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fantasy and "medieval" economics
Oct. 18th, 2018 11:50 amI just finished reading a short story set in someone's fantasy world.
Roughly medieval level, with multiple intelligent species and some magic (all I recall from this one was some healing potions).
So, some farmers are losing stock to some sort of big cats. Probably a group of them.
Some folks from the village who have relevant experience get together to go after them.
They search and finally find a dead cow (which seems to have been dragged there in some sort of cart). And they follow the tracks of the cats to a lair.
At the lair they encounter 13 of the big cats (types not specified, just "giant cats") and an extra large variety of orc (who is over by the cart which has a dead horse in the traces.
After a battle, our heroes manage to kill all the baddies with only minor damage to themselves.
They then go back to their "base camp" where the smith they'd dragged along repairs the minor damage to their weapons and gear (a nice touch, folks forget about that so often) and they use the potions to deal with wounds and bruises.
Here's where economics come into it. They left *all* the bodies out there.
Uh-uh. No way that'd happen. First of all, they'd attract a lot of scavengers, which is *not* something you want to encourage around farms and places with herds of animals.
Second, those hides are worth serious money. Even with the slashes, etc, large furs are useful. And sometimes decorative. So skinning the big cats is a no briner, even if they went back to base and came out later with a cart and some helpers.
Even the (probably badly damaged) hides on the dead cow and worse are likely good for *some* leather.
The meat of the cow and horse are likely unfit for human consumption. And the meat from carnivores isn't that great.
But at least *some* of it is almost certainly useful to feed to dogs and even pigs (remember, pigs are omnivores and will quite happily eat meat)
Heck some of the claws & teeth from the big cats may be valuable as decorations. Or for magical uses.
This is something that both writers and game masters need to keep in mind. A lot of stuff has value that modern day folks don't think of. Well, modern day *city* folks anyway.
Roughly medieval level, with multiple intelligent species and some magic (all I recall from this one was some healing potions).
So, some farmers are losing stock to some sort of big cats. Probably a group of them.
Some folks from the village who have relevant experience get together to go after them.
They search and finally find a dead cow (which seems to have been dragged there in some sort of cart). And they follow the tracks of the cats to a lair.
At the lair they encounter 13 of the big cats (types not specified, just "giant cats") and an extra large variety of orc (who is over by the cart which has a dead horse in the traces.
After a battle, our heroes manage to kill all the baddies with only minor damage to themselves.
They then go back to their "base camp" where the smith they'd dragged along repairs the minor damage to their weapons and gear (a nice touch, folks forget about that so often) and they use the potions to deal with wounds and bruises.
Here's where economics come into it. They left *all* the bodies out there.
Uh-uh. No way that'd happen. First of all, they'd attract a lot of scavengers, which is *not* something you want to encourage around farms and places with herds of animals.
Second, those hides are worth serious money. Even with the slashes, etc, large furs are useful. And sometimes decorative. So skinning the big cats is a no briner, even if they went back to base and came out later with a cart and some helpers.
Even the (probably badly damaged) hides on the dead cow and worse are likely good for *some* leather.
The meat of the cow and horse are likely unfit for human consumption. And the meat from carnivores isn't that great.
But at least *some* of it is almost certainly useful to feed to dogs and even pigs (remember, pigs are omnivores and will quite happily eat meat)
Heck some of the claws & teeth from the big cats may be valuable as decorations. Or for magical uses.
This is something that both writers and game masters need to keep in mind. A lot of stuff has value that modern day folks don't think of. Well, modern day *city* folks anyway.
