Price of salt

[Biggus]

In the Arms & Equipment Guide (p.31) salt is listed as costing 1cp per ounce, which means that 1GP gets you about 6lbs of salt. As far as I can tell, this is roughly the actual historical value.

But then in the 3.5 PHB (p.112) the price is listed as 5GP per pound, or just over 30 times as much.

Am I missing something or did they decide to vastly inflate the price of salt in 3.5 for some reason?

[MaxiDuRaritry]

In the Arms & Equipment Guide (p.31) salt is listed as costing 1cp per ounce, which means that 1GP gets you about 6lbs of salt. As far as I can tell, this is roughly the actual historical value.

But then in the 3.5 PHB (p.112) the price is listed as 5GP per pound, or just over 30 times as much.

Am I missing something or did they decide to vastly inflate the price of salt in 3.5 for some reason?In 3.5, salt is literally worth its weight in silver. If the cost went up, then it went up.

All the better when you start up your wall of money salt enterprise.

[Saint-Just]

In the Arms & Equipment Guide (p.31) salt is listed as costing 1cp per ounce, which means that 1GP gets you about 6lbs of salt. As far as I can tell, this is roughly the actual historical value.

But then in the 3.5 PHB (p.112) the price is listed as 5GP per pound, or just over 30 times as much.

Am I missing something or did they decide to vastly inflate the price of salt in 3.5 for some reason?

Many A&EG prices are insane, even when compared only with other prices in A&EG.

On a more general note I am under impression that question of "generic" pre-modern prices is meaningless. Sources are often fragmentary but what is there definitely tells us that prices varied wildly, especially if you do not confine yourself to a narrow area and time period. Salt being worth its' weight in silver definitely seems over the top, though

[Beni-Kujaku]

In a magical world where salt can be harvested off of a 4th level spell, it is unrealistic that the salt harvested from the wall of a 7th level caster would cost much more than the service of said caster (280gp). I'll double that value for the investment margin, the availability of the caster and the cost of harvesting and selling the wall of salt to get the price of 560gp for a 7inch x 35 ft² volume of salt. That's roughly 0.58 m^3. Which means a cubic meter of salt should be worth around 1000gp. 2.16 tons of salt for 1000gp, or 2.1 silver pieces per pound and 1.3 cp per ounce. That's so close to the Arms & Equipment guide's price (considering our approximations) that I would believe that's intentional, if not for the fact that Sandstorm was published after the A&EG. All that to say that you probably should use the A&EG value, both for realism's sake and to avoid too much abuse by our fellow spellcasters. Of course, since the mass of salt scales as the caster level squared, the abuse is still very much possible at higher levels (if we go by "finding a spellcaster and harvesting doubles the cost", it becomes worth it for a company to harvest salt for less than the market value as soon as they higher a caster of 10th level or more), but at least you're not crashing the market at level 7 (and if you're the spellcaster casting wall of salt, it's probably more interesting to sell your services than to take the time to sell your salt ounce per ounce, so there is no real abuse possible here).

(Purifying the salt is no problem since Purify Food and Drink is a cantrip but a company buying the service of a spellcaster casting Fabricate to change the wall into sellable bits would make the whole thing a loss, since it would cost more than the wall itself to Fabricate it, and it probably would warrant a Craft check to not have big salt crystals in your table salt)

[Firechanter]

Many A&EG prices are insane, even when compared only with other prices in A&EG.

On a more general note I am under impression that question of "generic" pre-modern prices is meaningless. Sources are often fragmentary but what is there definitely tells us that prices varied wildly, especially if you do not confine yourself to a narrow area and time period. Salt being worth its' weight in silver definitely seems over the top, though

Yeah, here it's not the AEG but the PHB price that's insane. Such an immense salt price is entirely arbitrary. Real-world historic prices are all we have to compare, and salt was _never_ that expensive, and there isn't a reason why it would be.
One historical source I have is from 15th century England:
Salt, rock 1d per pound
Salt, sea 0.5d per pound

Where "d" (from denarius) means penny, i.e. 1/240 of a pound sterling, or just under 2 grams of silver.
In relation, a typical daily wage of a worker in that period is about 3-5 pennies.

Now ofc D&D prices are not required to perfectly resemble any historical instance, but there should be some rhyme and reason to them.
Personally I've ignored/changed the PHB price and set a more reasonable 1-2SP/lb.

[Maat Mons]

Do you have any sources on the price of salt in ancient West Africa? Whenever I read about really expensive salt, it's in relation to ancient West Africa.

[Beni-Kujaku]

Do you have any sources on the price of salt in ancient West Africa? Whenever I read about really expensive salt, it's in relation to ancient West Africa.

https://www.worldhistory.org/article/1342/the-salt-trade-of-ancient-west-africa/
Best I've found with a superficial research. Salt was so expensive mostly because it was unwieldy to carry through the desert to remote locations from the salt mines. Sometimes it seems it could be exchanged for its weight in gold dust, but it was mostly in extremely remote locations, and in places with abundant gold, like a gold mine. All in all, the price varied so wildly (salt was so cheap in cities near a mine salt that people used it to build their houses instead of rocks) that it's difficult to give a consistent picture. In Timbuktu, 90kg of salt was worth 450g of gold, which translates to 4 pounds of salt for 1gp if we're using the d&d weight of a gold piece (1/50 lb).

[ShurikVch]

For the IRL prices:
Salt tax (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_tax)

A salt tax refers to the direct taxation of salt, usually levied proportionately to the volume of salt purchased. The taxation of salt dates as far back as 300BC, as salt has been a valuable good used for gifts and religious offerings since 6050BC. The salt tax originated in China, in 300BC and became the main source of financing the Great Wall As a result of the successful profitability of the Salt Tax, it began filtering through the rulings of nations across the world, France, Spain, Russia, England and India were the main regions to follow the Chinese lead. Salt was used as a currency during the Roman Empire and towards the end of their reign, the Romans began monopolising salt in order to fund their war objectives. Salt was such an important commodity during the Middle Ages that governments would often incorporate the salt trade as a state enterprise. Salt is one of the longest standing sources of revenue for governments, the taxation policy was so successful due to the vital role of salt within the human diet. Salt Taxing has been extremely influential in many of the political and economic revolts within history, resulting in important historic events including the French Revolution, the Moscow Salt Riot (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moscow_uprising_of_1648), the Salt March (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_March) in India, and the Salt Tax Revolt (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_Tax_Revolt) in Spain.
Other reasons for high prices:
Insufficient production quantity: up to XX century, salt production couldn't catch up with the consumption
Imperfect technologies, bad logistics: it took huge army of workers to keep the fire going, add water, to take out the finished product to a warehouse
Salt mining centers and their caravans were targets for bandit gangs - which resulted in need for extra security
Monopoly: salt mining centers weren't numerous - which resulted in overpricing

[Malphegor]

the lower price is probably because A&EG probably based its prices on the AD&D Aurora’s Whole Realms Guide with different stuff gold’s considered equivalent to in value

[Saint-Just]

For the IRL prices:
Salt tax (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_tax)

Other reasons for high prices:
Insufficient production quantity: up to XX century, salt production couldn't catch up with the consumption
Imperfect technologies, bad logistics: it took huge army of workers to keep the fire going, add water, to take out the finished product to a warehouse
Salt mining centers and their caravans were targets for bandit gangs - which resulted in need for extra security
Monopoly: salt mining centers weren't numerous - which resulted in overpricing

It still was nowhere near that price. The first link In your example (Moscow Salt Riot) resulted from salt being taxed at 2 grivnas (so, slightly less than pound of silver) per poud (40 pounds), and that resulted in salt prices "growing exponentially".

You can't even say it's because gold is overabundant in D&D, because basic necessities are close enough: a pound of grain costs 1 cp or 1/500 of pound of silver which implies that while silver is cheaper in D&D than IRL it's not that cheaper. For salt you definitely should look more to the prices of basic fare than prices of weird equipment (like elven thinblades and longblades which cost more than their wight in gold even when non-masterwork).

[Biggus]

Many A&EG prices are insane, even when compared only with other prices in A&EG.

On a more general note I am under impression that question of "generic" pre-modern prices is meaningless. Sources are often fragmentary but what is there definitely tells us that prices varied wildly, especially if you do not confine yourself to a narrow area and time period. Salt being worth its' weight in silver definitely seems over the top, though

Obviously there will have been times and places where the price varies considerably, but in general it seems fairly consistent. For example, this (http://kiwihellenist.blogspot.com/2017/01/salt-and-salary.html) article says that a Roman soldier's pay would have bought 20lbs of salt per day, which matches the A&EG's price exactly (salt is 1cp per ounce, and a 1st-level mercenary Warrior who is armed by his employers costs 2sp per day).

Similarly this (https://www.economics.utoronto.ca/munro5/SPICES1.htm) source says that in England in the middle ages, a master mason or carpenter could buy 16 pints of salt with their daily wages. If that were in solid blocks that would equate to 35lbs, but more likely it means granulated salt, which includes gaps between the grains, which according to this (https://chemistry.stackexchange.com/questions/139386/density-range-of-table-salt) means it would be more like 20-25lbs.

In this (https://history.stackexchange.com/questions/673/when-and-where-was-salt-as-valuable-as-gold) thread someone says that in 200AD 8 grams of gold (1 gold piece in D&D) would buy 2268 grams of salt, or about 5lbs - almost exactly the same as the 6lbs the A&EG quotes. Annoyingly, they don't link to a source, but it aligns pretty closely to the other two which do.

So it seems that between the Roman empire and 15th-century London at least, prices were generally pretty close to those in the A&EG and nowhere near the ones in the PHB.

[AvatarVecna]

In a magical world where salt can be harvested off of a 4th level spell, it is unrealistic that the salt harvested from the wall of a 7th level caster would cost much more than the service of said caster (280gp). I'll double that value for the investment margin, the availability of the caster and the cost of harvesting and selling the wall of salt to get the price of 560gp for a 7inch x 35 ft² volume of salt. That's roughly 0.58 m^3. Which means a cubic meter of salt should be worth around 1000gp. 2.16 tons of salt for 1000gp, or 2.1 silver pieces per pound and 1.3 cp per ounce. That's so close to the Arms & Equipment guide's price (considering our approximations) that I would believe that's intentional, if not for the fact that Sandstorm was published after the A&EG. All that to say that you probably should use the A&EG value, both for realism's sake and to avoid too much abuse by our fellow spellcasters. Of course, since the mass of salt scales as the caster level squared, the abuse is still very much possible at higher levels (if we go by "finding a spellcaster and harvesting doubles the cost", it becomes worth it for a company to harvest salt for less than the market value as soon as they higher a caster of 10th level or more), but at least you're not crashing the market at level 7 (and if you're the spellcaster casting wall of salt, it's probably more interesting to sell your services than to take the time to sell your salt ounce per ounce, so there is no real abuse possible here).

(Purifying the salt is no problem since Purify Food and Drink is a cantrip but a company buying the service of a spellcaster casting Fabricate to change the wall into sellable bits would make the whole thing a loss, since it would cost more than the wall itself to Fabricate it, and it probably would warrant a Craft check to not have big salt crystals in your table salt)

This is dependent on people capable of casting the spell being in high supply, but magic isn't as common as people tend to think it is.

Wall of salt can be cast by a cleric, druid, sorcerer, or wizard capable of 4th lvl spells. We'll just assume that any NPC sorcerers/wizards capable of such a spell level have the spell, rather than getting into the odds that they'd have it by random chance. We'll take 1200 communities as a sample size - that's 120 thorps (pop 50 each), 240 hamlets (pop 240 each), 240 villages (pop 650 each), 240 small towns (pop 1450 each), 180 large towns (pop 3500 each), 120 small cities (pop 8500 each), 48 large cities (pop 18500 each), and 12 metropolises (pop 40000 each). That's a total population of 3585600 people.

Thorps have a 0% chance of generating any clerics, sorcerers, or wizards capable of 4th lvl spells. There is a 5% chance that a given thorp will generate a powerful druid (1d6+7 instead of 1d6-3). That's a 5/6 chance of generating 1 druid capable of the spell, and a 1/6 chance of generating 3 (since a druid 13 would spawn 2 druid 7s). Across all thorps, that's 8 druids.

Hamlets are similar to thorps except they have another +1. That makes it 2/3 chance of 1 druid and 1/3 chance of 3. Across all hamlets, that's 20 druids.

Villages and small towns have a 0% chance of generating any casters powerful enough to cast the spell.

Large towns are 1d6+3 for cleric/druid, and 1d4+3 for sorcerer/wizard. This is a 50% chance of generating a single cleric, 50% chance of generating a single druid, 25% chance of generating a single wizard, and 0% chance of generating a single sorcerer. Thus, all large towns together will generate 90 clerics, 90 druids, and 45 wizards.

Small Cities generate two of the most powerful of each class. They have a 100% chance of making a cleric/druid/wizard powerful enough to cast the spell, and a 75% chance of generating a sorcerer powerful enough. Across all small cities, that will be 240 clerics, 240 druids, 180 sorcerers, and 240 wizards.

Large Cities generate three of the most powerful of each class. Additionally, if we get a 13 for the max roll on C/D/W (or 15 for the max roll on S), the highest-level will also generate two weaker NPCs who are also capable of casting the spell. Large Cities have a 50% chance of generating 1 and a 50% chance of generating 3 (for C/D/W); they also have a 100% chance of generating 1 sorcerer. Across all Large Cities, that's 288 clerics, 288 druids, 144 sorcerers, and 288 wizards.

Metropolises are 1d6+12/1d4+12, and rolls 4 times. This is a 100% chance of generating 3 each of C/D/W, then a 50% chance each for generating 1 or 3 sorcerers. All metropolises together creates 144 clerics, 144 druids, 96 sorcerers, and 144 wizards.

In conclusion, 1200 average communities will have a total adult population of 3585600 people, and will have a total of 762 clerics, 790 druids, 420 sorcerers, and 717 wizards capable of casting the spell. That's a total of 2689 casters capable of the spell (assuming every sorcerer/wizard knows the spell in question), or approximately 0.075% of the population. That's 1 in 1333 people capable of casting the spell.

Additionally, 68.5% of communities have nobody capable of casting the spell at all. That's a little over 2/3 of communities that just don't have a caster to mine salt from. They're going to be dependent on whatever price the market returns for both the acquisition of salt from mines or casters, and the price of transporting it to the middle-of-nowhere thorps not lucky enough to have a powerful druid on hand.

EDIT: I've no idea why they made salt so much more expensive in 3.5 than in 3e, but it takes precedent. It's possible that it's reflected in how there used to be more common casters, and fewer abandoned salt mines, but then the magic apocalypse happened? Except for the part where 3e was also supposed to be post-apoc. Ehhhhhh.

[Telonius]

In the Arms & Equipment Guide (p.31) salt is listed as costing 1cp per ounce, which means that 1GP gets you about 6lbs of salt.

Were they talking weight or volume?

(curses under his breath in metric)

[Biggus]

Were they talking weight or volume?

(curses under his breath in metric)

The table says "ounces" not "fluid ounces" so I assume they mean weight. Even if it's volume that only changes it by a factor of 1.5 to 2, not 30 (see my second post).

[Beni-Kujaku]

In conclusion, 1200 average communities will have a total adult population of 3585600 people, and will have a total of 762 clerics, 790 druids, 420 sorcerers, and 717 wizards capable of casting the spell. That's a total of 2689 casters capable of the spell (assuming every sorcerer/wizard knows the spell in question), or approximately 0.075% of the population. That's 1 in 1333 people capable of casting the spell.

A wall of salt at level 7 is around 1 ton of salt. Assuming even 1/10th of these casters casts 1 wall per day (and why wouldn't they, if they're paid the regular caster service fee), that's 100kg of salt per 1333 people, or around 100g per person per day. According to that random reddit person (https://www.reddit.com/r/history/comments/886mqu/how_much_salt_did_people_use_in_medieval_times/ I know, very scientific source, but I don't really want to search for long if I have an approximate answer), that was around five times the demand (20g/person/day) in medieval times, when salt was used to preserve food. It would be even lower in a society with other means of preservation like the Purify Food and Drink cantrip.


The table says "ounces" not "fluid ounces" so I assume they mean weight. Even if it's volume that only changes it by a factor of 1.5 to 2, not 30 (see my second post).

Gosh I love imperial units.

[AvatarVecna]

A wall of salt at level 7 is around 1 ton of salt. Assuming even 1/10th of these casters casts 1 wall per day (and why wouldn't they, if they're paid the regular caster service fee), that's 100kg of salt per 1333 people, or around 100g per person per day. According to that random reddit person (https://www.reddit.com/r/history/comments/886mqu/how_much_salt_did_people_use_in_medieval_times/ I know, very scientific source, but I don't really want to search for long if I have an approximate answer), that was around five times the demand (20g/person/day) in medieval times, when salt was used to preserve food. It would be even lower in a society with other means of preservation like the Purify Food and Drink cantrip.



Gosh I love imperial units.

They've got other things they might want to cast with 4th lvl slots tho - especially if (as is the case for a lot of them) 4th is their highest level slot.

[redking]

D&D is a pretty crappy economic simulator. For one, apparently supply and demand does not affect prices at all. Perhaps a better system might add some randomisation to the prices. Do a d6 roll first. 1 to 3 means that the price is down. 4 to 6 means the price is up. Then roll a d100 for the percentage of variance.

[Biggus]

D&D is a pretty crappy economic simulator. For one, apparently supply and demand does not affect prices at all. Perhaps a better system might add some randomisation to the prices. Do a d6 roll first. 1 to 3 means that the price is down. 4 to 6 means the price is up. Then roll a d100 for the percentage of variance.


A&EG has a table on p.39 for simulating over/under supply on prices.

[Firechanter]

What I find quite remarkable is that _most_ of the prices in the official prices are, in fact, not as entirely arbitrary as one might think. Once you find a reasonable conversion rate between real-world silver and the D&D silver piece, many of those prices line up surprisingly well -- almost as if someone actually did some research at some point. ;)

Here is a link to a collection of actual historical prices, most of them from 15th century England:
http://www.amurgsval.org/feng-shui/prices.html
(note, there are a few outliers on that list too, that don't appear to make much sense. I guess it's completely natural that any collection of data will have some errors.)

Going from this list, a reasonable conversion rate seems to be 1d = 1SP.

The salt price is actually one of the biggest discrepancies between fact and fiction, as has been demonstrated in this thread. The other biggest blunder (that I'm aware of) of D&D pricing is the expected daily wage of a laborer. You know, that "a laborer makes 1SP per day" horsecr*p, in a price structure where this would mean you would wear only rags, could NEVER afford new clothes, and only a highly malnutritional diet, and no roof over your head. Going by that pricelist, even an (unskilled) laborer could expect a daily wage around 5d, or 5SP by our conversion rate.

MAYBE the "1SP/day" legend comes from a faulty conversion -- mb the designer looked at a historical list and was like "5 pennies per day, that's about 9 grams, that's exactly the weight of one of our Silver Pieces". But that doesn't work when _all other_ prices are converted by the rate 1 penny = 1SP.

[Biggus]

The salt price is actually one of the biggest discrepancies between fact and fiction, as has been demonstrated in this thread. The other biggest blunder (that I'm aware of) of D&D pricing is the expected daily wage of a laborer. You know, that "a laborer makes 1SP per day" horsecr*p, in a price structure where this would mean you would wear only rags, could NEVER afford new clothes, and only a highly malnutritional diet, and no roof over your head. Going by that pricelist, even an (unskilled) laborer could expect a daily wage around 5d, or 5SP by our conversion rate.

This point is addressed somewhere in either the PHB or DMG (I can't find where right now). Typical peasant labourers grew most of their own food and made most of their own clothes and wooden items. Their monetary income was mostly spent on manufactured items they couldn't make themselves, or things they couldn't gather for themselves locally (such as salt in many areas).

My understanding is that this is a fairly accurate representation of how medieval peasants actually lived.

[danielxcutter]

Didn't someone do the calculations that, say, a farmer could easily make more than that? With Skill Focus in a Craft or Profession and so on. It's not like they care about optimizing for combat or anything.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

Didn't someone do the calculations that, say, a farmer could easily make more than that? With Skill Focus in a Craft or Profession and so on. It's not like they care about optimizing for combat or anything.Au contraire. They combat...

...the weeds.

[Firechanter]

Didn't someone do the calculations that, say, a farmer could easily make more than that? With Skill Focus in a Craft or Profession and so on. It's not like they care about optimizing for combat or anything.

Yes, of course. Inside the D&D world, that functions by D&D rules, which apply to PCs and NPCs alike, you can easily calculate the typical income for common folks as per the "earn a living" rules. This is what I'm doing in my game world, anyway. The result is that even folks with sub-average mental stats doing menial tasks should still make a minimum of roughly 3GP/week. And with slightly "optimized" stats - not a too rubbish Ability score, Skill Focus, maybe even MW tools - it's easy to get that number up to 10GP/week. All for a level 1 NPC, mind you.

[ShurikVch]

The salt price is actually one of the biggest discrepancies between fact and fiction, as has been demonstrated in this thread. The other biggest blunder (that I'm aware of) of D&D pricing is the expected daily wage of a laborer. You know, that "a laborer makes 1SP per day"
Correction:

Untrained laborers and assistants (that is, characters without any ranks in Profession) earn an average of 1 silver piece per day.

Table 4–2: Primary Skills for Hirelings lists - among those which can be Commoners - income from 8 cp (Polisher/cleaner) to 6 sp (Limner/painter); Laborers and Porters got exactly 1 sp/day

Also, Table 4–23: NPC Gear Value lists 900 gp for 1st-level NPC. With 1 sp/day income, it's almost 25 years of savings...


Au contraire. They combat...

...the weeds.
Varmints! (https://p6-tt.byteimg.com/origin/pgc-image/ef5bc7ee0e48478ab5d3ffb69289a929?from=pc)

[Fouredged Sword]

See, there is a simple solution to the wall of salt economic problem.

Salt is a lot more than just table salt. Most salts are not edible. Wall of salt could easily be said to produce a wall of inedible or even mildly poisonous salts.

And salt production tends to be very localized, ether at the coast or specific mines. Mining in 3.5 is dangerous due to underground monsters and the underdark. Shipping salt from the coast or from mines is dangerous due to tons of bandits and monsters.

Thus salt is expensive.

[icefractal]

Salt being that expensive has odd results for diets though. A certain amount of salt is required for health, so having it be way out of reach of many people's budgets seems at odds with how most D&D settings are depicted (average townsfolk not being notably malnourished). I think I'll be using the A&EG price from now on.

Using the cheaper price also might solve the Wall of Salt / Flesh to Salt thing, but that's not my main concern, since other "free money" combos exist anyway.

[Maat Mons]

Having even one rank in a Profession drastically improves your quality of life. It's a trained-only skill, so without any ranks, you can't make a check to see how much money you've earned. That leaves you stuck with the 1 sp per day figure.

But put a single rank in, and even with a Wisdom score of 8, you've got an average check result of 10.5. That's 5.25 gp per week, or 0.75 gp per day. Seven-and-a-half times the income of anyone without a rank.

Maybe a typical D&D setting just doesn't have very many untrained laborers. If most people can manage to attain a rank in a Profession before reaching adulthood, trying to support yourself on 1 sp a day just might not be a thing.

Actually, if someone with a Profession rank and a Wisdom score of 1 can can be guaranteed 6 gp per week by taking 10 on the check, why are trained hirelings willing to work for 3 sp a day? That's a big pay cut over just making a Profession (hireling) check.

[Biggus]

Found the quote I mentioned (DMG p.139):



A common laborer earns 1SP a day. That's just enough to allow his family to survive, assuming that his income is supplemented with food his family grows to eat, homemade clothing, and a reliance on self-sufficiency for most tasks (personal grooming, health, animal tending and so).

[Saint-Just]

That laborer pay is an utter nonsense. If the laborer gets paid food + 1sp then his pay cannot be written as 1 sp. If the laborer has access to the land (whether by owning, or by paying for it with produce), grows most of the food he eats and then takes side jobs to earn 360 sp/year then he is not a day laborer, he is a peasant. And Polisher/cleaner sounds like someone who is unlikely to have an access to the farm.

2sp per day for light infantry and 4 sp per day for light horse also do not sound all that good. Soldiers were rarely paid well, the wages make sense if you compare them with the laborer's pay - except laborer's pay makes no sense, GIGO.

I am sure that wages of 1 sp for laborer, 2 sp for infantry, 4 sp for light cavalry existed for a along time, definitely at least 2e, likely 1e or OD&D. Not sure whether prices of commodities were more sensible back then or it was always impossible to survive on that wage.

[hamishspence]

He's not getting paid in food - the implication here is that he's got the medieval equivalent of an allotment.

[Firechanter]

Yeah but Saint-Just is totally right here: if the labourer's family has the means to grow their own food - which requires access to arable land and tools - he's not a labourer, he's a farmer.
That 1SP/day rule makes exactly as little sense as the salt price, and both should be ignored / replaced with more reasonable figures.

And honestly I can't understand why some people feel the need to rationalize or defend the official rulebook entries. Where does this idea come from that everything in those books must be 100% perfectly true and beyond doubt? The thread making out dysfunctional elements (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?508514-Dysfunctional-Rules-IX-1d3-Dysfunctions-from-the-8th-Level-List) in 3.X is currently in its 9th iteration, having identified nine-hundred and sixty-six (966) dysfunctions; why is it so hard to accept that salt price and labourer wages are two of them?

[Biggus]

That laborer pay is an utter nonsense. If the laborer gets paid food + 1sp then his pay cannot be written as 1 sp. If the laborer has access to the land (whether by owning, or by paying for it with produce), grows most of the food he eats and then takes side jobs to earn 360 sp/year then he is not a day laborer, he is a peasant. And Polisher/cleaner sounds like someone who is unlikely to have an access to the farm.

2sp per day for light infantry and 4 sp per day for light horse also do not sound all that good. Soldiers were rarely paid well, the wages make sense if you compare them with the laborer's pay - except laborer's pay makes no sense, GIGO.

I am sure that wages of 1 sp for laborer, 2 sp for infantry, 4 sp for light cavalry existed for a along time, definitely at least 2e, likely 1e or OD&D. Not sure whether prices of commodities were more sensible back then or it was always impossible to survive on that wage.


He's not getting paid in food - the implication here is that he's got the medieval equivalent of an allotment.

As hamishspence said, he's not being paid in food, he has either a small area of his lord's land he's allowed to farm (which his wife and children will help with; in medieval times children were expected to do some work almost as soon as they could walk) or there is common land they can use.

I will say that laborer rates would be higher in large towns and cities as the majority of people will not have access to growing land (they will still make their own clothes and simple goods to a large extent though).

Soldiers have their food, clothing, housing etc provided for them when they're working, they only have to spend money at all when they're off duty.


Yeah but Saint-Just is totally right here: if the labourer's family has the means to grow their own food - which requires access to arable land and tools - he's not a labourer, he's a farmer.
That 1SP/day rule makes exactly as little sense as the salt price, and both should be ignored / replaced with more reasonable figures.

And honestly . Where does this idea come from that everything in those books must be 100% perfectly true and beyond doubt? The thread making out dysfunctional elements (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?508514-Dysfunctional-Rules-IX-1d3-Dysfunctions-from-the-8th-Level-List) in 3.X is currently in its 9th iteration, having identified nine-hundred and sixty-six (966) dysfunctions; why is it so hard to accept that salt price and labourer wages are two of them?

There wasn't a sharp distinction between laborer, farmer, or indeed clothesmaker or woodcarver in the middle ages. Most families did all of these things and more, because they had to.

As for "I can't understand why some people feel the need to rationalize or defend the official rulebook entries" you'll recall that I was the one who pointed out that the PHB price of salt was absurd in the first place. The difference between that and this is that according to my understanding, the description of how most people lived that I quoted from the DMG is largely accurate.

[Firechanter]

the description of how most people lived that I quoted from the DMG is largely accurate.

It accurately depicts a number of misconceptions people have about pre-modern times, yes. "The middle ages" is also a very vague term, and for the typical D&D setting, not even accurate. We're talking about the era of full plate armour and rapiers, neither of which existed until the very late middle ages, and only really became a thing in the renaissance. This era is entirely different from, say, the 9th or 12th centuries. Again, if you look at historical sources for this era (such as the one I cited), the DMG figure is off by at least 300%.

[Darg]

How do we know that a wall of salt is made of (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_(chemistry)) table salt?

I know it's silly, but is there any reference to it being fit for consumption other than assumption by name?

[Maat Mons]

But by the same token, how do we know the price in the Player's Handbook is for sodium chloride, and not some other type of salt? Maybe the writers of that book just though it was really important that we know how much Epsom salt goes for in a fantasy marketplace. Adventurers need to soak their sore feat, after all.

[Thurbane]

As usual, another thread demonstrating that 3.5 D&D does an awful job of modelling realistic world economics - basically because it was never designed to do so.

Riddle me this: how much does mithril cost per pound?

[Firechanter]

Probably by the same logic that creatures in D&D don't need oxygen, they need "air" (or "water" in some cases) to breathe.

[Tzardok]

Does "oxygen" even exist in D&D? I mean, the Inner Planes are the stuff the multiverse is from, and we have the Elemental Planes of Air, Water, Fire and Earth, not of Carbon, Oxygen, Sulphur and Hydrogen.

[bekeleven]

Does "oxygen" even exist in D&D? I mean, the Inner Planes are the stuff the multiverse is from, and we have the Elemental Planes of Air, Water, Fire and Earth, not of Carbon, Oxygen, Sulphur and Hydrogen.

Oxygen is referenced in the following spells:
Continual Flame (PHB)
Resist Energy (PHB)
Ghoul Light (SpC)
Thin Air (FB)
Pocket Cave (CoR)
Protection from All Elements (MotW)

That doesn't explicitly declare its function, but I think it's a solid pointer. Also we have the DMG line that says "unless otherwise noted, the material plane uses the laws of physics."

[Darg]

Riddle me this: how much does mithril cost per pound?

Obviously it costs a pound.

[Maat Mons]

In keeping with the tradition of minting currency from precious metals, I suppose a pound of mithril would be worth 50 mithril pieces. I'm not sure what the conversion rate would be though. Maybe 100 cold-iron pieces = 10 mithril pieces = 1 adamantine piece? Fey dislike taking payment in cold-iron pieces, naturally.

[Firechanter]

Riddle me this: how much does mithril cost per pound?

Well mithril has no price because mithril doesn't exist in D&D. :p
But if you mean mithrAl...

Yeah that's a great question. Since a Mithral Chain Shirt weighs 12.5 pounds and costs 1100gp, and 1/3 of the market price goes into material, and 150gp of the total price must be a Masterwork component, that would mean that 1lb of mithral would cost 25gp. If you do the same calculation with a Breastplate or a Full Plate, you get entirely different numbers, though. xD But I guess this is the lower limit.

[hamishspence]

For a non-weapon, non-armour random item made of mithral, it being made of mithral adds 500gp per pound to the cost.

https://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialMaterials.htm#mithral

Other items +500 gp/lb.

[Firechanter]

For a non-weapon, non-armour random item made of mithral, it being made of mithral adds 500gp per pound to the cost.

https://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialMaterials.htm#mithral

Other items +500 gp/lb.

Yeah that's exactly the point: the surcharges are all over the place, with no world-internal rhyme or reason. Why would a mithral cooking pot of 2lbs cost just as much as a mithral chainshirt of 12.5lbs? Why does a normal chainshirt cost six times as much as a longsword, but a mithral longsword would cost twice as much as a mithral chainshirt, even though the chainshirt requires six times as much mithral to make?

In short, the price of raw mithral (as crafting component) seems to vary between 25gp/lb (light armour, making it half as expensive as gold) and 165gp/lb (any non-armour).

I guess you _could_ rationalize it by defining that mithral armours aren't pure mithral but only alloys of varying grades. But if that were the case, why would anything else be made of _pure_ mithral? And why is not a syllable of this mentioned in the book?

(ofc the answer is that the prices for armour were balanced by their in-game usefulness, and nobody bothered checking the math for non-armour bc there isn't any reason to make that stuff of mithral in the first place.)

If this matter bugged me enough to introduce a solution for our games, I'd probably make Light armour a bit more expensive and Heavy armour a bit cheaper, and explain the remainder of the difference with the increased effort it takes to harden and temper mithral armour plates. In consequence, non-armour mithral items would become MUCH cheaper, to below the specific cost for light armour. The main reason I don't is because I tend to forget such things after a short while. :p

[ShurikVch]

"The middle ages" is also a very vague term, and for the typical D&D setting, not even accurate. We're talking about the era of full plate armour and rapiers, neither of which existed until the very late middle ages, and only really became a thing in the renaissance. This era is entirely different from, say, the 9th or 12th centuries.
Sourcebooks have means to simulate about any age - from Stone Age and up to spacefaring sci-fi


Well mithril has no price because mithril doesn't exist in D&D. :p
But if you mean mithrAl...
Mithril was in the Dungeoneer's Survival Guide, and mentioned in the 1E Player's Handbook


Yeah that's exactly the point: the surcharges are all over the place, with no world-internal rhyme or reason. Why would a mithral cooking pot of 2lbs cost just as much as a mithral chainshirt of 12.5lbs? Why does a normal chainshirt cost six times as much as a longsword, but a mithral longsword would cost twice as much as a mithral chainshirt, even though the chainshirt requires six times as much mithral to make?
One more price for you: vehicle armor plating made of mithral weighs 3000 lbs., and cost 3500 gp. (Arms and Equipment Guide/Dragon #353) :smallsmile:

[Yahzi Coyote]

Many A&EG prices are insane, even when compared only with other prices in A&EG.
This! Do not compare the A&EG price of flour with the wages of hardened mercenaries. You will lose your mind.

(For a more consistent price list you could check out Merchants of Prime, on DriveThruRPG for free).