D&D General Fantasy Farming

[Ixal]

Farms arent necessarily nature killing, the Roman Farm included an irrigated garden, willow plantation, olive orchard, meadow, grain land, forest trees, vineyard and an acorn woodlands and encouraged nymphs to visit. A druid who sees people as part of nature and farming as a way to boost productivity of the surrounding lands should be happy to help.

Even practices like Swidden farming that use Fire in some tropical ‘jungle’ areas help forest regeneration and nutrient cycling.


properly stored grain in a granary could last up to four years with good cycling. Its also important to remember that hard bread and fermented grains (ie Beer) were important rations as beer in particular allowed Grain to be stored indefinately.

However I am confused by your reference to Nile shipping - how did that help the Romans get grain from Spain or when they went north into Europe?

You usually did not get good cycling with granaries available with D&D tech level.
Converting grain into bread and beer increases its volume and thus requires more storage space. And the more space you need the harder to keep it vermin free.

The main food source for Rome was Egypt, not Spain or Europe. Partly because Egypt very fertile and partly because shipping was easy as all farms were near a major river with easy sea access.

 

[Ancalagon]

I mean can the fighter swing an axe to cut down a tree?
Can the barbarian swing a pick/shovel?

no matter how much of a limit you put on the cantrip you HAVE to limit the physical work just as much and the cantrip will always do more faster

isn't that what I said?

My main message though is that if someone wants to calculate how much work a cantrip-wielding mage-farmer can do, casting every round for hours on end is not realistic. The same way you can't swing an axe constantly for 8 hours.

 

[Zardnaar]

isn't that what I said?

My main message though is that if someone wants to calculate how much work a cantrip-wielding mage-farmer can do, casting every round for hours on end is not realistic. The same way you can't swing an axe constantly for 8 hours.

I have worked in a farm and yes we did 8 hours or more (sometimes 12).

I would assume the spellcaster would take breaks. Spellcasting would be comparatively easy.

One of the worst days was bad sunburn blistering the skin on my ears and having the blisters pop.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

isn't that what I said?

My main message though is that if someone wants to calculate how much work a cantrip-wielding mage-farmer can do, casting every round for hours on end is not realistic. The same way you can't swing an axe constantly for 8 hours.

I have worked in a farm and yes we did 8 hours or more (sometimes 12).

I would assume the spellcaster would take breaks. Spellcasting would be comparatively easy.

One of the worst days was bad sunburn blistering the skin on my ears and having the blisters pop.

I am weak now, I do office work and could not do 2 hours of 'hard work'. I still have friends in retail and in shipping reciving that are getting ready for the time of year were there will be 10 hour days with little to no break, on your feet moving doing things... now 99% of us are inside at least but my argument is that the cantrip is no MORE taxing then the shovel or the axe. And we know people can do those actions with a few 15 min breaks and a meal break for 8 hours.

so assuming that you have a caster cast the cantrip 5 times per minute (less then half the speed they could) for 8 out of the 10 hours they are supposed to work 4 15 min breaks and 1 hour one(that counts as a short rest) and you have 2,400 uses of the cantrip at least.

 

[Voadam]

The Mold Earth cantrip in Xanathar's could do a lot of plow and planting type work with an at will cantrip quickly and easily and could be heavily exploited for such as written.

Since it is a supplement spell that originated in the Temple of Elemental Evil web enhancement to give some more elemental flavored cantrips in an evil cultist non-agricultural context I don't think it should be assumed as part of the common D&D baseline for economics and agriculture though.

From the PH there is Mage Hand and Prestidigitation, which are useful but harder to leverage for these kinds of situations.