RuneQuest Trade in Glorantha(1), Podreczniki RPG, RuneQuest

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TRADE IN GLORANTHA
©1994 by Gerald Bosch
Author's Notes
My purpose in doing this is to provide gamemasters with a set of tools to run
trader characters and also to allow them to fill in the background more fully. The
way that household production works, for example, will determine what goods
are available for trade, but it also contributes to how the family works, what that
farmyard the characters walk into looks like, how cities work... any number of
things. I want to allow the gamemaster who likes world-spanning campaigns to
be able to run trade all over, while also allowing the gamemaster who runs
detailed local campaigns to get a better feel for the productive life of his
community. It is important to bear in mind that all this is very much my vision of
Glorantha. I tried to hold to the written sources, but in the absence of other
material, I decided what regions I thought should produce various goods, what
regions would want them, what things were important to include and what to
ignore, so feel free to take issue with any of this and to use and discard at will.
I have confined myself to the regions and cultures described in the Genertela
source pack. These notes are really only about human trade. Although Trolls are
superficially similar to humans in some ways relating to trade, Mostali and
Aldryami (not to mention Dragonnewts!) are so alien in needs and in mindset that
their economic priorities are bound to be different than those of mortal humans
who must produce and consume to survive.
Introduction
In trying to discuss trade in Genertela, I will be using a number of idea from
economic theory (but rarely discussing them...that was close, huh?). To do this, I
am assuming that certain things that economists hold to be true on Earth are also
true on Glorantha:
Relative scarcity determines value.
In other words, the value of a good is determined by how much there is,
how many people want it, and how badly those people want it.
All other things being equal, people will give up as little as
possible for whatever it is they want.
A person looking at identical or interchangeable goods will buy the
cheaper one. This does not mean, however, that a rabid Sartarite patriot
wouldn't buy something at higher cost from an Issaries merchant that he
could get cheaper from that hated Etyries merchant. In addition to his
goods, he is buying the right to trade with who he wants.
The Gloranthan economy operates like pre-industrial economies on
Earth.
This is probably the most controversial assumption I'm making, but I think
it holds up. This doesn't mean I'm thinking in direct analogues (although
this seems plausible with the West): For example, my ideas about Peloria
combine agricultural techniques from Mesoamerica with irrigation
techniques from the Nile and an agricultural and marketing organization
from ancient Rome. I believe the fit is general, and varies by location.
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Material concerns interact equally with socio-cultural concerns in
shaping Gloranthan economic realities.
I'm rejecting the idea that the material realities determine the cultural
ones as well as the idea that culture overrides material concerns. Both
interact to create the Gloranthan landscape (I include the mythic with the
cultural).
Profit & Trade
One important idea to consider when designing elements of the game related to
trade is that people exchange things for other things because they believe that
what they are getting is worth more than what they are giving up. In other
words, people are seeking profit in exchanges- they are not simply trading in
order to trade. Profit can assume many forms beyond the acquisition of material
wealth. A piece of art provides an aesthetic value beyond its purchase price to
one who appreciates it, whatever the general market price. A donation to a
charity can provide the giver a certain social status, the feeling of having others
be grateful, or just joy in the happiness of others. Each of these id profit of a
sort.
This doesn't mean that people are always happy about the terms of exchange. A
person dying of dehydration in the Vulture Country might not want to give up all
their metal goods to those Bison Riders in return for water, but if they value their
life above their goods, they will make the exchange. This is an important point--
just because someone doesn't like the trade they are making doesn't mean they
aren't making a "profit". Merchants turning a decent profit have been complaining
about the prices they pay and the value they receive since time immemorial. In
the absence of physical force (i.e. theft or taxation), people will not exchange
goods unless they think they are getting more than they are giving up.
When determining whether trade in a good exists between two places, there are
a number of factors to consider:
Supply
- Is there a surplus of the good at the point of production? How
much are they willing to give up? What do the producers want for it?
Demand
- Is there a demand for the good elsewhere? If so, do those who
want the good have the means to pay for it?
Substitutability
- Is there a local good that can replace the good in
question? If there is, why do the locals want to pay to import the foreign
good? (Why would a Praxian tribe buy Sartarite leather goods when they
can make the stuff themselves? If there isn't some other factor, such as
superior durability or attractiveness, that offsets the difference in cost,
they probably wouldn't.)
Transportation costs
- Can the good be moved from point A to point B?
If so, how much will it cost to do so? A famous economist once said that a
market for a particular good on Earth and the same market on Mars can
be said to be linked, the only difference in price is the cost of
transportation. Whether the consumer is willing to pay that additional cost
will determine whether a trade route can develop between two points.
Trade in Glorantha
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© 1994 Gerald Bosch
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Transportation
The means for moving goods from point A to point B are vitally important in
understanding trade. Goods can be moved in four ways, listed here in descending
order of cost: human power, animal power, wagon, and water.
The costliest way of moving goods is by having humans carry them. Human
beings are weaker than any draft animal, and more stubborn. They can, however,
adapt themselves to conditions no animal could.
Animals have a much higher capacity than humans for carrying goods. They are
also able, depending on the species, to move over broken and difficult ground.
They are, however, susceptible to a number of diseases and environmental
conditions, and must be fed and watered. Animals transporting goods cannot
simply graze, because while they are moving around in search of edible ground
cover, they aren't hauling their loads from point A to point B.
An animal's capacity for moving goods is greatly increased by hitching them to
wagons. The problem is that wagons require either relatively flat and open
ground or roads. Some areas of Genertela are blessed with good road systems,
but many are not.
By far the least expensive way of moving goods is water transport. Even in the
modern world, a longer sea voyage is usually preferable to a shorter land voyage
for most bulk goods, hence bulk goods being shipped from one coast of the U.S.
to another are routinely shipped via Panama rather than by rail. Water transport
is also generally faster and more reliable. In the Eighteenth century it took less
time for a piece of mail to travel from Boston to London than it did for a piece of
mail to travel from London to the West Country of Ireland.
Long distance land-based trade is usually only possible with low-bulk, high value
goods. The spice and silk trade between Europe and Asia is a good example. Even
that trade, however, used rivers and seas wherever possible. The trade in Indian
cottons, by comparison, was only possible once sea links around Africa had been
secured.
Gloranthan caravans were greatly stimulated by the Closing, and are now slowly
being strangled by competition from the sea. When adventurers do encounter
caravans, they can be sure they will be laden with highly valuable and relatively
easily transportable goods.
Production & Consumption
The purpose for all economic activity is consumption, the use of resources be
they food, clothing, magic goods, whatever. Any process that leads to
consumption is production, from gathering walnuts to manufacturing a Protection
4 Matrix. Trade only exists as a way to convert production into different types of
consumption (Trading the Protection 4 Matrix you manufactured/produced for a
fine horse you want to use/consume).
The bulk of people in Glorantha are engaged in primary production, in using their
labor to provide directly for their own needs. They are farmers, herders, or
hunters and they spend the bulk of their time producing food, shelter, and
clothing. This is true even in those societies that are the most highly urbanized.
These people produce most of what they consume and consume most of what
they produce, leaving little surplus for trade. A minority of people are involved in
Trade in Glorantha
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© 1994 Gerald Bosch
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secondary production, the trading of skills and labor for the necessities of life.
These people include everyone from warriors to artisans to merchants to nobles
to priests, anyone who doesn't actual kill, raise, or grow their own food.
If we use the cultural categories provided by RuneQuest (primitive/hsunchen,
nomad, barbarian, civilized) we can see an increasing specialization of economic
functions, leading to increasing numbers of people working in secondary
production.
Almost all production amongst the various hsunchen peoples is primary. Only
shamen exist off of selling their skills to the tribe. The rest of these hunter-
gatherers produce all their necessities themselves and consume very few things
they do not produce. If terrestrial hunter-gatherers are any guide, the bulk of
their diet is actually produced by gathering (usually done by the women and
children). What trade they engage in is mostly geared toward luxury items. They
usually have no formal market structures, and outside traders hoping to deal with
them must go to where they are liable to have congregated.
The nomadic cultures of Pent and Prax are somewhat more specialized
economically than the various hsunchen peoples, but are still mostly self-
sufficient. Most nomads are herder, hunter, craftsperson, warrior, all combined.
Once again, if terrestrial models are any guide, most of these people's diet comes
from non-animal sources, either gathering or small-scale gardening at semi-
permanent camps. Part of this role in Prax is taken up by the Oasis Peoples. The
nomads are somewhat more inclined towards trade with livestock acting as the
basis of wealth.
The biggest step toward economic specialization comes with agriculture. The
Theyalans are able to support a wide range of secondary producers, including
nobles, priests, specialized craftspeople, and merchants. The food production of
the Theyalan cultures is somewhat specialized between pastoralists and
agriculturalists, but most Orlanthi are small peasant free- holders growing grain,
gardening, and raising some livestock. Local trade is dominated by village
markets linked into larger trade patterns with the cities. Most people are still
rather removed from trade and are mostly self-sufficient except for certain
manufactured goods.
The Western, Pelorian, and Kralorelan cultures enjoy an even higher level of
economic specialization than does the Theyalan. In each of these areas, most
people are peasant farmers whose lives are very similar to those in Theyalan
culture. The major difference is that most of these are not free-holders, they are
required to pay a portion of their crop to a landlord (usually a nobleman).
Supplementary agricultural labor (beyond what the household can provide)
usually comes from the local poor or from one-year indentures of young people
from other families.
These cultures also have a number of primary producers who are bound to the
land in one sense or another. They may be the serfs who live in the farming
villages of Seshnela or the coloni working the huge grain farms of the Lunar
Heartland, but in each case they own next to nothing and are unable to leave the
land without permission.
Most trading among these farmers, bound and unbound, is very small scale.
There are regular local produce markets that also provide access to a limited
amount of goods from outside the area.
Trade in Glorantha
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© 1994 Gerald Bosch
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The economic specialization of these cultures also allows them to support an
urban society comprised of merchants, craftspeople and a small wage labor
market. It is in the urban areas that the bulk of trade goes on. These people use
money more often than their rural counterparts, allowing them more access to a
wider variety of goods.
Most urban wage-earning families supplement their income with small-scale
gardening. The keeping of gardens and livestock within cities was more common
than not until recent times. There are estimates that suggest that as much as
one-third of the support for an urban family in the industrial northeast of the US
during the nineteenth century came from gardening, raising animals, and selling
homebrew (all of this done entirely by the women and children, who were also
wage-earners). I assume this is also the case in Gloranthan cities.
Household production plays a large part in most industries (especially textiles).
When Europeans were paying top money for Indian textiles, most of the Indian
textile production was done in the home. An entrepreneur would bring around
raw materials and then come back later and buy the finished pieces which he
then sold to the cloth merchants. The same "out-work" system also operated in
Europe. This system is in operation in most areas of Genertela, but in Fronela and
Teshnos especially.
Young, unmarried craftspeople, who are learning their trades, join a skilled
craftsperson's house, and are supported by the household system. When
supplemented with unskilled wage labor, this system produces the urban
workshops that are the genesis of modern factories. This type of production is
common in Safelster, Peloria, and Kralorela.
The end result of these different types of manufacturing are rarely sold directly.
The manufacturer usually sells to a merchant who then retails the item to the
consumer.
Large-scale retailing is a result of industrialization, modern transportation, mass
production, an urban society, and the fact that mean individual income in the
west has increased by a factor of twelve since 1700. Without all of these
elements, there is no support for modern retail stores. This doesn't mean that
people in Glorantha, particularly in towns, don't buy things. It means that most
things are bought on a piecework basis. The model is a tailor shop. A person
walks in and orders an item of clothing, the tailor takes measurements and then
makes that item from raw materials in stock, and then sells it to the customer.
Some common items will be held in stock, but not many. Most things will be
made-to-order.
Markets
We can think about Gloranthan trade as falling into two broad categories: local
and long-distance. Local trade usually occurs within a cluster of villages which
have a regular market in a central village. Other possibilities include meetings
between different clans or tribes among hsunchen and nomadic peoples. The
trade is in locally produced goods. One village has a bumper crop of yams,
another has had a bad year, but has cloth to trade. There is also trade for
superior versions of commonly made goods. One example might be a metalsmith
who is known to be particularly skilled, so people from all over the area come to
trade with him, bypassing other smiths. Another example is a particular nomad
who is very good at leatherworking, so other nomads trade extra meat or milk to
him for items they could produce themselves, but not as well.
Trade in Glorantha
I
© 1994 Gerald Bosch
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RuneQuest Trade in Glorantha(1), Podreczniki RPG, RuneQuest

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