Work and earning
Courier, coachman and watchman
The trades that ride and walk: the courier carries parcels, the coachman drives travellers and the night watchman walks the town's round - each paid by the task.
Courier
At a town hall, ask the clerk for a parcel (or /parcel): the courier's board opens with four parcels to choose from - a short plain one, two with a trait and a round of three doors. Each card shows the door, its town, the distance and the minutes it takes, the pay and the tip. Click one (or press 1 to 4) and its door shows on your compass; ride there, and the parcel is delivered and paid as soon as you stand outside the door. Each offer heads to its own side of the compass, never two to the same door, and New offers come whenever you ask. Where to? picks a town: two parcels for it join the four, and pay the same as the others. A quick delivery earns a tip; a late one still pays in full. A parcel you do not want can be handed back, three times an hour at most (a reply, and a round already begun, are handed back freely); after a delivery your compass points to the nearest town hall. A courier also finds the board on the Work tab of My town (the clerk's window): Take a parcel to deliver opens the hall's board, and while you carry one, My parcel shows it.
| Trait | What it asks | What it gives |
|---|---|---|
| Plain | Nothing but the ride. | The best way to learn the roads. |
| Urgent | Less time for the tip (80% of the usual). | A tip 40% bigger. Too slow, you keep the usual tip in the usual time - never less than a plain parcel. |
| Fragile | Care: each blow you take, a fall from your horse and a death knock it - never below 70%. | 8% more at 100%, paid by its condition. |
| Sealed letter | Nothing more. | 30% of the time the recipient hands you a reply to carry back to the clerk: a second paid ride, which you may hand back freely. |
| Precious | From courier level 3. Lost if you die on the way - nothing is owed for it. | 12% more. |
| Round | Three doors, one after the other. | Each door paid when you reach it, and no ride back to a town hall between them. |
Every card pays about the same for the time it takes: choose what you like. Two things reward a change: three different kinds in a row (plain, urgent, fragile, sealed, precious, round) pay 10% more on the next parcel (the board counts them for you), and the realm's parcel of the day - urgent, fragile, round or sealed, turning at 06:00 UTC - pays 10% more, marked on its card. The Tour of Bohemia rewards your first parcel taken at each town hall with a little experience and coin; the board shows how many you have seen.
While you carry a parcel, a small card at the side of the screen shows the door, how far it is, the time left for the tip and a fragile parcel's condition, and the parcel is in your pack (B, its papers). /parcel anywhere shows your parcel with Show the way and Hand it back. A parcel waits for you 15 minutes if you leave or crash, and outlives a server restart.
Coachman
With a horse or a cart of your own, go on duty (F2 > Work > The coach service, or /coachduty). A traveller waits for you at an inn, a stable, a market or a town hall, bound for another town; your compass shows where. Ride up on your horse or drive up in your cart and they climb aboard, then your compass shows where to set them down. There you are paid by the distance: about 6 groschen plus 18 for each kilometre, half as much again in a cart, a fifth more for a brisk ride, and more as your trade rises. Then the next traveller appears. /dropfare lets a waiting traveller go.
Players can call a coach too, with /callcoach where to or F2 > Work > The coach service. Every coachman on duty hears the call: take it (/acceptcall id), drive the player, and ask your fare (/fare player price, up to 100). The fare is the player's coin, handed to you; the trade adds its own pay and XP only when the ride really went somewhere - at least 250 m and a minute and a half from where you took them up (their call, or their last fare).
Night watchman
Between dusk and dawn (20:00 to 06:00 game time), start the night round from F2 > Work or the action wheel's Night round slice, anywhere in a town or by its town hall (/patrol still works). There is no fixed route: six posts, each one shown when you reach the last, among the town's posts, public places and house doors 25 to 80 m from the last (when none is free that near, a little further, never the long walks across town) - never inside a keep, on an upper floor or on a table, and a house's door is tried from the street. The watch walks: the key to walk is shown for the whole round, and running or riding is a warning - the third puts your lantern out, and the round is lost. (On the Adventure server the round is on foot but running is free; riding is still warned.) The round only starts at night, but one under way at dawn is walked to its end. At a post, hold the use key to raise your lantern for a few seconds and the hour is cried to the street.
On the way, something may need you (optional, marked on your compass, four minutes): a door to try - a house really left unlocked counts double, and its owner is told -, a drunkard asleep in the street to wake and send home, or a noise in a lane. Each post is paid as you walk it, by the length of its leg, with a bonus at the end of the round and 1 for each matter seen to. The Work window's night watch card and the trade's page at the town hall say about how much an hour the round pays at your level (some 500 groschen an hour at level 8). A round outlives a server reload: take your character up within 15 minutes and the posts walked, the pay and the warnings are kept. The Work window shows the post, the matter at hand, your warnings and Show the way; on the round the wheel offers Show the way and End the round.