Now that I am, how do I have? (or, Stuff) <- More rules.

Now that I am, how do I have? (or, Stuff)



Oh Yeah.  Throw in a mask, and I'll drive it off the lot !

If you need something that isn’t permanently linked to your character, you need to roll enough successes, which vary by the value & scarcity.  The career you use is citizen, unless your adventuring career would be more appropriate. As a guide, your social class is defined by your CITIZEN career.

Night Train Rockafeller,
Millionaire Hobo
(rejected player character)

Class                                         CITIZEN

·        RICH                                   5

·        UPPER                                 4

·        WORKING                             3

·        POOR                                   2

·        BUM                                     1

·        DESTITUTE                         0

 

Forobtaining  stuff, determine how many successes it costs from the table below:

·        If your CITIZEN is greater, you have it (until it gets blown up) !

·        If your CITIZEN is equal, you can be assumed to be renting it, but have to make a single success citizen roll each adventure to keep it.  If it is blown up, you now have a new hobby –paying it off !

Ha !  Thought you were safe up here !
Luckily I have
MY VERY OWN HELICOPTER !

·        Otherwise, roll the above number of dice, adding the citizen rating to each.  Yes, the rich can have it all.   As ever, each 7+ is a success.  If you have enough successes, you have it till you don’t

You can only roll if it is possible to succeed.  However,  if the item requires more successes than possible, a player can gain one free success before rolling by reducing your Citizen by one . Two successes requires lowering it by  TWO levels. OUCH ! If you get it, you lose it between adventures, but regain your CITIZEN points.  

While lots of common stuff is bought using your CITIZEN skill, career specific stuff can be different.  Any time you need to roll for an item, instead of your CITIZEN, you can use an appropriate CAREER . The adds are still the citizen rating, but the number of dice rolled is determined by the career.  Thus, a BUM (1) would normally  be unable to obtain a pistol (cost 2) as he can only roll one dice at +1 (CITIZEN dice +CITIZEN) ; however, an ex Army (3) BUM rolls three dice for +1 (ARMY dice +CITIZEN).  Two successes and hes a Hobo with a pistol !

NOTE that in a major pinch, you can reduce the career you substitute as if it was CITIZEN.

If you have NATURE instead of CITIZEN, your effective CITIZEN is BUM.  Use careers where you can, Tarzan.   In his case “RICH BASTARD HEIR” turned out to be his career.

Cost of stuff with some examples, or, everything has its price, sweetheart !

NOTE: that Items rated at 6+ require either being WEALTHY, or reducing you CITIZEN or CAREER, or being an NPC villan or patron, who can have a citizen higher than 5. Characters, never.

Free/dumpster divings      0             Rags. Old butts.  Ketchup and chickenbone soup. Squirrel.  Shank. Club. Beano.

Cheap/Ubiquitous               1            Old clothing, gum, shiv, smokes, Poison Liquor. flop

Inexpensive/common           2            Zip gun, , Cheap Booze, Old Car. hardscrabble, apartment

Affordable/uncommon         3            Pistol, Rifle, Shotgun Sm House, Car,  good stuff Booze, farm    

costly/Unusual                    4            Lg House, fancier car, sm airplane,country estate Military arms (BAR, Grenade) top                                                               shelf Booze:

Luxury/uncommon               5            Mansion,Yacht, fighter, race car, lab, big/new plane, tank, plantation,  best Booze

Ruinous/Rare                      6            Secret base, rocket, flying yacht/HQ

Priceless/Unique               7+           Hope Diamond, The Mona Lisa, Battle cruiser, Spy army

Examples of transport:  match with value (hints: one is 0, one is 6)

 

 

Well, Heck.......(money part 4)

That was a waste of time and typing. The money stuff. Unsurprisingly another blog, one that I follow (but apparently not closely enough) has already done the same kind of analysis, and come to a better system than what I was futzin around with. Ah well:

http://deltasdnd.blogspot.com/2007/03/od-variants.html

Well done, Delta, and thanks. I'll most likely steal it.

What next Pt 2: frp money

So, I gather that money systems in D&D is on a par with, say, near lightspeed rocks and jump torpedoes in Traveller: OOOO-VEERRRR discussed. Ooops. Well, if its any consolation, rest assured that I could be writing screeds about planetary atmospheres and empty hex jumps with jump torpedoes, so consider that I'm not doing that to be a win for now.

So, There's bunches of theories about how to organize faux-medieval money and economies: the ale standard, the lunch standard, the cow standard, the biblical standard, the standards of Diocletian, the wereguild standard, and more. And, obviously, they all disagree, 'cause the very meaning of money now is different now from what it was then, and often from what it was in the time we are trying to emulate relative to the time we have references for.

Throw in the fact that back then our fluid metal rates didn't exist, and that there was no use for silver and gold other than coins, bullion and jewlery, and so even the value of them doesn't mean what it used to, and there's no way for a hobbyist, even an obsessive one, to untangle it.

And, then, the whole slavery thing: a slaveholding society is going to mess crap up far more than one can imagine. See, there's this class of workers where most of the expense is up front (and cyclically very cheap) , and the daily wage is just for food for them. The point is, even the value of a days labor cannot be used to value items: what is the real value of a sword when made by slaves vs made by a (not enslaved) blacksmith. Hard to say.


So, why the droning about economics ? Becuase I'm building a rationale for doing it my way and ignoring unsightly contradictions, thats why.

Some few facts that seem to emerge from the morass can be used to gain a grasp on the subject for RPG purposes.

1. Silver < Gold, almost always.
2. Food < crafted goods, almost always.
3. Clothing is surprisingly expensive, actually: Hardware can be industrialized far more efficiently than clothing production.
4. prices change, but basically ratios give a clearer illusion of consistency.
5. A standard days pay should keep you from starving or eating your children. Slavery messes with this, seriously.

So, not too much to say today - I'm going to go with the Roman silver economy, but I'm not sure about the whole tirade about Arcs and episodes. On a nights sleep, I have yet to come up with any way for the non- linear time concept to work without too much grief and paperwork; and I'm not sure I want to abandon an experience system to ease it.

Which brings me to a question: would anyone play a fantasy RPG without some form of experience ? If Adventurer was more like pure traveller, the experience system would be minimal, but would it still feel like OD&D which is the goal ?