D&D Society requires Fabricate.

[Username17]

The wizard economy is innately flawed. Part of the basis of economics is give and take, it's the only way economies work. Unfortunately with fabricate and spells like wall of iron, you really don't need anything. Under this system you've got producers and no consumers. Because to consume, someone's gotta be paying them something, but we already established they'd be useless.

Tools <-> Food.

That's a simple economy, but it works. Wizards can't efficiently farm, so they need to trade the product of their labor (tools) for the product of other peoples' labor (food).

Clerics can efficiently feed and clothe themselves, and have only services (no goods) to offer the peasantry. So they would attempt to trade healing for worship of their religion.

-Username17

[RandomCasualty]

1085501321[/unixtime]]
Tools <-> Food.

That's a simple economy, but it works. Wizards can't efficiently farm, so they need to trade the product of their labor (tools) for the product of other peoples' labor (food).

Clerics can efficiently feed and clothe themselves, and have only services (no goods) to offer the peasantry. So they would attempt to trade healing for worship of their religion.

-Username17

But wizards don't need lots of farmers, nor do they have to give them anything, not when they can just dominate or charm them. And lets not forget the ring of sustenance, a magic item that totally eliminates the need for farming altogether.

Clerics would basically offer the peasants safety in exchange for worship. Because nobody really cares about the peasants, there's nothing to protect them from the stuff that wants to eat them. The clerics fulfill this role and in return the peasants worship who they tell them to.

[Username17]

1 dominate per farmer per 9 days for the whole year.

Or 1 casting Fabricate like twice for the whole year to pay all the farmers all of the tools they need to actually perform their jobs.

All this evil is expensive. Just paying them with the stuff you make with fabricate is cheaper, easier, and more effective. I honestly don't understand why you would want to cast Dominate Person 41 times per year on every single farmer. Heck, they still actually need those tools, so you are going to have to cast Fabricate anyway.

You gain literally nothing by enslaving all the farmers. Why bother when you can get more cheaper by not turning everyone into mindless slaves?

-Username17

[RandomCasualty]

Well, you can have a ring of sustenance anyway to feed yourself, so really you don't need the farmers at all. Meaning you just sit back and let them do their thing while you do your thing. Unfortunately for them, "their thing" involves them getting raided and destroyed by orcs, gnolls, ogres, giants, dragons and anything else looking for food or death.

And the peasants have no one to protect them because nobody needs them.

Really, a by the book D&D world wouldn't look like medieval Europe at all. There wouldn't be any aristocrats, there wouldn't be any merchants and there wouldn't be any peasants. It'd be composed of big theocracies and small camps run by retired adventurers wanting to play humanitarian. And the only reason someone may try to build a non-divine empire is simply because they enjoy having people to dominate, in which case the peasants exist solely to be oppressed. In terms of social classes, there'd be: adventurer, tyrant, tyrant's soldier, tyrant's opressed peasants and clergyman.

[Username17]

Nobody ever needed peasants. Ever. They still don't.

You really can wander off into the woods and live off of berries and game. But it's easier to just provide some minimal service for the peasantry and get them to feed you and thank you for it.

Casting Fabricate twice a year is cheaper and easier than getting a Ring of Sustenance. I like those things as much as the next guy, but from the standpoint of your average 9th level wizard - it really is more expensive and difficult to do things that way.

Ring of Sustenence (to build): 1,250 gold pieces and three solid days, and 100 xp.

Casting Fabricate for everything the peasants need: 500 gold pieces, 30 seconds twice a year, and zero xp.

All of your "you could just screw over the peasants" plans are more expensive and difficult than the ones where you don't. I'm sure some people would do it your way, but it's actually laughable to think it could ever be the norm.

-Username17

[Lago_AM3P]

Well, you can have a ring of sustenance anyway to feed yourself, so really you don't need the farmers at all. Meaning you just sit back and let them do their thing while you do your thing. Unfortunately for them, "their thing" involves them getting raided and destroyed by orcs, gnolls, ogres, giants, dragons and anything else looking for food or death.

And the peasants have no one to protect them because nobody needs them.

Since when did this change from an argument of building an economy to a wizard's self-sustenance?

Even with all of the mithral breastplates in the world, people need food. They really do. High-level PCs can't take on the monumental job of feeding a population base; even if all of the spellcaster NPCs of every race and alignment in Faerun and Greyhawk got together and tried to feed folks through magic, they wouldn't even make a dent in a typical metropolis.

Food is always very valuable, especially in a peasant economy. Even though a cleric and a wizard can pretty much live by themselves in the mountains rather comfortably, the fact is that there are clerics and wizards who are interested in the feudal economy, and they will contribute spells to make their dream come true.

The way the races are fragmented, the typical medieval economy is impossible through regular means, because of a lack of means of production. However, this doesn't matter, because there are a handful of wizards who can save the day and get the ball rolling.

[User3]

How are you forgetting that the Wizard needs to spend skill points on learning how make shoes, boats, metal tools, jewelry, houses, fine foods(cooked, baked, or otherwise prepared), glass, clothes, medicines, furniture, carpets, cloth, armor, weapons, and so on.....?

Or, the wizard can cast one spell like Lesser Planar Binding, send a few demons after the local orc tribe, kill them, and collect all the swag. Then, instead of being feared and hated for being the monopoly on all local commerce, he is loved for saving the people from rampaging orcs.

The world is rarely so poorly designed that killing one guy can detroy your whole economy. "Ok, if we kill the wizard of Easthaven, and take the armory first, we can invade them and dominate them easily since he was the only person in town who knew how to make weapons and armor."

[Username17]

How are you forgetting that the Wizard needs to spend skill points on learning how make shoes, boats, metal tools, jewelry, houses, fine foods(cooked, baked, or otherwise prepared), glass, clothes, medicines, furniture, carpets, cloth, armor, weapons, and so on.....?

I'm not, because he doesn't. Craft is an untrained skill based on Intelligence, a 9th level wizard actually makes better shoes than a 1st level cobbler. Not just because he takes many less days to get the project completed, not just because he has the ability to make shoes that the cobbler simply can't, not just because he can do it with less input of materials, but also because the untrained wizard has a higher Craft: shoes bonus than the 1st level Shoemaking expert.

You can, if you want, also invest skill points. Then you can create things that mere mortals could only dream of, but if you "just" want to make better made, higher quality goods with less material inputs in seconds than it would take normal people weeks to make pale immitations for more - then you don't need any Craft ranks at all.

-Username17

[RandomCasualty]

1085582956[/unixtime]]
Even with all of the mithral breastplates in the world, people need food. They really do. High-level PCs can't take on the monumental job of feeding a population base; even if all of the spellcaster NPCs of every race and alignment in Faerun and Greyhawk got together and tried to feed folks through magic, they wouldn't even make a dent in a typical metropolis.

Yes, they need food, but nobody cares. Seriously. The only reason you want them to have food is because they produce something for the economy. With fabricate, they don't produce anything other than food. A high level character survives with a ring of sustenance or create food spells, so he isn't going to want to buy the peasant's food.

The point is that there IS no economy, at all. Peasants have no means of actually making money, because they have nothing of worth to sell. Every peasant is going to be a farmer, because being a blacksmith or a cobbler is pointless, so they don't trade food with each other, and high level characters don't need their food. So where then are they making any profit? They are simply surviving, doing nothing.

To have an economy you need something of value, and other people need other stuff of value, and they have to want to trade. With fabricate, the high levels have everything, and don't need anything from the peasants, and the peasants just farm food because nobody cares about them.

The only people who are an active part of the economy are the adventurers and the ruling wizards. And the adventurers get their goods from stealing them from others, usually monsters.

There are really only a few things of true value in such a world:
-Precious metals (mithril and adamantine)
-Components to make magical items (whatever you deem those are)
-Magical items
-Spells and spell components

That's it. Basically peasants have none of these, or if they do have some, there's no reason why a wizard would deal with them and not just take what he needs.

Adventurers trade item components and spells for magical items and precious metals. Magical items are also traded freely.

But the point is that the adventurers and the wizards are totally on another level above the average peasant, and the peasant has nothing of value to offer them.

The peasant economic trade goods are essentially
-prayers to a god
-food
-someone to beat around to make an evil overlord feel good about himself.

The problem is that none of these are going to actually get him much beyond the ability to keep his own life.

About the only way a peasant is going to actually make money is to steal it or to become a whore to high level characters and hope they actually pay instead of casting charm or dominate and taking what they want. And you know your economy is screwed when its foundation is prostitution.

[User3]

Wow, Craft skills are not trained only. How dumb. Rather than spend the 10,000 gp on a trap, I’m going to just cast Fabricate.

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Ninth level Wizards don’t need anything from society. With the Leomund spells, they can create shelter anywhere (though the ones less caring about material things might live in a Rope Trick). With Wall of Stone, Dispel Magic, Stone Shape, and Rock to Mud, and basic Knowledge of Engineering, they can build castles in their free time, heated by a system of clever vents and a permanent Wall of Fire. With Lesser Planar Binding, they can summon companions, warriors, friends, or even workers who will hold down jobs and earn money for the wizard (Personally, I’m running a Succubus-only cathouse.).

A summoned Succubus makes a great thief as long as you only steal things from the market. (“We have finally tracked you down, K of the Black Robe. Coris the Butcher and Jander the Baker have tired of your villainy!”)

Nominally, he needs some place to spend his gold to make magic items, I guess. But otherwise, he’s good to go.