The economics of Faerun's Inner Sea

[Icelander]

Among the denizens of our forums, there are many people whose grasp of economic theory far exceeds that of most d20 setting writers. I desire to plunder the fertile brains of these people. Brains...

On the continent of Faerun, in the 3.x WotC campaign world of the Forgotten Realms, there exists an inland sea by the name Inner Sea or Sea of Fallen Stars. Over this sea, many powerful trading nations exchange goods on a scale far larger than our historical Earth knew until recently, with technology mostly confined to GURPS TL3/TL4 and some magical augmentation.

Nations of the western half of it include Chondath, with a population just shy of 2 million; Cormyr, maybe 1.4 M; Sembia 2.5 M; Turmish 1.7 M and various free cities and loose confederations that make up another million or two. Say about 10-15 million depending on how far inland we count cities and nations. The Moonsea, a lake that drains into the sea by a navigable river, adds perhaps another two million and we can reach north to touch perhaps several more millions with a bit of overland trade.

Then there are several powerful nations on the eastern shores, collectively making up more than 20 million people and increasingly starting to trade with their western neighbours. Those nations rely on slavery (banned in most of the western polities) to some greater or lesser extent. From those nations, overland trade can relatively easily reach another 20 million, some of them fabulously rich.

The nations of the western Inner Sea do trade overland with the Sword Coast (the other side of the continent) and various realms to the South, but overland trade is significantly less profitable. The 600-1000+ miles to the Sword Coast feature smaller cities than on the shores of the Sea of Fallen Stars and much of the land belongs to monsters more than humans. Still, well-guarded caravans remain profitable, especially given the wealth of some of the nations there (Amn, Calimshan, etc.).

Acriculture is incredibly advanced, due to magical assistance, with nations such as Thay controlling their entire climate with long-lasting spells and working huge fields with specialist mages directing a workforce of slaves and undead labour to bring in a yield for good farmland up to ten times what nonmagical TL3-TL4 farming did in our world. Even nations more hesitant to use such titannic large-scale magic still double their yield with clerical blessings and minor hedge magics.

Economic equality is very low, with nobles and warlords often owning assets worth thousands of times more than a peasant makes in a year. A Sembian merchant noble family might have an income of $10 M per year while the poorest farmhands in the same nation earn perhaps $1000/year and most of that in goods and services they need for survival. Ironically, in feudal (although increasingly strongly centralised) Cormyr, the gap is likely to be less, with the income of the royal family being perhaps 1/10th of what a merchant house makes and with effective 'minimum wages' being closer to $1500/year.

Due to several factors; chief among them the presence of nonhuman races significantly more at home underground and with mining than humans, the past use of powerful magic and abundant natural resources; the price of gold and silver, for example, is much reduced from our world at a similar technological level. Silver is worth $250/lbs. and gold $2500/lbs. Various gemstones, while much more plentiful than in our world, are also important components for magic and the demand for them outstrips supply by a comfortable margin.

Sailings ships are solidly TL4 and have been for a while. Some poorer nations are still relying on their TL3 fleets, but generally, even those have early TL4 ships. Cormyr, Sembia, Chondath and other rich nations have the ability to build sailing ships that span the entire TL4 on Earth and even early TL5 (although the wooden sailing ships of early TL5 were not significantly superior to their predecessors).

Magical transport is usually not practical for bulk goods, since few wizards can transport more than perhaps a 1000 lbs. at once (and most who can Teleport at all manage something closer to a few pounds of extra weight) and a reliable Teleport of that size might cost $50k for one casting (a personal one might be closer to $5k-$15k). The chance for a lost shipment or significantly damaged shipment would be about 1% if shipped to a familiar location, perhaps double or more if shipped to a seldom visited one. Given that this would also land the wizard in hot water, requiring him to refund might be impractical. The chances of some damage to a large shipment might be closer to 5%.

Added to that, no more than perhaps two dozen wizards over the entire Inner Sea region would consider Teleporting goods for payment on a regular basis (the mage generally has to come along and while the chance for fatal or crippling error is small, it adds up to a certainty if you do it long enough). Still, this means that small goods of fabulous value, such as gems, can be brought to whatever place they'll fetch the most relatively easily, as long as one doesn't mind paying through the nose.

Monsters infest the deep waters as well as the wilds. There are also creatures living underwater that are not hostile to humans, such as the merfolk, tritons, aquatic elves and other sea-people of Kingdom of Serôs under the waves. Serôs has a population of under one million people and survives mostly by seaweed farming, fishing, fish-farming and priestly magic. Just three years ago, a crusade of the evil races of the deeps (sahuagin, kraken, malenti, kuo-toa, etc.) forced the surface world and Serôs into temporary cooperation and that has now borne fruit for the last two years in a very profitable trade relationship between Cormyr, Sembia and Serôs.

So far, this trade is a very specialised one and usually carried out with the aid of magic, but the two worlds have much to offer one another. As examples, the price of pearls in Serôs is about 1/10th of the surface value, or less for common specimens, while Serôs mostly cannot make good steel weapons without using powerful magic to do so (Everbright spearheads which cannot rust are some of the most desirable trade goods). Connoisseurs above and blow the waves value new artistic styles and methods, centuries of shipswrecks have left the sea-people with plenty of debris that is essentially useless to them, etc. The magic of the two worlds is also different and mages from both lands pay dearly for scribed examples of new spells.

Gunpowder is an alchemical substance that requires magical knowledge to make, and so has been limited in its application so far. The ability to manufacture it was by edict of most of the major Gods confined to the far East and isolated mavericks until about 14 years ago, when the embargo was broken due to an upheaval in the divine realms. No major army yet fields large musketeer contigents, although that's due to change within the next few years. Seaborne cannons are used only by pirates and Thayvian navy ships so far, but are available for sieges on land to most of the larger nations, if they are interested (Cormyr mostly isn't, given that the capabilities of their War Wizards are more mobile, cheaper to deploy and no less destructive).

Being a self-employed or guild wizard is generally a Filthy Rich job at least. Even relatively minor apprentices rate Wealthy. Despite this, mages seem to pursue other occupations than the pursuit of wealth surprisingly frequently. This may be due to the influence of Mystra, the goddess of magic, and Azuth, the god of mages, who often steer mages towards goal comprehensible only to their divine selves.

The ability to work magic is inborn, but it's unknown how many are born with it, since it requires fairly specialised knowledge to spot the talent. Some sages theorise that maybe as much as half of humanity has the ability to manifest spellcasting, but given that some of those will always lack of schooling, innate intelligence, dedication or interest, it seems very hard to harness all those mages. Organised schooling, strong guilds and societal acceptance of mages does yield a much higher concentration of them, lending some support to the theory that the ability to work magic is much more common than the number of mages.

Clerical spellcasting requires only devotion, not an inborn spark, but is no more common than the wizardly version (few people combine the required level of devotion with the required understanding of the God's vision). Some healing magic is available to everyone in good standing with the church and/or with funds to spare. Most churches are fabulously rich due to donations, with real tangible benefits accruing to the faithful, giving at collection time is usually brisk. Large scale plagues are rarer than on Earth at any time but the present and when they happen, they tend to kill people in the hundreds or a few thousands at most, not tens or hundreds of thousands.

Perhaps 2% of people are able to use spell-based magic of some flavour (with another 1-2% or so with other special abilities, mostly related to Imbuements or supernatural heroism and fortitude) and one or two in every thousand can call themselves a wizard or priest (as opposed to acolyte/apprentice/hedge practisioner/alchemist/etc.).

Sailors are paid from $3k-$12k per year, with the value weighted toward the higher end for experienced and capable sailors. Most every ship requires a marine complement and a ship's wizard, meaning that in addition to a full crew, it's often necessary to pay $100k-$500k per year for their salaries.

[Icelander]

With this background out of the way, I've got a couple of thoughts.

1. How many tons of cargo would it be realistic for Sembia (trading hub with 2.5 M people and incomes between $1k-10 M, with the median yearly income close to $6k) to ship yearly? What would be a good $ value for their yearly trade?
   
2. How many ships do the main trading nations have, compared to their populations? How big are those ships? Does it make more sense to have a few large ones or a larger number of smaller faster ones? What's the proportion of military vessels and civilans vessels?
   
3. What's the minimum value of a ship's load of cargo to make it profitable to ship? What's the maximum believable value? I realise that this depends on a host of variables, but if someone has time on his hands and interest in the subject, seeing someone else's thoughts on what those variables would do would be interesting.
   
4. What goods would be shipped by magic?
   
5. How fast is it likely that the trade with Serôs would grow? How much volume in $ per year in the first year, second year and how much will it be worth in ten years?
   
6. If we assume that the kingdom of Cormyr has access to high-quality sapphires in staggering numbers, say perhaps tens or even hundreds of thousands of stones, how much would that depress the price of sapphires? If we assume that they have successfully kept the extent of their stockpile secret, attempt to sell through intermediaries everywhere around the Inner Sea and beyond and maintain a slow pace, how much would they have to sell in one year to have a significant effect on the price? Would a thousand stones at $25k-$150k (average $50k) each sold all around Faerun over a period of two years depress the price catastrophically?
   
7. Any other thoughts on the economics of the world? Anything strike you as weird, unexplained or impossible? Anything else people need to know to comment?
   

I debated whether to put this in Roleplaying in General or the GURPS forum, but eventually settled on the latter, as I'm using GURPS rules and use GURPS concepts such as TL and the $ as convenient shorthand.

[Dwarfolo]

Originally Posted by Icelander

With this background out of the way, I've got a couple of thoughts.

7. Any other thoughts on the economics of the world? Anything strike you as weird, unexplained or impossible? Anything else people need to know to comment?

I don't have the sourcebook with me right now, but IIRC there is a vast system of Magic Portals. These portals were used by the Netherils in order to travel Faerun and are located all over the world. Maybe the knowledge of the location and the 'interconnection' of these portals isn't spread enough to justify a systematic use of them for transport purposes, but it's still a factor to take in account.

P.S.
this link seems to have some usefull information on the matter
http://www.wizards.com/dnd/article.asp?x=fr/pg20010131b

[chris1982]

Creating a portal that permanently connects two points on Fearun with each other is a 9th level spell. (Teleport Circle with permanency spell)

Yes, you need a high level caster to do this, but for intense trade this would be the way to go - No ships etc. necessary at all, just caravans that move through a portal.

This is how trade would happen realistically in a world that is as high magic as Faerun.

[rozumcrans]

Distance usually increases the value of all mercantile goods unless demand drives it down. It all depends on what a nation or city wants or needs or otherwise deems valuable.

I don't know the distance from one natino to the other in Faerun (though I've heard of it). Assuming its the size of the continental U.S., what's really needed are merchant factors to go abroad and find out what people reallly need. Unless these countries have a substantial middle class, the only one buying these imported goods will be the nobility, wizards and other rather rick folk. A chair built in Cormyr is as good as a chair built in the Sword Coast. Find o ut what the Sword Coast needs and you'll have a market. If sapphires are out of favor on the Sword Coast, then any would-be gem merchant cum wizard is in for a disappointment.

The evil nations that grow food with undead labor may actually find it profitable to ship it abroad, though historically food has always had a low return on cash investment. I picture the dwarves being given a couple hundred pounds of raw meat in exchange for similar amount of iron ore or the like.

To ship it, it has to be something they 1) can't get anywhere else and 2) have a desire for it. Perfume and spices are good for merchant ships to carry, ditto wine and olive oil. Ditto pottery (what else will you put the wine in?).

Note that high-quality iron ore or finished slabs of iron ready for use at a blacksmith might be worthwhile for shipping purposes. Some specualte the feudal Japanese were able to make such fine wepons due to the presence of such high-quality ore. Others specualted that the Vikings were successful due to the fact that they had better (more) iron weapons and goods available to them than the people they came in contact with.

Magical goods made in bulk might be the only thing left. Perhaps a circle of wizards speicalizing in Purify Water hoops might make a killing trading with desert folk for spices, horses, or even just plain access to trade routes through their territory.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by chris1982

Creating a portal that permanently connects two points on Fearun with each other is a 9th level spell. (Teleport Circle with permanency spell)

Yes, you need a high level caster to do this, but for intense trade this would be the way to go - No ships etc. necessary at all, just caravans that move through a portal.

This is how trade would happen realistically in a world that is as high magic as Faerun.

Note, I'm not running the game by D&D rules. I'm focusing on Forgotten Realms 'fluff', not D&D 'crunch'.

It is possible to create a permanent magical portal in the Forgotten Realms. Most methods available to modern wizards that do so, however, require a vastly powerful wizard and leaves such a wizard weakened and significantly shortens his lifespan.

That doesn't mean that there is no trade through portals, but rather that such portals tend to be rare and closely guarded secrets with considerable strategic importance. If they open close to a major city, they are a weakpoint in the city's defence system (which includes geographical factors such as distance) and portals have been known to degrade over time or even open up into demonic realms.

Most portals, moreover, aren't large enough for caravans. They can fit maybe five people on foot through per minute and that's if the portal key isn't a rare item of some sort. A permanent portal large enough to fit a wagon through would be a marvellous creation and cost several millions of gold pieces ($10+ M). It would also give military strategists and court mages fits when they thought about the implications for the security of their realm.

Even so, several major trade routes incorporate portals. Waterdeep is connected to many, most of whom are kept secret by their controlling agency, but a few known to merchant lords (who've grown very rich even with the limited cargo capacity a secret portal gives them). There's also the Skullport portals under the city, large enough for ships to sail through, but these benefit from the immense magical field there.

[Cernig]

Some thoughts:

1) the thing to ship by teleport is information - who is buying/selling what, where and for how much. That means you no longer need so much "adventure cargo" - speculatively loading a cargo and hoping to sell for a profit where you end up.

2) Less adventure cargo means bigger (and more specialised e.g. bulk carriers) ships - since the contract to sell is assured before loading it makes sense to load bigger cargoes to fulfil bigger contracts.

3) The general principles and math of cargo, trade and war-fighting ability were well explained by S. John Ross in an article for space campaigns. The principles and formulae are entirely applicable to fantasy campaigns too - as Ross notes, most space campaign assumptions are drawn most heavily from nautical trade of the 14th-17th century Earth. I strongly recommend checking it out, as it has a lot of the answers you're looking for.

4) a war wizard might well be more deployable and more deadly than a broadside of cannon - but he isn't as easily replaceable. In a protracted war of attrition, that matters a very great deal. The cannon-users will beat the wizard-users every time, over the long haul. Those who use both will win over those who use only one, mind you.

5) At some stage, someone is going to replace the mercantilist paradigm with a value-added one, shipping in raw materials only so that they can fashion various things worth much more from them and then export those things. That nation is the trade-war winner and probably the first to advance to full TL5.

[NineDaysDead]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Added to that, no more than perhaps two dozen wizards over the entire Inner Sea region would consider Teleporting goods for payment on a regular basis (the mage generally has to come along and while the chance for fatal or crippling error is small, it adds up to a certainty if you do it long enough).

What about “Teleport Without Error”?

Originally Posted by Icelander

It is possible to create a permanent magical portal in the Forgotten Realms. Most methods available to modern wizards that do so, however, require a vastly powerful wizard and leaves such a wizard weakened and significantly shortens his lifespan.

2nd ed had “Blood Link”; 7th level necromancy spell, that made someone else pay the cost. It was considered a non-good act, but compared to most medieval punishments it seems quite light.

[chris1982]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Note, I'm not running the game by D&D rules. I'm focusing on Forgotten Realms 'fluff', not D&D 'crunch'.

It is possible to create a permanent magical portal in the Forgotten Realms. Most methods available to modern wizards that do so, however, require a vastly powerful wizard and leaves such a wizard weakened and significantly shortens his lifespan.

Ok, if casters are not as powerful in your world as in the original setting this changes a lot of course. I think the only limiting factors of magic changing the whole economy drastically are
1) There are only a few mages capable of casting mighty spells (need to define why?)
2) Mages will earn a lot of money by other means than aiding merchants and the like.

Originally Posted by Icelander

Most portals, moreover, aren't large enough for caravans. They can fit maybe five people on foot through per minute and that's if the portal key isn't a rare item of some sort. A permanent portal large enough to fit a wagon through would be a marvellous creation and cost several millions of gold pieces ($10+ M). It would also give military strategists and court mages fits when they thought about the implications for the security of their realm.

I think an investment of 10M gp is nothing compared to costs of major shippings to distant lands.
In a world where mages can summon large Demons I don't really fear invading armies over small portals (that can be guarded, dispelled in case of danger etc.)

I just believe in a high magic world with lots of spellcasting most things would be very much different than standard ships and caravans...

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by chris1982

Ok, if casters are not as powerful in your world as in the original setting this changes a lot of course. I think the only limiting factors of magic changing the whole economy drastically are
1) There are only a few mages capable of casting mighty spells (need to define why?)
2) Mages will earn a lot of money by other means than aiding merchants and the like.

There are still powerful spellcasters, of course. But a significant number of them is either undead (and thus not a part of normal society), divinely inspired (and thus not interested in actions which do not serve the goals of his deity) or have their own arcane goals. And being weakened and vulnerable to assault from their foes for a long time is not a part of their plans, generally.

Originally Posted by chris1982

I think an investment of 10M gp is nothing compared to costs of major shippings to distant lands.

That's the sort of thing I'm looking for, really. How much money is floating around Sembian docks? How much are they spending on magical travel?

Originally Posted by chris1982

In a world where mages can summon large Demons I don't really fear invading armies over small portals (that can be guarded, dispelled in case of danger etc.)

The $10 M investment of the portals can be dispelled, yes, but that's a very expensive way to deal with the problem (and it depends on your controlling access to the portal). As an example, a Cormyrean Purple Dragon soldier costs about $20k to fully recruit, equip and train and that includes everything up to amortizatised housing costs. You could field a regiment of those for the cost of the portal.

In any event, one demon is far less of a threat than the 3000 soldiers that can walk through a Gate during a whole day.

Originally Posted by chris1982

I just believe in a high magic world with lots of spellcasting most things would be very much different than standard ships and caravans...

In our world, we've got space ships, airplanes and helicopters; but ships are still the mainstay of goods transportation.

In any event, I'm looking for thoughts about how different it would be. I know that there are not permanent portals linking everything together, but I also know that the Red Wizards of Thay, for example, use portals extensively to stock their enclaves in cities all over Faerun. That's so profitable for them that they are rapidly becoming the richest nation on Faerun.