Expenses

When not descending into the depths of the earth, exploring ruins for lost treasures, or waging war against the encroaching Darkness, adventurers face more mundane realities. Even in a fantastical world, people require basic necessities such as shelter, sustenance, and clothing. These things cost money, although some lifestyles cost more than others.

## Lifestyle Expenses

Lifestyle expenses provide you with a simple way to account for the cost of living in a fantasy world. They cover your accommodations, food and drink, and all your other necessities. Furthermore, expenses cover the cost of maintaining your Equipment so you can be ready when adventure next calls.

**At the start of each tenday,** choose a lifestyle from the Expenses table and pay the price to sustain that lifestyle. The prices listed are per day, so if you wish to calculate the cost of your chosen lifestyle over a thirty-­‐‑day period, multiply the listed price by 30. Your lifestyle might change from one period to the next, based on the funds you have at your disposal, or you might maintain the same lifestyle throughout your character’s career.

Your lifestyle choice can have consequences. Maintaining a wealthy lifestyle might help you make contacts with the rich and powerful, though you run the risk of attracting thieves. Likewise, living frugally might help you avoid criminals, but you are unlikely to make powerful connections.

*\*When you own your own property, you no longer have to buy all you meals, rent lodging and pay for the reparation of weapons and tools. When you own your own home, you can prepare your own meals, fix their own stuff and save on expenses.*

**Wretched.** You live in inhumane Conditions. With no place to call home, you shelter wherever you can, sneaking into barns, huddling in old crates, and relying on the good graces of people better off than you. A wretched lifestyle presents abundant dangers. Violence, disease, and hunger follow you wherever you go. Other wretched people covet your armor, Weapons, and Adventuring Gear, which represent a fortune by their standards. You are beneath the notice of most people.

**Squalid.** You live in a leaky stable, a mud-floored hut just outside town, or a vermin-infested boarding house in the worst part of town. You have shelter from the elements, but you live in a desperate and often violent Environment, in places rife with disease, hunger, and misfortune. You are beneath the notice of most people, and you have few legal protections. Most people at this lifestyle level have suffered some terrible setback. They might be disturbed, marked as exiles, or suffer from disease.

**Poor.** A poor lifestyle means going without the comforts available in a stable community. Simple food and lodgings, threadbare clothing, and unpredictable Conditions result in a sufficient, though probably unpleasant, experience. Your accommodations might be a room in a flophouse or in the Common Room above a tavern. You benefit from some legal protections, but you still have to contend with violence, crime, and disease. People at this lifestyle level tend to be untrained laborers, costermongers, peddlers, thieves, mercenaries, and other disreputable types.

**Modest.** A modest lifestyle keeps you out of the slums and ensures that you can maintain your Equipment. You live in an older part of town, renting a room in a boarding house, inn, or Temple. You don’t go hungry or thirsty, and your living Conditions are clean, if simple. Ordinary people living modest lifestyles include soldiers with families, laborers, students, Priests, hedge wizards, and the like.

**Comfortable.** Choosing a comfortable lifestyle means that you can afford nicer clothing and can easily maintain your Equipment. You live in a small cottage in a middle-­‐‑class neighborhood or in a private room at a fine inn. You associate with merchants, Trained tradespeople, and Military officers.

**Wealthy.** Choosing a wealthy lifestyle means living a life of luxury, though you might not have achieved the social status associated with the old money of nobility or royalty. You live a lifestyle comparable to that of a highly successful merchant, a favored servant of the royalty, or the owner of a few small businesses. You have respectable lodgings, usually a spacious home in a good part of town or a comfortable suite at a fine inn. You likely have a small staff of servants.

**Aristocratic.** You live a life of plenty and comfort. You move in circles populated by the most powerful people in the community. You have excellent lodgings, perhaps a townhouse in the nicest part of town or rooms in the finest inn. You dine at the best restaurants, retain the most Trained and fashionable tailor, and have servants attending to your every need. You receive invitations to the social gatherings of the rich and powerful, and spend evenings in the company of politicians, guild leaders, high Priests, and nobility. You must also contend with the highest levels of deceit and treachery. The wealthier you are, the greater the chance you will be drawn into political intrigue as a pawn or participant.

## **Food, Drink, and Lodging**

The Food, Drink, and Lodging table gives prices for individual food items and a single night’s lodging. These prices are included in your total lifestyle expenses.

## **Services**

Adventurers can pay Nonplayer Characters to assist them or act on their behalf in a variety of circumstances. Most such hirelings have fairly ordinary Skills, while others are masters of a craft or art, and a few are experts with specialized Adventuring Skills.
Some of the most basic types of hirelings appear on the Services table. Other Common hirelings include any of The Wide variety of people who inhabit a typical town or city, when the adventurers pay them to perform a specific task. For example, a Wizard might pay a carpenter to construct an elaborate chest (and its miniature replica) for use in the Secret Chest spell. A Fighter might commission a blacksmith to forge a Special sword. A bard might pay a tailor to make exquisite clothing for an upcoming Performance in front of the duke.

Other hirelings provide more expert or dangerous Services. Mercenary soldiers paid to help the adventurers take on a Hobgoblin army are hirelings, as are sages hired to Research ancient or esoteric lore. If a high-­‐‑level adventurer establishes a stronghold of some kind, he or she might hire a whole staff of servants and agents to run the place, from a castellan or steward to menial laborers to keep the stables clean. These hirelings often enjoy a long-­‐‑term contract that includes a place to live within the stronghold as part of the offered compensation.

   Within a city
  Untrained
 Messenger
 Road or gate toll
 Ship's passage

Trained hirelings include anyone hired to perform a service that involves a proficiency (including weapon, tool, or skill): a Mercenary, artisan, Scribe, and so on. The pay shown is a minimum; some expert hirelings require more pay. Untrained Hirelings are hired for menial work that requires no particular skill and can include laborers, porters, maids, and similar workers.

## **Spellcasting Services**

People who are able to cast Spells don’t fall into the category of ordinary hirelings. It might be possible to find someone willing to Cast a Spell in exchange for coin or favors, but it is rarely easy and no established pay rates exist. As a rule, the higher the level of the desired spell, the harder it is to find someone who can cast it and the more it costs.
Hiring someone to cast a relatively Common spell of 1st or 2nd level, such as *Cure Wounds* or *Identify*, is easy enough in a city or town, and might cost 10 to 50 gold pieces (plus the cost of any expensive material components). Finding someone able and willing to cast a higher-level spell might involve traveling to a large city, perhaps one with a university or prominent Temple. Once found, the spellcaster might ask for a service instead of payment—the kind of service that only adventurers can provide, such as retrieving a rare item from a dangerous locale or traversing a monster-infested Wilderness to deliver something important to a distant settlement.

## **NPC** **Social Classes**

Untrained workers are paid 2 sp per day, while Trained workers (anyone performing a service requiring proficiency) are paid 2 gp per day. Untrained workers tend to live a poor lifestyle, while the Trained ones lead a comfortable life.

The lifestyle cost is intended for an adventurer. It assumes he buys all his meals, rents lodging and pays for the reparation of weapons and tools. Clearly, this is not the case for all NPCs, as they prepare their own meals, fix their own stuff and own their own home. (Disclaimer: Many NPCs, especially of the lower classes, would probably in fact be renting and not owning, while they do have a business to maintain). Every commoner over the age of 14 pays a set tax based on his social status, not his actual income. The higher classes would not be preparing their own meals or fixing their own stuff). The average tax in Tal En'Estela is 10%.

Quite a large sum flow through them in the course of a week, but they don't have a lot to spend. Many of them have a family to take care of, spends some nights a Tenday drinking at the tavern, or have to pay for unexpected stuff not covered by lifestyle and business maintenance, so their actual savings each Tenday will generally be lower than their profit.

A poor worker can spend 1 silver a week on beer at the tavern, but he won't be saving much if that's his choice. It will take a modest NPC a bit over a year to save up for a healing potion, two years for the antitoxin for his sick daughter. The comfortable smith can buy a second set of tools after 5 Tendays of hard work, while the successful merchant can buy a magnifying glass to more accurately assess gems in about a year. After little more than a Tenday the minor noble can buy a vial of acid to stop the mouth of that pesky guild leader.

* Money is an abstraction. More often than not, the NPCs will not see their pay in the form of coins, but of produce or services. The same applies to their taxes.
* The Tendayly costs are also abstractions. Some NPCs might get their pay on a weekly basis, while others only get their money a few times a year.

**Lower Class:** Have the Social Status of Wretched, Squalid, or Poor

**Middle Class:** Modest, Comfortable

**Upper Class:** Wealthy, Aristocratic