A lot of D&D settings or campaigns I've played in have basically been anarcho-capitalist paradises...

A lot of D&D settings or campaigns I've played in have basically been anarcho-capitalist paradises. The PCs have not/do not pay taxes, there is no governing body regulating their sales or clientele, and are effectively given carte blanche to kill anyone/anything that attacks them first (violates the NAP) or is threatening to destroy the realm.

If this is the case, why not go all the way?

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youtube.com/watch?v=5DhWrS7WH74
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/pol/, pls go.

ftfy

There's nothing inherently /pol/ about anarcho-capitalism. It's been around since the 50s.

>If this is the case, why not go all the way?

What does that even mean.

I think he means why not have a setting where there's Ancapistan somewhere, a location with no government basically. Like Extropia in Eclipse Phase.

The 50s were inherently /pol/

>If this is the case, why not go all the way?

Because those settings and campaigns you played are generic, identikit stories based on airport fantasy novels. They only look like anarcho-captalistic paradises because your worldview conditioned you to see them that way.

I'd take an ancap paradise over more of the standard cyberpunk "corporations are EVIL!" stuff we constantly see everywhere else.

An interesting point. They usually are run down, poor shitholes dominated by roving bands of literal murdering monsters.

Every fantasy setting I can think of has roads. Checkmate OP.

>If this is the case, why not go all the way?
Because most of that stuff is only the case to make things easier on GMs, and the economics of the settings are generally poorly thought-out and don't make too much sense when you look at them in detail.
That said, you now made me want to run a game where tolls and taxes are a regular occurrence. It'd be a decent money-sink to stop players obtaining more money than they know what to do with.

Actually, in an ancap society, corporations would likely bankroll roads, since they're useful but they'd ALL have heavy tolls

Surely they'd be more likely to have their own private roads rather than bankrolling public ones?

Medieval tax collectors were bandits who bid against each other for the exclusive right to steal on behalf of the king. The contract would then go to the band who promised that they could bring in the most gold, and their payment consisted of any extra gold they managed to steal.

Chances are the average D&D player has killed hundreds of tax collectors.

In an actual ancap society there would be no such things as corporations since those are a construct of the state to legitimize tax-reduction schemes for the oligarchs

All businesses in a true ancap society would be sole proprietorships or partnerships

Gets be private but can be used publically for a fee

Because anarcho-capitalism is excellent to model settings where people kill each other for money, steal stuff, roam tombs, and generally act like murderhobo.

If you can't see why that's bad for real life, then you're a faggot.

Is there anyone who genuinely believes in ancap ideology? Most of the ancap memes I've seen are making fun of the concept, and I can't wrap my head around how anyone would think it was a good idea.

I mean, Anarchism as a whole fundamentally doesn't work. Humans organize themselves into structures of government by default.

As a libertarian, yes, there are a whole bunch of ancaps and they try very hard to either be accepted as libertarians because
>"we want pretty much the same thing, the night watchman state is a good stepping stone for us"
Or try to convince libertarians that they are ancaps in denial.

It's idiotic. We don't want the same thing and the last thing libertarians need when people say "but that will lead to anarchy and chaos" is people within our own group who yell "great, that's what we want!"

They would probably have better luck trying to cooperate with the anarchy-syndicalists. After all, don't they want pretty much the same thing? Both groups want to destroy the government and then replace it with new institutions which the syndicalists call communes and the capitalists call corporations.

If you mean the 1450s, sure.

Actual 50s? IDK, they get mixed reviews.

We aren't paleocons, we are their logical conclusion.

Aren't swords a violation of the NAP?

>Aren't swords a violation of the NAP?

I would love for you to explain this one.

The upper left picture also fits into the lower right part.

Randians exist. And are very influental.

AnCap stuff makes more sense in cyberpunk settings.

Why don't Libertarians/Ancaps move to Somalia?

It's almost like your DM doesn't give enough of a shit to do things like that.

Better version, midly censored for Veeky Forums

>In an actual ancap society there would be no such things as corporations since those are a construct of the state to legitimize tax-reduction schemes for the oligarchs

>this is what ancaps actually believe
holy shit dude

Most lands in fantasy settings are already semi-Ancap because there may be a king claiming the land but he has neither the manpower or the resources to enforce shit on the fringes unless it's a pressing matter. In the vacuum we get murder hobos.

Murderhobos are cancerous as fuck, why would we want more of them?

It's legal to pay taxes through services or produce. I'd consider wiping out droves of monsters or toppling terrorists to be considered a public service.

>Not having your PCs be hounded by tax collectors.

Avoiding them can be an adventure all in itself.

Has anyone run a game where the central government tried to tax PCs? How about an adventurer tax on the discovery of magic artifacts/treasure in dungeons existing on government-controlled land?

Nobody there cares about taking NAPs.

That commie is a cutie.

The settings are feudal and the characters are vagabonds.

I've had the following:
Toll people fucking with the PCs by giving them confusing directions and charging toll fees several times.

Taxmasters offering "I've paid my taxes for [this year]" slips in return for services and silence.

Local tax collectors who don't have a death wish, not bothering the PCs.

Merchants offering the PCs better prices for their loot if they smuggle it into/out of a city so nobody needs to pay taxes.

Authority figures "gently persuading" the PCs to sell their goods in the right city, so the city can tax the shit out of the merchant.

And a few more I can't remember.

This

Peasants are taxed for a portion of the crops they produce - the PCs are not farmers and therefore do not pay tax.

Re: sales and clientele: The services the PCs offer are generally kept discreet as they are essentially black market deals. Neither the PCs nor their clients want the government or anyone else to aware of them.

Re: carte blanche to kill: PCs usually kill outlaws, which anyone is free to do, or wild beasts that are not considered game by the lord who holds the hunting rights. Should the PCs engage in poaching, or murder citizens, then they are of course breaking the law and are eligible for punishment.

I can only imagine it would end in slaughter if a GM actually introduced the realistic tolls anybody transporting goods would have to pay.

Which if the GM is doing his job and doesn't let them get away with murdering guards in front of dozens of witnesses will immediately derail the campaign.

i'm conflicted.

That's gay, user

I once ran a game that was basically seven samurais, except instead of bandits, it was tax collectors.
And some PCs were from the village it was set in, so basically, yes.

There mare be more or less laws, but the problem was law enforcement.

They could build a community on stilts in Saudi Arabia as Saudi law only is applicable a couple of hundreds of meters into the air.

I don't understand how anarcho-capitalism could ever result in anything other than corporate entities monopolizing everything, including force and then forming their own power structures and governments.

Am I missing something?

youtube.com/watch?v=5DhWrS7WH74

>anarcho-capitalism resembles feudalism

makes ya think

No, you've got it user. You just haven't drunk the kool-aid the ancaps seem to be sharing with commies

>hurr if humans were perfect this would work! It's totally a rational system

A lot of ancaps think monopolies are unnatural and wouldn't be that prevalent in a stateless society.
In a way they're right. I mean yes, many industries heavily favor the incumbent making entry hard, but the idea being pushed that you need big brother to protect you from the sociopath CEOs is an excuse to expand government power.
When it comes to force it's hard for security companies to justify punishing others for being security companies I guess.

The origin of the nation state is land, you gotta protect your clay, it's valuable. If you think swollen megacorps are going to go the same route as developing countries, do you really think they'll take the same path there? What use is there is binding people to you that feel no loyalty towards you?

Because they'd be dependent on the corporations for any semblance of a standard of living. Humans will naturally group together, they will naturally seek safety, and when a corporation is saying "Hey, come live in Corp City, we have running water and electricity and doctors and a militia to fight off the bears." what humans wouldn't go live there?

That's because anarcho-capitalism is a system that appeals to people who don't understand natural human tendencies. They're so ignorant about human history that they think government wasn't something that organically developed. As far as I can tell, they think that the human tendency to band together and form a hierarchy will somehow...go away if we dissolve the government. They're kind of dim like that.

>The origin of the nation state is land, you gotta protect your clay, it's valuable.

Meh, the origin of the medieval state were interdependantly guaranteed rights between quasi-state actors. Many of those dealt with land control simply because you need a lot of it to convert sunlight and water into enough of the actually useful shit you require for survival.

Nowadays multiple nations survive in being clearing-houses for virtual money.

It's the result of the proto-socialist and humanitarian heresies that lay at the core of the idea of the US being massaged by anti-socialist and racist propaganda for a couple of centuries.

The origins are even more obvious in the Sovereign citizen movement.

Okay, now assume it's easy to start your own corp city. That's the ancap mindset.
The water purification guys and the electrical companies are perfectly willing to provide their services to the rivals of their main customer and the founders have a set of marketable skills or resources to secure an equilibrium of import and export.
What's the benefit in trying to squash this start-up city? I guess they could try to buy it, but if the new city isn't a corporation they can just say 'no', we're independent. And even if they can buy them, why? It's not in a corps best interest to continuously expand, that only happens under narcissistic CEOs that want to have that notch on their belt.

>but the idea being pushed that you need big brother to protect you from the sociopath CEOs is an excuse to expand government power.
I think the plethora of competition law cases proves you wrong. Nature hates a vacuum and a dominant force will arise, so we might as well make sure said dominant force favors competition and low barriers to market entry.

Also
>sociopath CEOs
I'd call this a strawman if you weren't absolutely right
telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/13/1-in-5-ceos-are-psychopaths-australian-study-finds/

It's naive to assume corporations would stay as they are instead of becoming pseudo-governments who have their own energy and agriculture and defense etc divisions.

What's stopping a megacorps from hiring mercs and declaring himself prince of the town or emperor?

God, I had actually forgotten that sovereign citizens were a thing. They may be the only people dumber than an anarcho-capitalist. At least the AnCaps realize the current system has to go before they can do whatever stupid shit they want with impunity.

You know, apple and android compete on the smartphone market and at the same time apple is androids greatest customer when it comes to microchips.
Often vertically integrated suppliers continue to lend services to other companies in order to keep the bottom line optimized.
If corp city doesn't have any ideological justification to rail against start-ups stealing customers and potential employees, why not co-operate to create optimal benefit for their shareholders? That's what companies care about.

The issue is not the anarcho in anarcho-capitalism. The issue is the capitalism.

If you don't regulate the natural urges for capitalist to amass capital, power, and then use it to amass even more capital and power, then you have a society where there is two classes:

- The slaves.
- The owners.

That is the natural result of any anarcho-capitalist society. Slaves and owners. A very slight middle class of people too important to be slave but not wealthy enough to be owners, but 95% of everyone either in one category or the other. Far more slaves than owners, of course.

Full anarchism can work, with enough determination, and in controlled environment. Full capitalism can't produce a healthy society.

self-interest

>full anarchism can work in a controlled environment
you're trying to get (you)s aren't you? I can't tell because there are real people talking about #laststagecapitalism all the time.

Please.

The goal to any corp is to gain monopoly of a market, to gain more money. That's how any corp works, in the mind of any reasonable individual.

That's how real world works. Startup are bought everyday by big companies, not because they are good or valuable, but because the big companies don't want concurrence.

Again, capitalism. Amassing capital to amass more capital.

Any anarcho-capitalist society will stabilize with 5 or 6 competing megacorps who control absolutely everything. That's the easiest way to amass capital, being everywhere at once.

That's not what corporations would do. They'd just increase in size and scope until they became the de-facto government of wherever they are based.

In out of the way places and small settlements, that's where you'd get warlords declaring themself king.

>that's where you'd get warlords declaring themself king.
Well, they will until the Exonmobil-Walmart alliance sends in its private army (sponsored by general dynamics) takes control of the town and imposes its specific set of laws, taxes and business guidelines.

Anarchy works in Valve, by example.

When the individuals are intelligent enough, and driven enough, in a controlled environment.

Capitalism don't. Pure capitalism is a nightmare, where you will be probably a slave working for minimum wage for some distant overlords.

Not a very far cry from the actual U.S (the nation of 'capitalism will solve all your problem'), mind you. But even worst.

i had this setting i played around with that could basically be summed up as "corporations = feudal states".

>weapons technology, medicine and transporation have advanced
>but at the same time infrastructure, civility and environmental health have regressed
>the USA landscape has been reduced to a vast wilderness, sparsely populated by unlawful tribes, militias and outlaws
>but at the same time, there are corporation owned cities that are very tightly guarded and highly advanced, at least if you're privileged enough to live in one as a free man
>most of the population is bound to serfdom for their local corporation, basically working for them as slaves
>the sewers have mutant alligators so if the PCs go there, they'll get chomped up

it was a good setting

Anarchy CANNOT WORK. Sorry, but the fatal flaw for anarchy has always been its inability to keep other people from forming governments. It is human nature to band together and form a hierarchy to enforce social order. Name one, just ONE society that didn't have SOME form of hierarchy inherent to it. Do you know why that is? It's because humans naturally seek to bring order to chaos, and the easiest way to find order is to have one person that's designated to call the shots.

Oh, you have to be kidding me. With all the shit that's on Steam, you want to tell me an uncontrolled environment is in our best interests? How many Greenlight projects turn out to be scams, just because Valve can't be assed to perform basic quality control.

Fuck me, took the bait

I have no response for this other than just saying it's not true.
Corps buy start-ups for their talent.
Plenty of industries have a constant entry of new players, making destroying the compeition a ridicilous game of whack-a-mole (and the premise is that ALL industries will work like that)
Capital is a means on end. Value is created using a combination of labour and capital (the more technology progresses the more important capital becomes compared to labour, which will eventually lead to a patrimonial-based society, this is not a consequence of capitalism but of the concept of ownership and personal agency itself, but I digress), businesses care about creating value for their stakeholders but growing too big creates infrstructural bloat and is bad for the stakeholders, stakeholders in a corporation are the stockholders and don't care about longterm risk, only the value increase over next quarter. A lot of ancaps will probably try to tell you how in a true ancap society there will be no corporations only family businesses and partnerships.

Anarchy works for Valve. Anarchy works for NASA. Anarchy worked for the Commune. Anarchy works in controlled environment, and for small test run.

I'm not arguing that it works perfectly, or it is the solution, or that it will solve any issue. Just that it can work sometimes, and pure capitalism simply can't. In 'Anarcho-capitalism', the weak link is capitalism, not anarchism.

>Anarchy works
>cites steam as an example
>unironically thinking that steam opening the floodgates was a positive thing

What

>Pure capitalism is a nightmare, where you will be probably a slave working for minimum wage for some distant overlords.

In a purely capitalist enviroment, the people who can buy work would have to conspire to keep wages down though. The situation we saw during the 19th century was the result of a particular legal regime rather than straigth up the result of market forces.

well...that's a thing...

>C-Capitalism is weak, n-not anarchy, that's why capitalism hasn't catapulted society into technological advancement quicker than any other point in history

Here's the last (You) from me

Business analists are always advicing against the drive to mindlessly expand. They don't do this (just) because of antitrust laws. They do this because it's a bad idea.

A company is just a bunch of people trying to produce something you know. Imagine you're an adventuring party that ended the campaign by conquering your own small kingdom. Is it in your best interest to agressively expand the borders, because more farmers=more resources=bigger army=more expanding?
No, that's not creating optimal value. Empires are hard.

>Valve
>has total control of who can and who can't use their delivery platform
>Takes a huge cut of all profits from sales via that platform

When you start to apply this to things like building roads and providing a secure, accessible environment for commerce that cut of the profit starts to be called "tax" and the company that is providing those things starts to be called "government"

There is a tower restaurant in Saudi Arabia that can serve acohol because the law of the land has an upwards ceiling.

So a libertards city on stilts in Saudi Arabia would be an option and more feasible than the Sealands they're proposing. It'd put them under free US-protection and within easy reach of slaves as well.

>A lot of ancaps will probably try to tell you how in a true ancap society there will be no corporations only family businesses and partnerships.

That's incredibly, refreshingly naive. Do you live in our world?

Why would people stop?

You have your business. It makes money. Why would you stop growing? Why would you stop making more money? 'Grow big or go home', would you grow big, or go home?

Why would the psychopath next door stops himself from buying your enterprise to make more money? Why would he stops from buying another, and another, to have market monopoly? And decide the prices? And be the king of the town?

Why would Walmart, or Apple, stop trying to make even more money when suddenly they could buy whole town out of the blue? Why would they not buy armies to make even more money by controlling the lives of people? Why would they not simply decide to 'pay' their employees with foods and clothings, because they can?

If there is no laws, then the society will not stabilize with 'a lot of small companies everywhere'. The society will eventually stabilize with '3 companies that controls the entire lives of a third of America'. Not really text book anarchism, hum?

First, Valve is a company, so it would be ridiculous to assign a system of government to a corporation. Secondly, NASA is a government bureau, so it would be ridiculous to assign a system of government to it. Thirdly, the Commune was a miserable, tyrannical failure that ended for a reason. Fourth, one can be capitalist while also being a republic, whereas an anarchist society is not capable of representative government. Sorry, anarchism still loses.

How do you explain imperialism?

Well now I want to play a game set in a light-hearted ancap setting and start my own city.

Not him but:
Yes and? That does not imply it's the ultimate thing.
Considering the massive inequalities and instabilities it produces, it pretty sure is not.

That only works if there is more work than workers. In short there has to be no automatization.
As we see in reality the market fucks wages downwards otherwise.

Vanity.
Also, they're all collapsed now.

So, what this thread has taught me is that Anarchists want the world to be DnD and think dismantling government would do that.

No state to keep them save.

Yeah, automatization decreases the value of your labour.
How about you do something about it?
If we try to consequently overvalue humans without giving them incentive to improve we're turning the value of human life itself into a bubble.
Bubbles pop.
Let's not do that. Socialism kills kiddos.

>Implying bubbles are bad.

You just don't earn enough.

And before you decide this is all Gedankenexperiment, this is basically what happened at the end of the Wild West era. Europe was thoroughly disgusted by how companies monopolized markets and owned entire towns, deciding prices, making the laws, and basically being a state within the state.

It depends on what you call successful, of course.

A society of slaves and owners is certainly efficient. Very efficient. We have nothing better than capitalism for sheer raw efficiency.

I wouldn't call it a successful society, but if you can bear to be a slave in it, then I guess it's a society that has successes, at least.

Strangely, a lot of people will prefer to live shitty lives and toil everyday as slave in everything but name in a society with success. Stockholm Syndrome, probably. When you live a sad life, at least you can console yourself thinking the CEO has a plane.

What I saw in this thread was people asking questions about ancap and then other people who don't like ancap answering them, telling them what they believe ancap is.

>implying the world would be any more equal under any other form of economics

w e w l a d

The US is still around. They are failing as we speak, but still.

After them I think China will try to play Empire.

Or maybe they fuck each other up in martial masturbation.

All in all: Imperialism is not dead at all, empires just rule via puppet states now instead of declaring everything their territory.

People don't mind working because the benefits they get from working satisfy their most base desires, safety, community, and stability.

I'm very curious as to what ancap actually is. Why don't you weigh in? Let's get an informed opinion.

Since forever, my dude.

Did someone say ancap? See the goblins in warcraft.

>implying we get anywere if we stop thinking about options
>but muh holy market, my devine lord and saviour
user, once people from cenuries past are more forward thinking than you are, you have problem.