What are the basic costs of living versus wages in an Eberron campaign setting?, and are there any references in the various WotC books?
By this I mean things like …
- how much can a guard earn ?
- what is the cost of a room for the night ?
- what's a good bribe ?
I appreciate there are some tables in the books, but they only seem to cover the big cost items
Best Answer
Well, your second question is probably the easiest to answer. I imagine that the price is the same as in the
Player's Handbook(p.222), i.e. 5sp for a typical room and 2gp for a luxury room.The first one is tougher. The
Eberron Player's Guide(p.13) tells us that the lower class (of which I guess a guard belongs to) has no more than a handful of silver pieces on himself at any one time. Casting the net a bit wider, the 3.5 DMG(p.105) tells us that a laborer can earn 1sp per day, while a mercenary can earn 2sp per day. Seems likely that an ordinary guard might earn 1sp per day, while a better trained and more trusted one might earn 2sp per day.I could have sworn that bribes were mentioned under skills somewhere in 3.5 or 4th ed, but I'll be darned if I can find the mention. However, you might try to figure it out from the above. If a guard earn 1sp/day or 3gp per month, then 3gp is a months salary, and more than he has in his pocket. 40gp is more money than he will see in a year. Whether any of those are a good bribe depends on what you want him to do, and how loyal he is to his employer.
By the way, if you follow the 3.5 DMG, then a skilled craftsperson or scribe would earn approximately 3 times as much (9gp/month), while an architect, alchemist, barrister or low-rank officer would earn somewhere between 5 and 10 times as much(15-30gp/month). These guys probably form the the lower parts of the middle class mentioned in the
Eberron Player's Guide.