Quick and Dirty enchanter wages

[hal]

Has anyone run a quick analysis on the income of mages who engage in quick and dirty enchantments?

Let's say for the sake of argument, we have a Master enchanter with a skill of 20 in enchantment and perhaps 5 spells that are also at skill 20 for being enchanted into an item.

Now further suppose that each enchanter has access to a 20 point power stone.

Quick and dirty enchantments require 1 hour per 100 energy, with a minimum time required of 1 hour (even if the energy cost is lower than 100).

Theoretically speaking, that is, in an 8 hour work day, a total of 8 enchantments that can be produced. Let's say that we have an enchantment that takes 100 days of enchantment slow and sure - a widget spell if you will. Said item requires the use of an 11 point power stone, along with 9 fatigue from the enchanter. 5 x 20 = 100.

The problem is - these powerstones are fully discharged, and require 11 days to reach full charge of 11 energy again. Our circle of mages are going to need a LOT of these 11 point powerstones - by my calculations, 88 of them. One per hour's quick and dirty enchantment (8) times the number of days required to reach full recharge rate. Now, these powerstones could be made as one college powerstones: Enchantment use only...

But here is where things get a little fuzzy. 800 energy cast in one day, results in, at $1 per energy point, an income of $800 right? Dividing that by five, we end up with each mage earning a total of $160. This is almost 5x the income of a normal wealth character earning $33 per day. If we assume a working month of 24 days, at $33 per day, our mage is essentially earning ordinary wealth income per month equal to $33 x 24 or $792 per month.

This means then, for those five enchanters, they're at wealth level "Wealthy" for their income that would be that high.

Hmmmm.

[StevenH]

Well, I don't think you would ever get an enchanter who made "normal" wages. Unless they really marked down their product, which, of course, would greatly expand their market.

If that circle of 5 mages made 8 100 energy widgets per day, their widget would have to only cost $20 or so to get them "average" wages of $33 per day. And that's fine, if enchanter mages are common and magic items are cheap. But that's like saying that a doctor, who has gone through university, then another six years of med school, then two years of residency, should be paid only minimum wage.

Hedge mages, sure. Low(ish) wages could be possible, if they are common enough to be on every street corner. But even if enchanters are common, they would still command higher than average wages.
Or, look at it another way. How many mages would there have to be for them to be as common as a blacksmith, baker, or chandler, such that they would be paid the same amount?

[RGTraynor]

Originally Posted by StevenH

Well, I don't think you would ever get an enchanter who made "normal" wages. Unless they really marked down their product, which, of course, would greatly expand their market.

Mage prices/wages are a fiat anyway. Given accumulated wealth in the hands of the rich and powerful, under any rational economic system, an enchanter would reasonably charge the sun, moon, and stars for his or her creations. If I'm the only mage around cranking out Hide Thought items -- and it takes me the better part of three years to make one -- there's going to be a bidding war that draws in brokers and agents from foreign lands. No PC is ever going to be able to afford an item that isn't Quick & Dirty, without GMs setting fixed prices for things.

[Willy]

Originally Posted by hal

Has anyone run a quick analysis on the income of mages who engage in quick and dirty enchantments?

SNIP

I have done something like that as a basis for a mage who wanted to make a living as enchanter, sadly it was before having a computer, only some Power Stone creation tables are left.

You will use the smallest possible Powerstone, because the bigger they are, the much a energy point costs you. You will need a lot of space and guards to protect them anyway.

Quick and dirty is a good way to produce cheap mass items. Problem comes up if you want to enchant stuff that is already quite expensive before enchanting, because quick and dirty has a good chance to go wrong, and removing a failed enchantment is difficult. Just to be sure you have to cast a spell after each enchanting that the enchanting went right. Adding 5 enchantings quick and dirty on one item gives you a 10,.. chance to add a flaw on it, lowering the price, with effective Skill 15.

The end result of my calculations a that time were, in the long run it´s way more profitable for a lone enchanter to make mass production of arrows or powerstones, than working asss a living power stone for another enchanter. and for a circle to enchant high value items with slow and sure. Depending on the market price of the endproduct adding extra time can be worth the effort.

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by StevenH

Well, I don't think you would ever get an enchanter who made "normal" wages. Unless they really marked down their product, which, of course, would greatly expand their market.

If that circle of 5 mages made 8 100 energy widgets per day, their widget would have to only cost $20 or so to get them "average" wages of $33 per day. And that's fine, if enchanter mages are common and magic items are cheap. But that's like saying that a doctor, who has gone through university, then another six years of med school, then two years of residency, should be paid only minimum wage.

"Average" wages aren't average really. Well, they might be the mean in a modern society, but they certainly aren't the median in a modern or pre-modern society. That's more likely be half that (Struggling) to match the median Status -1.

That said, you're not counting the overheads of their business, especially the cost of their powerstones (or at least the returns on their cost or the payments to finance them. The usual assumption is six mages, one being the leader and one status/wealth level higher than the rest. Each of those 100-energy enchants needs 40-energy or so from powerstones, and actually only manages about four enchants a day (an hour for the enchant, an hour recovering for eight hours). So six 6-7 point stones per cast, 24 of them per day, each taking 6-7 days to recover, so for a five day week 120 of the things are needed. That's about $100,000 in powerstones (at TL3 - they'll cost rather more at higher TLs), or $18K per enchanter (about two years' income).

There will also be insurance and/or security expenses given the high value and portability of powerstones. While you can enchant heavier stones to make them harder to steal, they still need to be portable enough that they can be moved to and from their storage facility - which will be large, given the need to keep the things six feet apart while they charge (assuming half are stored and floor level, and half at 6+ feet up, you need about 15-20 ft^2 per stone, at a minimum).

At the assumption of $1/point for Q&D enchanting this makes $400/day. If they're paid $33/day ($66/day for the leader), which I agree is probably low), and another $66/day for a couple of Status -1 guards and a couple of apprentices, they have about $100/day to pay for the building, chattels, etc., the powerstones' payments/return on investment, and any insurance (or savings to pay for powerstone loss), etc. If it's a fairly safe business environment (which is not historical for TL3 at all) and a ROI, etc. of 10% is acceptable $40-50/day goes on paying for the powerstones. That leaves $50/day for everything else, which seems a bit low.

If the circle expects more pay, say enough for Status 1 and Status 2 for the leader, that eats up $495/day, and prices must rise, even if no powerstones are used.

Without powerstones the circle can manage four 60-energy enchants a day, for $240/day, and there's no way they'll be able to pay all their expenses unless they work out of someone's home and avoid paying almost any business costs at all.

Assuming it's used efficiently energy from powerstones is actually cheaper than mages' energy until you're using stones over 12-points at a 10% ROI. If the required ROI is higher (high interest rates, high rates of theft, etc.), the crossover point will drop. It will also drop if enchanters can't reliably sell items enchanted at or near their maximum capacity, so there's a good chance most circle will have only a few stones large enough to do enchants above a certain size, and as those stones will be part of their normal use cycle (because otherwise they're sitting, earning nothing) those larger enchants will need to be booked ahead and will have a premium beyond merely what the extra stone size would suggest.

[hal]

Originally Posted by Rupert

It will also drop if enchanters can't reliably sell items enchanted at or near their maximum capacity, so there's a good chance most circle will have only a few stones large enough to do enchants above a certain size, and as those stones will be part of their normal use cycle (because otherwise they're sitting, earning nothing) those larger enchants will need to be booked ahead and will have a premium beyond merely what the extra stone size would suggest.

Good point: Can the enchanters sell everything they make? The alternative is... will all mages make the $33 per day income? Is it possible that "journeymen" enchanters (even though their skill is at 15!) might be paid at a lesser rate.

As far as GURPS BASIC SET CAMPAIGNS go, the "range of income" between wealth levels is not absolute. If your income is less than that required for "standard wealth" jobs, then the classification for that income is deemed to be struggling - even if not exactly 1/2 that of the going rate.

I'll see if I can dig up the specific page. I remember working with the tables to try and determine the income rates for a Cyberpunk campaign.

None the less - it would seem odd that there are no specific instances in which an enchanter would make a struggling income wage - why would they be immune to what their non-mageborn brethren suffer from? Specialized skills that are manual, tend to be paid more than unskilled laborers - yes, but in instances where you have a guild structure that imposes wage rates from without, it could happen that certain enchanters may very well make less money.

Another possibility is that, in order to ply their trade where they sell their enchantments - they may have to drastically reduce their prices so that the masses can afford their services. A poor city without a major source of rich people buying magic items may well force the enchanter to sell their wares to the next lowest income bracket.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by RGTraynor

M, under any rational economic system, an enchanter would reasonably charge the sun, moon, and stars for his or her creations. If I'm the only mage around cranking out Hide Thought items --.

If you don't have a Mage across the street cranking out Mind-Reading Items (and this needs to be known generally in your area) your market for Hide Thoughts Items will be zero.

You at least have to educate the paranoids as to _how_ their enemies are out to get them.

There would be other items more obviously useful to rich paranoids with less education.

[KarlKost]

Originally Posted by hal

Has anyone run a quick analysis on the income of mages who engage in quick and dirty enchantments?

Let's say for the sake of argument, we have a Master enchanter with a skill of 20 in enchantment and perhaps 5 spells that are also at skill 20 for being enchanted into an item.

Now further suppose that each enchanter has access to a 20 point power stone.

Quick and dirty enchantments require 1 hour per 100 energy, with a minimum time required of 1 hour (even if the energy cost is lower than 100).

Theoretically speaking, that is, in an 8 hour work day, a total of 8 enchantments that can be produced. Let's say that we have an enchantment that takes 100 days of enchantment slow and sure - a widget spell if you will. Said item requires the use of an 11 point power stone, along with 9 fatigue from the enchanter. 5 x 20 = 100.

The problem is - these powerstones are fully discharged, and require 11 days to reach full charge of 11 energy again. Our circle of mages are going to need a LOT of these 11 point powerstones - by my calculations, 88 of them. One per hour's quick and dirty enchantment (8) times the number of days required to reach full recharge rate. Now, these powerstones could be made as one college powerstones: Enchantment use only...

But here is where things get a little fuzzy. 800 energy cast in one day, results in, at $1 per energy point, an income of $800 right? Dividing that by five, we end up with each mage earning a total of $160. This is almost 5x the income of a normal wealth character earning $33 per day. If we assume a working month of 24 days, at $33 per day, our mage is essentially earning ordinary wealth income per month equal to $33 x 24 or $792 per month.

This means then, for those five enchanters, they're at wealth level "Wealthy" for their income that would be that high.

Hmmmm.

To me, said mage is earning too little too few.

You're talking about someone with 6 skills at 20+ from a set of super technical and specialized body of knowledge that aint commonly avaiable (spells) and require an unusual background / special trainining, which is Magery, that is comparable only to Weapons Master, Trained by a Master or Gadgeteer, and that also requires very specific set of equipments to operate their craft - tons of Powerstones.

If a TL2-4 BIG town have even a single one of those, that's already exceptional.

The only real life modern comparative would be world renowed experts on a few fields, like a renowed neurosurgeon, an unparalleled computer engineer or programmer, a highly profitable stock broker or market analyst, famous lawyer, nobel winning scientist, mafia boss or a CEO. That's the level of competence we are talking here.

This may seem easy to achieve if the GM just allows you to "casually" pump up your IQ to 20 and Magery to 3 (or even 4), so that you can pump any spell to 20+ with just 1 or 2 CPs, but that's absolutely not common at all! IQ 20 is Albert Einstein super genius level, and Magery 3 is either a super rare gift or the result of massive dedication and study, so neither trait is normal, and definetly spells at the range of 20+ are VERY rare! Let alone 6 of them!

Also, Powerstones arent just casually found around. They require work to build too.

So no, that Mage actually makes way too little for his AMAZING capabilities!

[DemiBenson]

This seems like the kind of exercise that would benefit from a spreadsheet, so you could easily try out various starting conditions.

[StevenH]

Originally Posted by Rupert

"Average" wages aren't average really. Well, they might be the mean in a modern society, but they certainly aren't the median in a modern or pre-modern society. That's more likely be half that (Struggling) to match the median Status -1.

That said, you're not counting the overheads of their business, especially the cost of their powerstones (or at least the returns on their cost or the payments to finance them. The usual assumption is six mages, one being the leader and one status/wealth level higher than the rest. Each of those 100-energy enchants needs 40-energy or so from powerstones, and actually only manages about four enchants a day (an hour for the enchant, an hour recovering for eight hours). So six 6-7 point stones per cast, 24 of them per day, each taking 6-7 days to recover, so for a five day week 120 of the things are needed. That's about $100,000 in powerstones (at TL3 - they'll cost rather more at higher TLs), or $18K per enchanter (about two years' income).

There will also be insurance and/or security expenses given the high value and portability of powerstones. While you can enchant heavier stones to make them harder to steal, they still need to be portable enough that they can be moved to and from their storage facility - which will be large, given the need to keep the things six feet apart while they charge (assuming half are stored and floor level, and half at 6+ feet up, you need about 15-20 ft^2 per stone, at a minimum).

At the assumption of $1/point for Q&D enchanting this makes $400/day. If they're paid $33/day ($66/day for the leader), which I agree is probably low), and another $66/day for a couple of Status -1 guards and a couple of apprentices, they have about $100/day to pay for the building, chattels, etc., the powerstones' payments/return on investment, and any insurance (or savings to pay for powerstone loss), etc. If it's a fairly safe business environment (which is not historical for TL3 at all) and a ROI, etc. of 10% is acceptable $40-50/day goes on paying for the powerstones. That leaves $50/day for everything else, which seems a bit low.

If the circle expects more pay, say enough for Status 1 and Status 2 for the leader, that eats up $495/day, and prices must rise, even if no powerstones are used.

Without powerstones the circle can manage four 60-energy enchants a day, for $240/day, and there's no way they'll be able to pay all their expenses unless they work out of someone's home and avoid paying almost any business costs at all.

Assuming it's used efficiently energy from powerstones is actually cheaper than mages' energy until you're using stones over 12-points at a 10% ROI. If the required ROI is higher (high interest rates, high rates of theft, etc.), the crossover point will drop. It will also drop if enchanters can't reliably sell items enchanted at or near their maximum capacity, so there's a good chance most circle will have only a few stones large enough to do enchants above a certain size, and as those stones will be part of their normal use cycle (because otherwise they're sitting, earning nothing) those larger enchants will need to be booked ahead and will have a premium beyond merely what the extra stone size would suggest.

You are absolutely right. Overhead is a thing. And there would be a lot of it, as you laid out. (Although a Powerstone Charging Rack from Magic Items 1 would help a little, by concentrating the hugely expensive powerstones in a smaller area. So it would be easier to fortify the room they are in, instead of the entire wing of the building they would take up otherwise.)
So I suppose it is possible for mages to only make $33 per day, if they are altruistic and generous. I just figured that they would up their prices to cover the overhead AND make a decent living.