Building Values

[Kanthalion]

So in my game, the value of certain buildings has come up, so I found the downtime rules about building buildings (http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/ultimateCampaign/downtime/buildingsAndOrganizations.html) and of course you can just purchase one there, but damn if that doesn't feel awfully cheap. I mean 5000 gp for a Cathedral?? Am I missing something here or are there some more reasonable guidelines I could find elsewhere?

[Kurald Galain]

Bear in mind that one gold piece is more than two months' salary for the average peasant; it's just that adventurers are filthy rich by anyone's standard. Also this list appears to assume using magic to e.g. create walls.

Aaaaand whoever wrote that clearly has no idea what a "cathedral" is, since he thinks it contains just a single statue :smallbiggrin:

Yeah, I suggest starting from Wikipedia to get an impression of how long it took to build these IRL (years in most cases, decades in some).

[grarrrg]

Aaaaand whoever wrote that clearly has no idea what a "cathedral" is, since he thinks it contains just a single statue :smallbiggrin:

And it has an entry for "Black Market"...:smallconfused:
Not exactly the type of thing you purposefully build.

[Fizban]

Yeah, I think their building subsystem is pretty terrible. Stronghold Builder's Guide (from 3.0 of course) has building prices in line with the DMG's building prices of 2,000gp small house, 10,000gp big house, 50,000gp small keep, *tons* gp castle.

As for peasant income, well if you use profession then commoners make plenty of money. In fact they make twice as much money in Pathfinder as they do in 3.5 on the base profession rules, and Pathfinder's building system says that having a farm gives you a fat bonus on farming checks (for more income than you'd get just for. . . farming).

[Florian]

Am I missing something here

Yes. As with nearly anything else in PF, the pricing for buildings and such is done to fit with the WBL system. The downtime building and the teams to run them have their cost rated on the direct benefit they provide for their owners, which tend to be comparatively slim. Compare that to the cost and benefits of the kingdom rules cathedral, which clocks in at 54BP (216000gp), but provide 3 minor and 2 medium item slots, along with some hefty modifiers for the settlement.