Your best superpower will be being hated by both your GM and your fellow players. Other than that, I can honestly see no real reason to play the "rich kid".
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Just a suggestion, you may want to change the second one to "Miserly". It has a wildly different meaning than misery.
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Can ducks even wear rouge? I'd expect there would be a reaction of some kind.
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Just a suggestion, you may want to change the second one to "Miserly". It has a wildly different meaning than misery.Typo, good catch. I just don't know if this sort of mechanic can work, I think the base character would have to weak.
Just think of how the cartoon character actually was. Sure he had tons of money, but he absolutely hated spending it. If you focus on making more money, also focus on spending less. Maybe equip yourself with the absolute minimum you need to get by. You'll have a vault full of gold you can swim in in no time.
Scrooge McDuck started out poor, but learned to work smart, not hard. One of his "Lackys" was Gyro Gearloose. An inventor who almost never adventured himself. I think the OP is thinking of a self made businessman who made the fortune the hard way, while others were learning to swing a sword or cast cantrips.
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The "Merchant Prince" prestige class from the 3.5 Forgotten Realms is what you're looking for.
A bit complicated as you have to "buy in" a whole new subsystem of rule... better to figure out the max gold for a "money optmized" Merchant Prince then just provide an "additional gold per level" class feature perhaps....
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To me, there is a vast difference between being frugal and being miserly.
A frugal individual spends on what is needed (but spends no more than is needed), generally knows the value of whatever is being bought, but - most importantly - will not ignore the important things to save money. I think a frugal individual can enjoy money without being so in love with it that important things (and people) are ignored.
A miserly individual spends reluctantly and less than is needed. The miser loves money in and of itself and is willing to let morals slide to get more or to keep what is there. The miser certainly knows the value on what is being bought, but is willing to ignore important things to save money. The nature of a miser is that greed is good.
I consider Scrooge McDuck on the frugal end. He will spend money on friends and family. He makes sure people get a fair pay for their work. He enjoys money but does not love it - he loves people, as is shown by how he treats his grand nephews. He may be brusk and business-like but under all that, he's basically a good person. This is in contrast to Flinheart Glomgold who I think is much more of a miser.
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Note (particularly) to the naysayers present: This is not a new idea - DARK SUN had the Trader as a type of Rogue who possessed mercantile skills, AL-QADIM had a Merchant-Rogue kit (think Sallah from Indiana Jones) whose special benefits were the ability to buy in bulk ("You say we'll need how many flasks of alchemist's fire? I can get it for us wholesale!") and the ability to establish and profit from their own (mostly self-operating) businesses, 3.0's ROKUGAN conversion had the Courtier class, who received a small stipend of free extra gold with every level, 3.5 DRAGONLANCE introduced a Master class that was basically the Expert NPC class promoted to the level of a PC class, and let's not forget EBERRON's Artificer!
Regarding the "Miserly" thing: I understand you're trying to make the class's surplus wealth self-contained to prevent bickering or somesuch, but I question how necessary that actually is - there's nothing wrong with a character who has the ability to do the party added financial favor; in addition to the above examples, think of examples from other games, like Corporates and Fixers from CYBERPUNK, Barbarians with the Find Potion/Find Item skills from Diablo II, or Storm Knights from Nippon Tech with the Business skill in TORG (another thing we learn from TORG is that PCs can vary WILDLY in material wealth and even in their ability to acquire/hold onto/utilize/go without/comprehend it, and it turns out it's not so bad, though admittedly, that can have more or less or different kind of impact in different games - still, how problematic is it for the Superfriends and Avengers that Batman and Iron Man are partially this character? It's mostly just a source for jokes - "No Clark - you can't borrow my pirate ship!"). Heck, 1st Edition Assassins received special commissions for accepting contracts on people (which may even have been necessary for their class advancement). Getting back to your character concept: I thought a lot about something like this back when I was speculating on new classes for World of Warcraft (before the rising tide of sleaze and banality finally drove me out). Imagine a Numismatism class feature whereby you could pore over treasure hoards with a special Appraise check and discover that, due to discovering rare coins, unusually high precious metal content, and whatever other features of treasure that might amplify the value of treasure in the setting yet still go unrecognized by most, you are able to effectively say, "this treasure hoard/valuable item/bag of gold we were just awarded may look like X thousand gp, but it turns out it's worth...*rolls dice*...15% MORE than that!" Another idea would be the ability to call in favors (as the true aristocracy knows, it's not about money, it's about connections), including "You know that wonderful sword we keep in the family vaults? The one Great-Uncle Archibald received for services rendered the Padishah-Emperor of Calormen in his day? He did always say I was his favorite. I should like to borrow it, just for a month, no more...." As the character gained levels, they could also attract one or more warrior bodyguards/priestly vicars/roguish henchmen/wizardly counselors similar to an adulterated Leadership ability (they may require regular salaries subtracted from the character's normal bonus wealth, especially if the character should opt for more such retainers rather than fewer). A Mount, Animal Companion, or even something stranger (no doubt depending on PC background/race/alignment/possible Archetypes for this class) would also make perfect sense.