Adventurers are neccessary to balance the economy of Golarion. And disrupt the class structure.


Lost Omens Campaign Setting General Discussion

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At the risk of sounding nitpicky, deadman, I would remove land from your example. Land can often be worked, and crops can be grown from it. A landowner can also charge rent for living on his or her land. Land can create an income. A cube of force, not so much.

-Matt

Liberty's Edge

Mattastrophic wrote:

At the risk of sounding nitpicky, deadman, I would remove land from your example. Land can often be worked, and crops can be grown from it. A landowner can also charge rent for living on his or her land. Land can create an income. A cube of force, not so much.

-Matt

Actually...I disagree. Most magic items adventurers possess are a large part (at least cumulatively) of why they can take on the foes they do and thus make more money. So...they, too, can and are used to make money.


Mattastrophic wrote:
Captain K. wrote:
PCs have an incredible amount of money. Or at least they should have.

This is a major assumption that you are making here. The thing is... PCs, by and large, don't have very much money. They have magic items.

Just as I can't lug my television down to the grocery store and buy some yoghurt, PCs aren't really able to take their magic girdles and vestments down to the town square and buy some lettuce.

That's what pawnshops are for. Question is: Does your world have pawnshops that specialize in magic?

Mattastrophic wrote:


Conversely, the idea that magic items are freely bought and sold is ludicrous. How much effort would it take for the owner of an apparatus of kwalish to find someone willing to pay him 90,000 gold pieces in coin? How difficult would it be for a player character to find the exact apparatus he is looking for in the exact color he finds pleasing, just sitting on a shelf to be sold?

That would be like trying to go to 7-Eleven to purchase a fighter jet. "I'll take that F-14 over there on Aisle 2, in periwinkle blue please. And a Slurpee."
{. . .}

Not 7-Eleven, but if your world has the magical equivalent of Carmax, you're good to go. Except Carmax actually gives a lot better deal than you'd expect in a fantasy world -- at least for buying stuff from you.


I admit I don't go by the buy/sell guidelines you need to make a haggling check that determines how good a deal you get. 100% markup is the worst you can buy if you aren't good at it or are dealing with a very skilled merchant best you can get is 13% over cost of creation so 113-200% of the cost of building it or if your selling it 100-20%. E.g if an item costs 1000 GP to make you can buy it for 1,130 to 2,000 and sell it for 200-1,000 unless its special in some way. That is a merchant wont buy the item from you unless they expect to make a profit on it so your generic +1 sword will never be bought for more than wholsale value because that's what they'd pay to get a new one made. On the other hand a valuable ancient vase that cost 100GP to make may sell for ten times that because its value lies in the fact the culture which made is gone now and its an irreplaceable antique (I include artwork and other items in my treasure piles so you wont just get X Coinage you'll get X coinage, X magic items and X artwork like a pearl encrusted eye patch or a nice painting or a sword made for a king. Utterly useless in combat but an exqisite work of crafmanship).

Sounds like the downtime rules are worth investing in for the smart adventurer "I've a bit of gold left over I"ll buy that inn, village, title of nobility" depending on what level they are.


Magic items are like land in that they're an illiquid asset that can potentially provide an income, but you can reasonably likely to be able to use land as a guarantee against a loan. OTOH, few merchants are going to lend an adventurer 2000gp cash on the promise that your +2 shortsword is more than that so you're good for it.

Similarly, pawnshops are a perfect place to handle magic items, and they're terrible for handling land.


Mudfoot wrote:

Magic items are like land in that they're an illiquid asset that can potentially provide an income, but you can reasonably likely to be able to use land as a guarantee against a loan. OTOH, few merchants are going to lend an adventurer 2000gp cash on the promise that your +2 shortsword is more than that so you're good for it.

Similarly, pawnshops are a perfect place to handle magic items, and they're terrible for handling land.

Except that damn near every PC has a pile of stuff to sell on hand at any given moment, unless he's just sold it all to buy the next upgrade, in which case he's probably on his way off to the next adventure.

Sure, he'd have trouble borrowing money, but he doesn't need to since the income comes much faster.

It's not like being land-poor, since that's essentially the case where you've got land but it's not producing enough income - and probably already mortgaged to the hilt. At least for PCs, the investment in gear is guaranteed to produce income (or death, in which case who cares).


thejeff wrote:
Mudfoot wrote:

Magic items are like land in that they're an illiquid asset that can potentially provide an income, but you can reasonably likely to be able to use land as a guarantee against a loan. OTOH, few merchants are going to lend an adventurer 2000gp cash on the promise that your +2 shortsword is more than that so you're good for it.

Similarly, pawnshops are a perfect place to handle magic items, and they're terrible for handling land.

Except that damn near every PC has a pile of stuff to sell on hand at any given moment, unless he's just sold it all to buy the next upgrade, in which case he's probably on his way off to the next adventure.

Sure, he'd have trouble borrowing money, but he doesn't need to since the income comes much faster.

It's not like being land-poor, since that's essentially the case where you've got land but it's not producing enough income - and probably already mortgaged to the hilt. At least for PCs, the investment in gear is guaranteed to produce income (or death, in which case who cares).

Well from an economic standpoint we do care since we are looking at over all investment across all outcomes.

Adventuring is like gambling, it is a high risk short term investment pool that either pays really well, or really poorly.

Those that stand on the side and take the steady but boring investment strategy (sell to adventurers) have a lower return rate but generally have less chance of things going sideways.

Also PC's aren't always adventurers which I feel is an important part to remember.

CSB: Many of my PCs would never call themselves adventurers or anything of the like -- they aren't on quests, and what not. In their minds and actions they are just taking care of something now.

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