Well as soon as you actually look at the economy you realize the entire system is making wealth from nothing and giving your opinion on what it is worth.
This is exactly what happened during every speculation bubble bust (in fact is the definition of what causes the bubbbles -- people assuming wealth in something that has nothing to back up that assumption).
Isn't there an underlying assumption that the mechanics of the Profession skill describe an easily-implementable method for determining the outcome of Profession-related activities taken as part of a complex, fully-functional international economy, complete with trade routes and serious mercantile concerns?
(I mean, yes, that is the definition of the cause of bubbles, but in this case, the mechanics are detailed in the individual frame so the fact that a larger perspective isn't explicit doesn't mean that the dwarves are magicking up money out of nowhere.)
I'm aware and agree -- I just felt like it was worth the tangent.
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Please note that I cover family in my examples and since each family member is having a lifestyle bought for them they are also having taxes payed for them as well. I would suggest that the tax rate is 2 gp per person per month which means the average tax burden for a family of 5 would be 10 gp. This would mean that the village in my example would be providing 2,000 gp of taxes each month, or 24,000 gp a year in taxes.
This gives us a tax base and something to work with beyond ad hok taxing.
This gives us the means of starting to approach how the aristocracy is getting its gold.
I'd think the meat of taxes in such a setting would come more from land than on a per-person rate, wouldn't it?
And thanks for running through this--it's quite interesting. :)
This is an old thread, but I found it through a link and I want to dot it.
Also, it gives it a bump, which might mean more people read it. Interesting stuff.
I assume the farmer would still be working selling meat and dairy during the winter and thus providing himself with income, but I suppose not every farmer would.
Since the mayor is not an adventurer, the Wealth and resource rules don't have to apply to him. It seems the wealth rules are more to balance combat gear than actually provide a wealth level for NPC's.
One would hope so. Otherwise, as a Castle is worth 1 million, every baron or duke who is owner of a Castle is epic level :).
Same goes with rich merchants who own several fleets of ships, or great landowners. All of them have properties which are worth way beyond the WBL of a 20th level character, and I doubt they cast Wish or Time Stop, or do 10d6 sneak attack or can survive the fiery breath of a red wyrm without much effort.
The WBL is a balancing issue for PC and combat NPC, to make CR system work. Bill Gates or Carlos Slim aren't the highest level guys in the world, just the richest.
"I don't get it, how can merchants ever make money if they always buy things at full price and sell them at half price?"
That's how most of this thread looks to me.
Taxes are levied by however the chancery in charge wishes to squeeze. This is where things like national and rulership alignments come into play. Lawful Evil places don't consider drought a suitable excuse for coming up short.I'd think the meat of taxes in such a setting would come more from land than on a per-person rate, wouldn't it?
And thanks for running through this--it's quite interesting. :)
You had a fire? _ you, pay me...
We miss you Ray Liotta. Don't do any more Statham movies; come back home to the mob...
Since the mayor is not an adventurer, the Wealth and resource rules don't have to apply to him. It seems the wealth rules are more to balance combat gear than actually provide a wealth level for NPC's.One would hope so. Otherwise, as a Castle is worth 1 million, every baron or duke who is owner of a Castle is epic level :).
Same goes with rich merchants who own several fleets of ships, or great landowners. All of them have properties which are worth way beyond the WBL of a 20th level character, and I doubt they cast Wish or Time Stop, or do 10d6 sneak attack or can survive the fiery breath of a red wyrm without much effort.
The WBL is a balancing issue for PC and combat NPC, to make CR system work. Bill Gates or Carlos Slim aren't the highest level guys in the world, just the richest.
I think we're forgetting our Downton Abbey here. Lord Grantham is striding across the estate explaining he's not a great man; his FOREBEARS were. He's merely a steward of their legacy.
Another way to look at the "castle /= to epic adventurer" is the town of Inderwick I'm making for my current homebrew. One whole district, encompassing 3 wards of the town, is called the Citadel and is nothing more than a gigantic castle and keep. Within the walls of this place are a garrison, the lord mayor's estate, a modest university and all the support staff needed for the administration of these functionaries.
Since the Lord Mayor sits in the actual keep like the first mayor and founder for whom the town is named, he must be above mythic level right? No...he's just a 6th level schlubb. But 6 mayors ago, Master Inderwick was a 19th level alchemist who had wheelbarrels full of platinum pieces and diamonds...
Good point, Mark. I'm glad to see this thread back. It was awesome the first time around. I suddenly found myself statting up experts and adepts all over the place...
So I used the game mastery guide's list of NPCs. On that list we find something a bit odd -- the common farmer is listed as level 2 with a profession(farming) skill that has a +9 bonus on it.
So I sat down and did some math -- first I assumed that he would only be farming 3 out of the 4 seasons, winter being a hard time to grow anything. This gave me 13 weeks of the year he wasn't able to work leaving 39 weeks he could work. Taking an average roll of 10 for his profession check and not assuming masterwork tools we find that on the weeks he can work the farmer will make 351gp. Now assuming he's not just being lazy on the other 13 weeks instead working as unskilled labor he'll make an additional 9.1gp from those weeks making him a total of 360.1gp. He needs 120 to live an average lifestyle for the year which would leave him 240.1gp.
But lets look just a bit farther than just the farmer -- after all he probably has a wife and kids. If the wife also lives an 'average' lifestyle she's going to cost an additional 120gp. The kids probably won't live that well -- after all they have to share rooms, don't have as much spending money and such -- I would put their lifestyle at a cost of 'poor' which is 3gp a month. Assuming there are 3 kids at that price they are going to run the farmer 9gp a month or 108gp a year. Combined with the price of the wife that's going to take 228gp out of his left over each year leaving 12.1gp for anything he needs.
However his wife probably does some work on the side outside of simply keeping house. Lets treat this as unskilled labor since it's probably going to be fairly hit or miss for the most part (even though it's likely skillful work) assuming she does some of this each day she'll bring in 36.5gp a year, putting the bottom line at 38.6gp a year for the farmer as extra spending cash. This will pay for expensive tools, animals, and the like that will be needed throughout the year plus any savings he hopes to put back for a dowry or whatever.
We can plainly see that...
A good read. This reminds me of the mechanics in Mount and Blade. The villagers will steadily increase in earned wealth, the village will increase in prosperity as long as the taxes aren't too high and bandits/invaders don't rock through, kill all the animals, steal all the wealth and drop everyone back down to extremely poor. The problem is wars and bandits cripple growth if the village is hit; in D&D there are also monster heavy regions that can impact this, but on the plus side the villager might get a level in barb/fighter/ranger if they prevail. Joe the commoner 2 barb 1.
Since the mayor is not an adventurer, the Wealth and resource rules don't have to apply to him. It seems the wealth rules are more to balance combat gear than actually provide a wealth level for NPC's.One would hope so. Otherwise, as a Castle is worth 1 million, every baron or duke who is owner of a Castle is epic level :).
Same goes with rich merchants who own several fleets of ships, or great landowners. All of them have properties which are worth way beyond the WBL of a 20th level character, and I doubt they cast Wish or Time Stop, or do 10d6 sneak attack or can survive the fiery breath of a red wyrm without much effort.
The WBL is a balancing issue for PC and combat NPC, to make CR system work. Bill Gates or Carlos Slim aren't the highest level guys in the world, just the richest.
I think we're forgetting our Downton Abbey here. Lord Grantham is striding across the estate explaining he's not a great man; his FOREBEARS were. He's merely a steward of their legacy.
Another way to look at the "castle /= to epic adventurer" is the town of Inderwick I'm making for my current homebrew. One whole district, encompassing 3 wards of the town, is called the Citadel and is nothing more than a gigantic castle and keep. Within the walls of this place are a garrison, the lord mayor's estate, a modest university and all the support staff needed for the administration of these functionaries.
Since the Lord Mayor sits in the actual keep like the first mayor and founder for whom the town is named, he must be above mythic level right? No...he's just a 6th level schlubb. But 6 mayors ago, Master Inderwick was a 19th level alchemist who had wheelbarrels full of platinum pieces and diamonds...
A good argument for why there are nobility in games.
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This is my favorite thread so far this year.
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Also, for the experts and their jobs, you forgot the entire "expenses" side of the column, especially for the Tavern owner; food and beer dont just magically appear, (mores the pity) unless that owner is also a cleric or mage.
Expenses are covered by the Profession skill roll - while the game uses the term "earn", it would be better described in modern parlance as "pre-tax (gross) profit".
A more detailed ruleset for owning and running a business is certainly possible (see the rules in the 3.x DMG 2), but is beyond the scope of the CRB. I expect Ultimate Campaign later this year will have some nice rules for that sort of thing.
Speaking for myself, I have no desire to play a game where owning a tavern involves accounting for every single expenditure on food, beer, wine, new tables and chairs after a brawl, windows, doors, and the rest. It's one of the things I liked about the DMG2 rules: business expenses were either low, medium or high, profitability was either low, medium or high, business risk was either low, medium or high, and those things (along with a slew of other details, like number of staff and supervisors, what skills the business owner has, and so on) affected the monthly "Profit Roll".
At the end of the day, though, the analysis presented in this thread is a good high-level overview of income for non-adventurers, and shows that even using just the CRB, the basics of economic simulation work well enough to not instantly turn every farmer into a pauper.
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This is an interesting thread, but I detect a few flaws, I think; I could be wrong.
AFAIK:
There are no tools for tavern-owner, much less masterwork.
Likewise, the only "tools" for a barmaid are "T&A" and Im not even going to try and go into how to "masterwork" her body parts on this forum, nor what exactly that would mean (though that could be a fun topic).
Masterwork Tools are an abstraction of whatever you need.
Tavern owners can definitely have masterwork tools, they'll do all of the DIY, they'll clean, they'll re-touch damaged furniture, etc. etc. They also need to transfer barrels into the cellar without any getting broken, have storerooms which don't get infested... covering all of the little bits of kit that will make these things easier with a cost of 50gp doesn't seem unreasonable.
As for the barmaid: pretty girls with a bad attitude don't get tips. There is more to their job than their bodies.
Masterwork tools can cover anything: dancing shoes, bosom-enhancing bodices, herbs and poultices to keep certain problems at bay (if she's also a sex-worker), eye-drops...
Also, for the experts and their jobs, you forgot the entire "expenses" side of the column, especially for the Tavern owner; food and beer dont just magically appear, (mores the pity) unless that owner is also a cleric or mage.
They're already included in the abstract mechanics.
How much you earn after costs is part of your profession check, obviously in game circumstances (like droughts) can affect this but with a stable, 'standard' community the cost of resources is part of the mechanics.
Since the mayor is not an adventurer, the Wealth and resource rules don't have to apply to him. It seems the wealth rules are more to balance combat gear than actually provide a wealth level for NPC's.One would hope so. Otherwise, as a Castle is worth 1 million, every baron or duke who is owner of a Castle is epic level :).
Same goes with rich merchants who own several fleets of ships, or great landowners. All of them have properties which are worth way beyond the WBL of a 20th level character, and I doubt they cast Wish or Time Stop, or do 10d6 sneak attack or can survive the fiery breath of a red wyrm without much effort.
The WBL is a balancing issue for PC and combat NPC, to make CR system work. Bill Gates or Carlos Slim aren't the highest level guys in the world, just the richest.
I think we're forgetting our Downton Abbey here. Lord Grantham is striding across the estate explaining he's not a great man; his FOREBEARS were. He's merely a steward of their legacy.
Another way to look at the "castle /= to epic adventurer" is the town of Inderwick I'm making for my current homebrew. One whole district, encompassing 3 wards of the town, is called the Citadel and is nothing more than a gigantic castle and keep. Within the walls of this place are a garrison, the lord mayor's estate, a modest university and all the support staff needed for the administration of these functionaries.
Since the Lord Mayor sits in the actual keep like the first mayor and founder for whom the town is named, he must be above mythic level right? No...he's just a 6th level schlubb. But 6 mayors ago, Master Inderwick was a 19th level alchemist who had wheelbarrels full of platinum pieces and diamonds...
I don't agree with this view. Bill Gates made his fortune on his own. And he didn't become epic level with a huge Will and Fort save in the process.
Master Inderwick could be a incredibly rich alchemist with wheelbarrles full of diamonds, and be 4th level anyways. The only thing he needed was to buy Tulips when they were cheap and sell them when they were worth more than 1 house.The Wealth By Level is something for PC and combat-encounter NPC. Everybody else can be have higher or lower wealth than his WBL.
This is an interesting thread, but I detect a few flaws, I think; I could be wrong.
AFAIK:
There are no tools for tavern-owner, much less masterwork.
Likewise, the only "tools" for a barmaid are "T&A" and Im not even going to try and go into how to "masterwork" her body parts on this forum, nor what exactly that would mean (though that could be a fun topic)Also, for the experts and their jobs, you forgot the entire "expenses" side of the column, especially for the Tavern owner; food and beer dont just magically appear, (mores the pity) unless that owner is also a cleric or mage.
In the Masterwork tools of Ultimate equiment they give as an example that using certain perfumes might give you +2 diplomacy vs nobles in a given zone. I'm pretty sure than Barmaids that smell well get more tips than Barmaids that don't
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Likewise, the only "tools" for a barmaid are "T&A" and Im not even going to try and go into how to "masterwork" her body parts on this forum, nor what exactly that would mean (though that could be a fun topic)
oink
Dot.
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Likewise, the only "tools" for a barmaid are "T&A" and Im not even going to try and go into how to "masterwork" her body parts on this forum, nor what exactly that would mean (though that could be a fun topic)oink
Masterwork brassiere.
Bump-dot.
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Interesting.
A long time ago I used to play in a system called Chivalry & Sorcery, and if you were a noble (even just a knight) you had to keep track of your land and income. You had a table you had to roll-on for each farm - things like "Bumper Crop" and "Banner Year", and also bad things like "Crop failure". I wish I still had that book - it was a great resource for any game.
Anyhow, you'd have a percentage attached to each of those outcomes, which would adjust the 'average earnings' listed. If you want a little realism you may want to opt for something like that (and you seem pretty-much into realism - kudos for that).
IIRC, each roll would also provide a modifier for the farm next to it - if your crops failed, there's a good chance your neighbor's might to. Entire kingdoms could be 'dominoed' into ruin by this effect.
@T-Mark: that sounds cool but also harsh. I wish I had that level of immersion both by me and my players. The only time there's a crop blight or such in my games it's a plot device.
I just really like the idea of extrapolation on some of the professionals in the towns I make up. I've realized that crafters, despite having guilds and a finished product to sell, generally just break even at cost of living. This might explain why all the wealthy merchants just sell services...
Great thread!
As to the expense of castles and the like under the gold earnings of a level 4-6 NPC...
There are a few things to consider.
1) Accumulated wealth over generations
2) Loans, incremental payments (mortgage)
3) Piecemeal construction--sure a COMPLETE castle costs a huge sum, but how much does it cost to construct a manor, then add some walls partway into the next generation, a tower here, a tower there every decade or so?
4) You're not BUYING the thing, but crafting it, probably, so the cost is lower, and if you're in a position to be building, buying and inhabiting a castle, you probably hold some sway over the lower- and middle-class citizens in your region, meaning you probably can get slightly cheaper work out of them, or use tax revenue to this end.
5) The above is especially true if the castle will serve as a fall-back position of safety for the townsfolk in times of war or invasion, making it a community project.
6) It would be less expensive to hire a caster on retainer than pay per spell.
7) While the system is fairly abstract, one can assume that everyone is not constantly working, especially if they are skilled labor for things like home construction, masonry, etc... which have definite lulls in business, and would welcome the sort of consistent work that a major project like this represents, even for slightly lower wages.
8) It's entirely possible to exceed Wealth By Level, such as by traveling with higher level adventurers, or by getting very lucky. For example, a dragon attacks the town, everyone bands together and defeats it, even though it is well above the CR of the highest level NPC around. Then, the noble goes in search of the dragon's hoard and becomes filthy rich.
9) Conversely, one could have adventured with a group that either died on their adventures, or that died over time. In either case, this person could have been the beneficiary for the accumulated loot, propelling their wealth well beyond their level.
... or, you know, you could rule that a castle isn't exactly a fungible commodity and thus doesn't count. :)
Also, one person with a lyre of building could perform miracles of construction. Or seventh level autocrat with a maxed out CHA score and the leadership feat.
There was a assumption in the original post that bothered me, namely that farmers don't work during winter.
There are still the animals to care for, and for a medieval (or even a modern) farmer hauling feed and water out to the cattle/horses/pigs/chickens in the dead of winter is neither easy nor quick.
Tools are repaired, firewood is chopped, ice is collected for the ice house, etc...and everything is done in the cold, snow, and shorter days of winter.
Winter is NOT a break for farmers.
3) Piecemeal construction--sure a COMPLETE castle costs a huge sum, but how much does it cost to construct a manor, then add some walls partway into the next generation, a tower here, a tower there every decade or so?
A manor will cost 100.000g, which is beyond the WBL of most NPC. And this solution does not take in account those NPC who *DID* bought they castle in their life. Or those merchants who started with few, and built a huge fleet of galleons through the years.
Honestly, it's much easier to just ignore the WBL for NPC's gear out of combat, that using clunky rules and circumventions.
The maximum wealth at lvl 20 is 880.000. Unless you pretend to say that every rich person in the world is epic level (21+), this means nobody can be truly rich.
Crassus, in Rome, was so filthy rich that he had 170 millions of sexterces. His capital went up to 7.100 roman talents of gold(which are about ~235 TONS of gold. The equivalent of 23 million gold pieces or so). I don't think Crassus was a aristocrat 20/fighter 20/cavalier 20/expert 20 character. He was a decent level (7?) aristocrat with a huge bunch of gold.
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There was a assumption in the original post that bothered me, namely that farmers don't work during winter.
There are still the animals to care for, and for a medieval (or even a modern) farmer hauling feed and water out to the cattle/horses/pigs/chickens in the dead of winter is neither easy nor quick.
Tools are repaired, firewood is chopped, ice is collected for the ice house, etc...and everything is done in the cold, snow, and shorter days of winter.
Winter is NOT a break for farmers.
A farmer isn't getting any income off of most of that, however, and that lends credence to the assertion that farmers earn money during the year, then use their stockpiles to see their way through the winter when they are still performing upkeep and not bringing in earnings.
Now, as some people more familiar with farm culture said, there's still money-making work to be done in the winter, and the actual down-period is more like early spring, when the farm is being worked, crops sown, but not much being produced. Whether the low-income period is during the winter months or the spring is irrelevant.
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Mournblade made the poin; WBL can either be PC level or not at all for sedentary NPCs. Mr I you've used the Bill Gates example a couple times; he made his money SOLELY by plying his craft, re-investing and then reaping the fortunes.
NPC and PC adventurers aren't doing that. They're out on the front lines, taking the battle to the dragons and don't spare the time to build a super computer, market and sell it, then strategically work with teams of analysts to grow the profits.
So look at the medieval merchant. While PCs or adventuring NPCs are out there swinging a sword and taking a few quick payoffs in treasure, the merchant is sinking EVERYTHING he has into partial ownership in a galleyon. A few months goes by, he scrapes up the profits, reinvests, and begins slowly buying out his other investors. After a year, the PCs have gained a few levels and have a few thousand to their names. The merchant has been very fortunate and now OWNS his ship outright.
As the next year dawns the merchant is now realizing FULL profit from every voyage. He follows a similar strategy, diversifies into warehouses and landlordship, and by the fall he's sitting on top of a tidy sum. 2 more ships in the harbor are being built for his new "fleet" and as well his new venture into overland trade has taken advantage of all the hard work the heroes have done clearing the wilds of monsters.
Now is the merchant, following the logic of this thread, ever going to amass enough to build a castle? No, probably not. But then you have the fiat that mournblade suggests, where sedentary NPCs don't HAVE to follow WBL if you don't want. So if you WANT the merchant to build a castle or a fleet or whatever, he does.
I see this thread more of a way to justify the numbers of a settlement statblock, not individual wealth.
A farmer isn't getting any income off of most of that, however, and that lends credence to the assertion that farmers earn money during the year, then use their stockpiles to see their way through the winter when they are still performing upkeep and not bringing in earnings.
Now, as some people more familiar with farm culture said, there's still money-making work to be done in the winter, and the actual down-period is more like early spring, when the farm is being worked, crops sown, but not much being produced. Whether the low-income period is during the winter months or the spring is irrelevant.
Most of the year you don't make anything, which is why it's such a boom/bust lifestyle. The profession rolls average out the income. Trust me, work done during winter, mostly maintenance/planning/storing, is just as important to the harvest, i.e money, as work done in the other three seasons. This comes from personal experience. Farmers should get full income for 12 months. Remember, being a free farmer, rather than a tenant, was a relatively well lifestyle back in the day.
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Hello everyone,
First off thanks for the comments and bringing this back up, it is always fun to look back over for me. I would like to clarify some points so that my position on what's going on here is better understood (not that I think it is actually really misunderstood that much):
Part of this exercise was to see if I could justify with an even hand having farmers be actually dirt poor as professionals. IF I could have done that it would have been with what I see as the extreme bias against them that I presented in my original data (the bias being that they can only work 3/4 the year, that their kids would be burdens rather than assets and that the spouse would be unable to contribute much to the income of the family). Even with these rather excessive weights against the farmer we still see that he is well off. Indeed we could even suppose that he's taking 3 months of relative vacation instead of having to not work during that time period, perhaps for pilgrimages or tourism (not so odd for the very vague and imprecise time period we are talking about, consider the Canterbury Tales for a reminder of how common such pilgrimages could be).
Now we can always adjust upward to give the farmer more instead of less. It would be relatively easy to say that some of the family members that are being supported help with craft skills (which I would point have been updated to allow wealth generation at least on the pfd20srd site) or through actual skilled or perhaps handling the tasks the spouse does to allow the spouse to work full time too.
This modernizations of the work force would simply increase the wealth as a whole of the village and the specific families involved as well.
Personally I'm all for this -- I tend to dislike the campaigns where the only thing holding the campaign world together is the PC heroes and where the NPCs are seemingly so incompetent it's implausible that they could continue to live in a world where the fantastic exists.
Speaking of which I feel the very existence of the fantastic in pathfinder points to a well functioning and vibrant existence for most NPCs most of the time if they are going to have been able to actually cultivate civilization.
There are by necessity going to have to be some form of a class of people that handle the fantastic and to some extent the regular NPCs are going to have to be able too as well on a fairly frequent basis -- this is going to by extension require a surplus of goods to cover the costs of doing so and for advancement of civilization as a whole in general as well as in specific.
However these are points I did not really want to address in the original data as they were for later presentation to further reinforce the position that the system as presented works and was not simply a willynilly nothing spun of sugar that fell apart upon any examination.
I'm fairly willing to say that similar examination of higher level play and creatures would show that the supposed 'wish' economy (also the equally dubious claim of high level simply being rocket launcher tag) is based upon biased and misleading positions that fail under actual examination and critique.
However I currently simply do not have the time to put such a hypothesis to test or to actual defend it with vigor when pressed after presenting my conclusions and data (as many people are passionately attached to the opinions that I oppose with such a hypothesis and would rightly try to justify their positions in response to my own report).
Beyond that most of the actual work to dismiss the rumored rocket launcher tag theory is already done on this site by myself and several others already -- if someone were to go through the archives they could probably combined much of the data I helped with (but by no means did all of or even the bulk of) in the beta and such to build a competent argument on the subject if they wanted too. I would suggest starting with the magic archives from beta and looking for the threads where we discuss spell DCs, save throw bonuses, hit points, DPR and then compare the resource costs of each in comparison with each other. Upon such study it should become clear fairly quickly that both the ease of raising save throw bonus compared to spell DCs and DPR compared to Hit points means that for actual killing and combat the mundane method of "hit it repeatedly until it stops twitching twice" works better than spending magical resources for such point, and that the magical resources are better spent reinforcing the mundane methods and handling problems that don't have mundane solutions.
Quite a post Abraham, thanks for returning. You're right, the system actually allows enough wealth generation to account for feudal rent rates. Pretty cool.
Mournblade made the poin; WBL can either be PC level or not at all for sedentary NPCs. Mr I you've used the Bill Gates example a couple times; he made his money SOLELY by plying his craft, re-investing and then reaping the fortunes.
NPC and PC adventurers aren't doing that. They're out on the front lines, taking the battle to the dragons and don't spare the time to build a super computer, market and sell it, then strategically work with teams of analysts to grow the profits.
So look at the medieval merchant. While PCs or adventuring NPCs are out there swinging a sword and taking a few quick payoffs in treasure, the merchant is sinking EVERYTHING he has into partial ownership in a galleyon. A few months goes by, he scrapes up the profits, reinvests, and begins slowly buying out his other investors. After a year, the PCs have gained a few levels and have a few thousand to their names. The merchant has been very fortunate and now OWNS his ship outright.
As the next year dawns the merchant is now realizing FULL profit from every voyage. He follows a similar strategy, diversifies into warehouses and landlordship, and by the fall he's sitting on top of a tidy sum. 2 more ships in the harbor are being built for his new "fleet" and as well his new venture into overland trade has taken advantage of all the hard work the heroes have done clearing the wilds of monsters.
Now is the merchant, following the logic of this thread, ever going to amass enough to build a castle? No, probably not. But then you have the fiat that mournblade suggests, where sedentary NPCs don't HAVE to follow WBL if you don't want. So if you WANT the merchant to build a castle or a fleet or whatever, he does.
I see this thread more of a way to justify the numbers of a settlement statblock, not individual wealth.
In past games some players have got into maritime trade. A lot can be made there, if you can survive pirates, sea-monsters, theft of the boat.
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Now we can always adjust upward to give the farmer more instead of less. It would be relatively easy to say that some of the family members that are being supported help with craft skills (which I would point have been updated to allow wealth generation at least on the pfd20srd site) or through actual skilled or perhaps handling the tasks the spouse does to allow the spouse to work full time too.
An interesting thought for you.
After the black death the average income of the population has increased. Partially because there was a redistribution of the properties and partially because there was a lack of workers proportionally to the needs of the economy.Golarion is similar. The population is very scarce (from empirical data the population density seem to be 1/4 of that of medieval Europe) so the farmers have the possibility to use the best territory while the marginal lands are left unused. That should allow them a higher income than a typical medieval farmer.
Now we can always adjust upward to give the farmer more instead of less. It would be relatively easy to say that some of the family members that are being supported help with craft skills (which I would point have been updated to allow wealth generation at least on the pfd20srd site) or through actual skilled or perhaps handling the tasks the spouse does to allow the spouse to work full time too.An interesting thought for you.
After the black death the average income of the population has increased. Partially because there was a redistribution of the properties and partially because there was a lack of workers proportionally to the needs of the economy.Golarion is similar. The population is very scarce (from empirical data the population density seem to be 1/4 of that of medieval Europe) so the farmers have the possibility to use the best territory while the marginal lands are left unused. That should allow them a higher income than a typical medieval farmer.
Yet something else to consider would be the proportion of good farm land to poor farm land. Does Golarion have more acres of good farm land compared to Europe?
Yet something else to consider would be the proportion of good farm land to poor farm land. Does Golarion have more acres of good farm land compared to Europe?Now we can always adjust upward to give the farmer more instead of less. It would be relatively easy to say that some of the family members that are being supported help with craft skills (which I would point have been updated to allow wealth generation at least on the pfd20srd site) or through actual skilled or perhaps handling the tasks the spouse does to allow the spouse to work full time too.An interesting thought for you.
After the black death the average income of the population has increased. Partially because there was a redistribution of the properties and partially because there was a lack of workers proportionally to the needs of the economy.Golarion is similar. The population is very scarce (from empirical data the population density seem to be 1/4 of that of medieval Europe) so the farmers have the possibility to use the best territory while the marginal lands are left unused. That should allow them a higher income than a typical medieval farmer.
With Dragons / monsters they might have less available farmland of any kind...
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With Dragons / monsters they might have less available farmland of any kind...Yet something else to consider would be the proportion of good farm land to poor farm land. Does Golarion have more acres of good farm land compared to Europe?Now we can always adjust upward to give the farmer more instead of less. It would be relatively easy to say that some of the family members that are being supported help with craft skills (which I would point have been updated to allow wealth generation at least on the pfd20srd site) or through actual skilled or perhaps handling the tasks the spouse does to allow the spouse to work full time too.An interesting thought for you.
After the black death the average income of the population has increased. Partially because there was a redistribution of the properties and partially because there was a lack of workers proportionally to the needs of the economy.Golarion is similar. The population is very scarce (from empirical data the population density seem to be 1/4 of that of medieval Europe) so the farmers have the possibility to use the best territory while the marginal lands are left unused. That should allow them a higher income than a typical medieval farmer.
Dragons actually are unlikely to have a negative influence on farmland (at least true dragons) for a number of reasons:
1. Their preferred environments tend to be the sort that aren't exactly inviting to farming,2. The more they mess with the farming the less wealth there will be to extort.
3. The benefits of lording over a land instead of simply burning through it are substantial, something the smarter dragons (note the ones more likely to be near civilized areas) are likely to realize.
As to other monsters that's actually the next point I want to move on to -- the populations of monsters in specific terrain types and how that could affect civilizations growth.
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Plains (temperate):
Ankheg (CR 3) -- Possibly one of the more common menaces we could expect in pathfinder it is also a fairly weak one. Interestingly enough they are probably more a threat in areas that livestock is the primary selling point instead of crop land as they would be more drawn to livestock than plants. Because of this there is a chance that we would see livestock being primarily a nomadic preoccupation as keeping the animals on the move (and following their natural migratory patterns) would help protect the creatures from having ankheg nests settling in all the time. This would be due to the fact that herd animals typically move fairly fast (general move speed of 40 ft) and the ankheg is rather slow. Ankhegs are ambush predators and not having an exactly pattern of behavior from the animals would help prevent as much successful attacks by the ankheg. Also it's probably less than likely to hunt bison instead of say goats and other small animals since the smaller animals are easier to kill in an ambush and less likely to actually hurt the Ankheg in response to an attack (bison are CR 4).
In fact most of the monsters we see for plains locations are rather low in CR -- the typical CR is 3 with gorgons going up to 8, and they tend to be fairly solitary too (typically 1 but up to 12 individuals are possible) with most simply being examples that we already know humanity has dealt with in the past.
Warm Plains are a bit more varied but tend to the same CR and numbers.
Hills are more dangerous as we see creatures like the Behir, manticore, and phase spider moving in. However we also see more good creatures coming in at this point too with the copper dragon and phoenix showing themselves too. Of course the bulette, athach, and such are more than enough to probably keep people out of the hills for the most part. Though I would suggest that these monsters are probably not that common -- after all if they were knowledge checks to know about them would be much easier. I kind of follow the logic that if higher level characters are rarer it must be because the things that produce higher levels of experience are correspondingly rarer (since more of such creatures would produce higher numbers of higher level characters as otherwise we would have gotten to the point we have with civilization in the game).
Forests are interesting in that on the one hand we have more higher CR creatures and on the other we have more good creatures that have specific fluff saying they work to get rid of evil creatures. If we are to accept that the good tends to balance and check the evil while the neutral 'natural' tends to be left alone I think it's not to hard to accept that in general things are going to be fine here until we get high numbers of people in an area -- which by itself starts to offer its own protection.
Rivers and lakes are interesting in that while we have a range of CRs most of them are water dependent. Meaning that they can either be strung up and killed in through suffocation or simply left alone all together.
In fact we tend to see the more inhospitable the terrain becomes to people and civilization the more the creatures become dangerous and inhospitable too, where as where life would be easier, the creatures tend to not need as many nasty means of staying alive.
Unfortunately craft skills do not translate into earned income in pathfinder and this is quite frankly correct. I did take into account that farmers are still doing stuff during the winter time which is accounted by the unskilled labor rate -- unfortunately they didn't spend their skill points on a second profession, quite likely because they couldn't find a teacher for that profession.
Realize that it could just as easily be the woman out in the fields and the man taking care of the house -- it really doesn't matter which is which. It's highly unlikely that both are going to be available for full time professional work, especially if they are crafting things (eats up a lot of time by the crafting rules even as it saves a lot of money). Crafting could easily be doubling some parts of the family income however that is likely to be seen in ways that would directly appear in the income stream of the family (hidden revenue and good will from the neighbors, perhaps a few cure disease from the priest for donations and what have you).
Again it's not impossible that a 'mature' family will be earning much more than suggested -- if you check out the innkeeper you'll notice that he and his daughters are readily raking it in...
The difference isn't the level of skill or quality of work, it's much more time, place, and circumstances -- things that afflict many people the world over even to this day.
I think you are completely mistaking what would be going on during the winter on a farm. Farms would have animals that need taken care of, tools that need fixing or maintaining, buildings that need repair, lots of little things that need to be done, and few daylight hours to do them in. After dark, the family would be gathered near the fire knitting, sewing, whittling (spoons if nothing else), weaving or spinning thread (if they have a loom or spinning wheel), patching clothes or bedding.
Even in the dead of winter, farmers are busy running their farms. If they have extra cloth or yarn they may be making things for sale or trade, but most everything will be to support their family. Even the smallest children will have stuff that is productive to the family to do.
As for that priest, he is more likely to paid in ham than gold or silver or even copper. (No commoner whether farmer, laborer, or craftsman would ever be able to pay off the 150gp cost of a Remove Disease.)
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...and again I point out most of what you are saying about winter activities are things that don't make income. Repairs don't, and crafts (at the time) didn't either (and as you pointed out are more likely to be for internal use so wouldn't factor into profit margins directly).
Also again I point out that the point of the initial exercise was to stack against the farmer as much as possible while still being 'reasonable' -- if the farmer can actually farm for most the year and we count each person as productive then we see that the farmer is going to be far from being poor.
If each of the 5 kids is being actively productive as well as the spouse and the farmer for the entire year 150gp for a single remove disease would actually be rather easy. However far easier would be paying for someone to use the heal skill to give a +4 bonus on the save throw which will probably cover the needs of the family much easier.
In fact anti-plague at 50gp a dose and a doctor would be +9 on the save at 51gp and will cover most diseases at only 102gp total (this being 2 saves to cure).
Also perhaps ironically this method is actually preferable since the doctor is likely to be at minimum +6 (and much more likely to be around +10) on his check against the disease to give his bonus and the anti-plague is guaranteed on its bonus compared to the remove disease's meager +5 against the disease's DC (as it requires a caster level check to work). Heck the doctor is even going to help make sure your family member isn't going to get worse since the 2~4 points of ability damage recovered is likely to handle whatever was lost to the disease if the check failed.
Please note that if just the spouse and the farmer worked as professionals the 9 months a year I have them working their total net income for the year would be about 435.2gp a year -- this is after living expenses for the entire family. If we include the 5 children at unskilled rates we'll add in 182.5gp more for a family net income of 617.7gp a year.
Plains (temperate):
Ankheg (CR 3) -- Possibly one of the more common menaces we could expect in pathfinder it is also a fairly weak one. Interestingly enough they are probably more a threat in areas that livestock is the primary selling point instead of crop land as they would be more drawn to livestock than plants. Because of this there is a chance that we would see livestock being primarily a nomadic preoccupation as keeping the animals on the move (and following their natural migratory patterns) would help protect the creatures from having ankheg nests settling in all the time. This would be due to the fact that herd animals typically move fairly fast (general move speed of 40 ft) and the ankheg is rather slow. Ankhegs are ambush predators and not having an exactly pattern of behavior from the animals would help prevent as much successful attacks by the ankheg. Also it's probably less than likely to hunt bison instead of say goats and other small animals since the smaller animals are easier to kill in an ambush and less likely to actually hurt the Ankheg in response to an attack (bison are CR 4).In fact most of the monsters we see for plains locations are rather low in CR -- the typical CR is 3 with gorgons going up to 8, and they tend to be fairly solitary too (typically 1 but up to 12 individuals are possible) with most simply being examples that we already know humanity has dealt with in the past.
Warm Plains are a bit more varied but tend to the same CR and numbers.
Hills are more dangerous as we see creatures like the Behir, manticore, and phase spider moving in. However we also see more good creatures coming in at this point too with the copper dragon and phoenix showing themselves too. Of course the bulette, athach, and such are more than enough to probably keep people out of the hills for the most part. Though I would suggest that these monsters are probably not that common -- after all if they...
Good stuff, nice notes. In my current game the players are making settlements in hills and forested lands safer. Lot of foes in hills.
...and again I point out most of what you are saying about winter activities are things that don't make income. Repairs don't, and crafts (at the time) didn't either (and as you pointed out are more likely to be for internal use so wouldn't factor into profit margins directly).
Also again I point out that the point of the initial exercise was to stack against the farmer as much as possible while still being 'reasonable' -- if the farmer can actually farm for most the year and we count each person as productive then we see that the farmer is going to be far from being poor.
If each of the 5 kids is being actively productive as well as the spouse and the farmer for the entire year 150gp for a single remove disease would actually be rather easy. However far easier would be paying for someone to use the heal skill to give a +4 bonus on the save throw which will probably cover the needs of the family much easier.
In fact anti-plague at 50gp a dose and a doctor would be +9 on the save at 51gp and will cover most diseases at only 102gp total (this being 2 saves to cure).
Also perhaps ironically this method is actually preferable since the doctor is likely to be at minimum +6 (and much more likely to be around +10) on his check against the disease to give his bonus and the anti-plague is guaranteed on its bonus compared to the remove disease's meager +5 against the disease's DC (as it requires a caster level check to work). Heck the doctor is even going to help make sure your family member isn't going to get worse since the 2~4 points of ability damage recovered is likely to handle whatever was lost to the disease if the check failed.
Please note that if just the spouse and the farmer worked as professionals the 9 months a year I have them working their total net income for the year would be about 435.2gp a year -- this is after living expenses for the entire family. If we include the 5 children at unskilled rates we'll add in 182.5gp more for a family net income of 617.7gp a year.
Those things that they are crafting are income. Not cash, the richest farmer on Golorian will have very little cash, but income in that everything they craft for themselves, they don't have to buy or trade for. If I knit a hat, that means I don't have to pay for it. If I have sheep or goats, I can spin the wool into yarn to make the hat. The few coins that a farmer gets, need to be saved for things that he can't make himself or trade for.
Their "net income" isn't in money, is in things, food for their table, skins for leather, wool for yarn, and all the little things that people need to live. If they have a good year, they may have some excess to sell, a yearling cow, or pig, or sheep, and those while "rich" for a farmer, aren't worth much. 10gp for a cow, 3gp for a pig. How long do you think it will take to get an raise an extra 50 pigs to sell for a Remove Disease?
For some historic perspective in the late 18th Century, wheat farmers were getting between 6-8 bushels (32 qts) per acre or 224 qts per acre. So for your farming family you will need about 10 or 11 acres per year. Your farmer also needs to keep 1/3 of his output to be used the next year as seed. So 14-15 acres just for the family, plus what ever is lost to vermin after harvest. One bushel of that size, modern bushels are bigger, would weigh about 50 lbs. From the PRD 1 lb of wheat is worth is 1 cp. That means that an extra acre of land would produce about 3.5 gp. Based off of your 435.2gp income, and counting land need for seed, taxes, etc. Your little farming family is going to need 250 acres of land planted and harvested every year.
Just to share a few points:
Tobacco 5 sp
Cinnamon 1 gp
Pig 3 gp
Sheep 2 gp
Goat 1 gp
Various other spices 5~15 gp
Silk 10 gp
So yes while you can grab the very cheapest thing on the list and show a possibility of what could be what the farming family is selling and how much it could need, that is not the only option.
Please note that the profession check doesn't state what exactly the person does to bring in the wealth (on purpose).
Please note that we didn't even get into more expensive animal raising like horses, donkeys, dogs, falcons, and so forth.
We also aren't covering raising animals for things like familiars for wizards.
So yes if the only thing the family does as farmers is raise the maximum amount of wheat they can possibly profit from and they only get the average yield 6~8 bushels per acre they'll need about 250 acres of land.
However if like most farmers they don't specialize in what makes the lowest yield possible, and they are less than completely efficient they can do just fine for themselves as shown in the original post (and follow ups).
EDIT:
Finally that 435.2gp is again the net income of two farmers -- if you really wanted to factor up the amount of grain needed to take care of the profession checks you would have done gross income (which was 396.6gp for 'just' the farmer working and would be 793.2gp for both the farmer and his wife).
Taxes by the way (as we have already covered) were taken care of with the lifestyle costs. Wastage and such were covered with the profession check by the way:
You can earn half your Profession check result in gold pieces per week of dedicated work. You know how to use the tools of your trade, how to perform the profession's daily tasks, how to supervise helpers, and how to handle common problems. You can also answer questions about your Profession. Basic questions are DC 10, while more complex questions are DC 15 or higher.
Now of course I took 10 just to get the average roll (in fact doing so again shorted the farmer since the actual average is 10.5gp) but this was again just to give his average across the year, for a system that is a general example of commerce.
As we all know the farmer isn't going to actually be bringing in a weekly income -- more than likely he'll see a few big paydays a year and have to stretch those out to cover the rest of the year. This is an example of the system just being an approximation not an actual full blown simulation.
Now the farmer can still pay for the remove disease -- after all trade goods are generally accepted as well as coins are. So would the priest be paid in gp exactly? No. But then again Bill Gates doesn't have however much he is 'worth' in immediate wealth -- that is as we know an approximation of what the total of his assents are worth.
Actually I took your 435.2 gp and determined how many acres they would need for that amount of cash, then added in the amount they needed for food, the amount they needed for seed for the next year, and then taxes (1/3). That 250 acres feeds a family of 6, pays the taxes and provides seed stock for the next year.
If you want to make money off of cattle, you will need a large herd, at several acres per cow (there are too many variables to say better), pigs need less space, but more feed. Any way you look at it, a farm need to be that large no matter what you are raising to come up with the type of cash you are talking about. 45 cows a year means a herd of 100 or so cows, and 3-400 acres of land or more depending upon the quality of grassland and weather and that is just for your net profit at the gross, you will need 250 cows and 750-1000 acres. Note that for that 250 acres of wheat you will need 4-500 acres of land also.
I used Wheat, because they gave a price for it, finding statistics for how much seed is needed, yield, etc. was easy to find on the internet. Some grains are more efficient, some are less. As for it being cheapest, at 3.5 gold per acre, that is at least as good, if not better than cattle. You need two cows, (one cow/calf pair and one maturing calf) to get a cow a year, and unless you have near perfect conditions it will be at least 2 acres per cow, so that is 10 gp per 4 acres as opposed to 14 gp per 4 acres or wheat.