ORGANIZATION weight in brackets. Some of the beverages are sold This article gives a comprehensive price list for as complete barrels in a standard sizes, i.e. a Harn in alphabetical order. Most of the prices given hogshead (50 gallons), a pipe (100 gallons) or a tun here are in Harndex, listed under the guild or source (200 gallons). of the item. The list below is ordered by item name, The use of certain units to quote a price is not and subordered by the particular varieties of the item meant to imply that the unit is in common use on e.g. Axe/battle, Axe/hand, Axe/throwing etc. To fur- Harn (or even used at all). They are given to allow ther assist the gamemaster a cross reference of the gamemaster to calculate and compare prices. class names has been given. For example if one is The square foot and cubic foot are modern mea- interested in "musical instruments", the class list sures and are unknown on Harn. Most items priced on gives the specific instruments contained in the price area or volume are judged by eye or rule of thumb. list.
FOOD AND LIVESTOCK
LIST ITEMS On Harn food and livestock is bought either at a On Harn many specialized items, such as a crafts- market or directly from the producer. Most meat is man's tools, are made for personal use and are not bought live since a live animal is indisputably fresh for general sale. This reduces the number of items and will keep without spoiling, as long as you feed it. that can have a standard price and hence be includ- The prices for live animals are given in the list. These ed in the list below. are averages and can be adjusted for size and quali- The list has prices for actual goods only and does ty. Bargaining over the cost of livestock is as much not include services or incomes. an art form on Harn as anywhere. The gamemaster should also keep in mind that PRICES livestock is kept for utility and not food. Food is These prices are base prices; that is they assume an incidental benefit that comes when the animal normal availability combined with reasonable trans- no longer earns its feed. The nobility eats game from portation and distribution costs. The gamemaster their lands. In the cities fresh meat is rare. For salted may adjust prices to reflect times of surplus or scarci- meat add 50-100% to the price. ty; and in some cases to reflect the quality and size Although fresh meat is not easily obtained, it of the item. It should be pointed out that the prices is in the list, priced -by the pound. This is not to marked on map keys as low (80-90%), average (90- imply that meat is sold that way. The seller judges by 110%), high (110-130%) and h i g h + (130-150%) the size and quality of the item and, with an eye on are a reflection of the genera availability of those the shrewdness of the buyer, sets a price. Haggling items in the area covered by the map as well as the usually follows. Markets do not have large scales and quality of goods and establishments. if they did they probably would not be trusted by the buyers. The selling o p venison and other game UNITS OF MEASURE meats could be dangerous, as it is very hard to The units used in the price list are standard with prove on whose land an animal was killed. the following abbreviations: penny ( d ) b u s h e l (bl) pint (pt), quart (qt), gallon (gl), hundred SOURCE weight (hw), fathom (fa), ounce (oz), pound (lb), The last column of the price list gives the source of foot ( f t ), ya r d (yd), square foot (sf), square the item. This can be a guilded or unguilded trades- yard (sy), cubic foot (cb), glass (gs). man. In the case of fish the source is given as FISH- MARKET which is used to indicate that it can be
PRICE LIST 2 bought either directly from a fisherman or from a mar- ing an appropriate site. Site leveling and the dig- ket. If there is anything close to a general store it ging of foundations is the stage of construction that would be the chandlers. Chandlers will carry a large employs the most labourers. This apparently simple assortment of items from other guilds and mark them task is seldom entrusted to serfs or common workers; up. Only the items that are exclusive to a chandler working in a site and digging according to instructions are assigned to him. It is up to the gamemaster to de- is a skilled job, that more than repays the extra mon- cide what other items will be available in a particular ey for experienced labourers. chandler's store. To give further guidance for prices a simple keep could cost 100,000d, a small castle 250,000d FORTIFICATION CONSTRUCTION and a major castle as much as 2,300,000d. COSTS A large castle, if it is constructed in under ten The building of castles, keeps and any stone fortifi- years, will employ approximately 20 woodcrafters, 30 cations is a major expenditure. The cost as a per- metalsmiths, 350 masons one or two master masons centage of gross national product compares to a ma- or the design and the rest to cut stone etc.), and 500 jor modern weapons system. workers. The costs of construction are variable and depend Construction techniques vary on Harn, as the on local labour costs and proximity to building materi- spread of technology is never uniform. Most of the als such as stone and wood. The quality of construc- new developments in military architecture come either tion also has great bearing on the cost, for example from the continent by way of Melderyn or from the wall thickness, quality . of stone and depth of Khuzdul. The Khuzan influence explains the ad- foundations. Another major factor in the cost is vanced architecture of Burzyn castle, such as the the complexity of defensive features such as, barbi- round turrets and double walls. This design was the cans, machicolation and embrasures. work of an outcast Khuzan mason who brought these On Harn stone is not transported large distances. normally proprietary techniques to Chybisa. These The cheapest way is by water. There is little coastal methods have also been employed in Kaldor at Caer traffic around Harn. Hence most fortifications are built Kiban. This seems to have been the work of a human from local stone that is either carried by wagon or mason, one Reandal of Chybisa, who studied the de- brought down a river. This makes the distance to the signs employed in Burzyn and copied them. It is inter- quarry and location of rivers of crucial importance to esting to note that the wall about the town of Kiban is castle builders and a major factor in the cost. Telen being built with the more traditional and cheaper stone is reputed to be the best but is rarely available square towers. in eastern Harn. There are certain rules of thumb that can be adapt- SELLING ITEMS ed by the game master to estimate construction costs. Players may from time to time want to sell items A stone wall costs 12d per sq ft of surface, assuming that they have acquired. When doing so, they must a five foot thick rubble filled wall with two foot blocks first decide if they wish to sell to a merchant or on each face. So given a castle with four square tow- tradesman, or if they wish to sell directly to a con- ers each 30 feet on a side and 30 feet high, and with sumer. In the former case, they should expect to get connecting walls 50 feet a side each 20 feet high. The no more than 50% or so of the full price. Selling di- basic cost of the walls come to 220,800d. Another ma- rectly to a consumer, there will often – but not always jor cost is site preparation; leveling and digging ditch- – be a discount as well, but it will rarely exceed 25%. es for wall foundations. Digging for foundations costs This discount will depend on the circumstances of the 1d/10 cu feet, assuming a site that can be dug with a sale, whether the good is produced by a guild (this spade and does not require rock cutting. Site level- assumes the seller is not himself a member of the ing . is about 10d per square foot, again assum-
PRICE LIST 3 guild in question), and whether the seller is himself a mercantyler. After determining the prospective purchaser, the seller must then take into account the wear of the item. A sword fresh from the anvil is more valuable than one that has seen battle. While the discount for wear is ultimately at the GM's discretion, for most items having seen normal use without any obvious flaws, one should expect anywhere from 10%-30% discount. To determine the final base price, add up all the percentage discounts, apply this to the normal price, thus arriving at the final base price. (See Trading skill for arriving at the actual final price.) Example: A group of adventurers returns to town with a falchion retrieved from a defeated opponent. The group goes to the local weaponcrafter to sell the item. Selling to the weaponcrafter incurs an immedi- ate 50% penalty. The GM then determines that the original owner took care of the sword, but of course it still has been used. He adds another 15% discount. The final discount for the item is 65%. Since the pur- chase cost of the item is 120d, this puts the final base cost for selling the item at 42d.