Prices for buildings in Arms & Equipment

[Dan True]

Hi.

Is it just me, or are the prices for houses given in A&E completely taken out of the blue? I just think they seems ridiculously cheap. For instance:

Take a House, Medium/Shop - i.e. an average town house. Let's make a large house of 100 m^2 - about 3 times the size of my current flat.

100 m^2 * ~7 (1D6*2) Manhours / m^2 = 700 ManHours.

A price of 5 CP per 6 Man hours = 5 CP * 700 ManHours / 6 ManHours = 583 CP
So, roughly 59 SP.

Is this really correct? There's nothing in the errata about it, but it seems way to cheap doesn't it?

Also House, Large has a cost of 1 SP per 12 man hours, which is effectively the same as the 5 CP per 6 man hours... which doesn't make sense either.

Any thoughts on this? After looking at them I'm preparing to just wing property prices.

- Dan

 

[Khamulcalle]

I would not dare to live in such a big house at that cost.... sounds dangerous

 

[Simulacrum]

It only accounts for cost of labour if I read you right - but I'm not looking at the book.

Materials costs should be the larger part unless you happen to have your own resources immediately to hand with no shipping costs. And of course there's the cost of the land. It's also not clear if the man hours include making bricks, sawing timbers etc or just assembly.

 

[Dan True]

It only accounts for cost of labour if I read you right - but I'm not looking at the book.

Materials costs should be the larger part unless you happen to have your own resources immediately to hand with no shipping costs. And of course there's the cost of the land. It's also not clear if the man hours include making bricks, sawing timbers etc or just assembly.

According to the book, the cost is for labour and materials. Cost of the land should also be added, plus profit for the seller - but it still seems in the extremely low end.

- Dan

 

[Simulacrum]

OK, I just pulled the book out...

Pricing is generally 6CP-10CP (1SP) per 8-10 man hours (ie per man day). If you use the rates of pay in A&E as a guide it is reasonable that as a gross generalisation this allows for materials, because your labour costs are in the region of 1-5CP per person per day - with the labourers themselves being 1CP/day each.

This does not, I have to say, make a lot of sense compared to the pricing of goods in the book, by which even the simplest items are beyond the reach of the average labourer.

The RQ rulebook, which effectively gives 3CP plus free lodgings as a poor man's wage, is more logical.

So pinch of salt required with the pricing logic in A&E - a lot of it is arbitrary and inconsistent.

 

[Jujitsudave]

Keep in mind also that there really is no "land cost" per say. It's not like you buy property with a 30 year fixed from your adventuring days!!

A powerful noble such as a baron may grant you the land in return for faithful service, or perhaps you take it by force with a group of mercenaries from a weaker landowner with no support.

Anyway....

A house is more than likely a one room shack with a thatch roof and a dirt floor. Not particularly difficult to construct or expensive but not great quality either. Usually you don't comission to have a house built anyway, but live in a home that is technically owned by the lord and you pay him rent and service.

The only individuals needing to know about housing prices is more like landowning nobles bringing more serfs onto his lands.

 

[Dan True]

So pinch of salt required with the pricing logic in A&E - a lot of it is arbitrary and inconsistent.

Yep. I do however have an understanding that you cannot hope to express something as complex as real estate prices in a simple way... What they have done are properly about the best one can expect, but they are pretty much off. Perhaps they assume a person builds his own house, from materials he can buy locally.

I would just have liked some rough ideas of prices, as I have no problem winging it with something as rare as real estate purchases.

I'm properly going to rule that an apartment in Lower Sharn costs around 200-400 SP.
Renting it will be something like 2-10 SP per month, depending on size and locality.

- Dan

 

[Richard]

This is an ongoing problem with RQ2 (Legend?). Check out the wages of the average teacher/craftsperson/labourer and then look at the prices Player Characters have to pay for training! Of course any medieval or tribal economy is a completetly different beast to a modern capitalist one. However finding a pricing system that fits with the standard fantasy trope or explaing a basic feudal/barbarian market system shouldn't be too hard. You can always use another system with a more convincing background, Ars Magica or RQ3 for example, or get useful info from a history book.

 

[Simulacrum]

I submitted an article on replicating an "ancient" economy in RQ to Ultor for Impale (planned fanzine) - don't yet know if it's something he can or is going to use. That offers pricing benchmark for rates of pay, cost of living, price of land and key commodities etc.

 

[Jujitsudave]

You can always use another system with a more convincing background, Ars Magica or RQ3 for example, or get useful info from a history book

Ars Magica is the bomb and would be a fantastic setting for RQ with a complete overhaul of the magic system, something I've been half working on.

Unfortunately Ars Magica does not really have pricing indexes in the 4th or 5th Ed. core rules. Another option is Harn, a terrific medieval style setting in it's own right that has a lot of Medieval pricing.