yet indistinct, NPC that nobody plays. They exist as that off-screen voice telling your character what to do. I'm not sure if there's already a term for it, but I call these "prop NPCs"—non-playable characters that aren't being played by ANYONE AT ALL but can be handwaved and utilized as seen fit, to your liking, just like props. Most of the time your character will only just refer back to them, like "Oh, you know, my boss is making me do this" or whatever. If you are so inclined, you can briefly pull them into your thread; maybe your character's chatting on the job and midway the boss should come out of the back and give them a giant crate of cupcakes to hand out.

★ Job acquisition is handwaved.

That's right: getting a job is just handwaved one way or another. Your character won't have to engage with the employer in a thread, and you don't need any modly permissions in regards to whether or not your character can have this job. If you want you can still play your character as being at the business before/after they've got their job, or you can completely handwave that they got it at some point off-screen.

★ Your character will not be stuck inside a building when they work.

Most, if not all, of your character's tasks assigned by their employer are odd jobs that are meant to take place OUTSIDE the business. Now, if you work at the library or the clinic, odds are you might be indoors a little more, but you're STILL encouraged to get out there and engage with people! The employers can run the registers/desks/etc themsleves—they hired YOU so you could take care of all the random things they can't! Now, this isn't to say your character can't stick around in the building all day, but—well, you get my point by now I hope.

★ Your character's job should be listed on their stats/permissions.

OOCly there's no "job list" to add your character to. Your character's job should be listed in the Stats/Permissions post on their journal, by the appropriate section. We encourage every player to make a post like this for their journal.

★ Characters can freely change jobs.

That's right—they can change their jobs whenever they want. You could just be all "yeah Bob here's not going to be on patrol anymore he's just gonna work at the library now" and that's cool. Businesses around here are surprisingly flexible with this. Just make sure to keep your Stats/Permissions up to date!

★ There's no limit to how many employees a business can hire.

Even if there's already five other characters working at that business you want to toss your character at, they can work there! It's part-time for a reason, and hey, you might get the opportunity to meet characters through working at the same place as them.

★ Character's can be fired...

...but that's up to you. If you WANT to play with your character being fired from their jobs, you can toy with that. Employers here are surprisingly easygoing, and perhaps blissfully unaware of their worker's habits on the job. But sometimes they might catch them at the wrong time. And just as employers are easygoing with their crappy workers, they're also easygoing about rehiring them... sometimes. If you want a reason for your character to have a job change against their will, you have it.

★ You don't have to assume your character is working everyday.

Again, these are part time jobs—characters are either working too often or not often enough, so just wing it!

The tasks listed with each business are examples to give you the general gist of what your character's work might entail should they work there—and should you want to utilize it for threads. You can use what's listed and/or make up your own tasks, just so long as they're ~vaguely~ relevant, even if it's crack. Each employer is pretty eccentric with their idea of work, and overly devoted to anything surrounding it, so you can expect to play with a wide range of things.

The perks, again, apply should your character be employed here! It can be goods, access to particular things, or some skills your character can come to learn by working there. You don't gain it all at once, you gain it over the course time, so it's best to handle it gradually. You can be relatively creative with what your character gets from working here, too, but we'll also try to keep this list updated with anything else we think should be added!

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FLOWER SHOP

The exterior of this shop is charming, decorated heavily with hanging and potted plants. You can easily peer inside thanks to the large shop windows that proudly showcase the plant-related clutter indoors. Inside there are flowers and planters EVERYWHERE. It might even be overwhelming! This shop sells exactly what you'd expect: floral arrangements, bouquets, potted plants, spices/herbs, etc. But, you can also buy non-floral gifts! There's a corner of the shop that's dedicated to balloons with messages, cards saying all sorts of things, stuffed animals, candles, and so on. Very standard gifts you'd expect to find in a gift store, with some weird stuff thrown in.

At the current time it doesn't sell anything fantasy-like, so everything in there is standard "our world" stuff. We're not sure where their plants come from, but it's all very fresh.

Tasks: handing out flowers on the street (to demonstrate that this shop has lovely flowers!!), driving a flower cart, dropping flowers seductively and bending over to pick them up, scanning the area for flowers ("just because everything's dead doesn't mean there isn't hope," says the employer), trying to break into someone's room to decorate it with flowers, showering petals on things because your employer said to, teaching people about pollination, delivering flowers to people, offering to create bouquets utilizing flower language, shoving "I'M SORRY" bears at people and telling them to pay, etc...

Perks: not only do you learn about flowers and how to arrange them beautifully, you also learn the ~language of flowers~ which i'm sure is a very useful skill to have. you also get free tacky gifts AND free flowers, sometimes in the bushels, congratulations.

Edited 2015-08-16 19:19 (UTC)

GARRISON

Open 24/7. The garrison itself is aesthetically simple, much like a small Japanese police box with many tall windows on its front to naturally light the building. It's recognizable by a giant yellow star-shaped sign. This is the home of your local crime fighters! Er, something like that. They hope to help people in general, and to keep them safe from monsters. The main floor has someone working the desk. In the basement of this garrison is a prison; basically just four holding cells. Only characters who work patrol are given keys that can access this prison.

The job of those who work at the garrison isn't to enforce justice and arrest people (unless they personally take it upon themselves), it's to provide that veil of safety by standing around and, well, patrolling. It's also to provide general guidance, assistance, and maybe even protection when need be. Any actual protecting might happen at night, when the monsters come out—hope you don't get stuck with THAT shift too often!

Tasks: patrolling the town, patrolling OUTSIDE town, searching the ocean for anyone who might be lost at sea, watching out for any trouble, making sure people get home safely before nightfall, defending those in need, enforcing JUSTICE!1, asking questions to make sure nobody is suspicious, protecting people from monsters, blowing your whistle ("testing, testing"), reminding people that a prison exists, flashing your weapon if you have one ("it's ok you're safe! winkwonk), etc...

Perks: you get a whistle (which is very shrill ouch) so you can draw all sorts of attention and a rusted skeleton key to the garrison's prison, which you can throw people in. hoo boy.

Edited 2015-08-16 19:20 (UTC)

TAILOR'S BOUTIQUE

This elegant building's large sign reads 'TAILOR'S'—below it, in smaller font on a separate sign attached by hooks, is 'BOUTIQUE'. You can see all the fanciful clothing the shop carries from its large windows; the shop is spacious inside, and it feels luxurious. It not only mends clothes, it also sells clothes—many times the clothes will be sitting outside on racks for you to go through, and inside is a series of dressing rooms.

The selection of clothes to pick from is large, and comes in many different fashions—you could be surprised by their unique and plentiful stock. Is that an astronaut suit? A prom dress? Seriously? On request they can also work on other cloth-items, like pouches, blankets, leathers, dolls, etc.

Tasks: mending clothes, making cloth items such as bags and dolls, trying to get people to try on boutique's clothes (even if you gotta take it to the streets, man), staying up to date with fashion trends, offering to sew random things, showing people how strong the thread is, offering to add pockets to a stranger's clothes, giving people makeovers, etc...

Perks: you get a pair of really cute scissors and free access to many cloths, leathers, and other sewing materials. you also learn how to sew if you don't already grasp that!

Edited 2015-08-16 19:23 (UTC)

BAKERY

Its front, shaded overhead by a cotton candy-colored awning, is composed of glass so everyone can see the delicious treats and cute setup inside. There's small seating areas inside AND outside the shop. Oddly enough, it's set up a bit more like a cafe, but the employer insists that it's a bakery since it "doesn't serve petty things such as soups and sandwiches." Their words, not mine.

The shop itself is rather small, but clean and cute. You can find your typical breads, cupcakes, cakes, donuts, pastries, and any other delicious baked desserts here. They also serve simple coffees and teas over the counter. When you open the door a bell will ring to signal your presence. On request they will do large orders!

Aside from The Dolph-Inn's tavern, this bakery is the only other place in the entire town of Port Perplex that supplies food—even if 99% of it's sweets.

Tasks: eating sweets in public to make people jealous of the good food you have, giving out samples of anything on the streets, driving a [bread/cake/etc] cart, dressing up as a giant cupcake, brewing coffee, throwing pieces of bread around even though there aren't pigeons wtf, seeing if there's anything else edible out there, offering cooking classes, asking people for recipes, etc...

Perks: not only do you learn how to bake, you learn a bit about plain ol' cooking, too! you also get a cool chef's hat and free access to extra sweets that didn't sell at the end of the day.

Edited 2015-07-20 04:28 (UTC)

CLINIC

Open 24/7 and easily identified by its giant plus (+) shaped sign hanging over the double doors. Though it has large windows on the front, allowing you to generally see in, it seems that these are in place to make use of the natural light through the day. The clinic medically incorporates modern science AND magical potions. Still, it isn't capable of insta-healing—only sped-up healing. This very clean building constantly smells like antiseptic. There's a counter, some seating (like you would see at a doctor's office), and some curtained areas in the back for patient treatment.

If your character is injured/dying/DEAD it is best to bring them here, assuming you don't have a healer friend. We can't speak for the characters who work at the clinic, but the clinic's employer stays hush-hush about who they treat, so they'll never out any suspicious injuries without your agreement.

Characters can also come int to receive educational instruction on health/medical topics. It's always stocked with many helpful health-centric things—bandages, condoms, medicine, health potions, etc. Ask and you shall most likely receive.

Tasks: keeping the shelves organized, sterilizing utensils, going out and demonstrating first aid techniques, actually administering first aid to those who need it (or... don't?), teaching sex ed to the public, offering pamphlets and info with or without prompting, setting up a booth to offer a wide range of mental/physical advice, being ready for emergencies, etc...

Perks: you'll get to learn the basics of first aid among many other medical procedures, like stitching people up and cpr and the list just goes on. also free access to much of the medical equipment/goodies.

Edited 2015-08-16 19:23 (UTC)

LIBRARY

This is a surprisingly impressive building with colorful bunting that reads "♥ READ ♥" strung across the front. There are tall, fancy windows all across the front, allowing you to see all of the shelves inside, but the inside of the library isn't too bright because of this. Inside are many shelves full of books, some plush seating areas, and a couple tables to sit/work at. There's empty desks and chairs lining the back wall, indicating that there MIGHT have once been computers—but not anymore.

There's no information on the kingdom itself; nothing like maps, history books, information on any former flora/fauna, no nothing. But if you're just looking for an instructional book, some standard nonfiction, a fictional novel, or whatever else, you're in luck! Seriously, google some dime novels and random books and it's here.

You can check books out or read them here as you please. Be careful—if you check them out, anyone who works here will be able to hound you about it if they so choose.

Tasks: suggesting books to everyone, telling everyone to read, washing the books, making book castles to demonstrate the sturdiness of the books, cleaning up books that are lying around, dress like a book and quote Shakespeare in public, reading books in front of EVERONE (wow), cleaning the furniture in the library, driving around a book cart, giving people books, bugging people to return their books, etc...

Perks: well you have access to books, and lots of them. i. i. need to think of more.

Edited 2015-08-16 19:24 (UTC)

WEAPONS N' MORE

Its existence is notable by the hugeass sword-shaped sign hanging up and above, so it's never hard to find. It has huge windows on the front (some of which have fracture cracks...?) allowing you to see all the junk that's inside. The building itself is rather old, with wooden planks for walls and wooden planks for floors. It's very cramped once you're inside since there's so much stuff crammed in here—and it's not all weapons. This shop does focus on weapons, but you can find other things here, too, such as many kinds of tools, random non-technologically-advanced devices, knick-knacks, junk, and so on. If you can't find it anywhere else, chances are you can find it here, though most what you find is old and worn.

Additional note to those who would work here: the jobs here are focused moreso on odd jobs around town in a sort of handyperson-maintence-all around helper way. You are THE master of the most random odd jobs.

Tasks: gathering mounds of clay from Tier 3, giving people nails ("samples") sharpening blades, showing off weapons (yes in the streets), repairing weapons, fixing other things around town, looking around town for cool junk, asking people for their junk, cleaning streetlights, teaching people how to use weapons, cleaning out the public trash, offer people to hammer their things, offering to help anyone with anything, etc...

Perks: you occasionally get offered free goodies, even if you don't want them. "wow a box of nails? thanks..." but hey that also means swords and stuff from tiem to time!

Edited 2015-08-16 19:25 (UTC)

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