The Price of Pie and the Inherent Cost of Beating up an Orc

[Larry Fitz]

On another thread about Anthony Volterra's latest project, the question of a book on the economics of a fantasy world came up. How important are economics in your game? Would you be interested in having a more detailed system of rules to work with? Or at the very least having someone else create easy to use price lists for various cultures and economic systems? What level of importance do you place on such things in your game?

 

[Crothian]

I use basic economics in my game. Everything is not the same price town to town, country to country. Sometimes it frustrates players, but I like it and think iot adds a good level of flavor. If done right, I think it would make a good addition to a book, but I'm not sure a book solely on this would be needed.

 

[Harlock]

This would be of great interest o me as a DM. I would really like it if much of it was OGC. And based on the other thread and the series of questions and answers that prompted this thread, a lot of it sounds like it would be based on real world economics and possibly present several systems to use. I'd vote for a big book that detailed several systems and gave ways to incorporate a little or a lot as well as low, average and high economic games. What I mean by the last bit is that High Magic is also presumably High Coin in that if you get a lot of loot, you sell a lot of loot. Also, how does an adventuring group keep from flodding the market? Things like this have always intrigued me and seems to be the sort of thing that's glossed over. d20 Modern went even further in glossing over it with it's economics.

Would it sell well? As much I I want this book, I honestly doubt it. I think it's better suited as a labor of love meant for the .pdf market rather than a large hardbound print version. I wish I was wrong.

 

[The Sigil]

I'm interested... but with a caveat.

As a DM, it's great if the system is complete and detailed, but even more, I need a "lite" system which is "quick and dirty." I need something that can resolve everything with just a die roll or two - I don't have time to track interactions among a hundred variables every time the PCs go shopping.

So, you need to walk the line among "balanced for game play" and "accurate to a great degree" AND "quick enough to make substitution of the system almost effortless."

I don't know that you can satisfy all three. If you can, more power to you. If not, I'll stick with the system in the Enchiridion of Treasures and Objects d'Art for now.

I *AM* very interested, but make sure you don't completely sacrifice "ease of use" on the altar of "accurate simulation" or you'll lose a good deal of the utility such a system implies.

--The Sigil

 

[kenjib]

Maybe fleshing out the scope would help. What kind of specifics would it entail? Here are some things that come to mind for me:

1. Price fluctuation ranges on trade commodities so the DM can pick the extreme ends of the range for potential trade routes (i.e. ginger trades for 10gp to 100gp per pound and is native to sub-tropical regions -- the DM can decide various local prices between this range). A big list of various common trade commodities here would be really nice.

2. A new system for labor, living, and business costs. How much do household staff cost to retain? Mercenaries? How much average to maintain a castle and grounds assuming standard staffing for a castle that size (include various castles and give breakdowns of the staff included)? How much would a magistrate earn? A city guard? An executioner? A craftsman? How much does it cost per year or month to run a merchant outfit with four galleon class ships and eight cogs? How much does it cost to run a banquet worthy of the attendance of an important Duke and 50 other guests? How much does it cost to rent or own a small living flat in a typical large city? What is the weekly out-of-pocket living expense for people of various social strata?

3. A macro-system for determining the month-to-month and/or year-to-year welfare of farms, manors, baronies, kingdoms, empires, etc. Each such organization gets some stats based on imports and exports, education of populace, economic system, tax burden, etc. and then a couple of quick dice rolls tell you how that time period fared.

4. Hooks to an OGL mass combat system, like maybe Eden's forthcoming Fields of Blood. Include a really small stripped down version and indicate compatibility with the larger product. Integrate these rules into #3 above and add a macro-resolution for completing a war with a single die roll.

5. Some perspective on bribing and the value of money to different people. If I bribe some street urchin with a whole gold piece I expect his eyes to darn well pop out of his head in excitement as he trips over his feet to do whatever I ask. Most DM's don't react this way due to the hyperinflated adventurer economy. "Only 50 gold? Yawn. Better make it 100."

6. Alternatives to coin. I'd wager that the amount of gold flowing around freely in D&D is way more than the entire amount of gold that exists on Earth. As such, the value should plummet. How else can characters acquire and store wealth? What kind of banking system might exist? How might a feudal lord reward adventurers for successfully rendering services to him?

7. Magic economy. What are some options for how characters can buy and sell magic items, accounting for different DM preferences? Commission based deal-brokers? Black market only? Seeding inquiries among the elite? Seeking out a reclusive wizard and bartering services for magic and vice versa?

I think that there is a lot of potential. You could almost create an entire new game out of this where you run holdings and send your men off to fight and trade for you to increase your power, and it could seemlessly scale from the lowly manor estate all the way up to Empire as your campaign progresses and becomes more epic in scope. Kind of like the Civilization computer game for d20. If a product like this truly met it's full potential, I wouldn't be surprised to see it doing well in the market, but what do I know?

The synergies between the various topics have lots of potential and I think it could kick serious booty!

 

[kenjib]

3. A macro-system for determining the month-to-month and/or year-to-year welfare of farms, manors, baronies, kingdoms, empires, etc. Each such organization gets some stats based on imports and exports, education of populace, economic system, tax burden, etc. and then a couple of quick dice rolls tell you how that time period fared.

I forgot to also factor in something to account for the leader's competence. Perhaps knowledge (administration), diplomacy, or something else similar. Have to figure out how to deal with councils and senates though.

 

[Shadowdancer]

I would be very interested in such a product if it also included rules for establishing and running a fief.

 

[Number47]

I buy almost nothing outside the core books. I like my homebrew. A product like kenjib detailed, that would help me set up my homebrew and have "real" events happen over time with just a few dice rolls would save me a lot of effort in an area that I'm not too knowledgable, especially if the whole mechanics of it is invisible to the players. If a product come out like that, I will probably buy, no matter the cost.

 

[Saeviomagy]

SOME of those things, I think, would be good.

Specifically some way of indicating wealth level that ISN'T merely a ludicrous count of gold pieces.

Specifically I'm thinking of d20 modern's wealth mechanics, which (with minor modifications to the profession skill and wealth gaining - ie changing them to a 'per wealth-gaining event' model rather than 'per level') work not-too-badly. Specify that your profession is managing an estate, or trading etc, and you're set.

I don't think that creating mechanics for price fluctuations is necessary. I don't particularly want to spend my time in game playing accountant (which is the reason I like the wealth mechanic - no adding up large numbers). I'd much rather let something like a profession roll handle that. Possibly with some easily understandable little modifiers (like the DM telling me that if I take the heavily bandit-infested route, I'll get a +4 to the check, but with obvious consequences).

As a DM, something like:
http://www.io.com/~sjohn/demog.htm
would be fantastic. Lots of maths, but you only have to do them once for your kingdom and you're set. Realistic populations, services within areas etc, all at your fingertips. Expansions for fantasy topics (ie - listings for magically-enhanced cropland population support, intakes for non-humans etc) would be great additions.

 

[Herremann the Wise]

This is something I was contemplating the other day so I suppose I'd have to say yes to the question of whether I'd be interested in such a resource.

Some Thoughts

However, I suppose the idea of economics in a fantasy game can be abused by both players and DMs to the detriment of the campaign. An explanation:

- The fundamental concept in 3rd Ed. D&D is that the average worker gets 1sp per day. Depending upon taxation, such a person would earn between 20 and 36gp a year. This is a good concept to ground things upon in terms of relativity.

- However, where the abuse comes in is that in most campaigns, adventurers would be averaging this amount per day if not much more. As such, the whole concept of relativity pretty much goes out the window. In the end, you have players totally divorced from the real campaign world economics.

- As such, it comes down to the player feeling good that he has got a bargain price, or bad because they got ripped off or neutral because things went by the book. Normally, players don't want to see behind the veil and the enormous but invisible economic engine determining their purchase price.

- However, the DM can also abuse this by being radically inconsistent with their pricing policies. Sometimes sticking to the standard book price is the best way of making sure the DM does not get too inventive and the players remain happy that their goals (I need 600gp for that beautiful...) are not changed indiscriminantly.

- A Forgotten Point: I'm sure most of the older people here would not forget this but too often people forget the most basic concept of buying and selling: Buy low, sell high. On several occasions, I've had players telling me that a perfectly new Chain Shirt that they want to sell should get book price - 100gp. Umm... No. I don't care if it has been freshly constructed by the local armorsmith. Some merchant is not going to pay 100gp for a Chain Shirt only to sell it for the market price of... 100gp. If they know they can sell it for 100gp, they'll try and buy it for much less than this - 60gp or there abouts (this depends upon a variety of factors).

However, a good general rule from the merchants perspective is:
Common Item: About 10% profit
Uncommon Item: About 10 to 25% profit
Rare or Selective Item: About 25 to 100% profit
Very Rare Item: Up to 300% profit
Artifact: If you need to ask how much it costs, it's too expensive for you.

The main thrust behind this is making it realistic.

- Appraise Skill:
Always remember that a Merchant has the Appraise Skill raised to the gahutza. Rarely will the PC's be on par or better than the merchant. However, it is good that sometimes a merchant wants an item quite desperately and will raise their offer to match this. I find this a much more palatable explanation of a poor Appraise skill check rather than they couldn't price a regular item within 10%. Again, it all depends upon interpretation. Bluff and Sense Motive should also be treated accordingly.

Some Further Ideas

I think the base price for goods and services is pretty good, as set out in the PH and A&E. However, the following factors are worth considering:

- The Campaign World has:
- Low or very High Magic (Making some items worth more or less)
- Low or High availability of Metal.
- Low or High Merchant Competition (Cheaper in Larger Populations).
- Low or High view of Craftspeople (Fabricated items cost more or less).

What you could do is have a base list and then have several lists after it with these considerations taken into account - spreadsheet format. This would make a quick price base easy to work out for the DM. It also allows the DM to see a good range of possible prices for an item.

Once you have a base price to work off, you can then vary it further as required by skill checks and other varying factors.

However, while this is all very interesting and provides a myriad of amazing variables to use and abuse, you must remember that the players are still only going to have one of three possible reactions to it (good, neutral or bad). Under these circumstances, sometimes the effort just does not seem worth it. In most situations, playing it on the fly without even rolling is perhaps the best solution. Go with what ever mood takes you. If you need a cantankerous encounter to spice the game up, do it, otherwise let the players make the purchase and get on with the game.

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise