Where you start
Every character leaves prison as a hobo: no money, no home, only a room at Lenny’s Motel. The motel is your base until the first plot. Lenny can hold your cash while you save, but he does not store items — stolen goods have nowhere to go until you rent land.
The intro quests lead you through Looty Bay and explain the core rules. Skipping them means learning the loot-loss rules on your own losses.
Transport: free until you own a house
With no active car, the nearest parking terminal gives you a rental for free; terminals are marked on the Looty Bay map. You cannot install upgrades on a rental. A car of your own needs a house of your own: the first purchasable cars, Fukurou Tensa (200 000 $) and Longhorn Van (180 000 $), each need 50 000 $ of research in Larry’s tree first.
For a courier the van is the better first buy: 6 cargo slots against 1 in the Tensa.
First money: five ways
| Path | What you do | Risk |
|---|---|---|
| Robberies | Mask on, a target in Looty Bay, a fence | High: death as a criminal costs the bag and the gear |
| Cargo | Carry and sell contraband to smuggler vans | Medium |
| Production | Plantation, lab and workbenches on your plot | Your base can be raided |
| Police | Arrests and confiscations with issued gear | Low: you risk nothing of your own |
| Clan and territory | Taxes from settlements and districts | Needs a clan and laundered money |
You can switch later; the first choice only decides where the early money comes from. For most players it is small robberies: they need nothing but a mask.
Your first robbery
- Walk the route as a civilian: the shop, the nearest fence, the exit bridge.
- Switch the alarm off at the fuse box outside, or hold the clerk at gunpoint — do not kill him.
- Take what is expensive and small. One bag, one shop.
- Drive out of the city: the criminal status ends in the exit zone on the bridge.
- Sell to a fence and take the cash from the counter straight away.
For scale: a Ruby in Case sells for 20,000 $ and a Gold Bar for 52,000 $ at the base price level — but both lie in the bank, which is not a first-day target. What lies in ordinary shops and what it costs is on the building pages.
Where the first haul is safe
| What you have | Where to keep it | What can take it |
|---|---|---|
| Cash | With Lenny until you can launder it | Players and police |
| Money on the account | Looty Bay Bank, withdraw at ATMs | Nothing until the wipe |
| Stolen items | Your base (the motel does not store them) | Confiscation on surrender or arrest |
| Equipped gear | On the character | Death as a criminal in the city, any death in the desert |
| The bag | Sell it before a trip to the desert | Death in the desert takes everything |
A bank account is opened only as a civilian at the Looty Bay Bank. Do it as soon as you have the first money: the account is also what you pay a bribe from.
The first plot
A plot is rented only in a settlement that already has an owner: find the rent sign and sign the contract. The first plot is paid in cash and comes with a trailer as a gift. The plot gives you a base, storage, a respawn point and access to production. Settlements and districts are on the world map: click a district, then a settlement twice to open its 31 plots.
The trader tier equals the level of the district where your plot stands: no plot — tier I, district 2 — tier II, district 3 — tier III. To move up you need a plot document of that level from Larry’s tree. When you rent a new plot, the whole base moves with you.
While you rent, you pay the settlement owner a percentage of every laundering and every purchase in the laptop. This is normal — it is how the owner earns.
Rules newcomers learn the hard way
- The mask stays on the record: once it is on, you are a criminal in Looty Bay until you leave the city.
- There is no law in the desert: anyone may attack, and death costs the whole inventory.
- Surrender beats a lost fight: the bag is taken, the gear stays.
- A criminal who logs out dies. Finish the run before you quit.
- The party limit is three players. A clan is a different thing: it is for territory.
- Seven days after the server opens the Federal Raid confiscates everything — spend accordingly.
Next: the solo plan for the first week, where to sell loot and what the weekly wipe takes.