Paying the troops - D&D Economics

[haakon1]

For me, the D&D economics system is flawed and totally unrealistic. I once tried to fix it for my campaign, but it proved too much work. So now, as a DM, I wavehands economics. As a player I prefer not to think about it...

I more or less agree. Economics for players is one world using the rulebooks; economics for NPC's is another.

I think a lot about the NPC background economics, 'cause I get geeky jollies from it and because I think it makes for more "suspension of disbelief" that the game world is real.

But it's a medieval world, so modern analogies just don't work. Things to worry about: trade (spices, and other commodities worth shipping long-distances in wooden ships with no refrigeration) and farming. Thinking about stuff like how much it costs to buy a house or what a bank will lend you makes no sense to me -- banks? what's that? The jewelers guild or moneychangers or a merchant family might lend money to the king or a merchant, but why would they lend money to you? This is a world with no insurance, no stock, probably no interest rates, etc. Definitely no mortgages -- building your own house from the wilderness, or get a land grant from a noble, or pay a lot of looting wages to buy the inn in town from an old guy whose retiring and wants money plus a permanent room and board deal.

As for mercenaries . . . that's PHB economics, so whatever the book says works, even if it means they can never "buy" a house, or they make a chicken a year, or they make 300 large galleys a week; just like if it was platemail, it costs what the PHB says it costs.

I'm more interested in questions like "how many acres does a family of 5 need to live on", "how many cows per square mile does a 19th century cattle ranch equivalent have", or "why might a merchant be travelling to Highfolk" -- and it better be a better story than bringing copper ore to trade for "foodstuffs". One of my players knew exactly where I was going when I started asking all about the horse barn near his house.

 

[haakon1]

Things that would make interesting awards:
land grants (undeveloped)
land grant (developed property, thus giving income)
noble titles
potions
magic weapons
magic armor
other random magic goodies
art
gems & jewelry

- Free training
- Somebody to sell loot to
- Military promotions, if they are in the military (or militia, like Colonel Sanders of KFC fame, who didn't spend a lot of time fighting anything but chickens).
- Jobs for relatives. Hey, we're medieval, right?
- Spells
- Advice, access to libraries and sages, etc.
- My favorite of all, for a personal big favor the PC's did an important nobleman (who happened to be my PC retired from an earlier campaign): anything you name. The cool thing there, in an ongoing campaign, is it's a good role-playing challenge. What do the PC's really want? What's a reasonable ask? What's unreasonable and sours the patronage?

As I remember, the PC's, all 1-3 level, asked for stuff like training, a +2 longsword (something the noble had and didn't need), and for the thief a "get of jail free, one time" card.

 

[Janx]

I think we're diverging into two topics: what "modern economic concepts apply to D&D" and "what should I pay the troops in D&D"

Both are interesting.

To be brief, as I said, I'm playing in a more modern era than circa 10th century (which D&D kinda models)

So do they have banks, insurance, stocks?
17th century Scotland did: http://www.scotbanks.org.uk/history.htm
it's hard to google for any older references, but more primitive versions had to have existed

Insurance:
Lloyd's of London, 1690 : http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/LONlloyds.htm

Stocks:
harder to find, though we know that much of the colonization of America was financed through stocks (shares on the investment in the new world).

Loans:
people have been loaning each other money for ever. It's the second oldest profession (used to finance visits to the first maybe) Though my example was mainly meant to provide feasibility. The Admiral in my example can simple save 1/3 of his salary for 3 years and buy a house. The point being, make sure the numbers add that to support reasonable activities, such as buying a house.

Now on the other topic: What stuff to give as rewards to players. Well, the DMG kinda covers that. In general, it implies that each encounter is worth X amount of money. And if one encounter didn't make sense to have treasure, you could roll that amount over to another encounter. And balance would be maintained.

So a simple method would be to make the "giving of a reward" an encounter and apply a CR to it equal to the party level. The directly give the loot to each character (unlike the traditional pool method).

So now a good question is? What's a title worth? What's land worth? Obviously prices vary, but figure there's a few types, and pick a type and set a value.

factors would be:
colony or homeland
developed or "estate"
country, suburb or city

Ah the fun of fudging economics...

Janx

 

[Amal Shukup]

So do they have banks, insurance, stocks?
17th century Scotland did: http://www.scotbanks.org.uk/history.htm
it's hard to google for any older references, but more primitive versions had to have existed

Insurance:
Lloyd's of London, 1690 : http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/LONlloyds.htm

Stocks:
harder to find, though we know that much of the colonization of America was financed through stocks (shares on the investment in the new world).

I'm currently reading Quicksilver (Neal Stephenson) - which is set in the 17th century. Lots of explicit info (REALLY KEWL) scenes showing early 'stock exchanges' (literally buying stuff cheap and storing it in an attic until it could be sold for more), people investing in ventures (mining, etc.).

Bit later, folk are buying and selling shares (and fractions of shares, and options on shares ans sell-short options on shares...) in the Dutch East India Company. Not to mention all sorts of shenanigins to artificially increase and decrease stock prices for financial and political gain.

Insurance is discussed explicitly as well - How rates determine the profitability of shipping, defrauding insurers through arson...

I'm not making the book sound all that exciting - but there are a number of GREAT concepts for D&D, including some wonderfully archetypical Rogues...


A'Mal

 

[MonsterMash]

Janx,

As your setting is in the 'early modern period' then its true the idea of the nation state was growing and nationalism could be a motivator, but in the English Civil War (1640's) regiments were still often raised by individuals - though the Roundheads did raise the New Model Army which moved away from that model.

I'd second the recommendation for Quciksilver. For an academic reference (one I've not yet had time to check out) try Civlization and Capitalism 15-18th Centuries by Ferdinand Braudel. Some of our historian posters will probably have additional suggestions.

 

[kigmatzomat]

Kigmatzomat - nice post on integrating a simple feudal model with modern/Roman ideas about what a professional military is.

Thanks. I've tweaked my DL campaign to use this format for Solamnia. it works well as the home setting since it's sufficiently close to the modern ideal of a euro-centric fantasy monarchy. it also helps throw the variances in other regions into higher contrast.

The following is from my high-level game. I found that if you add on officer costs the military costs about 50% more than the base per-soldier cost. Note that that base cost (12gp/month for standard infantryman) includes garrison food, board, new & repaired equipment etc (including horses for cavalry), the actual net pay the soldier get in his pocket each month would be maybe 2gp to spend on beer and (cheap) whores.

By my quick math, ~2gp is about equal to the 24sp an unskilled laborer makes over four 6-day workweeks. Since the soldier's have been given room & board they have significantly more income than the typical masses.

IMC only about 10-15% of the full military fighting strength is a "standing" army and even that is the sum of the nobility's troops.

About 75% of it is in the form of militias, particularly in the form of peasants who pay their taxes through national-guard type service. the remaining 10% are professionals, artisans, landless nobles (like the Knights of Solamnia) able to buy their way out of militia service during peace time but available during wars.

This works out for a couple of reasons, at least IMC. Most of that standing force will be your elites and officers, by throwing the bulk of the grunts back into the general workforce and you keep peacetime costs low and increases the taxable population.

Since my campaign has a high "base" level (around 4th level for a typical 25yro craftsman) this creates a bit of in-game class distinction. The peasants not only toil and have little cash, they also find themselves doing grunt military work while the guildmembers have ready cash and don't deal with the grubby tasks of hunting rabid bears or chasing bandits but when they do get called up they have their own swords and armor. The guilds charge a lot of money for apprenticeship and can justify it in a multitude of ways.

It only works for gov'ts that that aren't afraid of being overthrown by the masses, though. I have other regions IMC where the populace is either unarmed or there is a very expensive standing army to maintain the disliked ruler's iron grip.

 

[kigmatzomat]

So now a good question is? What's a title worth? What's land worth? Obviously prices vary, but figure there's a few types, and pick a type and set a value.

I'm a simulationist at heart but there comes a point where abstraction is your friend. the value of any property can generally be broken down to 3 things: production, position, politics. Assign an annual revenue to the land from production, an economic revenue due to position (rivers, roads, and borders make money) and a political value due to strategic importance (the only internal source of mithral or the materials for alchemist' fire, for instance). 99% of the land in the world has little strategic value so it's primarily for plot purposes that I bring it up.

Don't start measuring line of sight from the road, calculating the timings of travelers and hunger or the niggly details. It's a game. Start with the 3 abstractions and add details only when it advances the enjoyment of the game. Give the players a 500page logbook detailing their 150acre farm and they'll chuck it in a box and forget it.