# Trading commodities in D&D



## Holy Bovine (May 26, 2007)

OK so my players have a cargo vessel, ocean going, and want to engage in a little trading as they travel from port to port and adventure to adventure.  They are pretty good about me not having a complete trade goods listing of every item but i want to change that.  What are you rules, ideas etc for trading in D&D.  I am thinking of basic goods like iron, wood, foodstuffs, medical supplies etc.  Prices?  Expected profits?  Costs to run the ship?  Anything you have can help or if you know of a book/pdf that has rules governing this kind of thing please share!


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## DreadPirateMurphy (May 26, 2007)

Traveller used to have a fairly comprehensive trading system in their book on merchants.  FFE has been selling compilations of those books reprinted, so it should be easy to find and adapt.


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## Merkuri (May 26, 2007)

I think there's some information along those lines in the DMGII, but it's been a while since I looked at the book.


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## Holy Bovine (May 26, 2007)

DreadPirateMurphy said:
			
		

> Traveller used to have a fairly comprehensive trading system in their book on merchants.  FFE has been selling compilations of those books reprinted, so it should be easy to find and adapt.




I have the Traveller books (more than I can count really - my first love, Traveller) but they are difficult to convert to a D&D setting.  Prices can be either way too high or way too low.  I'm trying to find a happy medium for commodity prices that won't leave the PCs either with no profits to too much profit.  Thanks for the suggestion though.


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## Holy Bovine (May 26, 2007)

Merkuri said:
			
		

> I think there's some information along those lines in the DMGII, but it's been a while since I looked at the book.




Checking it out now - haven't used it much beyond the 'mob' template myself....


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## Vrecknidj (May 26, 2007)

I know it's kinda lame, but, you could turn the whole thing into a Profession check, modified, perhaps, by Bluff, Dimplomacy or high Charisma.

I mean, if the players _want_ to drag it out and turn the trading into part of the role playing, that's cool.  But if they're really just interested in turning a profit, there are ways to handle that.  They may complain, but just point out that taxes, supplies and other expenses eat away at everything but what the Profession check gives.

Dave


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## Michael Dean (May 26, 2007)

I really like "Silk Road" by Expeditious Retreat Press.  Not only do they have the rules for trade, they also have an incredibly huge list of trade goods that are good inspiration for new adventures.  Plus it's a darn interesting read about the Silk Road.


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## MonkeyDragon (May 26, 2007)

Arms and Equipment Guide is full of nifty goods.  I think someof the items designed to give skill bonuses are kind of silly, but I like all the lists of fabrics, alcohols, spices and exotic foodstuffs.  Depending on where the ship is shipping to, I imagine that the easiest goods to get involved in are silk and spices.  I think they underprices the saffron, though.


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## SiderisAnon (May 26, 2007)

*Detailed Trading System*

In my current campaign, the party has a ship and uses it for trading between adventures or on their way to adventure sites. They have plans in the long run of acquiring a larger vessel and ultimately in funding other trading ships.

I am using the A Magical Society: Silk Road that a previous poster recommended. It is an excellent resource for information on trade goods and also an interesting read. You'll have to make decisions on where things are produced in your world because the 1,000 trade goods are based on the idea that you buy them where they are produced and ship them as far as possible away from there to get the best price. I've been assigning a few goods to each area they travel, rather than trying to divide up the whole 1,000 item list at once. 

One nice thing is that they include information on most of the trading goods, because I didn't know what some of them were. The rest I've been looking up on the internet.

There are no specific rules in there for shipping by boat, so you have to wing a few things. In doing some research, I found that historically sailors were paid either through a small share of the final profit, through a daily wage, or through a combination of both. To this, you add the cost of feeding the crew and the party. 

You also have to take into account wear and tear on the ship. I have been using a model that is roughly one-half of one percent of the ship's value in upkeep and parts each month. I have no idea how accurate that is, but it is comfortable for my group.

I apply a flat amount spent on taxes, docking fees, and tariffs. Different trading ports have different values, so the PCs can learn where to get the best value.

All and all, I think it's a great value for a $12 book. (And the same can be said for their other Magical Society books.)


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## BiggusGeekus (May 26, 2007)

SiderisAnon said:
			
		

> A Magical Society: Silk Road




Another vote for that product here.


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## Crothian (May 26, 2007)

Silk Road does a good job with this.  It is what I use.


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## Rodrigo Istalindir (May 26, 2007)

Michael Dean said:
			
		

> I really like "Silk Road" by Expeditious Retreat Press.  Not only do they have the rules for trade, they also have an incredibly huge list of trade goods that are good inspiration for new adventures.  Plus it's a darn interesting read about the Silk Road.




Second Third Fourth that.  Superb book.


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## Olgar Shiverstone (May 27, 2007)

OOH, a little summon nature's ally and wall of iron action, and they can corner the market on pork bellies and iron!


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## Twowolves (May 27, 2007)

Arms and Equipment Guide has prices for trade goods, and the Mother of All Encounter Tables has a caravan generator, complete with what they are hauling and lists with values.

I'm not sure, but I think Toolkit has some random trade good stuff in it (but without prices). 

The new Pirates of the Spanish Main rpg has simple rules for buying and selling cargo, as well as a random cargo generator for when your crew of saucy pirates takes that prize ship and peeks into it's hold.


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## 3catcircus (May 27, 2007)

MMS:Silk Road. Its that good.


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## taliesin15 (May 27, 2007)

Way back in the late '70s I can recall board games centered around trade of this sort. Anyhow, I think its a good cover for adventurers, though depending on the milieu, it could be very dangerous if they start chiselling into say a lucrative business and the other merchants start to catch wind of them--the contemporary example would be the drug trade, though in the middle ages and before the spice and silk trade was rife with assasination, armed robbery if not all out war between merchants.

Back to your question--sounds like others have answered yr basic questions--just keep in mind if the PCs start bringing a heretofore rare product into a specific market, they possibly run the danger of glutting the market, thus lowering their profits. Not sure too many DMs take that into account. The party I DM took a load of tobacco to some lands to the West where it is rare, doubling their money, getting in good with local officials. Good cover for their spy mission. They never did it again--yet--and thus, prices there are still high as is demand.


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## Kax Tuglebend (May 27, 2007)

I've never had the chance to use it, but the Minrothad Guilds Gazetteer for BD&D had a good trading system akin to the Traveller system ~ its long out of print but only $4.95 from DTRPG


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## Holy Bovine (May 27, 2007)

Wow!  Thanks for all the excellent ideas guys!  I will check out the products mentioned here (Silk Road seems like the most likely candidate).


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## Michael Dean (May 27, 2007)

Kax Tuglebend said:
			
		

> I've never had the chance to use it, but the Minrothad Guilds Gazetteer for BD&D had a good trading system akin to the Traveller system ~ its long out of print but only $4.95 from DTRPG




Ha, ha! I just checked it out on drivethrurpg and the women on the cover are such 80's chicks.  The overly blow-dried hair, the poofy shirts.  It's perfect.


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## jgbrowning (May 27, 2007)

I'm glad everything thinks highly of _A Magical Society: Silk Road_. Makes us happy!

joe b.


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## haakon1 (May 28, 2007)

*Naics*

If you want a free list of businesses or things to trade, search for the NAICS online.

NAICS is a list of every type of business, creating for government and statistical classification, as updated for NAFTA.  A lot of the industries are modern, but you can ignore those and stick with the berry farmers, diamond miners, and bail bondsmen, etc.

The one thing to keep in mind about medieval trade is that weight and bulk matter a lot.  Stuff like iron ore and wheat is a pain to move around with modern bulk transport ships and railroads.  In a medieval world, that stuff shouldn't move more than 40 miles or so.

Long-distance trade should be high-value add products: spider silk, spices, alcoholic beverages, perhaps preserved foods, arms and armor, art, that sort of thing.

Of course, fabulously rich dwarf farmers do need to import their food . . .


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## frankthedm (May 28, 2007)

And here i was going to say; "They make enough money to make them want to keep adventuring."


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## Ry (May 28, 2007)

There's a Savage Worlds setting that has a great system for this (by actual play reports, not my own experience) and a lot of really cool plot ideas.


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## mmadsen (May 30, 2007)

Holy Bovine said:
			
		

> I am thinking of basic goods like iron, wood, foodstuffs, medical supplies etc.  Prices?  Expected profits?  Costs to run the ship?



If the route is not particularly risky, then the expected profits should just barely justify the expense -- including the expense of buying the ship in the first place.  Selling the ship for 10,000 gp should be roughly equally appealing, from an economic standpoint, to holding onto it.


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## CruelSummerLord (Jun 1, 2007)

A previous poster pointed out the fact that merchants might not like competition, so perhaps your players might like to make themselves associate members of an actual trading house, which could conceivably be used to generate some new adventures.  If they are skilled fighters with good reputations, merchants might like to have them along to send a message to pirates, and also save on the cost of hiring low-level grunts as guards for the cargo.  

By being actual members of the trading house, the PCs can get connections and contacts that they might not otherwise have, and can use the trading house's resources to supplement their own.  They can also have latitude to do their own trading as associate members, paying a percentage of their profits to the merchant house, instead of just being employees for some other trader.  

If the players insist on staying independent, perhaps they might like to specialize in niche goods, trading with non-humans, or with humans not associated with the normal trading works of the region your players work in.  French and British fur traders from the 16th to the 19th centuries made huge profits trading with the First Nations of North America, giving metal trade goods (guns, cooking pots, etc.), and selling the furs at a huge price in Europe.  

This might be a way to introduce new cultures or races into your campaign, or get the players mixed up in the goings-on of another part of the world; the French fur trader Samuel de Champlain, for instance, ended up joining his Huron trading partners in their conflict with the Iroquois.


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## Mishihari Lord (Jun 1, 2007)

I have GURPS Free Trader for Traveler, which has pretty good rules for this type of thing.

My other suggestion would be to search these boards for an economics systems posted by Old One.  I copied it out for my own use, and it seems like it would fit what you want to do.


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## Mishihari Lord (Jun 1, 2007)

mmadsen said:
			
		

> If the route is not particularly risky, then the expected profits should just barely justify the expense -- including the expense of buying the ship in the first place.  Selling the ship for 10,000 gp should be roughly equally appealing, from an economic standpoint, to holding onto it.




That's solid basic economics, but it assumes perfect competition - anyone can get in who wants to.  Given other circumstances - danger (as you mentioned), a limited number of ships, a limited number of people who know the routes, a limited number of people who can sell cross-culture, etc, it doesn't necessarily hold.  Given any of these you would be able to turn a good profit by trading.


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## Slife (Jun 1, 2007)

To be really simple, have a profession check modified by +5/ton of goods (and some amount for distance traveled.  +2/week?).  This is your profit.


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## mmadsen (Jun 1, 2007)

Mishihari Lord said:
			
		

> That's solid basic economics, but it assumes perfect competition - anyone can get in who wants to.  Given other circumstances - danger (as you mentioned), a limited number of ships, a limited number of people who know the routes, a limited number of people who can sell cross-culture, etc, it doesn't necessarily hold.  Given any of these you would be able to turn a good profit by trading.



Excellent point, but if the player characters just stumbled across a ship, and they're trading, I would assume there are few barriers to entry.  I certainly wouldn't expect them to be the ones wielding any monopoly power -- although that might make for a great adventure reward, in place of physical treasure.


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