|
So the PCs decided that they would like to buy up surplus crops in asorted areas and create artificial shortages to bring down some guilds, starve out some communities ect...but there is no real measure of how much is produced by any farming district, and other than applying some minor rate of productivity like 12 bushels of wheat (50lb grain/bushel) per acre (1cp x 50lb x 12 bushels x #acres)...the info has to be seriously dug out of the available background info.
Any descent economic Data?
Do you really want or need that the level of detail? Could you describe the effects their actions have on the local markets in general terms and charge them for their purchases? What are they planning to do with the stored food? Have they taken precautions against vermin and mold? What about the tithe to the local lord? Also it seems to me that certain "concerned" citizens are going to take an interest in someone trying to undermine the local markets.
Does the local thieves’ guild get a piece of the action? They might be running a protection racket of some sort. Will the guilds you mention stand idly by? Surely they have political connections with the local nobility and the resources to sort out the problem. The whole point of medieval guilds was to set standards for the market and bring a measure of economic stability for the betterment of their members. Are the local towns going to take kindly to being starved out? Nothing like an angry mob. Maybe they should recruit some adventurers to solve the problem.
What about the powers of good and order...local lords, temples, knightly orders. They might not take kindly to such acts, if they bring misery to their people. Some ancient governments would buy up and store surpluses for times of draught and famine. What if these stocks were released to the public?
Just a few thoughts.
|
|
Some group you got there.
QFT.
Dungeons & Dragons not Accounting & Agriculture.I would be sleeping through the sessions with that stuff going on.
Just have a plague of vermin eat the stores, maybe those Moon mice thingys from MM2 to add a bit of interest. Maybe the local thieves guild burns the supplies to cause havoc. An enemy of the PCs decides to poison the supply. A group of adventurers comes to right the wrongs. Ankegs burrow up into the supply from below and start a colony around the now abundant food source, wreaking havoc on the area and drawing monstrous vermin to the vicinity.
Yeah, that's badwrongfun, don't let them get away with that!
Seriously, though, don't stifle their creativity. It might be a bumpy road (some of those guilds might think that paying a killer might be cheaper than paying for their corn), and they might not be the most celebrated characters in town after that stunt, but you should not piddle in their soup.
But unless you really like details like that, you should indeed more or less handwave it. Don't bore them to death with how many bushels or rice have recently fallen over in their silos or anything, just figure out some numbers for the profits they make.
And chalk them all up one for Greed - you're supposed to keep track of that stuff, anyway. I'm not against letting them feel the consequences, after all. Just don't punish them unduly because they're not sticking to the battlemat or anything.
|
|
Well How pertinant do you think it is? That little farming district in the Skinsaw Murders is 64 Acres of Farmland (About half under grain crop) so about 6 Tons of Grain...That should be enough grain to meet the needs of 21 families for a year.
What community do you think is going to starve if The farmers in that little district all get scarecrowed?
I wouldn't numbercrunch here, because it will put attention on D&D's economics, and they are riddled full of illogic so you really don't want to do that. You risk getting suckered into fixing the economics, which is practically impossible without rewriting everything.
It'd be better, if you feel the need for mechanics, to do a simple and highly abstract system that doesn't involve bushels of anything. I'd maybe draw up a table involving categories of "number of farms controlled" and cross-referenced with an appropriate skill roll, and allow rolls on that table at some fairly long interval, maybe monthly. I'd probably add a "someone objects" probability here as well, and then come up with an appropriate force to be objecting, if it comes up.
You'll also want to ask yourself whether this is the game you want to be running, and talk to the players if it isn't. The printed material has next to no support for economic plotlines, and it's likely to be a lot of work for you. I think the game works best if both GM and players are enjoying themselves.
Mary
|
|
Perhaps you are right...Manipulation of the economy is morelikely to be used by a villain so perhaps some basic demographics might be better. Plotting the network interconnection of tradegoods and wealth of your super-economy is more a campaign development level toy for DMs.
Guess I better Go burn my copy of the Domesday Book.
|
Perhaps you are right...Manipulation of the economy is morelikely to be used by a villain so perhaps some basic demographics might be better. Plotting the network interconnection of tradegoods and wealth of your super-economy is more a campaign development level toy for DMs.
Guess I better Go burn my copy of the Domesday Book.
depending on the PCs background wealth trough trade goods can be a very viable ambition (see the book series mentioned above) but also be aware that Magimar is watching, and full of professional merchants who this kind of buyouts for a living. They might not want a competitor in the little outlet of sandpoint who can work undisturbed due to being further away. You might be able to pull it off once the PCs have Fort Rannak, but before that the grain is easy to burn/poison in the fields, or burn/steal on the way to wherever the PCs are storing it. Plus the capitol to buy the grain, buy the wagons to haul said grain, rent the storage area (if before they have the fort) hire workers.. any of these things could be attacked. and I bet the Scanarni (or however you spell them) would take offense to this happening in their territory.
Of course it's villainy. Their alignment might have to shift (more) towards evil, and if you track their sins (as you're supposed to do in RotRL), they all get an extra helping of greed, as I said already.
If you don't want evil characters, you can tell them that this sort of behaviour is evil and reject it on grounds of alignment restrictions (which is perfectly acceptable).
But, again, don't reject it merely because it's not in their class descriptions.
Yellowdingo what level is your group? I only ask because a lower level party is going to have a rough time affording an operation of that scope unless they are just fantastically wealthy which is going to break down any campaign ('we'll just hire a few thousand mercenaries to go to Fort Rannick'...etc).
It is always a bit frustrating when players push the limits like this. As Kaeyoss said you don't want to stifle their creativity (this is certainly that), but you also have a story to tell and it is a bit crummy to have them go left at every right turn out of willful spite. Additionally if you are running a campaign for evil characters this is well within the diabolical realm of their personalities...and another reason that playing evil parties tends to be a better idea in theory than in practice.
If it was my group I would place realistic limitations (as mentioned above by Brian, KaeYoss, Mary, Kirstov and Selk) on their schemes and see how they reacted. It has been my experience that once a bizarre scheme is laid out with all the horrid consequences (angry mobs, warrants, death marks, huge upkeep costs) that players will most likely back down and choose a lesser more manageable version of their plans.
If they persisted in trying to loop-hole me to death in order to prove that they were in control of the story I'd just talk to them out of game and let them know they were really going down a path that was pushing me towards ludiocide. Definitely not a fun spot to be put in for sure, but it is important for people to realize that DM's like to have fun too.
Re-hashing Macro-Economics 352 in D&D shouldn't be weekend fun :)
|
I think they would have an awfully hard time doing so.
If there are guilds, then likely there are laws regulating who can buy and sell what. So, the PCs go to a farmer and want to buy all of his wheat and offers 10% more than the guild is paying. He smiles and says "sure sounds like a great deal, course I need to see your guild license first." So the PCs go join the guild so they can buy the wheat, but then by being in the guild they must abide to pay X amount per bushel of wheat, based upon the guild report for the day or week.
So they go to the farmer and buy for 10% above guild price. The farmer smiles and tells his farming guild who reports it to the produce guild who cancels the PCs' membership. So the next week when they try to buy from another farmer, the PCs learn they cannot do so. Then they learn they cannot rejoin the guild of a month, and need to pay a fine of 10% above the 10% they paid for the wheat.
Bureaucracy... it's a b!**$, but works... sometimes :)
|
|
Yellowdingo what level is your group?
Low but they pulled together a few hundred Gold pieces and bought up a vital grain harvest at twice the market price, and Lobbed some Phosphor wrapped in wet cloth using slings to torch a few crops that would have threatened their plan to destabilize a certain town...
Re-hashing Macro-Economics 352 in D&D shouldn't be weekend fun :)
But it is!!! Did you know it takes 5 quarry workers 41 years to cut the stone needed to build a small castle (3.0 DMG) effectivly doubling its real cost.
I'd have to agree with Selk. Any PC's that burn crops and manipulate markets are asking for Her Majesty's Royal Noose, if they don't get a pitchfork through the gut first.
Magical Medieval Society, from Expeditious Retreat Press, is a great source for questions like these.
O_o
I guess this is why the OP keeps asking for farm economy rules to be added to the Pathfinder RPG.
He's got some interesting players.
They're not exactly the heroes of Sandpoint are they?
"Now that we've saved your lovely town, we're going to starve some of you to make some extra gold."
Definately a "Dick Move" as Jon Stewart likes to say.
|
|
O_o
I guess this is why the OP keeps asking for farm economy rules to be added to the Pathfinder RPG.
He's got some interesting players.
They're not exactly the heroes of Sandpoint are they?
"Now that we've saved your lovely town, we're going to starve some of you to make some extra gold."
Definately a "Dick Move" as Jon Stewart likes to say.
More like: "How much farmland do ya have? What sort of Yields you getting?"
"Realy? That Much!" Stabs farmer with sword.
Any descent economic Data?
Nope.
But then, you won't find that information in most (if not all) full-fledged campaign worlds, much less one that's been developed through a bunch of modules.
You'll have to make all this up from scratch.