Item values

Being a new DM I'm still in the process of constructing my own methodology. I do this by cramming my brain full of random tables, house rules, scraps of painting, poems, and prose and regurgitating what is useful during play. I keep what work and discard everything else. In between sessions I comb back over what I liked and find ways to streamline it. My players, also new to the game, have been thankfully forbearing.

One thing I keep messing around with is the currency. How much treasure is worth, what kind of treasures are found and where, what kind of items are available in towns.

I dislike my players strolling around with hundreds of shiny gold coins and jewels in their pockets, especially at lower levels. I want them to be struggling, sleeping rough, on the verge of starving, bouncing from one windfall to the next, desperate to stay afloat. This harkens back to Dying Earth. Cugel is swindled out of his money at every turn, just as he swindles others. He haggles over the value of every single terce, and even so spends it with wild abandon in the next breath. I want this same frivolous feast-or-famine play in my own games.

My own players are a parsimonious lot, hesitant to even spend Gold on XP. Even when they go a-carousing they cautiously prefer to roleplay the entire night instead of rolling tables! It's hard to cheat them as their eyes are sharp. There are ways.

 CURRENCY
Using lower currency numbers makes each and every coin feel much more valuable. A tool such a 10' pole or a pickaxe might cost a single terce. If an inn costs 4 terces and you recently sold a gold brooch for 16 terces that's a quarter of your earnings!

What even is 700 gold coins?
We play Knave, which uses an item slot system based on Constitution score. My players keep track of their items using index cards. They enjoy drawing the pictures on each card, passing them around to each other, or piling them on the table when they make an item cache in the dungeon. Different items take up different item slots. A suit of plate armor takes up 5 slots. 100 coins take up an entire slot. I usually fudge it with small treasures like jewelry. Larger treasures might take up a whole slot.

The limit on amount of gold they can carry is important. They need those spaces for useful things. It's better to spend or hide the gold than to have it weighing you down.

Gilded tombs do worms enfold
I don't want to tell my players outright how much an item costs. I don't even outright tell them if an item is magical. I want them to use their judgement and decide what is worth lugging out of the dungeon.

Each Item has a Die value, d4 d6 d8 d10 d12 d20 or d00. When the player tries to sell this item to a vendor I roll that die, modified a bit by the Trustworthiness of the vendor (aka I fudge it a bit based on the vendor's personality). If the player doesn't like the number they can attempt to haggle.

We usually haggle the same as real life. Usually this starts out with my players giving batshit numbers they pull out of their asses. I have them do a contested Charisma check against the vendor to see what the initial reaction to the bid is. If they fail the check it reduces the vendor's Morale.

Vendors want to spend low and sell high and generally know about how much an item is really worth, so they outright reject stupid offers, and they also don't want their time wasted, so they might get pissed if you yank them around (ever sold a car on Craigslist?). If the players make a reasonable offer the vendor usually takes it. If the players are being dicks I roll a Reaction check on the vendor to see if things get hostile. I haven't had players try to charm or intimidate any merchants yet.


Shop Quality
If a player wants to sell an item they have to find a place that buys things. If they think the thing is special they'll take it to a specialty dealer and see what they can get for it. Specialty dealers generally give a fair price (unless they're assholes) and if they're nice might even give a bit of backstory about a particular item.

Different shops are of different qualities. If my players ask about shops I pull d6 names out of my ass. A shitty antique dealer might be called something like "the Dingy Compass" and a fancy one "the Effluvient Gryffin". The players have to actually investigate the place and meet the vendor to see what it's like.

Fancy dealers want the good stuff. They can be stuffy nobles, shrewd businessmen, or eccentric collectors. If an item is worthless the PCs will generally be told so directly, possibly laughed out of the store. They'll pay handsomely for extremely rare or potent artifacts. If they're evil they might try to swindle the players by way underselling the value. It pays to get a second opinion, especially from a competitor.

Shitty dealers won't know much about an items backstory, but they'll generally buy anything. You might be able to sell a hunk of junk for more than it's worth if you're lucky, but probably you won't get top dollar.

The very bottom of the barrel is pawnshops. I don't have qualities for pawnshops, they're all the same. It's how my players unwanted stuff into coin. Don't bother haggling here, you know you're not getting a good deal.

This is for larger towns. You'd be lucky to find a general store in most villages.

Only Wizards can appraise the magical qualities of an item.

the reviles of porglitag the saber, part 1

Here's something I wrote. It's entitled "the Reviles of Porglitag the Saber, part 1"

Counting the masses of silver coins on his desk was Porglitag the pigman highbringer, chief taxer to Derblesplish the lordcutter, a local minor lord. His office was a strewn mess of broken pottery and statuettes of jasper maidens exposing their orifaces. With a gleeful chortle he jangled his piles.

"Yee hee! Income is up 6% from last quarter! Before long I'll be able to purchase my own minor duchy from king Skirplupigan!"

There was a pounding at the door and a small putrid man wearing rusty chainmail entered, sweating profusely.

"Lord Porglitag! An army of bandits approach the castle!"

"Wonderful," said Porglitag "I'll be there in a moment!"

He chose his favorite plush pineapple hat and a crystal wand from a door before sauntering down the hall. It was a beautiful fall day and a crisp wind filtered in through the ports which faced the court. As he passed by one he caught a glimps of a sea of golden grass stretching out for miles to the far plump mountains. The sky was gray.

He crawled up a flight of spiral stairs before arriving on top of the rampart. Below was about a hundred and fifty men in black carrying spears and small wooden shields, arranged in two haphazard factions. Heading the group were three men riding small mottled brown horses. They came to a halt fifty yards from the outer wall.

The larger of the three men raised his arm in salute. His hair flowed in a firey coif around his neck and shoulders. He wore a bright red cape and purple steel cuirass which once had been in the latest fashions. Even from this distance Porglitag could see dents and spots of rust the bearer had failed to burnish out. The son of a knight on the descent into peasanthood.

"Highbringer Porglitag!" called the man "I am Shertrabe son of Guxlitux, son of Shertribux, heir to the hall of Lyllgyllyhylla. I come to to demand the release of"

Porglitag raised the crystal wand in his hand, Shertrabe son of Guxlitux burst into flames and fell screaming from his horse. Without a sound archers from up and down the ramparts presented themselves and released a volley upon the unsuspecting bandits, who turned and began to run. A full third of the men fell and were crushed underfoot by their retreating brothers.

The two remaining horsemen gathered their reigns and circled back around, swords drawn, corralling the deserting spearfolk and forcing them back towards the fort. The archers prepared to launch another volley. The spearfolk gathered back into their formations and bristled into a phalanx, shields raised.

The guardcaptain gave his order and the archers launched again. The bandit's were peppered, downing only the few who failed to raise their shields high enough. They marched forth, the riders on each side of the formation, swords drawn, shouting commands and encouragement.

Porglitug made a sign to the guardcaptain and a porticullus at the front of the fort was raised. Seven yellow chargers wielding heavy lances streamed forth. In a calamitous moment there was a crash of horse and spear against bone and the chargers cut through the phalanx like a bolt of lightning. They cast down their ruined lances as they passed through and drew long boar-headed maces. The archers readied to launch again.

Within twenty minutes the bandits were all dead, except for one. One of the riders who came with Shertrabe had been captured by the chargers and carried back. The other was smashed to death by three of the charger's maces in an instant, and his ruined body was carried into the woods by his horse. The prisoners was strawhaired boy, perhaps sixteen, barely of age to carry a sword at all, much less take part in a rebellion. Porglitag had him beaten and chained in the dungeon.

Moments later the butler arrived, announcing the gathering for supperfeast.

In a blur of lime green chiffonade Giffleblig of Butter, a visiting nobleman from the south, appeared at Porglitag's side as they made their way to the banquethall.

"Quite a wonderful display, Porgy! It is always a pleasure to visit you in fort Stamadingdong, what colorful wildlife inhabit the areas about. I should like to partake in a hunt during my stay!"

"Indeed," croaked Porglitag, as he pulled at the hairs on his chinny-chin-chin.

sub-revovulation

sub-revovulation

erased the face replaced becoming with knowingthe magical showing of ears and spine
fingers dancing with twine and time to produce
essence of everlasting verb
like weavers or bakers
the makers of cakers of conducive expulsion.
i feel repulsion to mass produced word
and excitement & frightment to
sentences smashed to senseless feeling.
what else is there in the mind of a human?
a sufficiently advanced AI could reproduce
like the tick of a metronome
could this help us assimilate the space between
mind and flesh the union of being and circuit
transhuman reducer replaced in confucius program
computers follows rules which are malleable and reproducible
the human element escapes stricture though scripture
belittles the brightest to bereavement, the seasons
the merging of dark
the eyeless branches waving lords of toil
demand sacrifice so that the soil may
sprout the fruits of dominion, the cacophony
of violence the childless giants the viscera
of silence
i don't think they can hold on long enough
the power that collects it cracks with each step
the loss of its fuel is the cancer in its bones
with glee our knives cut and fangs rip as we pull apart
and spread its guts and share with joys the surprises in the mud,
what can we do with the tech of dead gods? take it
and weave it into trees, power it with sun or feed it with leaves
take it and shape it to make love to our dreams, give birth
to an infinite world without seams? spread the dust of love to the stars, ignite the limitless direction without laws?
the way of control is one way only,
the tools of the masters can be broken and reshaped
inward and outward both lead to the same
ignoring the boundaries you find its a game

lingering lonely life

lingering lonely life

where does it come?

the break in between the movement and the madness

is the fear of breath, of life and death

there is no unmoving only steps

of chaos tumbling

makeshift shelters guard from winds

ripping at baseboards

they can't stand forever, kludged together

with old screws and bent nails

in the light of camp fires

heat off of friction grinding gears

the notmoving is where the stories breed

jumping through lip and mouth

carrying messages brainward synth

shared meaning twisted feeling

gathering the rim of rippled steel eye

unquiet might, dignified

or dijected firm

wyrm laughter

wolf candor

night whisperer

tongue twisted

glow stoking mind evoking

mother lore that leads to knowing

the new teachers preach being beyond walls

where cracks are our tunnels out of tombs

cement alchemized from gravel produced

by twisting rusty drills and endless mattock work

chiseling to freedom from the bound strucktures of power

language nymphoid developing fetus growing within us

and through oriphace to gather and spred seed

the myth is the language of old ways and new becomings

without heart ember fire goes out

but easy to find, we create with every breath,

every thought evolves the wink

all rhyme no reason

the puzzle fixes open if you sit with them

on a small island with a fragile ecosystem

I don't get the crooked signs and things that look like people but really aren't. It's frustrating if I try to swim against the currents, thinking I have to swim in my own direction, but if I just let go and let myself be carried down river it frees up a large portion of my brain to do other things.

 Where is it gonna carry me if I just let go? It won't be right in this spot, it'll be in some different spot.
If I try to struggle and make the path, who am I struggling against?  Reality? Other people? Myself?
It never feels right, if I hold some idea in my head of where I want to go, then try to make a path that leads there. The parts never meet up. I end up with a bunch of places I wanna plug things, but no wires. The ropes don't stretch all the way. The pieces don't fit together. There's all these gaps where the juices leak out.

Sleeping outside is easy, in parks, in forests, among the rocks and dirt. In the trees on the side of the highway with lights and low rumbles tumbling by ever couple seconds, swollen clouds spitting now and then. Stumbling exhausted into bushes near a park, kicking all the shit and trash out of the way so I can have room to throw out my tarp and sleeping bag. Listening to some tweaked out homebum screaming while I fall asleep.

I enjoy having nothing to do, or getting around to the shit that needs done on my own time. I like having no expectations, not needing to worry about anything. Worrying and struggling seem like a waste of effort, when you can just wait around until its time to do stuff instead.

Calling strangers on the phone to discuss made up stuff like bills or credit or interviews, with its maze of invisible rules, is agony. I get so tired of it that I just decide to crash through the walls blindly not even thinking what the next step might be, let the chips fall where they may, and usually things turn out better that way. I have to fool myself to get there, though. Distract my mind for a second then jump.

I'm fine growing my own food, I'm fine pulling food out of dumpsters, fermenting veggies, salting meat, baking sourdough bread, cooking over a fire, I'm fine stealing food.
I'm happy begging, I'm okay sometimes working if the work doesn't demand too much of my brain function. I'd rather be cooking or sewing or building for friends and trade, but you make due with what you can get.

There's nothing wrong with being lazy. People are supposed to be lazy. Ancient man goofed off and did whatever seemed like the thing they should do all day and it worked out for them. Doing that in the real world works out too. You end up getting exactly as much as you need and no extra. If you don't need much then it doesn't take much effort and you might even be able to put a little away for down the road. If you store up a bunch of biosurvival things (money, friends, favors etc) then you have surplus you can coast on. If everybody still lived this way we probably wouldn't have all the excess technology stress and diseases we do.

There's forces that pressurize every system, and things usually want to stabilize at a place of equal pressure. Think of osmosis in cells, or magnetism, or gravity, thermodynamics, or population ecology, or lift on an airplane wing. You can spend energy to push yourself up that hill, but then coast down. If you put in a little energy on that coast down you can manipulate it so that you don't have to spend as much energy coasting up into that next hill. You can find a groove and surf on your input/outputs. Balancing work and play until they become synonymous, like halves of the same whole, ya dig?

People's names fly through one ear and out the other the minute they say them. Probably because I'm too busy being anxious and trying to make all the right gestures and facial expressions to not appear like a robot. Knowing this about myself I usually tell people my name several times during an introductory conversation, and then again at the end. I don't know if it works, but I feel like they don't usually forget my name.

I still can't shit

The days drift by in both agonizing slowness, and with bewildering speed. My waking life seems one long stretch of empty corridors, while the past recedes in piles of lost years. The mind is a maze without end, furious piles of stares and locked windows painted black, and jammed doors that must be forced and only open onto more stairs and frantic nests of empty rooms.

I can't escape from it. When I'm alone, I'm lonesome. Around people, I'm practically paralyzed in the fear of making social faux pas. Or else I dare to make a fool of myself, only to end up regretting it.

I'm disappointed every day I wake up. By noon I feel totally reborn and powerful, ready to take on the world in all its challenges and ring every drop from life. By 3:30 PM the crushing weight is back.

If everything is doomed to death then life itself is an absurdity. Anything can be done because we're free from consequences. This logic works in the world of fantasy, but not in the world of flesh and blood. Adventures are filled with mostly waiting. The worker is the victim of a vampire, whether he knows it or not. The difference is that the ignorant one isn't aware of his pain. The worker who can feel his blood being drained but is powerless to stop it is at a much worse place.

Unless he can find a way to rebel, and stay there. Or otherwise weaken the vampire's grasp.

I don't know how to do that. I tried living without a house, traveling the country. I tried making friends and building something. Each endeavor burns and crashes with no satisfying resolution.

++++++

Upon writing all this out I can even devise arguments against each and every statement. I've grown and developed into a totally different person in the few years I've been on the road. I've learned social skills, I've developed a form of self-esteem, I've destroyed and replaced just about every barricade to my development. I've learned to survive on nothing, how to manage money, how to let go of painful emotions.

The insidious power of depression is that it makes you forget the times you weren't depressed. It never leaves, though. It's always waiting around the corner, to catch you alone. I need a bell and a hammer to crash away it's intrusions. Maybe that's what art & writing is for. Just clench and squeeze and fuck out all the words, all the feelings, all the terror and useless crap and wad it all up and burn it.

There's a fine balance to be struck between effort and no effort. If you push too hard or try to force it the whole thing stops up. This goes for everything. If you let your eyes kind of cross and loosen your grip a bit and steer intuitively, using your peripherals to guide you, it becomes easier.

You have to push gently.

My lungs hurt.

++++++

The biggest predicament is that I struggle with what it means to feel. I want to be able to feel with my whole body, to know deep in my bones a resonating vibration. I want to smile uncontrollably, to laugh until it hurts, to have my skin crawl, a cool breeze on a warm evening to bristle my hair. I want fear to strike like a bolt from the blue. I want icy chills, and grumbles, and triumphs, and passion, and fervor, and humility, and idolatry. I want to be stunned senseless, struck speechless, enraptured, nurtured. I want the world to be real, to affect me as I effect it.

How do I find feeling? Inside me there is only cold dull grey static, loud as the pounding of the ocean, that drives away life. There is a bruised and swollen ache which isn't so much a feeling as a smothering voidness. I can feel the lack of feeling, a clenching in my guts, the sinking of my shoulders, an ache in my neck, the shortness of my breath. I can feel my body full of cysts and tumors, my spirit malignant and infected, my soul shriveled and fearful. I can awaken to the feeling of an exposed insect in the bright light of god's damning gaze.

The nerves are dead.

INFINITE LIGHTNING DEATH SUNDAE

This is how you do it right:

1 banana, cut in half
two big fat scoops of the best quality vanilla ice cream you can find

Necessary toppings:
shaved dark chocolate
minced candied ginger
You can stop right there if you want. It's simplicity lets every flavor shine through. The ginger adds a bit of spice that melts well with all the sweet. If you're XTREME read on:

chopped strawberries
a drizzle of honey
sunflower seeds

Optional, but recommended: crushed potato chips (try pickle flavor!), a dash of Louisiana hot sauce, chocolate cake, cookie dough, maraschino cherries

If you're truly brave use a slice of pepperoni-jalapeno pizza as a bowl.

Eat with chop sticks, or blend it all up into a milk shake.