Negotiation and trading
Negotiation missions, and trading as a merchant, are two very different activites that nonethless follow the same rules.
Negotiation begins when the character selects a tactic from the drop-down menu that appears when the cursor is over a negotiation target. Do not click on the target themself; this will result in you attacking them.
Each round the player should pick one of the five tactics. The character's relevant ability (Charisma for Attack, Defend and Compromise, Intelligence for Evade and Collaborate) is rolled against the relevant ability for the target's chosen tactic. The winner will then move the negotiation in their favour.
The amount by which the negotiation is moved depends on the relative tactics chosen. Their relative effectiveness is
as illustrated below:
Thus, for example, Evade will produce a very good result where the opponent selects Attack, a fairly good result against Compromise, a poor result against Collaborate and will not produce any effect against Defend.
The position of the negotiation will shift in favour of the winner according to the success of their tactic and their competency in the chosen tactic.
Trust is another factor involved in a negotiation. A character playing the strongest tactic against their opponent runs the risk of reducing trust in the relationship. By contrast, choosing the weakest tactic can increase trust as the opponent feels that the negotiation is not entirely one-sided. If trust reaches zero, the negotiations will break down. Thus it may not always be in the player's best interests to choose the strongest tactic.
At each turn, the character's Perception competes with the target's Obfuscation score. Success by the character will reveal information about the level of trust in the negotiation, and the target's tactics. Similarly, the opponent compares their Perception to the character's Obfuscation to adapt to the player's tactics.
Negotiation in persuasion/negotiation missions
In negotiation and persuasion missions, the player must negotiate to shift the negotiation to a certain target point. This target represents success for the negotiation and the mission. The negotiation will fail if either the position or trust reaches zero.
Trading: brokerage and freelance
Forming contracts, whether for a mission or when a player merchant is trading for goods from a wholesaler, works rather differently. The negotiation position is a sum of cash. The negotiation may be ended at any time by the player, at the current position. The negotiation will also end automatically if it reaches the upper or lower limits that the target is willing to sell for. In these cases, the negotiation will be successful (or goods be obtained by the player) if the player can pay the final sum; otherwise the negotiation will fail. It will also fail if trust reaches zero.
Note that brokerage missions are not paid after the fact; any remuneration comes from the margin between the funds given to fulfil the mission and the final trading position.