Economic Dramatic Rules
From Exalted Wiki
- These rules were developed by the Wiki Editors Kukla and Democritus. They are largely based off the work of Moxiane at the Exalted Fan Wiki.
The Economic Dramatic Rules are a mini-system of Dramatic Rules dealing with a variety of economic actions. The system covers the following options which are detailed below:
- Scanning the Market is what a character does when he's either looking for goods or buyers.
- Stockpiling cash allows a character to purchase an item with a cost equal to his Resources without a temporary reduction in his purchasing power, or to save up for a purchase that would normally be beyond their means.
- Increasing Resources allows a character to increase their Resources through investments and trade.
- Trade Manipulation allows a character to make it easier or harder to purchase goods in a given marketplace.
- Economic Warfare allows a character to hurt another where it hurts - their finances.
These Dramatic Rules were designed to give the Resources background a little more impact on the game. They give Characters with business-related Bureaucracy specialties and interests something meaningful to use them for.
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Bureaucracy & Resources
This system allows characters to use the Bureaucracy ability to manage, increase, and use their wealth in the form of their Resources background. Wits and Intelligence are useful attributes, as is the ability to make strong Social Attacks and the Influence, Contacts and Connections backgrounds.
Scanning the Market
If a Player wishes is to interact with the markets, this is the basic mechanism. When looking for a specific item to buy, he Storyteller can consult these rules. This system can also be used to find a buyer for items the Character currently possesses. These rules assume that the item the character wishes to buy is for sale at all or that there are buyers for the characters goods, which is at the Storytellers discretion.
1. Determine Difficulty
The first step in this system is to determine the difficulty of the task. To do so figure out the (desired or owned) item type and market situation and then consult the following table
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RRimmel Repeated purchases of rarer items should increase the difficulty to find said items, probably doubling the difficulty each time or a similar effect, there is only so much firedust in the north.
- Democritus: I don't believe this needs a mechanic. The storyteller can simply say there is no more firedust available. Remember that this is noted in the 3. Determine Results step. A successful roll does not mean that there HAS to be something, only that the player would have found it, if there was. The storyteller can always veto the results should he feel necessary.
2. Determine Method
Depending on the characters approach to the task, a set of different attributes and abilities is rolled to determine the success. The different methods also have an influence on the time required and the availability of illegal goods.
- Roll Charisma + Bureaucracy when going through official business channels.
- When buying, the character inquires with large warehouses and shops. When looking for a buyer, he makes his intent known to the market waiting for someone to approach him. This is the least time intensive option and each attempted roll requires about 1 hour per difficulty, at a minimum of 1 hour. This approach is difficult when dealing with illegal items. In this case add 2 to the difficulty and even a regular failure can be troublesome.
- Roll Wits + Investigation when the character visits the markets personally.
- When on the lookout for goods, the buyer walks through the markets and shops, talking to vendors and looking for the item on shelves. When looking for a buyer, the seller uses a similar approach. This procedure takes about 3 hours for each level of difficulty on the roll, at a minimum of 3 hours. This time interval passes for each attempted roll. This approach can not be used when looking for illegal items.
- Roll Wits + Larceny when scouring the black markets
- When looking for illegal items or potential buyers, this approach is used. It is the most time intensive option as it requires the character to make the appropriate contacts through hidden channels and meet up with his business partners in secrecy. This requires about 6 hours per level of difficulty, at a minimum of 6 hours, for each attempted roll.
The character's dice pool can be modified by his backgrounds. Add the rating of the higher of their Influence, Contacts or Connections in dice to their pool, if applicable.
If the character fails to find what he seeks, he can try again, but he suffers a penalty to his die pool equal to the difference between the successes he needed and the successes he rolled. These stack with each failed attempt.
- Appearance should have an impact here, it does in every other social situation.RRimmel
- Democritus: This is troublesome, because there is no "target" that has an appearance that could be used for comparision. However I can see Linguistics (w/ Bureaucracy) and Appearance being useful here. Just don't know how though.
3. Determine Reults
Once the difficulty and the method were chosen, roll the dice pool. Success means that the chosen goods are available or that a potential buyer was found. The amount of successes on the roll beyond the difficulty are an indication for the amount of items available or the price a buyer is willing to pay.
For Mundane Items, each set of (Resources Cost) successes adds one to the Magnitude of items available. This also influences the price as determined by the storyteller.
- Example: A search for Resources 1 food with 3 successes will yield enough food for a Unit of Magnitude 3. Looking to buy Resources 5 Perfect Swords for an army with a roll of 3 successes will only yield a single such sword, while 5-9 successes will provide enough Perfect Swords for a Magnitude 1 unit.
For Artifacts, each set of (Artifact Cost) successes adds a single artifact to the available items. Each such artifact has to be paid for seperately.
- Example: A search for an Artifact 2 Jade Daiklave with 2 successes will yield a single such daiklave. Rolling 7 successes on such a roll will open the possibility to buy 3 such Daiklaves.
Note 1: Success with the option for large quantities does not mean the player has to buy these items, it only states that he has found available quantities and vendors willing to sell them.
Note 2: Success does not mean that the requested items are actually available. The Storyteller may feel free to rule against the roll and say that there are no, or only a limited amount of items available. For example the market in a small backwater town will most likely not have a 100 Jade Daiklaves in stock, no matter how well the character rolls. However such a roll may mean that the player is able to arrange for a shipment of those.
Charms
The following Charms have modified effects for use within the given economic systems. Unless otherwise noted, the following effects are in addition to what is written in the appropriate books.
Solar Charms
- Frugal Merchant Method
- allows the Solar to find diamonds in the rough. If the Market Quality modifier is -1, purchasing an Exceptional item costs the same as purchasing a Fine item. If the Market Quality modifier is -2, purchasing a Perfect item costs the same as purchasing an Exceptional item. This reduces the required Resources and the purchase difficulty.
- Insightful Buyer Technique
- reduces the difficulty to find the item for sale by the Solar's Essence. This is not a new effect.
Stockpiling cash: Purses
By default, a character can purchase an item without incident if his Resources background exceeds the cost of the item, or reduce his Resources by 1 if it equals it. However, it's possible to raise a reserve of cash to purchase an item of cost equal to, or even one greater than, your Resources if you stockpile funds first. This stockpile of cash is called a purse in game terms. A purse has a rating from 1 to 5; it can be used to buy something of that cost, but the purse is lost in the process. Characters can pre-emptively create purses for future use, but cannot have more than (Bureaucracy), with a minimum of 1, available at any one time.
A character can create a purse with a value less than their (Resources) with no more difficulty than purchasing an item of similar cost.
To create a Purse with a value equal to his (Resources), he can try to raise some cash using a mixture of selling easily liquidated goods, some fast deals and quick loans from friends and relatives. To do this requires some time and a little risk on the character's part.
| Purse Size | Strain |
|---|---|
| ●○○○○ | A week |
| ●●○○○ | A fortnight |
| ●●●○○ | A month |
| ●●●●○ | A season |
| ●●●●● | A year |
The character rolls (Wits + Bureaucracy) against a base difficulty of the rating of the purse, plus 1 for every Purse that is still straining the character's Resources. This action takes a base of (Purse * 2) weeks to perform; the time is reduced by one week for every success over the modified difficulty (see below), down to a minimum time of one week, and strains your resources for the following duration.
- A character who is a member of an organisation or who has significant numbers of contacts within a particular segment of society can try to call on its resources to help him raise the necessary cash. Should he so wish he can add his single highest applicable Backing or Connections to the dice-pool before making the roll. Unfortunately, should the character fail to raise the money then his standing and social currency has taken a hit - his Backing or Connections is reduced by 1 dot as long as the Purse strains the character's resources.
- If the roll is successful, the character now has a Purse with a rating equal to (Resources), If he fails then nothing happens, but the attempt still strains the character's Resources. Should the character be unlucky enough to botch then not only does he not raise the money, but deals go south, loans go bad, and his (Resources) is reduced by 1.
A character can push his finances to the breaking point in order to raise a lot of money quickly, but it has a cost, and the price of failure is high.
- By making a (Wits + Bureaucracy) test against a difficulty of (Resources + 2) plus 1 for every Purse that is still straining the character's Resources, the character can make a Purse with a rating equal to (Resources + 1), at the cost of reducing his Resources by 1 exactly as if he had bought something with an equal cost.
- If the character fails this test, then any further attempts to raise money while his finances are strained have a +5 difficulty modifier. Should the character be unlucky enough to botch this roll, then his Resources are immediately reduced by 2 as he begins to fall into bankruptcy, and he still suffers from the +5 penalty to raising cash.
Increasing Resources: Making money
A character's Resources will fluctuate over time as he buys goods, takes risks, loses money, and generally lives the life of a PC. If he specifically wants to increase his Resources then he can do so by spending time in the markets, trading and dealing to improve his finances. The character rolls (Wits + Bureaucracy) in an extended roll with a difficulty of (Resources). Each roll requires a month and the number of successes needed is (Resources * 5). Should the character wish he can use some of the successes over the difficulty to reduce the time required by 1 week per success, down to a minimum of 1 week.
A character can also use a purse to increase his Resources background if it's large enough. A Purse rated at (Resources + 2) or more can be used to increase his Resources by 1 with a simple roll of (Wits + Bureaucracy); if the Purse is only (Resources + 1) then the roll is at a difficulty of (Resources). Whether the character succeeds or fails at this check, the Purse is spent in the attempt.
Trade Manipulation
This mechanic is based around the abstraction of all contexts for trade and economic activity as marketplaces. For example, Nexus is a valid marketplace, as would be any Dominion, or any social group, but not, generally, any single person.
Marketplaces
A marketplace is defined as follows
- A marketplace has the goods-hoarding nature. Whether or not it currently has any goods to trade, be they physical goods like grain or abstract goods like knowledge, it has the capacity to have them, either passively (like a shelf or box) or actively (like a miser). A bazaar in Chiaroscuro, even if every merchant in it has nothing to trade, is a valid marketplace. However, an open ocean is not. It has no goods-hoarding nature.
- A marketplace has the internal-trade nature. It is possible for trade to occur within the boundaries of the marketplace itself - for example, two peasants standing in a field could be a marketplace, because they could hold and have things, and trade them between each other. However, a single peasant in a field is not. He has no internal-trade nature.
- Some marketplaces, but not all, have the external-trade nature. This means that it is possible for trade to occur between the marketplace and things not in the marketplace, for goods to come in and out. The bazaar has the external-trade nature because new merchants can come to add their wares to it's many goods, but a black pit in the earth containing only prisoners and rats does not have the external-trade nature, even though it has the internal-trade nature, since the prisoners can trade rats with each other.
- Some marketplaces have local produce, goods that the marketplace is well suited to producing. These goods are meaningfully easier to procure.
Supernatural Marketplace Natures
- Marketplaces might have the wealth-fostering nature or wealth-stripping nature, which means that people are likely to leave them wealthier or poorer, respectively, than they were when they arrived.
- Marketplaces might have the wealth-harvesting nature, which means that goods of note, such as artifacts or ancient knowledge, are supernaturally drawn to them.
PLEASE: Help me think up more supernatural marketplace natures. These are the biggies, since you can impose them on a marketplace using Charms, and are thus the sort of thing that characters might really wield to create interesting economantic effects!
Manipulating Marketplaces
With these rules, you can manipulate the natures of a marketplace, and use charms to create and impose marketplace-natures upon the world.
