D&D Economics
- Thread starter Viktyr Gehrig
- Start date
Rel
Liquid Awesome
Old One said:Yeah...that Old One is a total hack...yep, sure enough. Just add the d20 Economic System to the long line of brilliantly-conceived, shoddily-implemented ideas rattling around in my mellon.
~ OO
PS - <Old One busily begins upgrading the desert scorpion swarms for the NC Gameday VII>
I knew that would lure you into this thread!
On the matter of "rare magical components" for making magic items, I use a version of this in my game but it goes hand in hand with the existing system with no need to modify the existing costs of magic items.
Essentially, I don't like the idea that you have a pocket full of gold pieces and you spend a day in the wilderness "brewing a potion" and the next day you have a potion and your pocket is not full of gold pieces. In my campaigns, you cannot simply spin gold into magic.
That said, it is not hard to find the ingredients to make most magic items in a town of any real size. So I'm not saying, "You must have a Troll's kidney to make that potion." I'm saying, "There's a Wizard in town and he sells Scroll Ink and the components necessary to make Potions or Wands but not Arms and Armor or Wonderous Items." Then the party Wizard might say, "I'll buy 300 GP worth of Scroll Ink, 200 GP worth of Potion Components and 750 GP worth of Wand Components." He writes that down on his character sheet, spends the cash and now, when he's out in the field, he has enough of these ingredients to make that amount of magic items.
I find that this lends a certain level of realism that makes me and the players happy. And it also gives me a new sort of treasure I can hand out. Instead of saying, "You kill the Ogre and find 500 GP." I can say, "You kill the Ogre and discover that in addition to 200 GP, he's collected some magic mushrooms that are worth 300 GP in Potion Ingredients." I can even get fancy and say, "You kill the Ogre and discover that in addition to 200 GP, he's got some Greentop Mushrooms that are worth 300 GP in Potion Ingredients but are worth double that for making Potions of any Transmutation spell."
If I want to occasionally have some part of a critter they fight (we're back to Troll Kidneys and Basilisk Eyes here) be worth something toward item creation then I can do it. But when the PC's are in a city then they can effectively convert cash into magic items because the components are freely available. Right now I'm running an Eberron campaign in Sharn so this is more or less the way things operate but I've established the underlying system so the PC's won't be stunned if they fight a critter in the bowels of the city and discover that its horns are worth 100 GP toward crafting Wands. They can either use it for that purpose or sell it to a local Wizard. Either way it is valuable loot.
Altalazar
First Post
Rel said:
See, now I really like that idea. Though one could abstract the item creation "gold spinning" as saying you need to go to town and buy X gold pieces worth of components to make a potion.
I use the same sort of system, only I also include the fancy ingredients mentioned above - not as requirements, but as options - so if you can get the heart of an ancient red dragon killed with a blessed arrow on a full moon (etc.) then it can be a component that either adds some special properties to an item (that it wouldn't otherwise have) or it reduces either the XP or GP (or both) requirements for making a certain item. It just makes an item all that much more meaningful and cool to know all of the in-game effort that went into making it. But since it is an optional thing, it doesn't prevent players from making a lot of ordinary magic items, if they were so inclined, in the normal fashion.
Gez
First Post
Rel said:
I did something a bit like you.
Recently, having defeated a squad of powerful NPCs, the heroes IMC had loot to sell. Of course, I'm not the kind of DM to say, "well, that pawnbroker dude can buy all your magical junk loot for those handy-dandy 15 000 gp he kept in a sock under his bed." Instead, they had to barter items against items, with the merchant (an alchimist and broker in minor magical items) saying "I could offer you this and this in exchange for that" or "I don't want this in my shoppe, keep it!" etc.
And in the end, they got away with a few items I had decided would be available for them, and "2 000 gp worth of components" for use in creating magic devices or crafting alchemical items.
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A lot of magic would be afforable (though maybe not worth buying) by normal wealthy NPCs in default 3e, the only figure that's out of whack would be the mere 200gp it costs to live extravagantly for a month, if you assume that's a maximum rather than a minimum. Eg a king's court could cost 1000s of gp a month. A reasonably wealthy area could bring in ca 1gp/month in tax per head of population, for a typical kingdom of 1 million that's 1 million gp, for something like medieval France that's more like 20 million gp! If nobles & citiesget 80%, the king gets 20% of that total so he has 4 million gp/month, spend 3/4 on the state infrastructure (military, castles etc) and in theory he can commission or buy 1 million gp of magic items a month... Of course this is notional wealth, there aren't likely 20 million actual gp in circulation.
Certainly for making scrolls (or entering spells into spellbook) the Wizard PC has to buy actual vellum & magical ink; for making potions they'd need to buy potion ingredients (eg healing herb for Cure Light), making a magic sword needs meteorite iron, etc. Even a small village may have some of these, but gp are not a magic ingredient in themselves.
RobertCampbell
First Post
A quick word of caution on using modern economics with D&D. While micro-economics is improving and reasonably useful, macro-economics lags some distance behind. A glance at any major analysts results will show just how far off economic models are. One report concluded (somewhat snidely) that the best recipe for accurate forecasts is to (paraphrasing) "forecast late and often"! Looking at D&D economics with inadequate modern economics is therefore doubly distorting.
With regard to the earlier post on "magic as art" Europe does see the development of mass produced, generic studio art. Much of it is of very high quality and many paintings produced in studios are now in major galleries. Gf does History of art, shall check time period with her. The Dutch Republic's "Golden Age" sees widespread ownership of paintings (although just outside standard D&D tech), wills and credit reports are an excellent source for these.
So that my debut on these boards does not consist merely of naysaying, I shall attempt to develop a working micro-model over the next few days and post it.
With regard to the earlier post on "magic as art" Europe does see the development of mass produced, generic studio art. Much of it is of very high quality and many paintings produced in studios are now in major galleries. Gf does History of art, shall check time period with her. The Dutch Republic's "Golden Age" sees widespread ownership of paintings (although just outside standard D&D tech), wills and credit reports are an excellent source for these.
So that my debut on these boards does not consist merely of naysaying, I shall attempt to develop a working micro-model over the next few days and post it.
MonsterMash
First Post
Welcome Robert,RobertCampbell said:
personally I've always found economic theory a bit weak for predicting behaviour - homo economicus the totally rational man seems a bit of as much a fantasy as the dwarves mining gold or the Illuminatii. Recently needed to read some introductory economics stuff to help my partner with her degree course and realised that the 'dismal science' is very much in its infancy in many areas.
You may want to add a post to the 'Who's from the UK thread' as well.
Evilhalfling
Adventurer
My contribution comes in the form of stories.
Last session the Pcs found a neutral sketetal mage guarding part of a ruin, the sorcerer bought his scrolls from him for 190 gp. He then turned around and asked the party thief to buy more supplies for him, and gave him the same bag of coins. (huh. some much for killing monsters and taking thier stuff)
The party returned to town and the same bag of coins (+150 gp) was given to the local low lvl wizard for magic scroll inks, the party then had him ID party items, and gave him a battered platnium bowl, and for change he pulled out a familiar bag and gave them the 300 gold back. The 20 int thief had a brief glimpse of some kind of notes of credit economic system, just write 300 gp on the bag, fill it with rocks and keep passing it around. But realized that he would have to be in charge to get anyone to accept it. The party ended up opening the bag and dividing it up as loot - total reward 100gp 1 pp, and another 20gp3sp from selling mundane weapons etc. each. At leat 150 of it will end up in the hands of the local cleric for healing potions. (some of which will head back to the lowlvl wiz who is also an alchemist, as the cleric pays for the cost of creating the potions)
Just wait until they try and sell the +2 shortsword
"Lets see Ill give you my +1 shortsword, a favor I have from the local cleric/smith to enchant a weapon to +1, and .....
This game is the closest I have come to the barter system, and the players are loving it. About a third of the party buisness is conducted in the towns best tavern, rather than visiting actual shops.
They are currently in an isolated small town, If they get to a larger city the economy will swing back to standard.
Last session the Pcs found a neutral sketetal mage guarding part of a ruin, the sorcerer bought his scrolls from him for 190 gp. He then turned around and asked the party thief to buy more supplies for him, and gave him the same bag of coins. (huh. some much for killing monsters and taking thier stuff)
The party returned to town and the same bag of coins (+150 gp) was given to the local low lvl wizard for magic scroll inks, the party then had him ID party items, and gave him a battered platnium bowl, and for change he pulled out a familiar bag and gave them the 300 gold back. The 20 int thief had a brief glimpse of some kind of notes of credit economic system, just write 300 gp on the bag, fill it with rocks and keep passing it around. But realized that he would have to be in charge to get anyone to accept it. The party ended up opening the bag and dividing it up as loot - total reward 100gp 1 pp, and another 20gp3sp from selling mundane weapons etc. each. At leat 150 of it will end up in the hands of the local cleric for healing potions. (some of which will head back to the lowlvl wiz who is also an alchemist, as the cleric pays for the cost of creating the potions)
Just wait until they try and sell the +2 shortsword
"Lets see Ill give you my +1 shortsword, a favor I have from the local cleric/smith to enchant a weapon to +1, and ..... This game is the closest I have come to the barter system, and the players are loving it. About a third of the party buisness is conducted in the towns best tavern, rather than visiting actual shops.
They are currently in an isolated small town, If they get to a larger city the economy will swing back to standard.
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