d10 Economic Exchange Systems and a Draft for Barter Systems

d10 Economic Exchange Systems

1. Currency (coins)
2. Currency (coins and notes)
3. Currency (coins and notes and stock and capital)
4. Currency (rai stones)
5. Barter (simple)
6. Barter (Dzamalag)
7. Barter (debt)
8. Gift economy
9. Stockpile allocation (communal)
10. Stockpile allocation (tyrannical)

As my first Holy Selmat campaign winds down, I have the chance to look back and tweak things that did not go so well. One convention of the game which I loved in concept but which proved difficult in play is that most of the word does not use currency, and instead the barter standard is common. Players found this endlessly inconvenient, and often tried to juke it, looking for commodities that were “equivalent” to a gold piece, a silver piece, and so on. Worse still, I found it clunky enough that we often skipped over any actual barter and exchange.

So this is the first draft of my new barter economy. One resource which will be relevant to my travelling rules is “supplies.” One supply is enough to sustain one person for five days in food, warmth, water, and the like. Another resource is labor, skilled and unskilled. Unskilled labor can usually get you resources at the rate of one supply every five days, thus working for bed and board. Skilled labor will vary much more, but generally I’ll treat it as yielding two supplies every five days.

So the base denomination is time spent in work, a reality that successful parties will likely avoid. If they have devoted followers, they can reduce their upkeep in cities or even make a profit by finding work for them. 

Yet notably, the barter economy is incomplete. You are unlikely to purchase a sword with servitude or food. You have to engage in classic barter: the exchange of one valuable item for another. In this case I might have there be a simple procedure:

• Person 1 proposes a trade.
• DM decides if the trade is very roughly equivalent in person 2’s eyes.
• If so, person 1 and person 2 test their charisma.
• If the trade is roughly equivalent, the DM rolls 2d6 to determine if person 2 wants to make the trade, with higher numbers indicating higher degrees of interest. If both succeeded their test or neither did, take the average. If person 1 succeeded, the roll has advantage. If person 2 succeeded, the roll has disadvantage. 
• On a high roll, person 2 errs on the side of accepting the deal. On a low roll, person 2 tries to get a better deal.

Finally, the gathering of supplies provides an interesting logistical challenge for long journeys. It is wholly possible to wander a month between cities in Holy Selmat, and you can’t carry a month of supplies on your back (One supply is equivalent perhaps to five equipment slots.) Hunting can ameliorate the upkeep, (either skilled or unskilled labor, depending on several factors) but you will need ways to carry supplies even then. This is where porters, carts, mules, and the like come in.

Gathering supplies

• Bovine, milk: 2 supplies/month
• Skilled labor: 12 supplies/month
• Unskilled labor: 6 supplies/month

Harvesting supplies

• Bovine, meat: 70 supplies
• Pig: 10 supplies
• Wheat, bushel: 20 supplies

Carrying supplies

• Bovine: 20 supplies or one cart or half a wagon.
• Cart: holds 40 supplies
• Covered Wagon: holds 60 supplies
• Donkey: 10 supplies
• Horse: 10 supplies
• Mule: 15 supplies
• Person: 1 supply for every 5 strength they possess
• Porter: 3 supplies

d10 Holy Drugs (Practitioners V. II)

In Holy Selmat, the first gigre was revealed to a village elder in a dream. It was the recipe for a drug that protected holy men and gave them miraculous powers. Since then, different gigre have been invented (discovered? bestowed?) and its use is common even outside of Selmat. The Prophet Ehud is said to have created several skews of gigre.

All drugs follow the same rules. Three times a day while under the effect of a drug, you can spend a "wisp" to either add a d8 to a related test or to use its associated power. Each drug has at least one commandment. Breaking it makes you Unclean, which is a condition that prevents you from benefiting from holy or chemic spells. It also makes you unlucky. If something bad happens to a random member of your party, it happens to you. You must spend an hour ritually cleaning yourself to undo this effect. So:

• Wine: Helps to resist fear. You can get a feeling of whether divine magic is at play. Attacking your guest or host is unclean to you.
• Opium: Helps to befriend intoxicated people. You can get a feeling of whether chemic is at play. Manual work is unclean to you.
• Absynthe: Helps to resist fear. You can get a feeling of whether arcane magic is at play. Attentiveness is unclean to you.

Michael Sztuka Sowa

Gigre is different in only a few ways. It has more commandments, and sometimes has mortal sins. Commiting a mortal sin is like the fall of a paladin, and makes you unclean until you perform an extreme act of penance such as a quest. The upside is that gigres confer a greater power than mundane drugs. If you have are a practitioner, the Selmat equivalent of a paladin, gigres are abundant and have additional uses. A new gigre recipe makes for good treasure.

d10 Holy Drugs

1. Gigre of Angled Sight: Must remain silent every seventh day. On all other days, must compose a stanza. Must only eat seeds and meat. Indiscretion is a mortal sin. Additionally, you can see around corners but dead bodies are unclean to you.
2. Gigre of Justification: Must drink saltwater daily and only travel by starlight. Must keep a servant. Gullibility is a mortal sin. Additionally, you have an affinity with lions but the touch of a wolf is unclean.
3. Gigre of Sensual Embers: Must obey all laws and break bread daily. Must mark yourself with the blood of a relative. Betrayal is a mortal sin. Additionally, menstruation is unclean but if you would become pregnant, you instead gain a temporary level for nine months.
4. Gigre of Cometary Inertia: Must stay perfectly groomed. Must burn incense in prayer daily. Cannot ride any animal. Malice is a mortal sin. Additionally, you are untrippable and inexorable but sex is unclean to you.
5. Gigre of Cannibal Honor: Must consume the brain of an intelligent creature weekly. Must give your true name to anyone who asks it. Cannot imprison anyone. Weakness is a mortal sin. Additionally, you are immune to charms and staggering but holy days are unclean to you.
6. Gigre of Natal Strength: Must carry a weapon at all times. Must abstain from non-gigre drugs. Cannot take another life, even that of a fly. Abandonment is a mortal sin. Additionally, reduce the chance of miscarriage or complications of childbirth by 75%.
7. Gigre of Licit Work: May avoid sabbath restrictions. This gigre has fewer commandments, but a weak power.
8. Gigre of Circumlocution: Must keep all secrets. Must avoid direct sunlight when possible. Cannot tell the truth about yourself. Submission is a mortal sin. Additionally, you can pass through walls but entrapment is unclean to you.
9. Gigre of the Smiths: Must sleep indoors. Must flagellate self daily (1d4 damage). Vandalism is a mortal sin. Cannot be untrusting. You can extrude tools from your body or transmute one to another, but meditation is unclean to you.
10. Gigre of Revealed Wisdoms: Must engage in hedonistic acts whenever possible. Must accept all challenges and wagers. You get hunches about whether an act would be for weal and/or woe but firelight is unclean to you

A dose of gigre is of comparable value to a potion or scroll. A gigre recipe is of comparable value to a minor magical item.

Daniel Romanovsky

Finally, I present the updated practitioner. This class is a little more complex than average, since it tracks wisps per day as well as spells. Remember, the average intoxicated person can spend three wisps per day.

-PRACTITIONER-

Starting skill: drugcrafting

1: See evil, Plenty

2: +1 CD, Smite

3: +1 wisp, Tribulation,

4: +1 CD, Reckoning

• Chemic Dice: Charisma is your casting ideal. You begin play knowing two footnotes and three random formulae. More formulae can be learned through study. To cast a formula, you invest at least one chemic die. They work like wizard dice invested in wizard spells.
• Plenty: You can automatically gather enough ingredients to dose one person with any gigre whose recipe you know per day. You start with knowledge of one gigre recipe.
• See evil: Name three things which would make someone evil by your standards. As an action, you can identify who before you is evil by this definition.
• Smite: If a foe is evil, you may spend a wisp of gigre to deal an extra +1d6 damage to that target for the rest of a combat.
• Tribulation: When you lay low an evil foe, you may immediately use one of your formulae or regain one wisp.
• Reckoning: When you lay low an evil foe, regain a chemic die.

Practitioner Footnotes:

1. Smell Drugs: range 30'
2. Secret Combination: magical convince someone you will keep their secret, but only if you intend to.
3. Alter disease: can direct illnesses to act differently with a test of charisma.

Practitioner formulae:

1. Divine Lacuna: A single god chosen by the caster cannot see the target. Lasts [dice] days
2. Wisp: you gain [dice] more wisps of gigre.
3. Acute Quintessence: The weapon grants +[dice] to Attack. The next hit deals +1d6+[dice] damage, then the spell ends
4. Alter Self: Change your physical appearance, 2 CD changes voice to match.
5. Rubbery Body: +3 AC against bludgeoning. Immune to fall damage and similar things. Amazing contortions. Lasts [dice] minutes.
6. Shrink: For [dice] hours, target becomes half their size.
7. Adhesive Spittle: ranged attack to stick target in place for [dice] rounds.
8. Truth paste: when consumed, cannot lie. 2+ CD, must answer all questions.
9. Torque: automatically fail initiative and move slowly, but roll advantage on physical rolls. Lasts [dice] rounds.
10. Transparency: +2 AC and +5 stealth for each CD.