Some House Rules for a campaign permeated and soaked in arcane energy

[Angel Tarragon]

Disclaimer: Although commoners are capable of utilizing minor arcane spells I will be using either Sword Sorcery's Advanced Player's Guide skill system or the Midnight campaign setting rules for arcane spell casting.

Adventurer Taxes
All adventurers, which is anyone that makes a living by exploring the wilderness and plundering ancient ruins, is subjected to what is called the Adventurer Tax. This is not a flat tax. Instead, the adventurers must pay the government a small percentage of the coin that they have liberated from the monsters that inhabit the unknown.

Upon entering any town that has a population of 400 or more, the adventurers are escorted by a small band of military to the local Adventurer’s Guild. The Guild then takes all coin, tallies it up and relieves the adventures of 10% of it.

After the guild takes out the ten percent, the adventurers are then asked to sign the local registry and the Guildmaster initials next to their signature and the amount of tax that they have paid.

Any adventuring party that registers at their local guild before going on an adventure only needs to pay 5% tax, upon returning to the town.

Arcane Taxes
Every individual capable of wielding the arcane energies of the world must pay a tax every month. The tax is. Each month every individual capable of casting arcane spells must check in to the local Wizard’s Guild. The individual is then put through an arcane screening that determines his capability of handling arcane energies.

Each town must keep a record of each individual and their arcane potential. Individuals capable of wielding only minor magics (spells of 0th to 3rd level) are considered Mages, those capable of wielding only intermediate magics (spells of 4th to 6th level) are considered Wizards and those capable of handling major magics are called Sorcerers. Any individual that is capable of casting spells of 10th level or greater are known as Eldritch Masters. Eldritch Masters do not usually have to put up with paying an arcane tax, as they are magically and financially powerful enough to establish a fortified presence elsewhere.

The tax that the spellcasters must pay is based on their arcane title. Mages only need to pay 5 silvers, Wizards 50 silvers (5 gold) and Sorcerers 500 silvers (100 gold). If an Eldritch Master resides in a town, then they must pay a tax of 5,000 silvers (500 gold).

Eldritch Masters that are invited to reside on the local Arcane Panel only pay half the amount of tax. If the Eldritch Master is also a teacher at any Arcane Institution within their kingdom or empire, then they are not required to pay tax.

This tax allows the adepts of arcane energies to use the local Gate without having to purchase a Gatestone (See below). Also it is mandatory for anyone capable of arcane spellcasting to be registered as a Wizard in all towns where they wish to use their arcane talent.

Failing to register as a Wizard has consequences. If the wizard individual casts a spell that clearly violates another individual of their privacy or causes harm or damage to other individuals or their or government property then the wizard is subject to the process of law. Wizards that are subjected to the law and are registered have a lesser sentence than others arcane spellcasters that are not registered.

Cities and Gates
Each town that has a population of 400 or more has a road leading to two Gates. One Gate is for outgoing traffic and the other is incoming traffic. In order to use the Gate an individual needs to obtain a Gatestone.

Gatestones are available for purchase near the Gate by a shop called The Gatekeeper. When ready to travel from one city to another, the individual must carry the Gatestone through the Gate. Travel without a Gatestone through a Gate is impossible, unless the traveler is capable of casting Activate Gate.

Each Gatestone is keyed. When the traveler passes through the Gate, the Gatestone disappears from their possession, and the Gate deposits the traveler to the destination keyed by the Gatestone.

Commissioned Quests
The military may decide to commission a party of well known individuals, or a band of registered adventures, to undertake a certain quest. What does this mean to the characters?

It means all expenses are paid for. Any hazard the military knows about the quest, the party will be debriefed on. If a member of the party should meet an untimely end in the course of the quest, the party need only return to the town that they embarked from. The deceased will be returned to life, if possible, at the expense of the government. If the deceased could not be returned to life then the deceased’s next of kin will receive notification and the cost of burial and the funeral will be paid for by the government. Additionally, the deceased’s next of kin will receive restitution. Restitution is made in the form of plaque dedicated to the deceased for giving his life for the good of their nation and a cash settlement in the amount of 140 gold pieces plus the commission the deceased was entitled to.

Next of kin is described as the deceased’s spouse and children or parents and siblings. This money can be used for the player to generate a new character that is related to the deceased. Like a sibling or child (most likely). The new character will be able to start with any magic items that the deceased carried in life.

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Thoughts?

 

[ARandomGod]

I'd have to play a chaotic or neutral character type. I would never go into town... and I'd eventually attempt to take over the world. Or possibly destroy it. Hence I'd probably better be a wizard, as they have better world destroying potential.

I *hates* taxes. And restrictive laws.

But, all that aside... how are the non-adventuring mages making their monies? There must be a good demand for this magic as well, such that a mage can simply sell magics and make money. Taxes generally aren't more than 1/3 or the total income... so my main thought there is that you're going to have to work out a magical economy, and reasons why people would pay for spells. Probably a whole bunch of new spells too, ones that are worth more out of combat than in. I mean, really, who's gonna pay someone to fire off a fireball, generally speaking?

 

[Arkhandus]

I'd have to agree. It wouldn't pay to live in town; build a treehouse somewhere out of the way, or fortify a cave and furnish it. Once you can cast Illusory Wall, you can keep your cave hidden from sight and have privacy........to begin plotting your schemes of world-domination for the sole sake of getting rid of all those annoying tax-collectors and their thugs.

That aside, do you think each town will have a considerable and highly-foritified (magically, materially, and with manpower enough) bank for adventurers to store their loot and such each time they visit? I'd hate to walk into town one day after an adventure, be robbed by the government for 10% of my hard-earned loot, then lose 10% of whatever remains when I come back into town again next week after a hunting trip or something. Or, y'know, enter one town after an adventure, lose 10% of my wealth upon entering, then go through to the next town where I'm really headed, and get robbed of 10% more of my wealth when I hadn't even done anything since that previous adventure except travel.

Must be hard for the farmers if, every time they go back into town to sell the fruits of their labor, they lose 10% of it each day to the government just because they have to keep going back and forth from their farm outside town, since they're not likely to sell all of their produce or whatnot in one day alone.

What happens if a bugbear happens by one day and tries to steal some pigs from farmer Jack's barn, and farmer Jack catches the bugbear in the act, killing him with a lucky crossbow shot? He loots the bugbear's corpse for money, and goes into town with more money than he makes in a year, and no one in the government's going to steal 10% of it, because he's a farmer and not technically an adventurer? Even though he basically came across this newfound wealth the same way as an adventurer?

Why would the government charge Adventurer's Taxes and Arcane Taxes? What's it for, why would it be implemented, and how the heck would the adventurers and mighty spellcasters of the world allow the governments to rob them like that? I suppose the government itself employs numerous mages in every town to Scry and such to monitor activity throughout town to notice when somebody happens to cast an 'illegal' spell in town? What if the caster is outside of town, potentially miles away, divining townsfolk's secrets or whatnot with spells or magic items (crystal ball maybe?) that couldn't be detected in-town?

Then you've got the psuedo-medieval government spying on every citizen in town 24-7 with Scrying, Clairvoyance, and such, pretty much driving everyone out of towns to go live in communities in the wilderness that just so happen to look like towns but have no actual government, because everyone hates the government watching over their shoulder all day every day, all night every night.......

People aren't likely to build every wall of every structure to be just thin enough and the right material to allow for mere Detect Magic and such to monitor everything, so it will certainly take spying spells like Clairvoyance/Clairaudience and Scrying to accomplish this government-doesn't-trust-any-of-you-townsfolk mage-spy network. I doubt that every citizen is going to bother learning some Spellcraft, let alone enough ranks in it to reliably have some witness identify a local or visiting mage casting spells that violate the laws.......

What level is Activate Gate, and how are these gates made? Are they constructed like portals, or are they actually made through some permanent variant of the Gate spell? Things to think about.

 

[Angel Tarragon]

Activate Gate is a first level spell. The gates are made using the rules for contructing portals in the FRCS.

If I do not use taxes, then how does the government keep track of the potential of arcane spellcasters? The monies the government makes this way is used to pay its employees and the military.

So far no one has commented on my Commissioned Quests. Anyone have thoughts on it they'd like to share?

 

[darthkilmor]

It seems like you'll have to have Alot of magical devices in place to detect when someone enters town and needs to pay taxes. And a town of 400 ppl is going to have, what, a sheriff and a few deputies, maybe? Unless you're figuring on the whole nation being highly militarized , in which case, the gov'mint would send its own troops on whatever quests that it would have done. I'm assuming with quests you mean things like "rumors of a clan of illithids abducting villagers deep in the western hills are getting worrysome. Go investigate and we'll pay you 1000gp per slain illithid. And here's some horses to get you there and some spelunking equipment. good luck!"

It certainly seems like a neat idea but really without a strong incentive the players are just going to skimp out on the taxes. or just hide their loot in a bag of holding. or leave it in a tree stump outside town. I might suggest a more compromisable way to encourage players to do the required tithing. maybe something like, "Buy our nations savings bonds, invest in your country's future!" and say there's a 10% interest rate per year. Or that tithing it a requirement of the guild and with that membership you get say, access to higher lvl ppls to help train you, or for mages access to spell libraries. or say, any guild member who trains(levels up) in the guild hall cuts the training time in half and gets one extra skill point(due to access of various masters in the guild).

Overall a pretty cool idea but like any cheap player, I was thinking of ways to avoid the taxes every sentence along the way. The gate's are pretty interesting, but whats to keep an invading army from using them? (ala Stargate).