The retainer charts and equipment lists show that the average person in the campaign world is assumed to not have very much money. Even the starting money that PCs receive puts them in a significantly greater economic position than common folk, even if most of that gets immedi- ately tied up in adventuring equipment. The rules for gaining experience being treasure-based, along with an examination of how much experience characters need to advance even a single level, make it clear that PCs will be accumulating great amounts of money over the course of their adventuring careers.
But what to do with all this money?
Magic-Users have ready uses for their money, as do Clerics to a lesser extent. Others can surely find ways to get rid of piles of cash, such as hiring Retainers and equipping them handsomely. But there will still be large amounts of cash in the hands of the PCs.
A good Referee will make it difficult for PCs to carry massive amounts of gold around with them. Even if they get smart and invest in gems and jewelry to make their money more portable, the risk of carrying great sums of money should always be great. Where to keep it? In a room at the inn? On the horses outside an adventuring location, guarded by retainers of questionable loyalty? Players will protest and complain if you have their belongings robbed without their having a chance to chase down the thief, but at some point it’s their own damn fault.
Inns are priced depending on their quality, and lower quality inns should have a markedly higher chance of having customers’ rooms robbed. If retainers are left to guard vast sums of money, there should be morale checks to see if they just take the money and run, because that money is surely years’ worth of pay. And when such theft does happen, it is not
supposed to be an adventure hook. That money (along with whatever other belongings) is just gone. The players will be furious and they will attempt to track and investigate and find their stolen wealth, but barring fantastic means of tracking them down, there is no reason for you to allow them to bring the matter to a satisfactory (for them) conclusion. Not that thieves are completely untraceable, but PCs need to prioritize their time: Do they want to chase thieves to recover old wealth, or do they want to adventure and win new treasure?
Owning property is a great way for PCs to use their money, and the Property rules, along with the Investment rules, are intended to be a solution to the “problem” of characters accumulating hundreds of thousands of gold pieces worth of treasure over the course of their careers. By investing in land, and the attendant retainers, the PCs get to spend some money, have a place to actually put all the money they will recover from adventuring, and generally it helps them to care about the campaign world. Political upheaval and the threat of war will become serious concerns for them as they now have something at stake.
Of course the PCs will still be away from their property and wealth a good deal of the time (this is a game about adventuring, after all), but the risk that absence brings to their wealth shouldn’t be so great as it is when they travel with it. At least one member of the staff is likely to be loyal, if the players are intelligent about the money they pay. They can hire guards. And they’ll likely have very specific ideas about security when it is clear that they need it.
So “You’ve been robbed!” becomes a cruel Referee trick in this case, whereas it was once a justified occurrence. Property should be more secure, and players who intelligently approach such things should be rewarded by not having to really worry about it.
Territory Development
The property rules assume that a player is merely buying land and a house, and not attempting to become an actual ruler of an area. If they do want to actually rule land, then things become more complicated. The greater
ruler will want more than taxes, he’ll expect military service. If the character was not properly granted lands and a title from the ruling monarch, there will be political upheaval and the rival local nobles will surely be greatly offended by the establishment of a new domain, and the monarch will likely be unhappy as well. War may be a result.
If a PC wants to become an actual sovereign ruler, thereby no longer paying taxes according to the rules, then he has a problem. In a civilized area, such an action will surely bring war, and a king will bring all necessary force to bear to crush such a rebel. In the trackless wilderness, this will not be a problem, but a ruler without subjects isn’t much of a ruler at all.
A land without its ruler suffers, and becoming a ruler should effectively end a character’s career as an adventurer. If the player thought it was unfair that his room at the inn was getting robbed, just wait until he learns firsthand what political corruption will do to his treasury if he’s spending any appreciable amount of his time in unexplored wilderness or in deep dungeons instead of actively ruling his land.