Steve Jackson Games Forums - View Single Post

AlexanderHowl · 06-17-2018, 01:20 PM

So, our discussion in the Magical Birth Control thread has evolved into an economics of magic discussion, and I have come to the conclusion that there are some fundamental consequences to having mages making up even 1% of the population. First, mages only need a '15' in a second tier spells, like Continual Light or Shape Earth, to allow them to replace enough goods (lantern oil in the case of a mage with Continual Light-15) or labor (laborers in the case of Shape Earth-15) to justify giving them an income of Comfortable in a TL3 society (and skill '15' in higher tier spells, like Restoration or Regeneration, should give them Wealthy or higher income in a TL3 society). Second, there is really no good economic reason for anyone with Magery 2 to create magical items unless they literally cannot do anything else with their Magery, as making $33 per day with Enchant-15 really does not compare to the $112 per day they could make with Continual Light-15 or Shape Earth-15.

So, in that case, why do enchanted items exist at the cost given in Magic? It would make much more sense for enchanted items to cost 5x as much as they do in magic, as mages that are capable of making magical items can probably make more money doing anything else than making magical items at the prices given in Magic. Of course, that makes magical items much more valuable and much rarer than they are in Magic, but I do not think that it such a bad thing, as most PCs accumulate too many magical items in most campaigns.

What do you think? Should enchanted items cost 5x as much as they do in Magic? Or do you think that it is fine that they cost as much as they do in Magic?

06-17-2018, 01:20 PM	#1
AlexanderHowl Join Date: Feb 2016	The Economics of Enchanted Items So, our discussion in the Magical Birth Control thread has evolved into an economics of magic discussion, and I have come to the conclusion that there are some fundamental consequences to having mages making up even 1% of the population. First, mages only need a '15' in a second tier spells, like Continual Light or Shape Earth, to allow them to replace enough goods (lantern oil in the case of a mage with Continual Light-15) or labor (laborers in the case of Shape Earth-15) to justify giving them an income of Comfortable in a TL3 society (and skill '15' in higher tier spells, like Restoration or Regeneration, should give them Wealthy or higher income in a TL3 society). Second, there is really no good economic reason for anyone with Magery 2 to create magical items unless they literally cannot do anything else with their Magery, as making $33 per day with Enchant-15 really does not compare to the $112 per day they could make with Continual Light-15 or Shape Earth-15. So, in that case, why do enchanted items exist at the cost given in Magic? It would make much more sense for enchanted items to cost 5x as much as they do in magic, as mages that are capable of making magical items can probably make more money doing anything else than making magical items at the prices given in Magic. Of course, that makes magical items much more valuable and much rarer than they are in Magic, but I do not think that it such a bad thing, as most PCs accumulate too many magical items in most campaigns. What do you think? Should enchanted items cost 5x as much as they do in Magic? Or do you think that it is fine that they cost as much as they do in Magic?