|
2 people marked this as a favorite.
|
I think there is a major balancing issue with Investments.
In Ultimate Campaign.
I can work as a Innkeeper for 2 GPs per day.
Buy/build an Inn for 2130 GP(52 goods, 5 Influence, 47 labor)
Rooms: Bar +10gp, Bath +3gp, Bedroom +3gp, Common Room +7gp, Kitchen +4gp, Lavatory, Lodging +12gp, Stall +9gp, Storefront (+5 capital?) 49gp a year.
Or invest 2000 GP into Tavern, where I could lose money on a failed year or from 20GP to 200GPs at best 10% return on a breakout year.
It seems that it would be better to not spend the gold and just work a job in your off time.
I understand you get the gold back if you want, so long as you don't have 3 failed years in a row. I also understand an innkeeper job might not be open for a 2-5 days of rest wile other party members heal/work on X,Y,Z.
Or if your character works as a bard you can make some good coin at a busy Inn.
|
1 person marked this as a favorite.
|
Yeah, pathfinder economics is pretty screwed up.
Consider investing in addition to working. Every copper has a job to do!
Do all three vertical integration is the way.
Build the farms that provide the barley and grapes for your brewery and winery that you sell at the tavern you work at while investing in tangetical businesses like shipping and milling.
|
1 person marked this as a favorite.
|
Take Gunsmithing feat. Buy a gunsmithing kit. Get 100gp. Make 1,000gp a day in black powder. Sell powder for 500gp. 400gp/day profit.
Wait for GM to ban sales of black powder because it is ruining his game. Because it is.
More seriously, Downtime stuff is a system where you can make pocket change in gold, and a fortune in resources. Find ways to use the resources and it is worth doing. Downtime building and organizations are not worth paying for if you don't want the resources.
And if you want to get rich in Pathfinder, go adventure. That is where the real money is made.
|
1 person marked this as a favorite.
|
The issue is that the workers are getting more coin then the owner, how many burger flippers do you know making more then the CEO?
This does need to be balanced because if I have players that want to invest in something like an inn that they could have free lodging at and also make some side coin it almost seems better to spend the coin on other things then to invest 2000 GP. Or not invest at all and just put 2000 GP in the bank and go retire.
As for the gunsmithing feat, there would be few towns that have the required materials to make black powder and if they did, the city would have their own stock and not need your 2 pounds of it. Might even get you tossed in jail.
Gavin McStine wrote: The issue is that the workers are getting more coin then the owner, how many burger flippers do you know making more then the CEO?
This does need to be balanced because if I have players that want to invest in something like an inn that they could have free lodging at and also make some side coin it almost seems better to spend the coin on other things then to invest 2000 GP. Or not invest at all and just put 2000 GP in the bank and go retire.
As for the gunsmithing feat, there would be few towns that have the required materials to make black powder and if they did, the city would have their own stock and not need your 2 pounds of it. Might even get you tossed in jail.
I mean, if its golarion it generally means you've got alkenstar giving you the side eye.
Yeah, the reason to invest/build would be because you really want a wizard's tower or whatever. It is not a rational investment.
Gavin McStine wrote: The issue is that the workers are getting more coin then the owner, how many burger flippers do you know making more then the CEO? In small food&beverage businesses? Plenty. I know owners that do not pay themselves a salary every month lest they'd drain the bank account dry, sinking the business, hence getting paid less than their employees, especially if you monetise other aspects such as retirement or health insurance.
Yeah, Downtime is really not about profit. That is, unless you're generating Capital instead of GP.
A Level 1/CL 1 spell scroll costs 25 GP; crafting that requires 12.5 GP invested. Using an optional rule and a 3PP feat, you can craft this for 2.5 GP instead by making the scroll from treated birch bark. Using skills, a business, an organization, or a combination of all three, you can spend 1 day to generate 1 or more Magic Capital.
1 Magic Capital requires the PC to spend 50 GP per Capital once it is generates so that the PC can use it as a resource. Once so purchased, 1 magic capital can be used in turn to pay the crafting costs for magic items, up to a value of 100 GP worth of crafting costs/Magic Capital spent.
So, just using the normal rules you can write 8 Level 1/CL 1 spell scrolls for 1 Magic Capital. Using that optional rule, you could write 40 per 1 Magic Capital.
8 Level 1/CL 1 spell scrolls sell for 200 GP. So, for every 50 GP spent, you get 150 GP profit. Not bad.
40 Level 1/CL 1 spell scrolls sell for 1000 GP. So, for every 50 GP spent using the optional scroll writing rules, you get 950 GP profit. That's pretty good.
Downtime's real use is in crafting cheap items, preferably magic items. Using Capital to pay for crafting costs is a way to make those items actually profitable for sale.
If you're not crafting items with your Downtime, the only other reason to have a Business/Organization is to gain bonuses later on your Leadership score. If you're not using THAT... you might as well take the 2GP/day.
|
1 person marked this as a favorite.
|
@ Agenor Ya but most of them also own big bucks to the banks, once those are payed off they generally get more then the employees. Other wise its failing, and not because of pay issues but location location location.
@Mark. Awesome didn't think about leadership score.
Ya I felt that the players should feel rewarded for investing in something. I think that the 2000 GPs to invest/build the inn should at least have some returns before the 5th year. As most businesses, if successful, only make money on their 5th year, and that is with loans/interest. Since the players already have the coin to spend it should be shorter then that.
Also as the GM it means I can give quests to the players that have no GP/Item rewards, but are only a reputation gain.
As for the 2GP per day, that was the lowest job on the list, I think 4 or 5 was the top. In any event I'm still unsure if I should lower the pay to SP instead of GP, or instead of every year, make it every month.
@Tacticslion. Not sure why the "." but it seems to add it to my form post, anything I should know about?
|
1 person marked this as a favorite.
|
Tacticslion is dotting this thread on his account. Having posted in it, the title of thread will now appear to him followed by a dot. It is a way of bookmarking threads one finds interesting to be able to easily reference it later going through one's own paizo forum account.
Go ask the owners of your friendly local game store how much they earn on average per hour worked. It is lower than you believe.
|
1 person marked this as a favorite.
|
Gavin McStine wrote:
@Tacticslion. Not sure why the "." but it seems to add it to my form post, anything I should know about?
Adding a "Dot" post to a thread is a convenient way to bookmark a thread you want to refer to later. At least on this site.
As I've said before in this thread, Downtime stuff generates pocket change unless you use it to buy resources to craft stuff.
The normal rules for making and selling magic items generates zero profit. It costs 50% to make an item, and you sell it to NPCs for 50% so you make nothing from normal magic item creation.
Downtime Rules lets you generate opportunities to purchase Resources. Goods can be used for any sort of item creation. Magic Resources can also be used for any endeavor where magic is involved. While it is a bit of a stretch, some GMs might buy that Labor can be used to hire people to help craft items. Influence...is the ugly step child of resources.
Using the resources your actual gold expenditure to produce a magic item is only 25% of the market price of the item. You earn 5 magic resources, you pay 250gp to get 500 gp's worth of magic resources. You use 5 magic resources to produce a 1,000gp item and you immediately sell it to get 500gp. Boom, 250gp profit.
Also...the downtime system is weird with employees. You only pay to hire Teams. You never once give them a penny after you form them. Apparently teams pay themselves and the income they generate is the profit from their activities. The same with buildings. The biggest joke of the system is a Pit will manage to generate income after you buy one. Mysteriously somebody will move in after you pay to dig a hole and somehow that pit generates income if you just check up on it occasionally. Even if you don't build a team, a Building will somehow run itself and generate income without you doing anything and without a manager. You only need managers to watch things while you are out of town.
|
1 person marked this as a favorite.
|
You go to your pit and find X gold coins worth of salvageable gear from whoever fell into it
|
1 person marked this as a favorite.
|
I always imagine the first time you check up on the Pit after you buy it some hobo wanders up to you and shakes your hand. The next time you visit a different hobo shuffles over to you and hands you a leaf wrapped around a few coins. There are absolutely no signs of what the Pit is being used for, but a different strange and smelly man is there waiting with a few coins in tribute each and every day.
Eventually you come back from being stranded in another dimension for 3 months. You find several hobos bowing to a guy with a patchwork cloak and a box on his head. All of them give you disapproving looks with no sign of recognition.
Rooms and Teams wrote: For a room, the Earnings amount already subtracts the cost of having unskilled employees to do the basic work for you. For example, the Earnings listed for having a Bar already account for the wages of a bartender and servers. For a team, the Earnings amount assumes they are working at a building you own. If you don’t provide a building for the team to work in or from, halve the Earnings for that team. So a Building is made up of Rooms. You build your own Building piecemeal or buy it outright, or whatever. If your PC doesn't have an actual Building, just a pit in the ground they control, it's assumed that there's unskilled laborers working at it but you get half the GP it earns every day.
A pit gets GP +1, or it adds 1 to a skilled check to earn GP. It's assumed that you take 10 most of the time, so let's say that your pit with no building earns you 1.1 GP/day. You end up getting 5 SP, 5 CP/day for just having a Pit room.
What is the pit?
Sure, we can go silly and say people just randomly dump loose change in it or whatever. More seriously though, the Room is a simulation of any 1-5 square pit area that could possibly earn coin.
Might be a lye pit, if you're an alchemist. Yeah, it could be a shallow garbage pit; it might also be for sporting events, cooking charcoal, making gravel, stomping grapes, a soaking pit for pulping wood for paper, and so on.
Bear in mind, building a Pit room is more than just digging a hole in the ground. The Room's construction lists 1 Goods and 1 Labor to create it, and 2 days' time. The smallest Pit Room however is 5' radius, to a depth of 5' deep with "steep sides." While the fluff of the room suggests it's only a dump, please see above for other examples besides mass grave or communal latrine that this pit could represent.
My point is, if a common shovel costs, at most, 2 GP and the 1 Labor and 1 Goods to create the Pit have an earned cost of 20 GP or you can buy them outright for 40 GP, this "Room" isn't just a hole in the ground the PC takes a couple days to knock out on their own.
Finally, since it's assumed that there's unskilled laborers working any proper Room that a PC pays for using the Downtime rules, this Pit is manned by some kind of crew which ensures some kind of money gets into the PC's hands for having it. The workers would depend on the purpose of the pit.
Also... I mention that Rooms are an abstraction or simulation for a reason. You don't have to go with the fluff dictated in the entry for the room, only the mechanics of it are fixed. Let's look at the Room called Statue.
This is a large, showy decoration meant to attract attention to the Business or Organization. Y'know what that sounds like to me? A sign. Sure, any rank business likely has some kind of simple sign hanging on it but if you want your tavern to stand out maybe you spend 30 GP to earn 1 Labor and 2 Goods, then spend those resources on a big, gaudy placard hanging out front. It's got a permanent Prestidigitation of a bawdy barmaid carrying 6 frothing tankards that glows faintly; the edges are gilt in copper; the design features ornate scrollwork around the frame.
That humble "Statue" ensures that your business brings in +1 GP or +1 Influence. Since it also guarantees unskilled labor, the mere fact that you've purchased it means you've got some street caller trying to hawk patrons into your bar.
Of course, all this ostentatiousness isn't without risk. The Downtime system also subjects your Business/Organization to weekly "events" that might break good or bad for you, depending on how well you roll, but that's probably a discussion for another time.
TL/DR (as usual): the main point of my rambling is just to think of the Room(s) or Team(s) your character has as some kind of extension of what they want to be known for. Moreover, Rooms can have other functions besides the fluff given.
My final example... the Office. It doesn't ever add any bonuses, but look at what it comes from. It can be built on its own, or it can be an upgrade from a Shack.
A Shack is a 10'x10' room that is basically some kind of bare-bones living space for 1-2 people. Upgrading this to an office essentially makes the place a tad more sturdy and puts a lock on the door. Sure, the fluff suggests this is where you or the manager does the books, but think: it upgrades from a room you could live in.
Need a bedroom for your character inside the building of your Business, but don't want to pay for the Bedroom room? Build an Office instead. This is now a 10'x15' room with a locking door containing a desk, chair, and a cot to sleep on (left behind from when it was a Shack Room).
Hugo Rune wrote: Yeah, pathfinder economics is pretty screwed up. I mean, 2 cp is enough to buy a pound of flour or a chicken, 1 gp buys you a goat, and 3gp buys you a pig. While in the olden days killing and plucking a chicken was actually quite the ordeal, let's compare that amount to, for instance, the good ol' Cure Light Wounds wand, at 750gp. So, for the equivalent of removing an average of 275 hp of damage, you could instead obtain:
250 pigs,
375 sheep,
750 goats,
75 cows, or...
37,500 chickens.
In some ways, the economics obviously resembles medieval societies where in many cases it was local or regional authorities which set prices, but even so it seems absolutely absurd that there's such disparity between magic item costs (despite them being so widely available) and mundane item costs. I envision a California-Gold-Rush scenario, where the prices of most mundane goods get driven into the stratosphere because adventurers have the gold to spend on all these fancy things, they can afford a gold for a chicken.
What are you talking about?^^
Mark Hoover 330 wrote: Rooms and Teams wrote: For a room, the Earnings amount already subtracts the cost of having unskilled employees to do the basic work for you. For example, the Earnings listed for having a Bar already account for the wages of a bartender and servers. For a team, the Earnings amount assumes they are working at a building you own. If you don’t provide a building for the team to work in or from, halve the Earnings for that team. So a Building is made up of Rooms. You build your own Building piecemeal or buy it outright, or whatever. If your PC doesn't have an actual Building, just a pit in the ground they control, it's assumed that there's unskilled laborers working at it but you get half the GP it earns every day.
A pit gets GP +1, or it adds 1 to a skilled check to earn GP. It's assumed that you take 10 most of the time, so let's say that your pit with no building earns you 1.1 GP/day. You end up getting 5 SP, 5 CP/day for just having a Pit room.
A pit is a room. A building is a collection of 1 or more rooms. Teams get half income if you don't assign them to a building. The pit all by itself makes full income. If you build a 'Knights Order' and you want to earn full income from their activities, you could assign them to a pit... well, no. I'd have them rebel but it conforms with the rules.
Yes, of course; thanks for the correction Mei-queen.
Otherwise, I think we've done a pretty good job illustrating the Rooms and Teams from the Downtime rules.
|
