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Old 08-30-2018, 10:50 PM   #11
tanksoldier
 
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Default Re: Wealthy Elven Bards and the Bow of Infinite Money

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So what's stopping an elven bard from buying an Elven Shortbow at $765 and then selling it at the shop next door for $850?
...because the Elven Shortbow isn't available at the shop next door, it's bought from the elves deep in the forest or wherever.

If they character wants to become an elven equipment importer, great.
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Old 08-31-2018, 07:01 AM   #12
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Default Re: Wealthy Elven Bards and the Bow of Infinite Money

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Originally Posted by tanksoldier View Post
If they character wants to become an elven equipment importer, great.
And, of course, there's plenty of adventure to be had travelling deep into the elven forest with money and goods to trade and then traveling back to the kingdoms of men with stockpiles of elven goods.
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Old 08-31-2018, 10:48 AM   #13
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Default Re: Wealthy Elven Bards and the Bow of Infinite Money

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Originally Posted by ericbsmith View Post
And, of course, there's plenty of adventure to be had travelling deep into the elven forest with money and goods to trade and then traveling back to the kingdoms of men with stockpiles of elven goods.
...because if the elves come to you they start trying to dictate to you how many trees you can cut down. Ah, sorry that's a different game ;-).
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Old 09-01-2018, 12:30 AM   #14
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Default Re: Wealthy Elven Bards and the Bow of Infinite Money

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...because if the elves come to you they start trying to dictate to you how many trees you can cut down. Ah, sorry that's a different game ;-).
Bah! Trees! A proper Dwarves natural enemy!
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Old 09-22-2022, 02:11 PM   #15
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I'm running a rules as written dungeon fantasy campaign (after 10 years of far too many inconsistently enforced house-rules, it felt like it was time for one where we use the rules in the books and only those). During yesterday's char gen session, an interesting loop hole was found:

Elves lop 10% of the final price of "Elven" gear, buying such gear for 90% of listed price. Bards have a decent chance of being able to sell items at 100%, especially if this is what they're specialized in. First a reaction roll with a host of bonuses, and if that fails, a high merchant skill. Then luck.

So what's stopping an elven bard from buying an Elven Shortbow at $765 and then selling it at the shop next door for $850? And, with a little bit more seed capital, doing the same with an Elven Composite Bow (earning $1,530 in the process)?

Obviously, it can, should, and probably will be rule zero'ed, but that's not the point of this exercise.
It doesn't even need to be elven gear. Per Exploits page 13 (Getting Stuff Cheap), a high-enough Merchant skill can reliably get you stuff at 90% of list price. Per Exploits page 16 (Getting a Good Price), enough Charisma and Appearance plus a sky-high Merchant skill can make your effective Wealth two levels higher. If we extrapolate the Wealth table beyond Very Wealthy, that could mean you buy for 90% of list price and sell for 120% of list price.

Even if we don't extrapolate, that means you buy for 90% and sell for 10%, netting a tidy 10%.

There's a rug merchant (i.e. bard) sitting in my notes right now who spent his 60 discretionary points on 39 points of Bard Song and 20 points of Wealthy. He's only got Merchant-13 so he would buy at 100% and sell for 80%, but with another 23 points invested in Merchant-20 he'd be reliably buying at 90% and selling at 100%. And he'll probably never invest those points, because delving with his friends (and indulging his xenophilia) is much more fun than studying to become a master merchant who can buy $9000 worth of wool and quickly find a buyer willing to pay $10,000 for it. Those 23 points will always go towards e.g. Bardic Talent, Song of Terror, or Song of the Wild instead of Merchant, no matter what his parents say.

Edit: Oh, wow. Apparently I was in a thread on this topic already, back in 2008. http://forums.sjgames.com/showthread...715#post561715
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Old 09-22-2022, 02:56 PM   #16
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Default Re: Wealthy Elven Bards and the Bow of Infinite Money

get in nerds, we're playing Axes & Arbitrage!
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Old 09-22-2022, 03:37 PM   #17
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Default Re: Wealthy Elven Bards and the Bow of Infinite Money

It's worth noting that the generic dungeon fantasy setting is sufficiently inspired by medieval Europe that the economy is probably guild-based. The guilds apparently allow delvers to sell found items without issue, but, if the PCs seem to be moving out of the "delver" role and into "full-blown merchant" role (without having secured appropriate guild membership), them, if some stern warnings don't suffice, they will rapidly find themselves disbarred from the legitimate economy.
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Old 09-22-2022, 03:48 PM   #18
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It's worth noting that the generic dungeon fantasy setting is sufficiently inspired by medieval Europe that the economy is probably guild-based. The guilds apparently allow delvers to sell found items without issue, but, if the PCs seem to be moving out of the "delver" role and into "full-blown merchant" role (without having secured appropriate guild membership), them, if some stern warnings don't suffice, they will rapidly find themselves disbarred from the legitimate economy.
It seems to me that guild monopolies and connections are already covered by the Wealth (dis)advantage, and is why delvers with only Average wealth can't make a living as resellers.

As long as the GM doesn't permit transactions to be instantaneous, it shouldn't be an issue. Realistically, buying $9000 of wool and then selling it for $10,000 will involve hunting down someone with a wool surplus, buying it, and hauling it to someone willing to pay $10,000 for it. It wouldn't be surprising for that to take 1-2 days, which--let's face it--is much more boring way to make a $1000 profit than two days spent stabbing monsters and looking for treasure. After all, you can already get infinite money through infinite dungeon delving (if you survive).
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Old 09-28-2022, 07:05 PM   #19
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Default Re: Wealthy Elven Bards and the Bow of Infinite Money

Another reason to play a wealthy elven bard:

With 60 points to spend, you can afford to be a Wealthy [20] Elven [20] bard with Bardic Talent 3 [10], Song of Humiliation [4], and Energy Reserve 2 [6].

The elf synergy gives you Bow-15, Stealth-15, and Rapier-16 (yielding a parry of 11+DB), as well as slightly more speed (6.25) and Move 7. More importantly, it unlocks more spells including Concussion. Why is this awesome?

See, IQ 14 and Bardic Talent 3 is already enough to let you maintain some cheap spells for free if they are in the bard colleges. Hush, Hide Thoughts, Keen Sight are all worth having. But how about Resist Sound? You could take responsibility for maintaining Resist Sound on the whole party all the time. A -4 to -6 penalty on all spellcasting is no joke, and something a full wizard, cleric, or druid probably couldn't stand to do routinely given the opportunity cost. But you're a bard, and you don't have THAT many spells you want to keep up constantly.

And that means that the first thing you do every combat is toss your little Concussion ball that you summoned previously (at 15-6 = 9 or better, your reliability stinks, but before combat it doesn't matter much--you can spend 8 points to raise this to 12 or better if you want, and another 8 points will make it both 14 or better and free) before all the speed 6.0 monsters can move.

Now all the monsters have to roll HT-3 to avoid physical stun, and none of the delvers do. A lot of horrifying monsters like Ramexes, Flaming Skulls, Werewolves/Vampires, and even Watchers at the Edge of Time have HT in the 10-12 range and are likely to be stunned; even a tougher monster like a pudding (HT 13) or dragon (HT 15) has 25-50% chance of failing. As far as I can tell, Magic Resistance doesn't even help (per Adventurers pg 51) because Concussion is a Missile spell, so something like a Ramex is just stuck with flat 83% odds of being stunned.

It's not even a Quick Contest, just a straight HT-3 check, so your -6 penalty from having so many spells on doesn't even hurt your success rate.

Normally, the downside to Concussion is the high chance of stunning some of your friends as well, leading to casualties, but you're a bard and you've got them all under Resist Sound already. (So if the wizard wants to start chucking Concussion grenades as well, feel free!)

This is not your main contribution to the group. Your main contribution is your ability to buy low, sell high, and stun enemies with Song of Humiliation as a free action. (Plus make friends, hire good employees, and communicate at long distance, as well as psychically interrogating defeated enemies.)

But it's a nice little combat shtick for someone who otherwise might feel a lot like deadweight in combat against foes who cannot be mind-controlled, and it more than justifies spending those 20 points on Elf, if you have no objection to Sense of Duty (Nature). It's even better than spending them on Song of Terror because it works even on Unfazeable monsters, and has a higher success rate. (Of course you can get Song of Terror as well, eventually.)

Elf bard is best bard.

Last edited by sjmdw45; 09-28-2022 at 07:49 PM.
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Old 09-29-2022, 05:30 AM   #20
Anders
 
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Default Re: Wealthy Elven Bards and the Bow of Infinite Money

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Originally Posted by ravenfish View Post
It's worth noting that the generic dungeon fantasy setting is sufficiently inspired by medieval Europe that the economy is probably guild-based. The guilds apparently allow delvers to sell found items without issue, but, if the PCs seem to be moving out of the "delver" role and into "full-blown merchant" role (without having secured appropriate guild membership), them, if some stern warnings don't suffice, they will rapidly find themselves disbarred from the legitimate economy.
Are you saying they should be bard from selling stuff?
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