Understanding the Magical Economy, A Case Study
Recently, prompted by the Wandering DMs podcast, I have been thinking about the trade of magic in all of its forms. My own setting is still incomplete, but I also have enough detail to it that I can start thinking about how magic currently works in it. So, I will be doing a small case study on some fictional average wizard's apprentice.
Background Information
There are several important pieces of information to know about my setting, but I will be quick. The single largest change I have made is transitioning off of vancian spell slots to a Magic Points (MP) system with spell costs equal to the spell's level and odds of failure depending on the caster's level. As casters gain more experience, they will even get chances to cast spells for free, though it is very unlikely for an apprentice. A caster will have MP equal to Level + Arc, and they will recover 1d3 + Arc for every week of recovery time (no creating magical items, primarily focused on meditation or study, allows spellcasting).
With that established, it is also important to state that apprentices will be from levels 1 to 3 only, and that with this spellcasting system at 3rd level a caster has a chance to cast a 3rd level spell, provided they have the opportunity to successfully scribe it.
Another detail for adventurers, and I believe would fairly apply to most magic-users, is that living costs are 1% of XP (min 20) in silver pieces per month.
Introducing Our Study
This case study will be all about studying the apprentice magic-user Edward. He is a 2nd level magic user with an Arcane bonus of +1, studying under his master with a couple of other apprentices. As an apprentice, his work mostly consists of chores and self-study, with some minor magical tasks thrown in. He needs 30 sp in living expenses per month, despite having certain amenities provided by his master. In terms of magical power, Edward can have up to 3 MP at once, and given a week he can recover from 2 to 3 MP (since he can't get a 4th MP). While he could cast a 2nd level spell, given a couple tries, he hasn't been lucky enough to get to copy one of them.
On any week, Edward can cast two 1st level spells without any worries since he will always recover 2 MP (he doesn't go out much, so is always considered "resting"). He could cast a 3rd, but there is only a 2-in-3 chance he will recover it. He probably will, but it isn't a given. He has a 5% to cast a 1st level spell for free, but that is so rare it isn't really worth considering.
Of course, Edward can use these spells for his own purposes (studying ancient tomes, doing his chores, etc.), but he could also prepare ones that other people want and sell them to help cover his personal living expenses. He doesn't exactly get paid for the privilege of studying under his master, after all. He needs to earn 30 sp per month and the easiest way for him to do that is with spellcasting, since his own meagre knowledge probably isn't worth consulting.
So, over the course of a month, Edward can completely safely cast 8 spells. On a perfect month, he can manage 12. Usually, it he can only manage 11 per month. So, to reliably cover 30 sp per month, Edward could cast 1st level spells for 3 sp each. To be absolutely certain, he would need to charge 4 sp each. Of course, that is the bare minimum he could survive while charging.
Edward's master is the only proper wizard in town, and he only has a few apprentices. There isn't a lot of spellcasting to go around for the entire town, and Edward will also want to use some of his spells for himself. To ensure a safe buffer, and make sure he actually can save up money for his own special projects, Edward will charge more. At 5 sp a spell, he only needs to cast 6 spells per month to survive, leaving 5 or so more that he can either use or sell. However, Edward doesn't have a heart of gold.
Sure, he could get by with just charging 5 sp per spell, but he could also charge more and earn more money, especially if he is the only apprentice who has bothered to learn the specific spell being cast. And, with only two other people to coordinate with, it is easy for the apprentices to all agree to raise the prices. The only people they would really have to worry about in terms of competition, might be any adventurers or priests who are in town. However, they can't raise their prices too much or their master will start getting complaints and that would be bad for all of them.
With a cornered market, but some unknown price ceiling, Edward and the apprentices all agree to never charge less than 5 sp per spell, since that is a reasonable amount that can't really be argued with. However, they also agree that if someone looks like they can pay more, they should charge more. Still, they decide not to do more than double that, since 10 sp is still within reasonable bounds but very profitable for them.
Spell Scrolls
With prices for a 1st level spell established, we can now consider the utility of scrolls. They let anyone who can read the scroll cast the spell within it, they don't cost any MP to use, and they can be used to learn a new spell by other magic users.
Crafting a scroll takes a week worth of work, reagent expenses, a risk of failure, and it prevents the apprentice in question from recovering their own MP. Ignoring the reagent expenses, lets look at how the blocking of MP recover affects the price. For Edward, crafting a scroll (ignoring the chance of failure) effectively costs him three 1st level spells, since that is how much recovered MP he is missing out on. A surprisingly steep opportunity cost, which only gets higher when you realize this prevents him from working on his own projects or spending time studying like he needs to get more powerful.
Because of the annoyance and other costs, we will just assume that all of the spells missed out on costed 10 sp each, which means that the scroll will go for 30 sp more than the reagents alone would. Also, remember that a scroll's creation can still fail! That entails another week of work with another missed 30 sp and an entirely new set of reagents. However, at the same time, scribing spell scrolls is also a regular duty of apprentices and they have a nearly infinite shelf-life.
While the costs for scribing a spell-scroll haven't been set yet, 100 sp in reagents per spell level has a certain amount of tradition to it. So, with that in consideration, there is no way that a scroll would go for less than 100 sp, incredibly unlikely to hit 115 sp and with a normal price that is closer to 130 sp or more. Since he does have to scribe scrolls as part of his apprenticeship, Edward is going to have some one hand, and likely not going to be so annoyed by the task of scribing an average scroll that he drastically increases the price. Catch him at a bad time, however, and he will need to make it from scratch and definitely charge extra for it.
Higher Level Spells
It is of course an important consideration to talk about getting higher level spells cast. Edward himself can theoretically cast 2nd level spells, but hasn't gotten the chance to learn any so he can't in reality. Only his fellow senior apprentice has learned 2nd level spells and, obviously, his master. The master, being a higher level caster, can also cast even higher level spells though he prefers to work on his own personal projects.
Going purely by MP costs in relation to the 1st level spells, a 2nd level spell would go for 10 to 20 sp per casting. However, 2nd level spells are usually significantly better than their 1st level counterparts and if the senior apprentice is out of mana, people will want the master to cast them spells. The master, however, does not want to be bothered with such trivialities. Still, he does need to earn money to pay for his own living expenses and everything he supplies to his apprentices. So, he would likely prefer to just overcharge people than turn them away.
The senior apprentice will likely see this as an opportunity to charge more as well, possibly even encouraged by his master. Consider that the apprentices, at their top end, are willing to charge 20 sp for two 1st level spell castings. This makes a good baseline in price, with 2nd level spells being exclusively more expensive than their equivalent MP in 1st level spells. And, since it works with 1st level spells, perhaps the senior apprentice would even be willing to charge as much as double that.
Going even higher than that, 3rd level spells and more, starts running into problems. Fireballs and Lightning bolts are powerful enough to be impactful in war, which means they are likely going to be more heavily regulated. Further, only the most exceptional of casters (+2 or higher Arc) are able to consistently recover the MP from casting such a spell. This introduces the need to factor in additional cost into what spells can be sold next week due to casting this spell now.
What does this all mean?
Well, unfortunately, not much at the moment. Pretty clearly, based on what I laid out above, it seems reasonable that if there is a wizard in town with some apprentices, it shouldn't be out of the ordinary for people to go get a spell cast or ask to pick up a spell scroll. If too many people are coming they might see about raising prices even more, since the tower likely isn't meant to be a business (and I wouldn't want it to really be one).
Still, this is beginning to give me a rough framework for pricing goods:
- 1st Level Spell Cast: 5-10 sp (1d6+4?)
- 2nd Level Spell Cast: 20-40 sp (2d10+20?)
- 1st Level Spell Scroll: Reagents + 30sp (1d6x5+115?)
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