The economics of Continual flame

[lowkey13]

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[lowkey13]

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[Oofta]

In a pre-industrial society without mass production, how valuable would it be to extend the life of all goods at no cost?

I'm not trying to be mean, but it really doesn't seem like you've thought much about this. Especially when this is a cantrip. Please feel free to go back and look at the need for repair in the middle ages through the renaissance and get back to me- this isn't terribly advanced stuff.

You're assuming mending dramatically extends the life of goods. I'm not. Clothes could be mended instead of sewn, there may be slightly fewer patches. There's no reason to believe they'd last all that much longer.

It seems like you haven't thought about his much. Or ever been borderline poor like I was growing up and had to wear clothing that had been repaired multiple times. Feel free to get back to me when you stop using the argument that mending (which only repairs minor tears or breaks) somehow means you would never have to replace another material good ever again.

Maybe it makes sense to you that the only people that could possibly ever benefit from magic is PCs. I don't think that's a logical conclusion.

 

[Oofta]

I hate to break it to you, but I prefer my approach ("Yes, it would change a lot, but I'm not going to worry about that because it's a game") to your approach, which appears to be, "The world wouldn't change at all because of magic, and boy, it is amazing just how right this game got it."

The fundamentals of society varied widely between places just on Earth; it would be staggering that a make-believe world with powerful magic, present deities, and intelligent non-human races would be ... kinda like a weird 60s fantasy book. Don't you think?

I've never said the book got it exactly right. I do think that it would be weird if a world where magic existed would be no different than ours unless magic was extremely rare.

 

[5ekyu]

No, I'm not. This is what I was discussing before- it is really, really hard for someone, today, to try and understand all the changes that would occur. In fact, it would be impossible.

Heck, just look at the cantrip- mending. Always able to be case (so no real cost). Think about how the (assumedly) widespread use of this cantrip would affect the second-hand market. Go on.

Then what about continual flame? What would the effect of a wide-spread market for that be on the price and availability of rubies? Because, dang, who wouldn't want continual flames everywhere? It has no "cost" other than the material component, so any caster who can cast it likely would equal to their spell slots on every day off, and then profit (50gp cost, .... well, supply and demand would raise that but whatever, and then sell for 70gp).

If you are interested in how light affected us all, there are books and stuff, like I said. Feel free to incorporate those ideas into your campaign ...

Or, just ignore them. Which is what most people do.

The demand on rubies cost would be nil. Because the required amount is a gp value of dust. If price rises, amount needed goes down.

 

[lowkey13]

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[lowkey13]

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[Dausuul]

Because it is! Everything is.

I mean, I am sure there are DMs, somewhere out there, that dynamically adjust prices, or try to. Does the party have a home base that they get supplies in? Well, those prices are going to rise after the the first (or third) treasure hoard, right? But ... the vast vast majority of DMs don't bother, because it's not worth the paperwork.

That's why I added the caveat about PCs engaging in a scheme to mass produce continual flame items. At the gaming table, prices are mostly static, for the reasons you state. It's a convenient abstraction for the DM. When we're debating worldbuilding and the history of the setting, though, there's no reason to treat "50 gp for a continual flame item" as an ironclad law for all time.

Rather, we can assume that the price has ebbed and flowed. It spiked when the spell was invented. It dropped when the Anti-Magic Edict of Grimdark the Obnoxious wiped out most of the demand. But at this moment in time, the equilibrium price hovers around 50 in most parts of the world. In some places it's 60, in some places it's 40. In a few places, it might be 10 or it might be 200, but those are unusual. If you plug 50 gp into your math, you get a rough idea how hard it is for a common laborer to buy such an item in most places.

 

[Dausuul]

The demand on rubies cost would be nil. Because the required amount is a gp value of dust. If price rises, amount needed goes down.

Is this meant as a joke? I can't tell. Poe's Law and all that.

 

[lowkey13]

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