Yeah. I ran into this with the version of 03-12 that went to Origins. Just to cover our bases in the future, there needs to be a blanket rule that says soething like "Unless stated otherwise, 5 is the max cap on Negotiation Successes" or some such
That, and the Johnsons all need much better negotiation scores
Instead of just a flat 5 net success max, I'd like to suggest something a little more enticing. Before just "complaining" about the money / adventure I was doing some research into other published runs (on the run, Dawn of the Artifacts, Denver Missions, etc.) and really liked the mechanic of "For every net hit you can do one of the following:
1) Raise the pay by X (be it a percentage or a flat increment.
2) Increase the up front portion of the pay to cover expenditures
3) Have the Johnson provide something needed (asked to blow up a building, johnson provides some explosives)
4) Johnson provides information they might otherwise be reluctant to give up initially (A helpful contact info, pictures / video footage, whatever.)
#'s 1 and 2 should probably always be an option. 3 and 4 are more situational based on who the Johnson is, how much they know, and what they are capable of.
The Denver mission where negotiation hits let you get access to gear over availability 12 per hit is a pretty nice perk and would like seeing more things like that.