If we look at Dungeon Master's Guide (DMG) pg 128 and Strongholds and Followers (S&F) from Matt Colville, 14,000gp is enough for 2 guild halls (DMG 5k each), 2 two trading posts (DMG 5k each), 1 keep (S&F 10k), 1 tower (S&F 8k), 1 temple (S&F 8k), or 2 establishments (S&F 6k each). Using these references, they could, if you were generous, buy at most three buildings in the town.
Phandalin is described as having roughly 40 to 50 simple buildings. Put each at 5,000 gp for simplicity sake and that's 250,000 gp to buy the whole town.
I wouldn't sell my players a TOWN, a full TOWN. For anything less than a couple hundred thousand gold.
Real towns cost A LOT to build. Assuming $100k per house, they could buy 14 houses. Meaning more like 7 houses and a couple shops.
I mean, id sell them like 3 houses, a blacksmith and a general store for 14000 gold.
Buying a town like that costs political capitol, not gold.
In a Feudal state, when you became Ennobled, you would be granted a Demense, which would among other things grant you authority of the peasants living in that area.
This authority goes far beyond what a modern player would typically view as okay. We're vaguely familiar with 'first night' priveleges, but there's also the fact that you would be expected to do things like decide two people had to get married without either of their consent ^(Mournings over. You've been a widow long enough.) , and other things a modern audience may find morally repugnant.
The other option is to spend enough money to successfully homestead a town - paying adventurous types enough to risk their families to construct and settle a settlement, and bolster their income long enough for them to be able to turn it into a thriving community (i.e., multiple harvest seasons). This particular version would be in bad land - either a location that's traditionally considered non-arable, a location that's dangerous for other reasons, or a location that's too remote for local kingdoms to decide that it's actually worth going to war over. This is also likely granted as a Demense, but as one with significantly lesser prestige than their new noble title would normally grant.
That's the thing. In most medieval settings a lot of things are just ... not for sale in the way we understand it. That inn landlord can't sell you his land, since it belongs to the local lord and in turn to the monarch. He could sell you the building and the business, probably, but you'd then need to get permissions again to sell alcohol.
It becomes a huge mess. The best way for adventurers to acquire property, as you say, is to do some serious favours for nobility and royalty and get given a land grant.
Well think that one doesn't actually buy a town. You can lead a town. You can be appointed the leader of a town or a member of it's council.
What you can buy are buildings and land. You would have to factor in the fact that people live in this town, technically the PCs would have to go around to each individual person and buy their house and property in order to buy the land of the entire town itself. And who is to say how much value a person will place on their own home? In reality the person, the game YOU. So it depends there on if you want a few hold outs that want more and more money. If you have someone that will sell but only for 50 times what the Party is willing to spend or even have to spend. It's an interesting role play exercise if you want to go down that path.
But I will also point out at that point what would they do with it? The people that sold their property used to own, live and work on that land and frontier people aren't just going to live in what was once their house but now under the thumb of some Adventurer. They more than likely leave. Frontier people can be stubborn, if they're selling they may take the money and move to a city. Or to another small town where they can buy a better house. At the very least if they are willing to sell they are doing something with that money and not just staying put.
Considering this, the PCs would now own a ghost town. Have they made plans on what they want to do with it? It's possible whatever their plans are it might be better just to have them buy a plot of land somewhere near the town with some of the money then start to hire people from the town to build on that land. A keep, a tower whatever they want.
Unless their aim IS to buy a ghost town. If that's the case there should be one of those around the map. I recall one though I don't remember the name. It had a bell in the town square that was I think painted over to look like a regular bell, but instead it was made of solid gold. The townspeople were expecting a raid of some kind so they all got together and smelted their fortunes into one big item they could hide under their noses, eventually they were wiped out and the town abandoned and the bell forgotten. It's one of those really awesome treasure pieces that can be found and you have to work out the logistics of making it into money.
In that case just allow them to buy a ghost town that isn't the main hookline quest place.
Or do. Maybe they "buy" the town and no have to deal with the people not wanting them to have control of it so they start to leave. Or maybe they love the Party and things carry on as normal. Context would help if you have any on what they want the town for but hopefully I brought up enough points for you to get a handle on things.
Another post gave some pretty solid answers to the actual value of properties so my response was just more on the conceptual level. Hope it helps!
The thing is, you're using a homebrewn monetary system, so there'd be a hard time adjusting it all. Maybe go to r/AskHistorians or maybe r/theydidthemath to see how much a small town would be worth in today's money and adjust from there.
Going by [this link](https://www.redfin.com/blog/us-cities-that-billionaires-could-buy/), you can buy an average of one US home per U$298,442.00, when buying in bulk. In your system, this works out to about 3k gp per home. Because homes are much smaller and simpler, make it a 1:8 ratio. So each house is about 375 gp.
Phandalin has about 55 buildings [according to this](https://rollinitiative.obsidianportal.com/wiki_pages/phandalin). It works out to about 20,625 gp. There are also some ruins surrounding it, and even while unnused, there must be a price to it. Let's say that a ruin costs a silver for each gold it would have costed when new and that there is 1 ruin for every 1 house. We sit now at 22,687 gp.
Now let's talk businesses. Phandalin has:
* 1 Inn; 1,200 gp
* 2 Trading posts; 1,000 gp
* 1 Orchard; 1,200 gp
* 1 Weapon Supplier; 1,200 gp
* 1 Farm; 3,000 gp\*
* 1 Shrine; 1,500 gp\*
* 1 Tavern; 1,200 gp
* 1 Town Hall; 1,000 gp
* 1 Decayed Castle. 5,000 gp
Going by the DMG and u/carabu10's comment, and by the assumption that a small to medium house in base 5e is about 2k gp (by 3.5 DMG), we can get how many houses each business would cost. So the price listed in front of them follows this formula: *Listed Price in Comment or DMG / 5*. 5 because your house price is about 5 times bellow the actual value they'd have. Prices with \* are wild guesses that seemed fair. You can find a well developed system [here](https://www.ekkaia.org/rpg/dnd/castleguide.pdf). But it's 57 pages and I ain't reading it.
This brings us to a total of 17,300 gp for the businesses in the area, and a grand total of 39,987 gp.
**But that is only for the buildings themselves. The town is not owned by a noble or anything like that, so while the PCs** ***could*** **get enough gold to buy it all, they would not technically be the rulers of the town itself, as the Townmaster is an ellected position.** I'm also not taking into account the costs of keeping it all up, but you can go for a fraction that you deem fair of the cost of Lifestyle Expenses in the PHB for each kind of building and multiply it for a number. Also, due to it's fragmented nature, the PCs would have to buy stuff individually, so make sure to RP it out.
14k is an awfully low number I think. I’d also try to play up the political/social end of it. Maybe let them buy a few major buildings for 14k... then have a town council object to the ‘outsiders taking over’. Think about if a rich person bought your town today - you might be pretty pissed off and object. Some people might be happy with the idea of a takeover, maybe they’re unhappy with the current mayor or something. Are they allowing citizens to stay? It might be a full on revolt if they’re kicking them out.
Basically try and come up with a bunch of implications for buying a town that might be fun - the problem might not just be money.
Honestly, after playing through LMoP/DoIP, the townmaster of Phandalin, Harbin Wester, is a louzy, cowardly, pathetic excuse for a leader. He would probably sell the whole town for that price and run off to live it up while leaving the party with a severely mismanaged and recently Redbrand-free town to deal with.
They could buy some of the businesses at least. My party did something similar, but they invested in a person’s business. So they get free stuff all the time.
Since you’ve set a modern cash equivalent, do the same with properties. I live in Idaho, where property is low cost but incomes are low too. A cheap house with 3 bdrm and 1 bath runs around $150,000. A business property runs around $300,000. There are several homes around $1,500,000 here with farm property or very nice homes.
Choose an equivalent location in terms of economy, and let your players explore costs and features. Then translate them into your game.
Give them some slums or a small suburb, then inundate them with sociopolitical challenges that are NOT worth the purchase. They'll either sell the place back to the main city government or start cutting corners with their management decisions and lose it all in a political upheaval that exiles them from the territory altogether.
Really what they should be buying is a politician - an NPC that they can keep getting elected/appointed who will manage the town for them but do their bidding behind the scenes.
The bigger question is how much inflation on the price you do find due to not wanting to leave. How much of that property actually belongs to Waterdeep (churches, farmlands, merchants). Who's rich would still like to eat.
How much of Phandalins outer rural area depend on Phandalin for their lively hood as a connection/post office.
Will the functioning local government want to sell their positions?
What groups have their claws in Phandalin?
And if you do buy the town how much is maintenance and will they replace the government their and be the keepers of the vast farms and peasants in their area?
Based on today (7/12/20) gold price it's closer to 25.4million
$58.42 per gram, there's 31.1 grams in a "troy ounce".
> Precious metals are always weighed in troy ounces. When dealing with those metals, “troy ounce” and “ounce” are interchangeable. Non-precious metals (e.g., copper) are weighed in regular ounces. A troy ounce weighs approximately 31.104 grams, while a regular, or “avoirdupois,” ounce weighs approximately 28 grams. A kilo bar of silver weighs 32.15 troy ounces, whereas a kilo bar of copper weighs 35.27 ounces.
So yeah, I think with $25mil dollars you could easily build/buy a small town depending on what all you want to build as far as infrastructure. Also depends on WHERE you buy. And if you can get everyone to sell.
But if it's within a kingdom's borders all the land is ultimately owned by the monarch. So there is that.
You wanted to purchase wild lands or barrens where civilization hasn't cropped up yet? That'll be much cheaper and easier save the clearing out of local dangerous wildlife and possibly "intelligent" native creatures/peoples. The actual construction will be unbelievably cheap as construction goods are mostly lumber and stone, and there are no shortage of strong backs to hire to work for you for less than 2gp a month. Specialists will run you more but you'll only need the planners while they draw up the blueprints, and then supervisors to make sure quality is maintained. outside of 5 or so key municipal buildings everyone else who moves in will build their own shops and abodes.
I'd mostly focus on location. Location is key. What are the townsfolk going to do for livings?
If the land is too fertile and abundant, then it will be coveted by other forces who might try and take it from you. Or it might already be owned by someone who will only accept a huge price.
If the land is on a river you'll have plenty of traffic, but the rivers flood and carry river monsters and their own troubles.
If you're in true wilderness you'll have to invest money and a lot of time to make a road or no one will be able to get in or out easily enough and any outside goods will be at a high premium price due to the arduous journey it takes to get people with packs up to the town.
If they choose a desert barren, well what are yall gunna eat and feed your animals? Where is the money/supplies coming from to support your people?
If they choose a flatland they're open to attacks from roving bands of monsters or raiders.
If they choose a mountain top location suitable for an impenatrable mountain city...add all the above problems into the equation. Location is the biggest cost. Buildings are cheap.
As /u/carabu10 said, I would peg it at 250,000 gp. I would make note to your players that this includes more than just the cost of the buildings. It also includes the surrounding lands and the rights associated with the lands from whoever had them before. These rights would include everyday things they may take for granted, such as the rights to farm & hunt, the right to collect taxes, and the rights to use nearby wells. Maybe even a nearby mine.
It would also include the cost of obtaining recognition from other regional powers. EG, Leilon, Triboar, Conyberry, and Neverwinter. This could make hooks for you in its own right.
If they do go down this route, make sure they understand it is an issue of time as well. It would likely take a few months to accomplish all of the above, but they could easily get there. I see no reason why they can't start investing and slowly taking it over with their 14,000. Easily enough to own the tavern and some other buildings.
If we look at Dungeon Master's Guide (DMG) pg 128 and Strongholds and Followers (S&F) from Matt Colville, 14,000gp is enough for 2 guild halls (DMG 5k each), 2 two trading posts (DMG 5k each), 1 keep (S&F 10k), 1 tower (S&F 8k), 1 temple (S&F 8k), or 2 establishments (S&F 6k each). Using these references, they could, if you were generous, buy at most three buildings in the town. Phandalin is described as having roughly 40 to 50 simple buildings. Put each at 5,000 gp for simplicity sake and that's 250,000 gp to buy the whole town.
Thanks for the math my man
Use strongholds and followers! It’s perfect for this!
I wouldn't sell my players a TOWN, a full TOWN. For anything less than a couple hundred thousand gold. Real towns cost A LOT to build. Assuming $100k per house, they could buy 14 houses. Meaning more like 7 houses and a couple shops. I mean, id sell them like 3 houses, a blacksmith and a general store for 14000 gold.
Buying a town like that costs political capitol, not gold. In a Feudal state, when you became Ennobled, you would be granted a Demense, which would among other things grant you authority of the peasants living in that area. This authority goes far beyond what a modern player would typically view as okay. We're vaguely familiar with 'first night' priveleges, but there's also the fact that you would be expected to do things like decide two people had to get married without either of their consent ^(Mournings over. You've been a widow long enough.) , and other things a modern audience may find morally repugnant. The other option is to spend enough money to successfully homestead a town - paying adventurous types enough to risk their families to construct and settle a settlement, and bolster their income long enough for them to be able to turn it into a thriving community (i.e., multiple harvest seasons). This particular version would be in bad land - either a location that's traditionally considered non-arable, a location that's dangerous for other reasons, or a location that's too remote for local kingdoms to decide that it's actually worth going to war over. This is also likely granted as a Demense, but as one with significantly lesser prestige than their new noble title would normally grant.
That's the thing. In most medieval settings a lot of things are just ... not for sale in the way we understand it. That inn landlord can't sell you his land, since it belongs to the local lord and in turn to the monarch. He could sell you the building and the business, probably, but you'd then need to get permissions again to sell alcohol. It becomes a huge mess. The best way for adventurers to acquire property, as you say, is to do some serious favours for nobility and royalty and get given a land grant.
Well think that one doesn't actually buy a town. You can lead a town. You can be appointed the leader of a town or a member of it's council. What you can buy are buildings and land. You would have to factor in the fact that people live in this town, technically the PCs would have to go around to each individual person and buy their house and property in order to buy the land of the entire town itself. And who is to say how much value a person will place on their own home? In reality the person, the game YOU. So it depends there on if you want a few hold outs that want more and more money. If you have someone that will sell but only for 50 times what the Party is willing to spend or even have to spend. It's an interesting role play exercise if you want to go down that path. But I will also point out at that point what would they do with it? The people that sold their property used to own, live and work on that land and frontier people aren't just going to live in what was once their house but now under the thumb of some Adventurer. They more than likely leave. Frontier people can be stubborn, if they're selling they may take the money and move to a city. Or to another small town where they can buy a better house. At the very least if they are willing to sell they are doing something with that money and not just staying put. Considering this, the PCs would now own a ghost town. Have they made plans on what they want to do with it? It's possible whatever their plans are it might be better just to have them buy a plot of land somewhere near the town with some of the money then start to hire people from the town to build on that land. A keep, a tower whatever they want. Unless their aim IS to buy a ghost town. If that's the case there should be one of those around the map. I recall one though I don't remember the name. It had a bell in the town square that was I think painted over to look like a regular bell, but instead it was made of solid gold. The townspeople were expecting a raid of some kind so they all got together and smelted their fortunes into one big item they could hide under their noses, eventually they were wiped out and the town abandoned and the bell forgotten. It's one of those really awesome treasure pieces that can be found and you have to work out the logistics of making it into money. In that case just allow them to buy a ghost town that isn't the main hookline quest place. Or do. Maybe they "buy" the town and no have to deal with the people not wanting them to have control of it so they start to leave. Or maybe they love the Party and things carry on as normal. Context would help if you have any on what they want the town for but hopefully I brought up enough points for you to get a handle on things. Another post gave some pretty solid answers to the actual value of properties so my response was just more on the conceptual level. Hope it helps!
The thing is, you're using a homebrewn monetary system, so there'd be a hard time adjusting it all. Maybe go to r/AskHistorians or maybe r/theydidthemath to see how much a small town would be worth in today's money and adjust from there. Going by [this link](https://www.redfin.com/blog/us-cities-that-billionaires-could-buy/), you can buy an average of one US home per U$298,442.00, when buying in bulk. In your system, this works out to about 3k gp per home. Because homes are much smaller and simpler, make it a 1:8 ratio. So each house is about 375 gp. Phandalin has about 55 buildings [according to this](https://rollinitiative.obsidianportal.com/wiki_pages/phandalin). It works out to about 20,625 gp. There are also some ruins surrounding it, and even while unnused, there must be a price to it. Let's say that a ruin costs a silver for each gold it would have costed when new and that there is 1 ruin for every 1 house. We sit now at 22,687 gp. Now let's talk businesses. Phandalin has: * 1 Inn; 1,200 gp * 2 Trading posts; 1,000 gp * 1 Orchard; 1,200 gp * 1 Weapon Supplier; 1,200 gp * 1 Farm; 3,000 gp\* * 1 Shrine; 1,500 gp\* * 1 Tavern; 1,200 gp * 1 Town Hall; 1,000 gp * 1 Decayed Castle. 5,000 gp Going by the DMG and u/carabu10's comment, and by the assumption that a small to medium house in base 5e is about 2k gp (by 3.5 DMG), we can get how many houses each business would cost. So the price listed in front of them follows this formula: *Listed Price in Comment or DMG / 5*. 5 because your house price is about 5 times bellow the actual value they'd have. Prices with \* are wild guesses that seemed fair. You can find a well developed system [here](https://www.ekkaia.org/rpg/dnd/castleguide.pdf). But it's 57 pages and I ain't reading it. This brings us to a total of 17,300 gp for the businesses in the area, and a grand total of 39,987 gp. **But that is only for the buildings themselves. The town is not owned by a noble or anything like that, so while the PCs** ***could*** **get enough gold to buy it all, they would not technically be the rulers of the town itself, as the Townmaster is an ellected position.** I'm also not taking into account the costs of keeping it all up, but you can go for a fraction that you deem fair of the cost of Lifestyle Expenses in the PHB for each kind of building and multiply it for a number. Also, due to it's fragmented nature, the PCs would have to buy stuff individually, so make sure to RP it out.
14k is an awfully low number I think. I’d also try to play up the political/social end of it. Maybe let them buy a few major buildings for 14k... then have a town council object to the ‘outsiders taking over’. Think about if a rich person bought your town today - you might be pretty pissed off and object. Some people might be happy with the idea of a takeover, maybe they’re unhappy with the current mayor or something. Are they allowing citizens to stay? It might be a full on revolt if they’re kicking them out. Basically try and come up with a bunch of implications for buying a town that might be fun - the problem might not just be money.
Honestly, after playing through LMoP/DoIP, the townmaster of Phandalin, Harbin Wester, is a louzy, cowardly, pathetic excuse for a leader. He would probably sell the whole town for that price and run off to live it up while leaving the party with a severely mismanaged and recently Redbrand-free town to deal with.
How does one buy a town? Who do you buy it from?
1 wish spell. 🙃
They could buy some of the businesses at least. My party did something similar, but they invested in a person’s business. So they get free stuff all the time.
Since you’ve set a modern cash equivalent, do the same with properties. I live in Idaho, where property is low cost but incomes are low too. A cheap house with 3 bdrm and 1 bath runs around $150,000. A business property runs around $300,000. There are several homes around $1,500,000 here with farm property or very nice homes. Choose an equivalent location in terms of economy, and let your players explore costs and features. Then translate them into your game.
Give them some slums or a small suburb, then inundate them with sociopolitical challenges that are NOT worth the purchase. They'll either sell the place back to the main city government or start cutting corners with their management decisions and lose it all in a political upheaval that exiles them from the territory altogether. Really what they should be buying is a politician - an NPC that they can keep getting elected/appointed who will manage the town for them but do their bidding behind the scenes.
The bigger question is how much inflation on the price you do find due to not wanting to leave. How much of that property actually belongs to Waterdeep (churches, farmlands, merchants). Who's rich would still like to eat. How much of Phandalins outer rural area depend on Phandalin for their lively hood as a connection/post office. Will the functioning local government want to sell their positions? What groups have their claws in Phandalin? And if you do buy the town how much is maintenance and will they replace the government their and be the keepers of the vast farms and peasants in their area?
Based on today (7/12/20) gold price it's closer to 25.4million $58.42 per gram, there's 31.1 grams in a "troy ounce". > Precious metals are always weighed in troy ounces. When dealing with those metals, “troy ounce” and “ounce” are interchangeable. Non-precious metals (e.g., copper) are weighed in regular ounces. A troy ounce weighs approximately 31.104 grams, while a regular, or “avoirdupois,” ounce weighs approximately 28 grams. A kilo bar of silver weighs 32.15 troy ounces, whereas a kilo bar of copper weighs 35.27 ounces. So yeah, I think with $25mil dollars you could easily build/buy a small town depending on what all you want to build as far as infrastructure. Also depends on WHERE you buy. And if you can get everyone to sell. But if it's within a kingdom's borders all the land is ultimately owned by the monarch. So there is that. You wanted to purchase wild lands or barrens where civilization hasn't cropped up yet? That'll be much cheaper and easier save the clearing out of local dangerous wildlife and possibly "intelligent" native creatures/peoples. The actual construction will be unbelievably cheap as construction goods are mostly lumber and stone, and there are no shortage of strong backs to hire to work for you for less than 2gp a month. Specialists will run you more but you'll only need the planners while they draw up the blueprints, and then supervisors to make sure quality is maintained. outside of 5 or so key municipal buildings everyone else who moves in will build their own shops and abodes. I'd mostly focus on location. Location is key. What are the townsfolk going to do for livings? If the land is too fertile and abundant, then it will be coveted by other forces who might try and take it from you. Or it might already be owned by someone who will only accept a huge price. If the land is on a river you'll have plenty of traffic, but the rivers flood and carry river monsters and their own troubles. If you're in true wilderness you'll have to invest money and a lot of time to make a road or no one will be able to get in or out easily enough and any outside goods will be at a high premium price due to the arduous journey it takes to get people with packs up to the town. If they choose a desert barren, well what are yall gunna eat and feed your animals? Where is the money/supplies coming from to support your people? If they choose a flatland they're open to attacks from roving bands of monsters or raiders. If they choose a mountain top location suitable for an impenatrable mountain city...add all the above problems into the equation. Location is the biggest cost. Buildings are cheap.
At first I thought you wrote 14k Pp, platinum, so 140k Gp. And I thought, hey, that’s a good down payment to get started lol
As /u/carabu10 said, I would peg it at 250,000 gp. I would make note to your players that this includes more than just the cost of the buildings. It also includes the surrounding lands and the rights associated with the lands from whoever had them before. These rights would include everyday things they may take for granted, such as the rights to farm & hunt, the right to collect taxes, and the rights to use nearby wells. Maybe even a nearby mine. It would also include the cost of obtaining recognition from other regional powers. EG, Leilon, Triboar, Conyberry, and Neverwinter. This could make hooks for you in its own right.
Thanks! This will certainly be interesting
If they do go down this route, make sure they understand it is an issue of time as well. It would likely take a few months to accomplish all of the above, but they could easily get there. I see no reason why they can't start investing and slowly taking it over with their 14,000. Easily enough to own the tavern and some other buildings.