Sartarite City Economy

[MagikarpHunter]

I have a player who has the potential to become the City Rex of Alda-Chur, and I'm trying to figure out how much money Alda-Chur would be receiving for them to dictate the use of. I'm mainly interested in the economy of Argrath's Sartar for this exercise.

Using this post from Jeff on Sartar's economy, it seems safe to assume that Sartar is earning at least 2000 talents annually, with a talent being worth 300L (taken from this post). Assuming these funds get distributed around the cities, the easiest thing to think is probably that the money can be distributed according to population, with a boost to Boldhome's share with it being the capital.

So using the Guide we have a combined city population of 22,000, with money being distributed as follows. I rounded up some numbers for the sake of convenience, so the total number of talents I counted is actually 2025.
 

• Boldhome, 11,000 population, 1200 talents (adding another 200 from what would be 1000)
• Alda-Chur, 4000 population, ~ 300 talents
• Alone, 1000 population, ~ 75 talents
• Jonstown, 2000 population, ~150 talents
• Swenstown, 1000 population, ~ 75 talents
• Wilmskirk, 2000 population, ~ 150 talents
• Duck Point, 1000 population, ~ 75 talents

So using the Alda-Chur money as that's mainly what I'm interested in, Alda-Chur gets 300 talents. This is where I sort of start guessing but I'm assuming something around 200 talents have to be used by the city for the consistent running of the place (paying guards, buying grain etc.). So that leaves maybe 100 talents directly for the City Ring to play around with. Maybe 50L of that goes towards making the city court grand enough for visitors. So 50 talents are left over to build up as a treasury or to be spent by the City Ring for special purchases.

Does this sound reasonable or am I entirely off-base?

[soltakss]

You probably need to take the Tribes into account as well. You could work out the relative populations of each Tribe and City, as you have done for Cities, and allocate them a proportion of income based on population. You might need to work out how much is gained through tolls on the roads, maybe put that as a set figure.

[Darius West]

Frankly 90,000L as the income for a city seems a bit low to me.  Consider that a city represents only 5% of the population in a region at Bronze Age development, as the vast bulk of people will be rural.  That means there should be at least 80,000 in the surrounding area, and if we assume that we are only taxing households, then that should mean about 20,000 households being taxed about 10% each, which means 6L of a 60L income, or 120,000L (400 Talents).

Now add to that the fact that Alda Chur is an important trade hub during peace.  During war time Alda Chur is a very important fortress town, even if the Lunars will never attack it up the Glasswall because that would be suicide.  Nevertheless, as an important border fortification, it is necessary for Alda Chur to be well maintained.  The population will swell with warriors as well as caravan guards and warriors like Uroxi who brave Snakepipe Hollow.  Add to this that Alda Chur is the major clearing house for the Northern Sartar wool market (the foundation of Britain's wealth for most of its history btw), and Herongreen is the nearby major source of lumber for New Pavis and much of Sartar, and beyond. So the issue becomes whether trade continues between the Lunar Empire and Sartar along the Farpoint Road during lulls in the Hero Wars?

Edited Saturday at 08:51 AM by Darius West