Covenant Income Sources and Expenses

Games Discussion Ars Magica
1

Greetings Everyone

I was curious about a question I was asking my self now. I suppose most of you would think like I do, but I want to doublecheck and now how do other people do this.

I was thinking about how covenant rulebook tells about Income Sources and some examples of Income depending on the inportance of the source and its development or prosperity. But first question Do you think that expenses asociated with that Income sources are applied so that the people working in that Income Source are taken into account and their ""wages"" are already taken into account. So that the income of the source is the benefit, or you ahould apply non extraordinary costs in it?

I do understand that labor "wages" and the raw material buying nad so on is already accounted for and that the income is the net Income, unless you have extraordinary costs by any shenanigan you have done. Am I right? What do you think about it?

Another question in case the Covenant would develop chain Income Sources, like the farm de or gathering of A raw material as Income source 1, the use of A raw material to create B material as Income Source 2, and the use of B materia to create C finished product as Income Source 3. How would you handle those Income sources. Would you give the Covenant the sum of the 3 Income sources or would you apply a bonus to the Income Source 3.

In case 100% of the Income Source 1- wages is used in Income Source 2 and 100% of Income Source 2 -wages is used in Income Source 3 how would you count the income, the sum of the 3. A increase to Income Source 3?

If income Source 3 in this case was fully supplied by Income Source 2, in case you apply a bonus would it be more than 100% or less? In this case if every single Income would be supplied 100% by the Income Source that is the supplier, would you give a 200% increase to the Source 3, more or less? In the case you add the income Sources would you add something more give it a bonus, or you would just add it flat?

Many thanks everyone I would like to know if any of you thinked about this and other issue related to this. Many thanks

2

Yes, you are right. Covenants, p.58:

Just about all sources of income require a number of people to run them. For example, an inn owned by a covenant needs an innkeeper and staff, whereas a covenant with a large amount of agricultural land may rule over hundreds of peasants in several villages. You do not need to account for any expenditure due to such people (for example the costs to feed, house, or pay them), even if they live at the covenant proper, nor for the costs of any raw materials. Instead, the income provided by the source is simply the surplus after such “operating costs” have been deducted.

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If the output of an income source is fully or mostly absorbed as input by another, I would just treat the two as a single, bigger, source. (Only) if they are independent, I would treat them as two separate sources; in this case events adversely affecting one do not, in general, affect the other (that's why two Lesser sources, yielding 80 Mythic Pounds, are "worth" one Standard source, yielding 100: the two Lesser sources provide greater robustness).

4

I would rather abstract it all away, and rely on the mechanics of money. It does not matter to income source A whether it sells the produce on the open market or if it sells it internally to source B, nor does it matter if silver is exchanged or if the mythic pound is merely exists in the OOC bookkeeping. Similarly, it does not matter to source B if it buys from source A or from somebody else.

The advantage of doing it this way is that it is easier to understand what happens if the circumstances change. If source B takes a hit, source A may loose demand, but it does not have to. It may take a story, but new markets can be sought.

And if you do not want to tell stories about securing income, it hardly matters what you do anyway. And this is part of the point. The rules are written so that you do not have to worry about, unless you want to. The net income is clear. Everything else can be ignored until the story requires it, and then it has to be tuned to your saga.

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5

Under the abstract "Income" rules, each income source is independent from others.

If you setup several sources in a pipeline then it is just a single large income source. So your A>B>C is just a single income source the way you described it and should be written up as such. If you broke them up so A sells to whomever wants it (including B), B buys from where they can (including A) sells to whomever wants it (including C), and C buys from whomever they can (including B) then they are independent.

There are advantages and disadvantages of both approaches.

Multiple smaller income sources tend to be more resistant to both growth and shrinking. By that I mean the annual rolls, outside influences, and character actions will all cause less of an affect on the Covenant's total income. The annual rolls will each be affecting a smaller percentage and tend to smooth out rolls on the extremes. Outside influences will generally only be able to affect a limited portion. Character actions for improvement will have to target each and the effects will be smaller for the same cost. This is the safest income and generally the easiest way to increase total income under it is to add a new Source.

A single very broad income source (a large operation consisting of vineyards feeding into a winery with its own bottle making) is much more dynamic in both growth and shrinking. It has only a single annual roll which makes it more susceptible to both an exceptional or horrible result. Outside influences affect the whole income. Character actions have far more options and get a bigger result.

[Note that Outside Influences can be both good and bad.]

This is because things work on percentages of an Income Source. If you make an improvement you get something like "+10%" rather than "+10 pounds". Lots of smaller income sources results in lots of changes each working on a smaller total which tend to mostly balance out.

That is not to say that your varies income sources cannot harmonize to some degree with each other even if you keep them all independent. It is much better from a story stand point and generally feels more "realistic".

If your Covenant has a "Trade Fleet" as an income source, then them setting up a "Shipyard" as another one is realistic growth. As the "Shipyard" grows it will rapidly get to the point where it is selling more ships and boats than just those needed by the "Trade Fleet". So you setup a "Fishing Fleet" using smaller boats which primarily feeds the local population. With all the activity happening lots of other ships are stopping by (repairs, resupply, trade) so you massively expand and improve the "Port & Docks" to handle everything. Wow there are lots of sailors and traders around, setup some "Inns & Taverns" to capture some of their money. Look at all the drinking happening, how about a "Brewery" or "Vineyard" to supply some of it? So on and so forth.

While they all grew out of each other they, they are still independent since they end up with a larger percentage of their customers outside of each other.

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