Brootse

There were "compasses" in RQ2. It was some kind of "tin" nail iirc, that pointed to Magasta's Pool. It had something to do with the Sky Rune.

It would be a mighty poor carpenter that couldn't make a balanced javelin shaft. Javelins predate Homo sapiens by 80000 years: https://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2013/11/131126-oldest-javelins-stone-weapons-projectiles-human-evolution-science/ So if a Homo heidelbergensis was able to make a javelin shaft, I think that it doesn't require very trained or specialized workforce, just some suitable wood. Therefore shafts' prices should reflect the amount of wood used, and the rarity of suitable wood. And since javelin shafts require less wood than spear shafts, they should be cheaper.

From RQG: "The adventurer’s income represents the amount of income they make before their expenses from Standard of Living are deducted. Any remaining income is profit, and can be used by the adventurer, or re-invested into additional property. After determining their occupation income, an adventurer must pay to maintain their Standard of Living. After paying for their Standard of Living, any occupation income left gets added to the adventurer’s personal wealth. If the occupation income is insufficient to maintain the Standard of Living for that occupation, the adventurer can pay out of their personal wealth." So that 80 L for a crafter is a what a crafter household earns on a normal year, and what they use to pay for their living expenses, not the amount they make extra on top of their living expenses.

Speaking of, does Gloranthan bronze suffer from that too, and do iron weapons rust?

Haha, yeah it gets a bit silly, otoh carrying a ton of gold isn't much of a problem if you have a bag of holding In RQ3 if you wanted to buy a broadsword, you had to give the smith about the sword's weight in silver coins. That at least has changed in RQG.

A carpenter makes a 1.5L a week, so even when if a more balanced shaft requires a day more of whittling, planing, and filing, it wouldn't raise the price over what the extra bronze and wood would cost for a spear.

Yes, spears weren't the cheapest of weapons, but javelins require much less wood and metal, so they should be cheaper than spears. Fom: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/291766619_Late_Bronze_and_Early_Iron_Age_bronze_spear-_and_javelinheads_in_Bulgaria_in_the_context_of_Southeastern_Europe "The way to distinguish javelinheads from spearheads is to take in consideration the size and the weight of the ends. The first type weighs less than 150 g and is between 6 and 15 cm in length. The second kind has weight between 300–500 g and length between 20 and 50 cm." And while making a good atlatl requires some skill and work, it doesn't require weeks of whittling. I don't think that one stick should be equivalent to what a cottar makes in a season. RQG arrows seem to cost about 0.2L, so a sheaf of 24 arrows without a quiver would be 4.8L. This is relatively more expensive compared to the Medieval prices, but bronze in RQG is more expensive than iron was in the Middle Ages, so I think that it looks about right. I've used the same system that's in RQG, ie. the players have to keep a tally of the arrows, but buying new ones is included in the living expenses (along with new scales for scale armour, sword sharpening etc.)

In addition to bows, some other simple weapons also have inflated prices. Eg. atlatl costs 10L, when its accurate description is "A short stick with a socket at one end". Javelins cost more than spears, but they need much less metal. The staff in staff sling costs 9L. And two darts cost as much as a sword. Now missile weapons are effective, but their prices shouldn't reflect how good they are, but instead the costs of making one.

Nice! Would you, or anyone else, happen to know if IRL nomad tribes had designated bowyers, or was it something that every man had to learn himself? Or were full time bowyers only employed by some warlords?

Nah, I'm not. A Gloranthan crafter makes about 80L a year or 2L a week, and and it's difficult for them to save any of it if they want to keep their normal standard of living. So using the current prices, commoners can't afford the weapons they are supposed to use.

Interesting, was this something that Romans did elsewhere?

Awesome pics!

Yeah, this exactly. I've read that the Qin dynasty confiscated weapons, but not that the Roman Empire tried it. And I haven't read about the Lunar Empire trying to confiscate Sartarite or Pavisite weapons. Giving hunters and bow using soldiers and warriors some percentage on Craft(Bowyer) would make sense, but all archers didn't make their own bows. Adding rules for bowmaking would be great. Continuing on composite bows. Sure, some were posh status symbols for kings and nobles, like the 100k $ Beretta shotguns of today. But your average nomad could also afford a composite bow, while he couldn't afford a sword or a metal armor.

Adding to what others have posted about bowstaves, here's a cross cut of a longbow found on the Mary Rose:

I meant a crafter's wage, not an untrained labourer's. In 1460s a thatcher (ie. not the best earning craftsman) would have made 5.5p a day according to http://medieval.ucdavis.edu/120D/Money.html so the more expensive bow would have cost under a week's wage. And as for a Gloranthan crafter's weekly wage, that would range from 1.5 to 4 (p. 65 in RQG, and working 40 weeks a year). RQ3 lunars are worth about RQG's clacks. In the RQ3 Deluxe Edition self bows' prices were 150L, and longbows' and composite bows' were 350L, which would also have been too high. Bows cost too much in all RPGs I've seen. My guess is that Arneson and Gygax just made all the weapons doing the same damage cost about the same, and everyone's been copying them.

Yeah, I know. I was just asking his opinion about the prices.

Self bows are 50 L, composite bows are 150 L, and Elf bows don't have a price. The prices should be divided by 25 in my opinion. Why should the composite bows be cheaper than the longbows? They require much more work and material to make?

Here's a source for the longbow prices: http://web.mit.edu/21h.416/www/militarytechnology/longbow.html I've seen many other sources too putting the price in the same ballpark. And it didn't take a lot of active work for the bowyer, the long time was needed for the material to dry. And even if the wood had to be imported, it didn't raise the price to half a year's pay. The low price implies that if a bowyer hadn't just started his shop, he could manufacture a new bow from his raw materials in a few days. So self bows should be significantly cheaper that swords, and even cheaper than spears. Correct, composite bows required more than just wood, and they required more work too, and were easier to botch up. But they were still relatively cheap. A Manchu archery site: http://www.manchuarchery.org/bow-and-arrow-prices-1802 says that a composite bow cost about a month's wage for a crafter. Now the source is much later, but proles' quality of living changed relatively little before the industrialization.

Enquiring minds just want to know

As per title, how much cattle would an average poor, normal, or a wealthy clan have? From half to double the numbers compared to the human population?

Hah, those would be quite clipped coins. i wonder how clipped were the ancient coins?

A longbow cost about a week's wage for a Medieval English crafter, not a half year's wage. Why are bows so expensive in RQ? Is it for game balance?

The Guide to Glorantha 1 says that lunars weigh 0.2 troy oz, ie. about 6g, while the Runequest Roleplaying in Glorantha says that lunars weigh about 4g or 1/8 of an ounce. Which is it?