Campaign Economics

This page features historical economics data on the Web, various other links that might be useful for your campaign and the skeleton of a campaign economics system I have been thinking about. Enjoy! Any hints how I could develop this page would be more than welcome! Just send them to vesanto@cc.hut.fi.


Economics data


Campaign economics links


Economics system

The following describes a simple economics system based on the concepts of Minimum wage, Resource, Supply and Demand. Much of these ideas originate from the system in the Aria Worlds, but not all.

Minimum wage and the prices of different kinds of component goods and services will define the minimum price of the product. The base price is derived in the same way except that the instead of the minimum wage we use the wage of the provider of the good / service, which in turn is based on his Resource value. From the base price using Supply and Demand we finally arrive at the market price.

Minimum wage
the wage needed for minimal living
Resource
a measure of what are the raw material and work resources available in principle for the good/service (while supply gives the actual resources). This 'possibility of availability' along with the minimum price gives the base price for the product. Value of Resource vary between 1 and 20 like this:
        FREE dirt or air...
	20 plentiful			
	15 common			
	10 not common, not rare		
	5 rare			
	1 extremely rare	
	0 dream on...
Supply
a measure of the actual availability of goods / services in question. Supply has values from 1 to 20:
	20 plentiful
	15 commonly available
	10 available at fairs
	5 available in London
	1 not available
Demand
a measure of the interest in markets there is for goods / services in question. On the long run Supply will equal Demand, unless it is prevented by the low value of Resource. In this case some of the demand will be covered by different kinds of Substitutes. Also demand has values from 1 to 20:
	20 everybody needs it
	15 majority of people need it
	10 some people need it
	5 few people need it
	1 almost nobody needs it

The actual wage (the amount of money/goods the worker gets from his actual work) is derived from the minimum wage (per day) using the Resource value of the provider of the good / service in question:

   wage = minimum wage * (20 / Resource)^2

   Resource   Wage                Resource   Wage
     20         1                   10         4 
     19       1.1 (=20^2/19^2)       9         5
     18       1.2                    8       6.3
     17       1.4                    7         8
     16       1.6                    6        11
     15       1.8                    5        16
     14         2                    4        25
     13       2.4                    3        44
     12       2.8                    2       100
     11       3.3                    1       400

The prices are calculated as follows:

Minimum price
= sum of the prices of the component goods + minimum wage/day * time
Base price
= sum of component prices + minimum wage/day * (20 / resource of the provider)^2 * time
Market price
= base price * demand / supply
You can still vary the market price using such factors as


Example: Swords

Let minimum wage per day equal 1 economic unit (eu).

In medieval times it took 150 cubic metres of charcoal to produce just 10 kg of iron. It took a weaponsmith about a week to make a basic sword, and about a month to make a decent sword. The process of forging the blade would use 500 to 750 kg of charcoal. (That's half to three-quarters of a tonne of charcoal to make a single blade!). A mail hauberk took a similar time to make (about a month).

To produce a good sword one needs iron (5 kg, or 20 eu), wood (free), charcoal (750 kg, or 6 eu) and a weaponsmith with appropriate facilities (for a week). The minimum price for a sword is 20+6+1*6 = 32 eu (minimum wage = 1 eu per day). The minimum price is used as a check against longterm misuse: the working force won't hold for long if their wage goes below minimum wage - they can't buy enough food.

However the services of a good weaponsmith have resourcevalue of 8 so that the wage part of the price increases to 6 days * 1 eu/day * (20/8)^2 = 37.5 eu. Similarly one might calculate the prices of other components. The base price is then the sum of these component prices, or in this case 64 eu. The resourcevalue for the sword is the minimum of the resourcevalues of the components involved, or 8 in this case.

The market price may differ from the base price. Given the base price of the 'basic sword' of 64 eu we assume that the supply and the demand are in balance, let us say both are 5. Normally in the case of not-common goods resource and supply tend to be equal, but let's assume it is peace time and the existence of so many weaponsmiths is explained by a longterm war just 10 years ago. For common goods (like unskilled labour) the resources can far exceed the demand.

Now, if the sword suddenly becomes fashinable the demand will go up to say 10. The market price would then be 64*10/5 = 128 eu. After a time, of cource, the supply would catch up upto the resource base 8 and the market price would drop to 64*10/8 = 80 eu.

Now if in the neighboring country the weaponsmiths notice this profitable situation and start supplying their own swords to the market, the supply could increase to 11 (because of the imported goods - this is a Huge change btw.) and the market price would drop to 58 eu. Pretty quick the smiths will notice that the profit from swords is no more as good as it was and they will turn their attention to other goods. The supply balances with the demand and market price equals the base price again (64 eu). After yet awhile the market becomes flooded, the swords go out of fashion and the demand (and the supply) will drop back to 8 or below.

In the extreme case of the land suddenly being full of available swordsmiths with unlimited resources the resourcevalue for them would go to 20 and the base price of swords would be calculated using the minimum wage, or the base price would equal minimum price 32 eu. Now, if the demand for the swords would suddenly drop to 2 while the supply were 10, the market price would in principle be 6.4 eu (=32*2/10), but in fact it would be limited by the minimum price to 32 eu, although undoubtably there would be some who would sell a few swords even cheaper just to get some of the invested money back.

A sharp reader may have noticed that the changes in demand, supply, resources and finally prices offers valuable possibilities for someone with a little bit intelligence, enough money to start with and a slick tongue. That is what is called business.


Price list - the Silver Valley markets

The Silver Valley is a small kingdom (100000 inhabitants) in temperate climate in a fantasy world. It is pretty isolated from other societies, but it is located by the seas so traders visit is every year. As the name suggests Silver Valley has a couple of fine silver mines. There are also a few poor quality iron mines, big woods and the sea. The Valley is reknown for its fine wines. The biggest town in the Valley is Kanrain with about 5000 inhabitants.


Good       Resource        Base price  Supply  Demand   Market price
           (raw materials)    
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Food (-> minimum wage)


Wages (resourcevalues & examples)


Raw materials


Common items


Not-common items & services


Luxury items & services


Rare items & services