I'd like to start a discussion on how to make a 'Boiler Room' type game, where players are running the infamous Ponzi Scheme (or something similar) to make themselves rich at the expense of gullible investors.
The scheme is pretty simple. You offer high returns on money invested on a fake stock, but instead of paying Investors A, B, and C, with money from the stock, you actually just pay them with money from Investor D. This makes it attractive to new investors (who wouldn't like to see a 33% return on investment?), and you can then pay investor D back with money from these new people, or from investor A if he chooses to invest in you again. As long as people continue to invest, you have money to pay out, but in the end, the scheme always collapses under it's own weight (or is busted up by authorities), or the "investment firm" (you, the player) run away with the money.
The problem, is how do you make this into a game? Some ideas I have involve having players both run fraudulent companies, and invest in other players, but I don't know how to make that mechanic work. The other option is to have players get money randomly (roll dice) to represent investors as NPCs.
