Hirelings are a such a great investment!

[ArchonShiva]

Originally Posted by martinl

I realize this was a joke, but in my games when hirelings die their stuff is owned by their heirs, not their employers. If the PCs try to keep it or sell it there will be problems.

Obviously. There is no sane world in which hiring a plumber entitles you to his truck if he goes into cardiac arrest while fiddling with your pipes.

On the other hand, as far as I understand the town abstraction, mot gear is generic, and there isn't an especially good way to tell apart a broadsword from Bob the Fighter and a broadsword from Bub the Orc. The black market is already a feature of town, and all you're saying is that a few streetwise and armory rolls might be needed. It certainly won't get harder than the filch+smuggling combo.

Making a list of potential consequences often encourages clever players, who are after all there for the challenge and the rewards.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by ArchonShiva

On the other hand, as far as I understand the town abstraction, mot gear is generic, and there isn't an especially good way to tell apart a broadsword from Bob the Fighter and a broadsword from Bub the Orc.

Yeah, but it also doesn't matter. If you can't return Bob's broadsword to his heirs, you'll owe them either a replacement in kind or replacement fees, and also death benefits. When you hire someone and they bring their own gear, you're in effect renting their gear, with normal penalties for failing to return it.

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Anthony

When you hire someone and they bring their own gear, you're in effect renting their gear, with normal penalties for failing to return it.

That's one way of looking at it.

[ArchonShiva]

Originally Posted by Anthony

Yeah, but it also doesn't matter. If you can't return Bob's broadsword to his heirs, you'll owe them either a replacement in kind or replacement fees, and also death benefits. When you hire someone and they bring their own gear, you're in effect renting their gear, with normal penalties for failing to return it.

Wait, are you saying that if Bob falls into a lava pit and burns, you’re expected to refund every last bit of gear? What if he *jumps* into a lava pit, and you can’t quite tell whether he was being mind controlled or not?

PCs pay for repairs and consumables, but you don’t have to put $1,000mon escrow just to rent a guy!

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by ArchonShiva

Wait, are you saying that if Bob falls into a lava pit and burns, you’re expected to refund every last bit of gear? What if he *jumps* into a lava pit, and you can’t quite tell whether he was being mind controlled or not?

Unless you can convince his heirs otherwise, you assume mind control and pay out (and yes, DF90 mentions 'gear lost on quests').

Originally Posted by ArchonShiva

PCs pay for repairs and consumables, but you don’t have to put $1,000mon escrow just to rent a guy!

That's what being credit-worthy is about. The ability to hire people for dangerous tasks without a down payment should really be part of what the wealth advantage does.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by ArchonShiva

Making a list of potential consequences often encourages clever players, who are after all there for the challenge and the rewards.

Those consequences can very quickly make the game not fun. Being outlawed, excommunicated, with a bounty on your head, hunted by parties of 250 point adventurers (the aforementioned Holy Warriors of Order, Justiciars, and Mage-Hunters for example) and platoons of King's Men while living in a cave or ruin means that you are the challenge now.

[Mister Negative]

Even if you don't get outlawed, excommunicated, and have a bounty put on your head--see what kind of treatment you get in most towns. You know, the place where you rest, resupply, recharge power items, and get healing?

"So, you'd like this Curse removed? What assurances can you offer me that you won't strangle the Prelate during the ceremony?"

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by Mister Negative

Even if you don't get outlawed, excommunicated, and have a bounty put on your head--see what kind of treatment you get in most towns. You know, the place where you rest, resupply, recharge power items, and get healing?

"So, you'd like this Curse removed? What assurances can you offer me that you won't strangle the Prelate during the ceremony?"

That's effectively outlawed, reaction penalties to all interactions in town are reaction penalties to all interactions in town.

[martinl]

Originally Posted by ArchonShiva

Making a list of potential consequences often encourages clever players, who are after all there for the challenge and the rewards.

I'm not saying you're having hurting wrong fun if you're playing DF as an exercise in murdering townies and taking their stuff, but I will suggest that you may have accidentally reversed the polarization on the Dioracgalcum Matrix-Gyrotron.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by martinl

I'm not saying you're having hurting wrong fun if you're playing DF as an exercise in murdering townies and taking their stuff, but I will suggest that you may have accidentally reversed the polarization on the Dioracgalcum Matrix-Gyrotron.

Yeah, you are the monsters now.


That said my current Pathfinder game has seen the players murdering the NPCs sent by competing factions in their organization in dungeons a couple times now, but that's a nasty internal struggle.