Testing a Wealth characteristic (WEL) - Comments welcomed!
- Thread starter MongooseMatt
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MasterGwydion
Emperor Mongoose
Not sure how the term Operative is used in the context of this game, but the only use I can see for a Wealth stat should more be defined as a Stash Stat. How many stashes and how much is available in those stashes that are hidden around the world. The higher your "Wealth" Stat, the more locations of stashes that you know about, including stashes that may have more in them than just a few blank passports and a couple stacks of bills in several different currencies. Hell, a stash could include a car or a motorcycle, because an off the books rental unit can hold a lot of different stuff. Or that abandoned maintenance closet in the subway is repurposed to a weapons stash with explosives and automatic weapons. If the stat was used like this, I could see it having value.
MasterGwydion
Emperor Mongoose
I think you may have this a little backwards. Wealth flows up the pyramid, not down. A landed Knight pays his lord not the other way around. A landed Count pays his lord, not the other way around. The lessers maintain the greaters, not the other way around.
(Unless you are one of those who believes in trickle-down economics. lol)
Condottiere
Emperor Mongoose
You have to study the tax system, whatever form it takes.
The Church has it's hand in the kitty, as well.
It started out as labour, in exchange for the chance to work your allocated land.
The Church has it's hand in the kitty, as well.
It started out as labour, in exchange for the chance to work your allocated land.
Setting specific stuff. Don't look to make it too historical.
However, in Pendragon, if you're a Bachelor Knight (the usual situation) you don't own any land and are maintained by your Lord. If you move up a grade to Vassal Knight then, yeah... technically you're paying up the chain with a lot of your income - but you hold and administer that land on behalf of your Lord, and ultimately the King. You're still essentially an employee (for life). But the game basically leaves that accounting in the background and just deals with net incomes.
Regular Traveller uses the accounting of wealth and the accumulation of assets as a major game activity. But it's just a setting feature. Other settings that use Traveller mechanics do not have to use it. Even within Chartered Space, it's not the prime focus of a Naval or Exploration campaign where everyone is supported by the organisation with their gear provided and a character only has to track their personal petty cash.
Limpin Legin
Emperor Mongoose
That's not really correct is it? Money is exchanged for goods or services regardless of social standing. If you grew potatoes and onions, then you could sell those onto anyone who was bothered to buy - the money would flow to the seller, regardless of their title. It wasn't the high lords who sold farm produce (or for that matter clothes, furniture, medicine, etc.) It was just that, in medieval times, owning and monopolising land was a lucrative contract in terms of profits minus costs, so people who owned land faired better than those who had to make a living by other means. And that includes child labour. Child labour succeeds because the children are willing to do the jobs that no one else is willing to do, because of their illiteracy. Money flowed to them, at the bottom of your "pyramid", not because of their social standing but because they provided something that is considered a need. Watch the Little Matchstick Girl or Oliver Twist and you can see that the poorer kids earned a few bob by providing a service or product.
MasterGwydion
Emperor Mongoose
If the bottom 50% of the population has less than 1% of the wealth, than the wealth flows up the pyramid, not down.
Limpin Legin
Emperor Mongoose
Hmm. Size and Direction are two different measures. They are independent. It doesn't follow that if the smallest is less than a certain fraction of the largest, it will change direction, in order to favour the largest. That would be like saying a small stream suddenly flows up a mountain because it is less than 1% of the size of the biggest rivers or lakes - that is untrue because the logic of the argument is invalid. You are saying that if your net worth was less than 1% of the richest person in your country, then your wealth would start flowing towards the richest person. That is clearly not true of you or the population percentage who are of similar worth to you.
Condottiere
Emperor Mongoose
Depends on whether extraction, exploitation, or rent, is involved.
MasterGwydion
Emperor Mongoose
It is true in our world. Or do you think the top 10 people in the US have more wealth than the rest of the US combined by magic?
Can absolutely confirm that the Rogue Trader tabletop RPG pretty much *expects* the players to act that way. Bribing the crap out of hired mooks instead of fighting them is right there as an option in the core rule book.
I would put out there that given this is supposed to be modern day investigation of dark dangerous dirty and possibly daemonic things, it's not so much wealth that's an issue, it is, as noted, hiring a short company of infantry with miniguns and letting the players bypass the climactic scene.
Equipping the 'team' with shotguns for a mission that's expected to get noisy is fine, especially if there's some allowance made for the fact that these items are being bought with intent to dispose of them immediately (or are temporarily requisitioned from the organisation's armoury). being able to 'gun up' with a mission-specific variation of main weapon/sidearm/some sort of body armour/a couple of grenades isn't unreasonable.
I guess the counterbalance is some concept of what appears in Dark Heresy II as 'subtlety' - the two questions are 1) can you obtain weaponry X and 2) if you do get it, what are the odds that someone is going to notice - either the bad guys you intended to use it on, or some other third party. Having our heroic operatives kitting up to deal with the bad guys only to have an FBI tactical team smash through the door thinking they're raiding a terrorist cell at the wrong moment would be a very unfortunate complication if the PCs are too free with their money and their requirements.
Just wanted to pop up and say... this discussion is actually useful and I have already made some tweaks. For example, I do like the use of WEL as a DM to certain skill checks (bribery being an obvious one, you basically either go in with charm or your wallet). Opportunities for purchases will be a limiting factor in this setting, and the equipment lists will likely not be extensive at any rate.
Not suggesting this will be a common characteristic in Traveller-based games (I mean, useless in Pioneer!) and in others it will absolutely be useful to track actual money (like Traveller Cowboy). Just need 'something' there in the background for settings that have money, in theory, but it is not a focus.
Not suggesting this will be a common characteristic in Traveller-based games (I mean, useless in Pioneer!) and in others it will absolutely be useful to track actual money (like Traveller Cowboy). Just need 'something' there in the background for settings that have money, in theory, but it is not a focus.
CordwainerFish
Emperor Mongoose
Limpin Legin
Emperor Mongoose
What you think appears to have no bearing on what I was saying ... anyway this conversation is getting more off topic than previously intended, so I'll leave it there.
Limpin Legin
Emperor Mongoose
Why not set it up as a subset of Soc stat? Add in a rule for it being more variable than the Soc stat, so that there's a way for Soc 2 to 5 people to have hundreds of thousands of $, £ or ¥.
Condottiere
Emperor Mongoose
Opens up a floodgate of social standing subcharacteristics.
If you feed a Vargr and pet it regularly, does it think you're charismatic?
If you feed a Vargr and pet it regularly, does it think you're charismatic?
Another situation that occurs to me is when the economy is based not mainly on social standing or on cash in hand, but instead on reputation and demonstrated worth. Maybe a post apoc one, or a pre-technological one? Where there is no money and at best you have barter, maybe with pretty trinkets like cowrie shells or bottlecaps for convenience. You could use straight SOC, or replace it or add to it with REP.
I'd probably use in addition in most settings, since social standing tends to exist still. But you may have as an example a high ranking leader with plenty of bottlecaps but whom no one trusts (High SOC, low REP). If they go to another tribe and asks for aid, it probably won't be given freely. But if the capless, wandering hero of lowly birth, acclaimed throughout the valley for dealing straight and getting the job done (Low SOC, high REP), asks for help... well, that's a different matter!
(This could easily sit alongside other economies. Potentially any stat could be used as the basis of a setting's worth rating. A technocracy might used EDU, a macho barbarian culture might use STR. A culture based on dance could use DEX)
I'd probably use in addition in most settings, since social standing tends to exist still. But you may have as an example a high ranking leader with plenty of bottlecaps but whom no one trusts (High SOC, low REP). If they go to another tribe and asks for aid, it probably won't be given freely. But if the capless, wandering hero of lowly birth, acclaimed throughout the valley for dealing straight and getting the job done (Low SOC, high REP), asks for help... well, that's a different matter!
(This could easily sit alongside other economies. Potentially any stat could be used as the basis of a setting's worth rating. A technocracy might used EDU, a macho barbarian culture might use STR. A culture based on dance could use DEX)
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