Resources question: how does selling items work?

[Dwight]

@mykelsss

Man, a lot of downers in this thread. My two cents:

Since it takes 2x the obstacle of a test to have a 60-70% shot at succeeding, take the obstacle of an item in the resources list (or compare it to one), and double it. That’s the full value of cash die that thing is worth. A full plate suit is 12D then.

BUT! Players should never be getting full price for these—just think about pawn shops in the real world. They want to scam you as much as possible. So take the dice total and subtract 1/3 (or maybe the player can bump if up to 1/2 with a successful haggling test). So for a full plate suit, the character would get 4D normally and 6D on a good roll. Not bad.

The fundamental issue is that you add Fund dice to your Resource pool, creating an exponential increase in buying power. Top that off with with a little Artha and some Help and it throws your math assumptions out window, in practice. This may not be nearly as obvious with only an occasional rare, small ticket item sale. Particularly with a very small Resource character. But it is a substantial effect.

Sell superior quality arms, or run of the mill plate and you can end up with 15D Fund. A B5 Resources character can then turn around and be odds on favorite (before Artha) to buy castle with that.

For that B5 Resource character to have a better than even chance, before factoring Artha (and Help), to buy back that armor or weapon they only need a 5D Fund. Of course it is much harder for a B2 character, and easier for a B8 character, but that is fine because the B2 is poor. Trying to hang outside your present economic station is perilous and difficult.

Likewise, a swing larger than +1D/-1D off a given amount is quite sizable. Because of the exponential nature of ability rolls and the item prices, a fixed +1D/-1D is already effectively a percentage multiplier on of the underlying linear price.

P.S. Note that the rules state a single Fund ranges from 1D - 10D in size (page 374 of BWG). Your suggestion very quickly runs over the top of that. I think it is clear why, now?

[Jimbozig]

I thought he was talking about cash dice, not funds.

[Dwight]

@Jimbozig

I thought he was talking about cash dice, not funds.

Same basic math applies, although I have always read Cash on Hand as being incidental implying it should not be dwarfing Funds in size. Also notice the Ob 10 Test required to obtain just 5D when generating cash.

[Deliverator]

IMO, the real problem with cash (and, related to that, selling power) is the weirdness of requiring even Obs in such a tightly-scaled system. I mean, I get it, I really do—cash should be hard to generate! But couldn’t it be something like (Desired # of Cash Dice) + 2?

Matt