I’ll stand by until the day I die that Shadowruns magic allows for some of the best punk aspects for Cyberpunk. Just like the Fantasy genre uses supernatural and extreme settings to explore things easier than real life, a magic system that’s foundationally opposed to the technological exploitation of Cyberpunk has amazing storytelling potential.

It’s mentioned in the substack article that for a single individual his calculations place the poverty line around 50k, while 140k is for a family.

As someone in the Eastern US (grain of salt there), this rarely occurs but if it does it is usually when a place serves a large group (justified as the extra difficulty for serving so many people at once). If I saw this applied in another situation I would 100% consider that a tip, give them nothing, and never eat there again. If it was applied when I went in a large group I’d say it can go both ways, but I’d definitely not go back there with lots of people again because it feels like its an attempt at fleecing the customer for more than the trouble is actually worth. Alternatively I might tip less, taking the 18% into account already as a tip. Overall, I’d say it’s bullshit and a good proportion of the people I know would agree.

Hope your trip goes well