D&D 5E Teleportation circles costs *how* much?!

[Jester David]

50gp only buys 500lbs of wheat if wheat is available. Same goes for sheep and cows. If you can open the portal and bring 2500lbs of wheat through (ie - a draft horse pulling a cart), then sell it for twice the listed rate (ie - in the middle of a desert), then you've just made 200gp. We'll call it 150gp on the assumption that you need to get back again.

And why would you bring through a single cart? 6 seconds and a 10 foot radius should be able to get you multiple cartloads. And you should be able to haul something worthwhile back again - even if it's just sand.

Those ships you chartered cost 10,000-30,000gp each. Why would you ever build them when you can throw down 18,000 and get instant completely secure travel?

Three carts is probably all you could manage (one to the left, one to the right, and one straight ahead) for 550gp including a return trip. On your forth trip your break even.
Assuming there are enough people in the desert to need 7500 lbs of wheat.

As for ships, well the 18k figure was the minimum assuming the wizard was working for free. Assuming they were doing so for money could easily double the cost. Buying that 30k galley could be 6000gp cheaper and it can carry 150 tones per trip. Also known as 30,000gp of wheat paying for itself in a single trip.

 

[Halivar]

Unless all wizards are adventurers

Then let us say all the richest people in D&D world should be adventuring wizards. They can and do obtain more money as part of an adventuring group than some kingdoms. If anyone is doing the bankrolling, it's them.

 

[Dausuul]

Teleportation circles are certainly too expensive to be commonplace, and I'm quite sure that's by design. However, an empire that could afford them would absolutely make the investment.

Consider how powerful a mid-level adventurer is in D&D. Get a few of those together and you have a potent military asset. The ability to move such assets across the world in the blink of an eye would be of immense strategic value; likewise the ability to transport rulers and generals to where they needed to be. Fifty gold pieces a pop is nothing.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

The pricing seems pretty fair to me. It's cheaper than building a noble's estate, and in my world noble's estates are significantly more common than teleportation circles.

To really see how a cost fits into the world, the best place to compare it is real estate prices.

I do run a sparse magic game, so teleportation circles are extremely rare.

 

[BoldItalic]

Suppose the material cost was zero, but it still took a wizard a year to create a permanent circle. How would it change the world?

 

[Shasarak]

Then let us say all the richest people in D&D world should be adventuring wizards. They can and do obtain more money as part of an adventuring group than some kingdoms. If anyone is doing the bankrolling, it's them.

If they have invented compound interest in the DnD world then the richest people will be either Elven Wizards or Undead Wizards =;o)

 

[Halivar]

If they have invented compound interest in the DnD world then the richest people will be either Elven Wizards or Undead Wizards =;o)

It depends on whether undead are considered "alive" for the purposes of estate law. After all, there's still a "death tax."

 

[The Crimson Binome]

The pricing seems pretty fair to me. It's cheaper than building a noble's estate, and in my world noble's estates are significantly more common than teleportation circles.

How much does a noble's estate cost to build?

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Then let us say all the richest people in D&D world should be adventuring wizards. They can and do obtain more money as part of an adventuring group than some kingdoms. If anyone is doing the bankrolling, it's them.

Last time I did the math, the economy of my medium-sized kingdom was about 9 million gold per year, and once you subtracted out all the local dukes and counts, that meant the king was running the national government on about 1 million gold per year. Equipping a battalion of troops would be 800K gold or so, which makes spending 18K gold on a teleport circle to make that army more mobile sound like a bargain. It's much cheaper than buying more battalions anyway.

18K is a lot from the standpoint of an individual, but it's probably not that much by the standards of a functioning government. Rather like $1 million in real life, and in fact "1 gold = $50 to $100" is generally a pretty good conversion rate judging by listed prices.

 

[Saeviomagy]

Three carts is probably all you could manage (one to the left, one to the right, and one straight ahead) for 550gp including a return trip. On your forth trip your break even.
Assuming there are enough people in the desert to need 7500 lbs of wheat.

The website I quoted shows sell prices for wheat with a 100% difference from selling point to selling point in a modern day environment when travel is relatively quick and easy.

Per year, a person (in the modern age, in australia) eats between 75 and 160 lbs of wheat per year. So if you're insisting on wheat, then you're looking at supplying 1200 people for a month.

A person requires ~6.6lbs of water per day, so a delivery of water every day could provide enough drinking water for those 1200 people. I think you'd probably get a better return for that investment.

As for ships, well the 18k figure was the minimum assuming the wizard was working for free. Assuming they were doing so for money could easily double the cost.

It could easily multiply the cost by infinity. Doubling it is effectively paying the guy 5 aristocratic lifestyles for 10 minutes of work a day, which seems silly to do.

Buying that 30k galley could be 6000gp cheaper and it can carry 150 tones per trip. Also known as 30,000gp of wheat paying for itself in a single trip.

Only if you grossly inflate a wizard's wages, and only if your wheat actually gets to the destination. And your crew work for free.