I have built upon my ideas of trying to figure out how productive the free city arena is by trying to figure out how much gold my player who is about to open a old collapsed mine in Diamond Lake, might make. I looked up Iron Ore purities (although I fudged the bog ore, but I love the idea of mining Iron both below Diamond Lake and at the Swamps, it extends the setting). I further looked at the price rate in the players handbook between the weight of mostly steel weapons/armor and their price. I also tried to figure out wages, additional costs, and a resonable amount of wealth being made off the mines. It seems that the mine managers are wealthy but not just vastly so, at least in comparrison to high level adventurers and other powerful Free City Merchants.
So here it goes. Please tell me what you think.
Economics of mining in the Greyhawk area:
Dagger – Cost: 2gp, Weight: 1/2 lb Iron, 4gp per pound
Short Sword – Cost: 10gp, Weight: 3 lbs Iron 3gp per pound
Long Sword – Cost: 15gp, Weight: 4 lbs Iron 4gp per pound
Small Steel Shield – Cost: 9gp, Weight: 6 lbs 1gp+5sp pound
Large Steel Shield – Cost: 20gp, Weight: 15 lbs 1gp+5sp pound
I decided upon a rough estimate of 1sp+3cp per pound for the price of Iron that blacksmiths of the guild pay in the free city. Independent smiths, and those in smaller towns would of course pay much more.
1sp+3cp per pound Iron price means that for a blacksmith to make say 8sp per day (higher lifestyle than most artisans) they would have to produce and sell a dagger a day. Of course there would be guild fees, costs of hiring/boarding less skilled smiths/apprentices, and just the higher cost of living being in the big city and all, so most likely a Free City blacksmith would need much more than 8sp per day. But I digress.
1sp+3cp per pound - Price of Iron Ingots to a blacksmith of the Guild in the Free City
1sp per pound - Price paid for Iron Ingots by the Blacksmith’s Guild of the Free city
1cp per pound – Transportation cost of Iron Ingots from Diamond Lake to the Free City
5cp per lb – The rate per Ingot lb for ore refinement at the Diamond Lake Smelter (roughly half the profits, the backdrop did say that Vulgan Durtch is one of the richest men in the whole town, and of course he has expensive fees, licenses, and employees to pay).
1cp per 100lbs – Transportation cost from the mine head to the Smelter
5lbs x (Str+Con) – The number of pounds of Ore an average miner can mine per day. I just came up with this number but it seemed resonable, if even a little high, considering the amount of work it would take to get impure or extraneous rock out from around a purer vein of ore.
The Purities of Ore found in Diamond Lake:
Magnetite or Loadstone – A blackish, magnetic ore – 72% Iron
Very Rare, only accounting for 5% of all ore deposits
Hematite or Silverock – A reddish ore that can be polished to a
silver – 70% iron
Uncommon, accounting for 25% of all ore deposits
Siderite or Ogre Gold – A brownish crystalline ore – 48% Iron
Common, accounting for 60% of all ore deposits
Limonite or Bog Iron – A yellow-brown ore found in the swamps -
25% Iron
Uncommon, accounting for 10% of all ore deposits
Of course it is hard to get a pure ore so each pound of ore is actually only ½ ore and the other ½ other impurities.
So 1 regular human worker can mine 100lbs of ore, which on average is Siderite. Of that 100lbs only 50lbs is actual siderite which will in turn produce 24lbs of Pig Iron
Workers are paid 3sp per day on average.
So the avg. mine makes after wages, smelting and transport costs – 9 sp per miner/day
Minus from that the costs of hiring guards (average 1 per 10 miners or 1sp per miner/day)
And the cost of scribes, mine upkeep, and equipment (1sp per miner/day)
And the average mine manager is making a profit of 7sp per miner/day
Minus from this the 500gp yearly fees for registering as a mine manager. This is something I made up for my players. It seemed resonable though.
Minus from this the 300gp yearly property tax on the mine.
So:
20 miners working (with 4 weeks off a year) 280 days a year produce 3,000gp in profit
Take from this 33% in taxes from the Free City and Diamond Lake, and the average mine manager is making 2,000gp per year in profit from a mine that employs 20 miners.
A mine owner that owned 5 mines might make 10,000gp per year (think Smenk) or possible even more, especially if you upper the miner/mine ratio, as fees are based upon single mines not how many are working them.
What do you think? I am crazy or what?
Wow.
Looks good... consider it swiped with attribution ;)
I might add in some percentage die rolls to emulate unforseen costs or benefits over a period of time, such as a shaft collapsing, discovery of a vein, or the dreaded strike. Each would add or subtract a certain amount of gp each time; here's an example.
01-50: Tax hike, subtract 100gp from earnings.
50-74: Mineral Vein discovered, add 2000 gp to earnings.
75-90: Shaft collapse, spend 1000gp on repairs and new workers.
91-00: Gem deposit unearthed, add 3000gp in gems and 1000gp in coins to your earnings this period.
Thanks. Yah a quick little table covering extra costs or bonuses would be nice. I would make characters roll Profession (mining) checks to follow veins in the rock and find suitable sites for ore mining. You could also make a quick table to figure out how much of each type of ore is present, percentage wise, in a mine.
Thank you so much for the thought and effort you put in to come up with these numbers. My party just finished slaying Ilthane and the mayor decided to award them with one of Smenks mines. I had no idea what to do about the profits and other things your ideas were a godsent.
Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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Nice work. I put together some rules together for a campaign a few years ago that were similar. The characters decided to get the mine running in the bottom of the Forge of Fury.
IIRC, one source I referenced was the Complete Dwarves Handbook from 2e. It wasn't stellar, but you may find something of use if you have a copy lying around.
I am thinking of adding the mine in the MM4.
The Dwarves dig down into the mine and cut the adventurers
in on the mithral, if they evict the monsters.
The adventurers are already 16th level so I'm thinking Drugar
or Drow. Something with levels.