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selling loot vs. created items
- Thread starter Paragon
- Start date
kigmatzomat
Hero
I use the multiple sales techniques as well.
Need money *NOW*: 50% list in a big town, selling to anyone who'll pay. Often this is a fairly friendly temple, merchant, or noble who knows they can get rid of it eventually but isn't expecting to make a profit given the hassle.
Through the Guild: buy available items at 80%, sell at 75%, guild takes 5% fee. The guild doesn't keep the item (without an extra charge) and doesn't post the name of the seller or buyer. It provides a safe place for them to bring expensive items & lots of cash. There's no guarantees on how long this will take, but common stuff (longsword +1, shiled +2, cloak resistance +1, etc) often gets sold in 2-3 days.
Regional fairs: There's a flat rate for booth space (usually 5gp/day) plus a 3% sales tax. Haggle at will.
Seasonal fair: has booths and auctions. The auction is typically for high-value items, lots of security, etc. The auction verifies the items, provides security, and charges a 5% fee to seller of the winning bid (or minimum bid specified by the seller). Buyers pay a registration fee (10-100gp depending on what's on the bill).
Contract of first rights: a trustworthy bunch of adventurers who constantly have worthwhile items to sell may get a preferrential contract with a guild, noble, church, or some other wealthy organization. What happens is the organization will pay 75% of the list price for items no matter how worthless or hard to dispose of but they get first dibs on *all* the items you sell. So if you find a horn of the tritons in the Mojave Desert, the company will offer you 75% but let you sell it elsewhere if you want (such as you know someone going on a long boat trip and can get 80%). On the other hand a decanter of endless water will only net you 75% should you ever sell it since they get first rights. Complicated for the greedy, easy for those who don't ever want to bother.
Need money *NOW*: 50% list in a big town, selling to anyone who'll pay. Often this is a fairly friendly temple, merchant, or noble who knows they can get rid of it eventually but isn't expecting to make a profit given the hassle.
Through the Guild: buy available items at 80%, sell at 75%, guild takes 5% fee. The guild doesn't keep the item (without an extra charge) and doesn't post the name of the seller or buyer. It provides a safe place for them to bring expensive items & lots of cash. There's no guarantees on how long this will take, but common stuff (longsword +1, shiled +2, cloak resistance +1, etc) often gets sold in 2-3 days.
Regional fairs: There's a flat rate for booth space (usually 5gp/day) plus a 3% sales tax. Haggle at will.
Seasonal fair: has booths and auctions. The auction is typically for high-value items, lots of security, etc. The auction verifies the items, provides security, and charges a 5% fee to seller of the winning bid (or minimum bid specified by the seller). Buyers pay a registration fee (10-100gp depending on what's on the bill).
Contract of first rights: a trustworthy bunch of adventurers who constantly have worthwhile items to sell may get a preferrential contract with a guild, noble, church, or some other wealthy organization. What happens is the organization will pay 75% of the list price for items no matter how worthless or hard to dispose of but they get first dibs on *all* the items you sell. So if you find a horn of the tritons in the Mojave Desert, the company will offer you 75% but let you sell it elsewhere if you want (such as you know someone going on a long boat trip and can get 80%). On the other hand a decanter of endless water will only net you 75% should you ever sell it since they get first rights. Complicated for the greedy, easy for those who don't ever want to bother.
Philip
Explorer
Magic items are of enormous value, they are more like grand villa's than loaves of bread at the bakery. I you want to use modern-world analogies, I think you should treat magic-merchants more as real-estate brokers than shopkeeps.
Accordingly, if you want to sell your second-hand item (=existing house quickly) you generally sell it for less. If you make a magic item to order, you can expect a good price, but your broker still gets a big chunk of your profit.
Just imagine all the things that accompany buying a house: having notaries checking the public records of ownership, signing deeds, paying special taxes etc. The same would go for magic items.
Also included in the price of selling existing magic items is insurance. Who garantuees that the magic item you're selling is genuine and not cursed? What if the previous owner (or his next of kin) come around claiming the item was stolen?
If you don't have a deed of ownership signed by the proper authorities, expect to get a lot less. If you don't have a deed of authenticity signed by the notables of the local wizard's guild, expect to get a lot less. Of course, these deeds cost money and time.
Magic items just aren't the DnD equivalent of electronic equipment, you don't go window shopping for them.
Accordingly, if you want to sell your second-hand item (=existing house quickly) you generally sell it for less. If you make a magic item to order, you can expect a good price, but your broker still gets a big chunk of your profit.
Just imagine all the things that accompany buying a house: having notaries checking the public records of ownership, signing deeds, paying special taxes etc. The same would go for magic items.
Also included in the price of selling existing magic items is insurance. Who garantuees that the magic item you're selling is genuine and not cursed? What if the previous owner (or his next of kin) come around claiming the item was stolen?
If you don't have a deed of ownership signed by the proper authorities, expect to get a lot less. If you don't have a deed of authenticity signed by the notables of the local wizard's guild, expect to get a lot less. Of course, these deeds cost money and time.
Magic items just aren't the DnD equivalent of electronic equipment, you don't go window shopping for them.
kigmatzomat
Hero
Philip said:
I think fine art, or weaponry. It's like buying or selling a Rembrandt or main battle tank at the +5 level, and an original Kincaid or automatic weapon at the +1.
Comparing it to land breaks at many levels, since land values have increased faster than inflation in most regions and the bulk of paperwork attached to lands are due to the loans and records for tax assessment. Purchasing a piece of land for cash is a cashiers check and a signature at the deed office; a title check is a pretty simple thing to arrange and almost not worth mentioning when the noble who manages the sale of the land is also the one who would process any liens against the land.
Magic items sales should be monitored by the establishment. Buy "typical adventurer's gear 5th level" (i.e. +1 armor/weapon/shield/cloak, 2x potions CLW, boots striding springing) and you get noted as someone to keep track of in case you go bad. Anyone commissioning +3 brilliant energy saber of speed will be watched like a hawk since even a farmboy from up-country could slice up Imperial Guards with that kind of word. *No one* should be buying or selling a +5 unholy evil souldrinker in anything less than "Eric's Grandma will get it if you tell anyone" secret. Even the thieves' guild should decide to track that guy as much as possible and point the nobles at him.
Caveat emptor is an old saying, predating most of what we consider to be the medieval world, so verification is up to the buyer. I'm not saying GMs should sell bogus goods to players often....maybe twice. Three times if they don't learn to at least say "we detect/analyze magic on the device".
Well, I was once in a game, where I was playing a thief, infiltrating a city for nefarious reasons. I set him up as a merchant, rented a building and paid for a couple of workers. I utilized some of the people you get in leadership to man the shop. Between selling stuff that I stole, and came upon during adventures, the DM managed a monthly income for me depending on fluctuations in the products I produced. This demanded a little more attention from my DM, but caused huge plot hooks and some kind of bad ramifications. For example, i tried to set up as a fence for a while, and the local thieves guild came a callin for their take, suck. sometimes we Kept what we got, and i did not get to sell it so maybe my monthly take was lower. One time one of my "employees" was skimming, I killed him. But, it was kind of nice as a lot of it was handled out of game, but there was still plenty of oppurtunity for gamehooks.
kigmatzomat
Hero
Oh I'm by far from an expert. But at the "fine art" level, the state only cares because of taxes. The buyer should provide their own appraisal or use a bonded agent (simply meaning someone else is holding a lot of cash to make reparations if the agent makes a mistake).
The state will care about weaponry or devices indicating an expectation of violence. So in general I would expect most nobles to arrange for "interesting" tidbits of information to be provided at different points in the purchase process. Item crafters, expert appraisers, sales agents, etc will be tapped to share anything notable. Every wand or potion of CLW won't be that significant, but odds are any group purchasing 5000-10,000gp of magic items at one time should raise a flag. By volume, the bulk of magic item purchases should be in the 200-2000gp range so it will either take a significant item or a slew of items to draw great attention.
The state will care about weaponry or devices indicating an expectation of violence. So in general I would expect most nobles to arrange for "interesting" tidbits of information to be provided at different points in the purchase process. Item crafters, expert appraisers, sales agents, etc will be tapped to share anything notable. Every wand or potion of CLW won't be that significant, but odds are any group purchasing 5000-10,000gp of magic items at one time should raise a flag. By volume, the bulk of magic item purchases should be in the 200-2000gp range so it will either take a significant item or a slew of items to draw great attention.
