Did I take a loan? Assuming I found the Lacuna early in spring, immediately bought the manor and ship with a loan and was happily surprised by the source of vis - how high is the loan and interest (£200 and 15%?), how much were manor and ship and did the business need any further initial investment?
Investment into the business is now (summer) as per C&G?
How would we handle investment into the covenant, e.g. a basic lab? Are there other potential investments that can be made with money?
I'll calculate expenses for one magus, one companion, two guards and two servants (unless Larione suggests something different @loke?) Correct?
Do I now have or don't have a source of income? You mentioned the poverty flaw, or is that just reflecting that Serafino has to either spend time or money to keep the income flowing while usually a covenant just had a source of income and four free seasons for the magi?
Cost of the manor was 25 pounds
cost of the ship was 8 pounds
including interest on the loan and all fees we'll make it 40 pounds.
buying one year of functioning business trading with the ship costs 20 pounds, providing an income of 40 pounds- for a net +20. Since this can be repeated and the standard income for a covenant of 1 is 25 pounds you have effectively reduced your poverty level with this investment, and again additional money may be invested either to produce labor points each year or to improve the business...
20 pounds=18 labor points for investment purposes.
total expenses for the covenant for 1 magi, 1 companion, and 2 servants also requires 2 teamsters for a final cost of 21 MP a year.
Lab equipment costs 5 pounds, more for an exceptional lab (for example venetian glassware would add 15 pounds by itself).
So after paying for the loan, the business, and the covenant expenses for 1 year you have spent 41 pounds of either 500 (1 pawn) or 1000 (2 pawns) of vis being sold....
So we do not use the rules from C&G?
I.e. depending on wealth level 6, 12 or 36 (you said it should even be 6, 18 or 36 or similar) labor points per investment depending on the type of income, £10 for a lesser source of income.
Just asking, not questioning the decision.
What about the guards?
I'm apparently half asleep- 10 pounds is 18 labor points- or 20 pounds is 36 (one year), I did include the grogs, but not their weapons and armor, in the calculated covenant costs. I also assumed 1 person writing and a standard lab- or should have: I had 4 authors, putting that right makes total annual costs 18 pounds of silver...
meaning you have effectively eliminated to poverty hook, at least for now, and have a 2 pound/year surplus.
Ok, so I suppose if I put £200 into a commodity investment, that is going to provide for the 36 labor points to sustain the business (until a story event destroys the investment or I use the 'stored' labor points for something different).
I am wondering however if this kind of heavy investment has the potential to raise suspicion?
It has the potential to raise suspicions, but medieval merchants had ways around that as well (the concept of an annuity was a means to get around charges of usury) and having abilities in disguise and intrigue you should be able to manage fine, especially if you incorporate and act like you have unnamed partners...
you might even cut a deal with the redcaps to legitimize the company, or just incorporate your covenant and seek members...
I'll try to do the math for a) learning it and b) to calculate future growth.
Spring 1195
Inhabitants
5 pt - Serafino
3 pt - Larione
2 pt - 2 guards
4 pt - 4 servants
2 pt - 2 teamsters
16 pt - Total
The servants & teamsters required for the 10 pt worth of inhabitants increase the number of required servants & teamsters...
Weapons
8 pt - 2x standard weapon & shield
16 pt - 2x standard partial armor
24 pt - Total
Summing up in pounds: £16 (inhabitants) + £1 (weapons) + £1 (lab) + £1 (writing material = £19
Not sure about laborers, they can save cost, but don't they increase inhabitants points by the same amount? A trading business would make sense to employ some laborers for stowing etc.
What about the ship, is it part of the covenant, the crew inhabitants or how is that calculated?
In the future, we'd add a companion (@Plot_Device wanted to build a pirate/merchant/captain) and should think about specialists. If I'll leave day to day trade business to someone else, that would be a specialist as well, wouldn't it?
Money in stock should be £460 after selling one pawn and paying back the debt.
How does hermetic economy look like? A pawn
of Vis is roughly £500 (in the Roman Tribunal), is that independent of the art? What do books cost? There is an accounting currency based on Vis, isn't there? Is that different do to scarcity of Vis in the Roman Tribunal?
What is the price of mundane books? What abilities can be learned from books?
Storing ten years worth of labor (£200) in commodity, will that fit into the manor or should we add another building to the covenant, e.g. a warehouse at the harbor? What would be the cost? What would be the extra personell to run and guard it?
I was planning for some agency, e.g. a group of orphans (the thought being that as children they can move pretty freely and will be ignored most of the time) - would a charity investment (as per C&G) be a good start to get that rolling?
Mundane books, according to Covenants are 1MP. I am unsure how Silveroak handles the many mundane books mentioned in various places that are multiple volumes, personally I think multi-volume books should be 1MP per volume sine the 1MP is material and scribal time.
Pretty sure you don’t apply the servants & teamsters function recursively.
Another supplement, C&G I think, have mundane books at 11 shillings.
1MP (or 11 shilling), no matter the quality/level???
I read "including" scratched my head, took it for odd but didn't really question it. Re-reading it clearly states "excluding". So those are accounted for already with the inhabitants, right?
Isn't the 11 shillings for extremely basic copies? As in not a decent scribe, binder, or Illuminator? The sort of books a university student would easily have access to?
Yeah, the number of Servants & Teamsters affect the covenant costs and available space but don't then mean you need more servants & teamsters.
Only one price is listed in each supplement. Why would it depend on the quality and level? It probably should depend on the page count (or number of volumes as nullsettings says), which may depend on the level, but low quality books aren't cheaper to produce in general. The discrepancy suggest wide variation though, so it all comes down to SG.
Not sure what you second question refers to.
10 points of basic inhabitants requires 2 servants, which then requires 2 teamsters. If you hire one laborer it brings the total down to one teamster, and provides a pound of savings in food. Either way you will have 14 points of inhabitants and you have 10 points of building space. A second building costs 2.5 pounds per point of inhabitants, and will probably be selected for proximity rather than a lacunae. These may be purchased as individual houses (1 inhabitant point each), a second manor, or a huge house (5 inhabitant points), or other options to try and get different selections of room to expand.
Investment commodities are stored in warehouses, which are included in the investment price, along with guards for the commodities.
What are 10 points of building space? That in the manor fit only 2/3 of the covenant's inhabitants and we should already acquire more?
What can be done then to make negative events less likely?
keep stories away from your investments? story events are events that occur within stories- for example if Okeania challenges you to certamen at some point and you have her meet you in one of your warehouses because (?) and there is a both on a high level ignem roll the warehouse could burn down... but it will not be targeted randomly.
Ah, ok. The random part is what I thought.
Does Larione have any recommendation with regards to securing the manor, employing specific roles, extending the covenant's building, etc.? @loke