Ritual Economics/Spellbook Peeve

[kelnas]

Some nitpicks after reading the Wizard and related parts of the PHB:

It seems like wizards can live the good life as the village handyman using their Make Whole ritual. At a cost of 20% he can repair anything that fits in a 10 foot cube and charge customers 50% or more (beats paying 100% to replace it). At 10 minutes per ritual with no daily limit (correct?) this could be a lucrative gig. The economics just seem a bit off.

And one thing is for sure, my wizard will not be in the business of creating and selling potions or magic items. Manufacturing cost equals retail cost. No profit. Which is fine for the game, but it makes me wonder where the in-game stores get their goods (deceased adventurers? extra loot adventurers are bringing back and selling at 20%)? The economics make no sense but I can live with this one for game reasons.

Finally, after WOTC has done such a great job simplifying so many of the not so fun elements of the game, I am surprised Wizards are still expected to keep track of the number of pages in their spellbook. Does anyone enforce/enjoy this rule? I'm surprised it wasn't eliminated. To avoid wasting time at the early levels, does anyone know at what level on average the 128 page limit even becomes a factor (with or w/o Expanded SB)?

 

[Traken]

I like keeping track of my spellbook. When I'm in for the long haul, I actually get little notepads with the appropriate number of pages and write down all my spells. Just a neat little thing to so.

Make Whole: I think you're underestimating how poor peasant types usually are. To fix a latern costs 1.4gp plus whatever the wizard charges. Most peasants would either attempt the fix themselves, live with it, or barter for someone to fix it.

The real question, is how much does it cost to repair by non-magical means? If it only costs 20% non-magically, then they'd have no reason to turn to a wizard. The only added benefit the wizard brings is timeliness and possibly quality.

Making magic items: Making an item costs the base price listed in the PHB. Buying an item is usually at a 10-40% markup. So if you did nothing but make and sell items, you'd be turning a nice profit.

 

[Zephyrus]

My only thoughts on this is the implied idea things for the PC's are handled are not the same as the things for the NPC's are handled and that is is a direct bid to preserve game balance (sucks to be the PC's yes but prevents them from abusing the system generally speaking). NPC's since much of the time are not stated but rather 'serve a purpose' and outside of combat who cares what level, feats, special powers etc they may have. By following that line of thought NPC craftsman could be well have the ability to produce items at a cost less than what the cost a PC would have to pay to create a similar item. It could be said that much like HP's being an abstraction, wealth in the form of gold etc could be somewhat of an abstraction as well. Hero's 'BUYING' things have reputation and status that acts as a gold-multiplier of sorts when it comes to what they can buy. In turn when they make things on their own out of pocket expenses might be more literal (or maybe ambiguous as a result of rarity/volume whatever). In a nutshell it looks like 4E wont destabilized the world economy as much because you don't Have to think of thing as literal.