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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7581088" data-attributes="member: 42582">To relate this to   [MENTION=82106]AbdulAlhazred[/MENTION]'s posts: a really strong set of assumptions underlies this post. Some of those are sociological/economic: that a noble family has readily available assets that it is able to repurpose at the behest of the character. As a matter of human history this isn't always true; in the context of a fantasy RPG it's even easier not to proceed on the basis of its truth.But probably more importantly, it rests on assumptions about how resolution is handled - for instance, that there are "equipment lists" that generate fictional positioning that can make a big difference in action resolution, either directly because of the gear, or indirectly because the money on the list is - in mechanical terms - freely transferable to equipment.Some RPGs work like this. Classic D&D, 3E and 5e are examples. So is Classic Traveller.Some RPGs have elements of this, but don't implement the full model. Burning Wheel is like this (it has equipment lists, but they don't include money, which is an attribute - Resources - that has to be used in a successful check in order to buy stuff).Some RPGs don't have this at all - Marvel Heroic RP/Cortex+ Heroic is an example of this. As I've already posted, being a noble would most naturally be expressed as a Distinction, and when used that will contribute d8 to the dice pool. One of the PCs in my Cortex+ Vikings game has the Noble Ancestry distinction. Another has the Distinction At Home Among the Peasantry, and that contributes d8 to dice pools too. HeroQuest revised would be broadly similar to this.A literary analogue of the approach mentioned in the previous paragraph is Lord of the Rings. Aragorn's Noble Ancestry is an important element in his strivings and success, and we can imagine a mechanical implementation of that as a dice pool component. But Sam's Love of Animals and Plants is an important element in his strivings and success, and we can see that it plays a comparable role in driving the story.Or to point to a different medium, Power Man and Iron Fist are equal partners in their adventures, and contribute equally, although one is very wealthy while the other is from a poor background.In a LotR or superhero RPG conceived along these lines (as MHRP is), there is no greater advantage - from the point of view of successful action resolution - in being a wealthy noble than a loyal hobbit. Though those differences will colour action declarations and therefore, perhaps, consequences.EDIT: It is also possible to have a RPG that has the trappings, but not the substance, of the D&D approach to equipment and money. Prince Valiant is an example of this. PCs have equipement and coins on their PC sheets, and the equipment matters in mechanical terms. But the game has no equipment price lists (we use the ones from Pendragon when it comes up), and equipment is gained and lost as "story consequences" (eg for winning or losing a joust) rather than horded and managed in the fashion that is characteristic of (say) AD&D or Classic Traveller.</blockquote>

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