Mage about town...

OK, so your wizard/cleric/druid/bard's last adventure ended a month ago and no new adventure has presented itself. A day end with a trip to the tavern stops being about listening for rumors of adventure and more about a game of darts, a good drink, and arguing about the local sports teams.

What does your full spellcaster do with his time? What spells does he have prepared every day? Does he have a job?

For example, I have an 11th level (deep) gnome enchanter. He is preparing to buy a tavern out of which he'll also run a small for profit spellcasting business. Move Earth to prepare fields (with Unseen Servants to seed them and start the watering). Permanent Major Images cast in your home to provide classy embellishments (or just some inspirational imagery for the bedroom). Need a new bridge, stable or statue? 10 minute fabrication while you wait.

And then in the evening he'll be enjoying his own tavern … quietly using his charms, his hypnotic gaze and his illusions to keep life fun.

What about your PCs? What do they (or would they do) with some prolonged down time...

jgsugden said:

OK, so your wizard/cleric/druid/bard's last adventure ended a month ago and no new adventure has presented itself. A day end with a trip to the tavern stops being about listening for rumors of adventure and more about a game of darts, a good drink, and arguing about the local sports teams.

What does your full spellcaster do with his time? What spells does he have prepared every day? Does he have a job?

For example, I have an 11th level (deep) gnome enchanter. He is preparing to buy a tavern out of which he'll also run a small for profit spellcasting business. Move Earth to prepare fields (with Unseen Servants to seed them and start the watering). Permanent Major Images cast in your home to provide classy embellishments (or just some inspirational imagery for the bedroom). Need a new bridge, stable or statue? 10 minute fabrication while you wait.

And then in the evening he'll be enjoying his own tavern … quietly using his charms, his hypnotic gaze and his illusions to keep life fun.

What about your PCs? What do they (or would they do) with some prolonged down time...

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It likely varies greatly between classes and subclasses.

gyor said:

It likely varies greatly between classes and subclasses.

Click to expand...

… which is why I am asking what your PCs would be doing? Also, two PCs with the exact same build might have very different 'private lives' in town.

I'm curious about how people envision their PCs in the less dynamic parts of their lives. A few years back I had the PCs in one of my games experience a decade of peace. There were no significant adventures to be had. No wars to be fought. No major criminal enterprises in their area. I asked the players to tell me what their PCs would do, starting off by asking about the first day, then the first week, then the first year then all 10 years. It was a memorable session, despite the lack of combat, and introduced a huge number of hooks for me to use, as a DM, to move the story forward. Two PCs settled down and had kids. Another started a business that resulted in a lot of travel. Another just left the plane to study magic abroad.

I'm curious what others might do with their down time to see what hooks might jump to mind out of it.

Several of my characters:

14th lv 1e fighter (human, male, Roman citizen).
I played this guy for a good # of years in a fantasy Roman Empire campaign. The game opened with him & the other PCs as members of one of the Legions & about to muster out - as soon as this one last campaign against the (??? I'd have to check my notes) wrapped up.
Just for the heck of it, when selecting weapon/non-weapon proficiencies, I asked the DM if I could be proficient in Roman Siege Weapons. He said "Sure, why not." He let me be proficient with all of them for 1 weapon slot - with the understanding that this slot would be almost wasted as siege weapons never/rarely factored into his adventures & I certainly wouldn't be able to buy/lug one about. But he'd never had anyone ask about this before, & he knew it'd never break anything, so sure.
For my non-weapon prof? I took engineering.
So my fighter was a Roman siege engineer (offense & defense) attached to an infantry group as the game opened.

After the first several sessions/adventures, he does indeed muster out of the Legion. He returns to Rome & sets about making a life for himself as a civil engineer.
When not adventuring he spends his time/makes his living planning & overseeing the construction of roads, designing aqueducts, sewers, etc. Sometimes this work takes him further afield than when he was in the Legion.
Now in his true downtime - as in-between jobs & not adventuring - he returns to his small estate just north of Rome and enjoys simply sitting by the pool. Maybe getting together with some old friends & seeing what the newest attraction at the colosseum is.

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My PF Bard/Wizard (12th lv human, male).
When he's not adventuring he spends much of his time helping raise his twin toddlers. Somewhere in there he also finds time to manage a small, but very lucrative, horse trading enterprise.

---

1/2ling barbarian (8th lv, female, 5e)
Thanks to how & why she's an adventurer, she doesn't really have any downtime. Although her 1st adventure was technically attending a Satyr party, her life of adventure truly began when she was abducted by them & managed to escape by open a Cubic Gate/Amulet of the Planes one of the rescuing PCs tossed to her. Since then it's been about 8 months of fleeing through hostile jungles*, being attacked by pirates, being captured & enslaved by orcs*, and now trekking through the Desert of Desolation modules with a bunch of elven criminals/exiles*.
(* = times she's managed to open a gate.)
If she could be said to have any DT? It'd be several months of slave work & abuse in an orc tribe, a lot of hot sweaty trekking through a desert, bouts of sulking & feeling sorry for herself, and constantly fiddling with the Cube/amulet thing trying to get it to take her back home.
And she's realizing that she's pregnant with a 1/2orc baby....
Assuming she doesn't get killed, her story ends in downtime.
A) She makes it home. She'll help her father run the family tavern, raise a little 1/2orc-1/2halfling, & never ever, never, go adventuring again.
B) She won't get home but will eventually have to stop somewhere because of the baby. Fortunately she has a decent amount of loot from helping the elves raid a theft-proof pyramid at the behest of a ghostly pharoh....

----

Fighter/Assassin Deep Gnome (1e, male)
When not adventuring <Bob> is a miner of gems & a LRRP (Long Range Recon Patrol)vs underdark threats to his clan. In fact it took him 100s of years to acquire the skills/class lvs he had when he joined a party of idiot surface dwellers who were seeking the Glass Pool & needed help getting to (and into/through) the Koa-Toan city that guarded its entrance. (we were playing Night Below)
For a fat share of the loot he decided to help the idiots. He was also tasked by the clan elders with keeping an eye on them.
After a near TPK & getting critically injured, <Bob> took as much of the loot as he could lay hands on (hey, those dead morons wouldn't miss it), bailed on the survivors, returned home to his clan very rich, & has resumed gem mining (though now it's more a hobby) & long range guard duties.
The Koa-Toa city was wrecked, the flow of surface born slaves stopped, & he never saw any of the surviving PCs again. But, since nothing awful seems to have happened, he suspects the survivors managed to accomplish their quest....

Run a magical hair salon: http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?526341-So-my-campaign-is-being-derailed-by-HAIR

Hiya!

Hello there! My name is Mr. WetBlanket! I'll be your destroyer of fun tonight!


Curious...has your DM though to the ramifications of 'letting' you do this? Have YOU thought of the ramifications?

Opening your own tavern...go for it! Sounds like fun. Hell, it's pretty standard fare for PC's of your level; I can't count the number of "Inns/Taverns" that my players PC's have opened over the decades of play.

But...

Spellcasting "for a small fee"? Lets examine this a bit.

Move Earth to prepare fields
"Sorry, Bill, I don't need your labourers. Oh, Fred? Yeah, don't need your oxen...or the tiller. This guy does it all in one day for a fraction of the price!"

(with Unseen Servants to seed them and start the watering).

"Oh, and while I have you here, Bill, you can cancel the order for the labourers for seeding and watering as well. Sorry"

Permanent Major Images cast in your home to provide classy embellishments (or just some inspirational imagery for the bedroom).
"Hey, Gaston? About that whole 'water nymph' statue I wanted? Uh, yeah...sorry. I'm gonna have to cancel and ask for my money back on that. Found someone to do it exactly as I need, almost instantaneously using an illusion. While I'm here, can you let Frieda, Susan, Bellamon and Hank I don't need those tapistries, stained glass, or portraits either? I'll pick up my coin later. Terribly sorry!"

Need a new bridge, stable or statue? 10 minute fabrication while you wait.
"Ok, ok, ok....settle down everyone! I know this town meeting is a bit sudden, and none of you are happy about it, but the truth is that we just don't need any carpenters, blacksmiths, coopers, stonemasons, engineers, cooks, farmers, ostlers, water bearers, general labourers, or artists. This gnome guy can do it in 10 minutes with magic. It's simply a matter of cost. You know...budget and all that".



So, if I was DM...your gnome enchanter would have a very short lived "business", or at the very least the character would be public enemy number one as far as all the out of work citizens are concerned. E.g., "Oh, geeze, sorry there Mr. Gnome Enchanter. Turns out all the ostlers and labourers sent to pick up your order last week all came down with a case of the sniffles and couldn't do it. Maybe you can use your 'magic' to just 'magic' all your food and ale?" ... "What's that? Why did the price of chickens just increase to 10gp each? Well, hard times and all that...seems a couple farmers in these parts fell on rough times after not being able to rent their equipment or get jobs sowing seeds and whatnot. Rough times...rough times. You understand, being a business owner n' such".

In short...magic is very useful. But the vast majority of people in a 'standard' D&D world do not know how to use it. Need to build a road? You hire labourers, stonemasons, cooks, engineers, etc. You don't just "cast a spell or two and POOF!...a fully cobbled road appears". And anyone who was capable of doing such a thing would NOT be a very popular guy to the "working class folk" (re: just about everyone).

^_^

Paul L. Ming (aka, "Killer Wetblanket DM")

Salazzar, my 17th level Undying Pact warlock 3rd tier Harper, uses his unique abilities to walk among the undead to study them in their natural habitats. Track their movements, learn what he can about their strengths and weaknesses and even speak to more intelligent ones. He then passes the information on so that those who oppose the undead can muster up a force to destroy them. I envision him as the most knowledgeable person of the undead in the country, and his collection of information is invaluable. Also, he recently was changed into Yaun-ti pureblood while adventuring in Chult. He will use his new found powers to also spy on the snake people. He has nothing but time since he no longer require sleep and age far slower than any normal human. He also owns a tavern in Sagwick, which serves as a base of operations when he is on the Sword Coast.

Your character background should probably be a major focus of your character's activities away from adventuring. Most people have jobs, or at least work they can do to get by.

My current PC is a mercenary "transport mage" who uses Tenser's Floating Disk to help transport goods across the harsh jungle environment (horses and other pack animals aren't used due to the dinosaurs and other monsters that would prey upon them). When not adventuring, I'm usually chatting up the merchants' guild members to look for work, doing said work (if I have a week or two off adventuring), or crafting alchemical items.

My previous PC was a noble knight of a fallen realm. He would spend his downtime meeting with other nobles in exile, or schmoozing with the rich merchants of our new homeland (the noble lifestyle is pretty expensive). Never got to do much along this line though, as I died 3 sessions into the campaign.

In the last campaign, I had a soothsayer shaman whose free time was mostly taken up by serving as priest and seer to the common folk. My only true pleasure was attempting to forge a romantic relationship with another PC (stuck in the friend zone).

What does your full spellcaster do with his time? What spells does he have prepared every day? Does he have a job?

Click to expand...

Depends on the PC.

Brother Sycamore- a very plantlike Geomancer- would be interested in the local flora, but would also spend time healing the masses in order to gain followers.

Adragon von Basten would be researching all things lighting and blue dragon related, time permitting. Much of the time, he’d be trying to figure out how to avoid pursuit by the family of the young nobleman he killed...who killed his betrothed.

Harlequin would be interested learning about puzzles and riddles from around the world, as well as playing “The Dozens” and other insult games with master japesters, all in an effort to improve her intellect and sharpen her wits. For small coins & giggles, she entertains the kiddies with minor magics and storytelling.

Varis, my 11th level wood elf druid, loves to spend his free time in animal form hunting when not needed by the Emerald Enclave. When he returns back to his community, he helps any way he can. Usually casting plant growth (the long version) on crops of farmers who can afford it so they can yield a much larger bounty for their food. He will also spend time protecting sites that has a high interest for the druids of that area, by awakening trees and animals. Whenever it is possible, he wiil hunt and destroy undead, and any other abomination that enters his woods.