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Greenface
2011-03-03, 11:38 AM
I have a lvl 6 gnome sorcerer specializing in illusion and enchantment spells. My party is desperately short on money and desperately short on work ethic. Any ideas for cons or scams which could remedy our problem?

Gaius Marius
2011-03-03, 11:42 AM
I have a lvl 6 gnome sorcerer specializing in illusion and enchantment spells. My party is desperately short on money and desperately short on work ethic. Any ideas for cons or scams which could remedy our problem?

Have your rogue run wild cons and scam, with you helping out with the occasional Suggestion/Charm spells.

Silent Image on false documents are also great to reproduce seals and the like. You can easily make the argument to your DM that bi-dimensional illusions are much, much easier than tri-dimensional ones.

grimbold
2011-03-03, 12:03 PM
how much money do you have right now?
you can buy out a couple of stores and dominate an industry in a surprisingly easy way.

LibraryOgre
2011-03-03, 12:03 PM
<Blackadder quote>I have heard there's good money to be made down the docks. Doing favours for sailors. </Blackadder quote>

Gaius has a good suggestion with scams and the like, though watch out... most of those either require you to TALK to the mark, or make you their friend, but not necessarily the Rogue... i.e. they're still going to be suspicious of three-card monty. It could be useful, however, with you turning into a "face" to deal with the local thieves guild, while your party performs robberies.

I've also had a player who decided that her character was going to be based on Max Bialystock, who went hunting for a rich widow. He charmed her (in this case with upper-class manners, a high charisma and tales of adventure) and would use her house as his own base of operations while in town (made it easy for the assassins to find him, actually). You might do something similar... charming a rich person of the appropriate gender, then using them for money.

Gaius Marius
2011-03-03, 12:45 PM
Or just scam rich merchants about a potential business venture. Use Charm/Suggestion (not necessarely on him, but his advisors) to sway his good jugement. Take the money, and run away with it.

Even better if you don't look like the culprits.

Amnestic
2011-03-03, 12:47 PM
1) Find rich person
2) Take rich person's money
3) ???
4) Profit.

If you're willing to run cons and scams, you must be willing to do straight up robbery, extortion, blackmail etc. You're taking the money either way; my way is just more direct, quick and a lot less subtle.

bladesyz
2011-03-03, 12:51 PM
You can always try to find a way to cast "Wall of Salt"...

Cieyrin
2011-03-03, 01:23 PM
You're an adventuring party, right? Adventurers and bandits are not that far apart. Think about it, there's got to be a nearby trade route to raid once and be rolling in gold, just be careful where you fence the goods and where you spend the money to keep everybody in the dark till you ditch town for high adventure! :smallbiggrin:

DragonBaneDM
2011-03-03, 01:48 PM
Buy a ladder for 5 copper pieces...

:smallbiggrin:

Telonius
2011-03-03, 01:56 PM
First, craft a really fancy eyepatch. Disguise yourself as a bandit, and rob a few rich folks, while wearing said eyepatch. (Illusions could help here as well). Bury their valuables. Then, show up at the local merchants' guild and offer to put an end to the bandit menace, for a price. Say you'll bring back the eyepatch as proof of having killed him. Then, go camping for a few days, return with the eyepatch.

To avoid Zone of Truth and the like: "I have put an end to this threat. Never again will he steal from this town. The end was swift - no more than an eyeblink - and I can assure you he never saw me coming. Unfortunately when it happened he did not have your valuables. He must have hidden them somewhere."

All literally true.

Cieyrin
2011-03-03, 01:56 PM
Buy a ladder for 5 copper pieces...

:smallbiggrin:

Pff, gather up all the clubs and quarterstaffs you can carry and sell 'em as firewood. :smalltongue:

Titanium Fox
2011-03-03, 02:02 PM
Gnomes DO stand at the right height... :P

Asheram
2011-03-03, 02:02 PM
I can imagine that the "Glim drop" scam would work pretty well here.

It's a cross between the pidgeon drop and the fiddle game

First you chose a mark, it's often a shopkeeper. First you scout the area with a person dressed as a wealthy merchant or a nobleman, then you come back half an hour later, feigning distress and worry.

The "nobleman" claims to have dropped a trinket, a ring or a pocketwatch, anything that's easily dropped and have great sentimental value. For extra points you'll have it be a gift from a spouse or something like that.

Now, the sell here is that you need to put a reward out on the item, a Lot more than it's actually worth just due to the sentimental value. He'll leave his contact information and then leave.

Fifteen or so minutes later the accomplice will come in, claiming really good fortune and flaunting the trinked that've supposedly been dropped, saying that he found it in the gutter or in an alley.

Now, if you've chosen the right mark, the shopkeep will either try to claim ownership or buy it off the accomplice in order to claim the greater sum of the reward money.

He'll probably ask for some petty sum, but the accomplice shall act like there's no way in hell that it's worth that little if the shopkeep wants to buy it from him just like that.

He'll put fourth a sum, probably a quarter, i'd suggest to not go higher than half of the actual reward sum, and if the shopkeep ignores it, he'll just buy what he came to get and then leave.

If done right, the mark won't be able to resist the temptation of gaining a lot of money for little effort, and buy the trinket, then run off to claim the reward. (ofcourse there's no nobleman at the destination, but could lead to additional scams.)

Edited for format.

ShneekeyTheLost
2011-03-03, 02:18 PM
Scroll of Wall of Iron. Cost: 1700 gp

What that nets you:

minimum caster level 11th for that price, so that nets you 11 5' sections. Each section is 2-3 inches thick.

Now then, a square foot, one inch thick, of iron weighs 40 lbs. So for a 2 inch thickness, it's 80 lbs. So a 5' x 5' section is 25x that, or exactly one ton. You have eleven of these.

Now, iron also happens to be a trade good (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/equipment/wealthAndMoney.htm#wealthOtherThanCoins) worth 1sp/lb.

So, let's do the math 22,000 lbs at 1sp/lb is running you at 2,200 value.

Congratulations, you jut made 500 gold.

But wait, you say. That's not a good return on investment. Plus using a higher level scroll can do Bad Things. So we do things a little cheaper...

To hire the services of a 12th level caster who can cast a Wall of Iron would cost 12*60 = 720. For which you get a 3,300 return on investment (because at CL 12, you get an extra inch of thickness for free)

That's a RoI of 2580 on your 720 investment, for a whopping 358% return on investment!