Shadgard Metalcrafters Union

The place to brainstorm, discuss, and organize player-run organizations.
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Marcuson
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Shadgard Metalcrafters Union

Post by Marcuson »

Dylan is considering starting a company. The company's aim would be, in his words:
Speaking to Hoss, you explain, "The union'll be open to any folk that work with metal: miners, metallurgists, prospectors, and smiths. I got this idea that I'd pay miners above-market prices for metal, and other folk could buy ingots from the union supply. That way folks'd always be able to earn wages and practice their craft."
If a benefactor were to offer their support to the company (similar to the Shadgard Farming and Ranching Association) then what Dylan would ask for is a 20% reduction in consignment fees at the marketplace for members of the union. This would hopefully encourage members to add more goods for sale to the market.

The OOC reason for founding this company is that, right now, it seems difficult for PCs to earn a living just from mining. The company would help with that by paying miners for metal, which would in turn be made available to members of the union at cost. I'd like to get everyone else's input on the company idea, though.
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Bonehead
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Re: Shadgard Metalcrafters Union

Post by Bonehead »

I support workers rights! :mrgreen:
Wut?
tacos
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Re: Shadgard Metalcrafters Union

Post by tacos »

I'm all for it,.
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Marcuson
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Re: Shadgard Metalcrafters Union

Post by Marcuson »

An open invitation to all MINERS, PROSPECTORS, METALLURGISTS, and SMITHS! Join the Shadgard Metalcrafters Union! Fair prices for miners and a steady supply of available metal for workers! For more details, see the board in the workyard. - Dylan Cresswell, #5337

The Shadgard Metalcrafters Union will pay miners 200 riln for copper, 300 for iron, and 500 for tin - either ore or ingots. Union folks can buy the metal at cost and bronze ingots for 250. Guild-affiliated miners get free repairs on their pickaxes from any smith in the guild. That's all there is to it. Talk to Dylan to get set up.
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Marcuson
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Re: Shadgard Metalcrafters Union

Post by Marcuson »

The Shadgard Metalcrafters Union has received a shipment of steel. Union members can buy two ingots of steel every week for a thousand riln apiece. That way the steel can be made to last and is available to all union members who want to work with it. - Dylan

I've handed the steel over to Florenza. She'll be the union record-keeper. If any of you want steel, go to Florenza, pay the cost, and she'll disburse it to you and make a note. That goes for me, too. Every Lightsday, you can request more steel. Her color is Maroon, and her post number is 2994. - Dylan
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Marcuson
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Re: Shadgard Metalcrafters Union

Post by Marcuson »

Now that it's been a little time since Dylan's death, I'd like to talk a bit about the OOC reasoning behind the union. (This was prompted by some discussion in the game Discord.)

I pretty much pulled the union's prices out of thin air, and they were guesstimates based not only on prices I saw from other PCs but also on the potential crafting value each ingot represented. I tried to balance the prices so that PCs could still purchase metal from the market, craft things from that metal, sell those things to the market, and still turn a profit. (I did screw up a few times. Someone showed up with 1000 pieces of ore, and Dylan didn't have the riln to buy it all at the time. I was never able to get them to come back, and I still OOC feel really awful about that.)

Even with the union prices, though, mining still wasn't very profitable for the miners. The way it all worked in practice is that new miners would join the union, sell ore for a little while, and then move on to something more profitable -- like forging the metal themselves. I'm not really sure how that might be fixed. Maybe the prices of metal just needs a little bit of tweaking. The metals from most-purchased to least, in my experience, are: iron, bronze, copper, tin.

Copper ingots only rarely sold at 200 each, and honestly that was probably too expensive to sell them for (which is why they only rarely sold at that price). Dylan ended up with huge amounts of copper, which he would mainly use to make bronze, reasoning that most people would probably just go and mine copper if they needed it for something specific. And I should note that he ate a 10% loss on every ingot he consigned to the market, since he sold them at the same price that he paid miners for them.

Anyway, just wanted to ramble a bit. The "too long; didn't read" summary is that miners have a hard time making money, and I'm still not sure how to fix that. The union didn't seem to be doing a good job of it.
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Lexx416
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Re: Shadgard Metalcrafters Union

Post by Lexx416 »

Marcuson wrote: Thu May 12, 2022 2:51 pm Now that it's been a little time since Dylan's death, I'd like to talk a bit about the OOC reasoning behind the union. (This was prompted by some discussion in the game Discord.)

I pretty much pulled the union's prices out of thin air, and they were guesstimates based not only on prices I saw from other PCs but also on the potential crafting value each ingot represented. I tried to balance the prices so that PCs could still purchase metal from the market, craft things from that metal, sell those things to the market, and still turn a profit. (I did screw up a few times. Someone showed up with 1000 pieces of ore, and Dylan didn't have the riln to buy it all at the time. I was never able to get them to come back, and I still OOC feel really awful about that.)

Even with the union prices, though, mining still wasn't very profitable for the miners. The way it all worked in practice is that new miners would join the union, sell ore for a little while, and then move on to something more profitable -- like forging the metal themselves. I'm not really sure how that might be fixed. Maybe the prices of metal just needs a little bit of tweaking. The metals from most-purchased to least, in my experience, are: iron, bronze, copper, tin.

Copper ingots only rarely sold at 200 each, and honestly that was probably too expensive to sell them for (which is why they only rarely sold at that price). Dylan ended up with huge amounts of copper, which he would mainly use to make bronze, reasoning that most people would probably just go and mine copper if they needed it for something specific. And I should note that he ate a 10% loss on every ingot he consigned to the market, since he sold them at the same price that he paid miners for them.

Anyway, just wanted to ramble a bit. The "too long; didn't read" summary is that miners have a hard time making money, and I'm still not sure how to fix that. The union didn't seem to be doing a good job of it.
This could just be a "copper" issue, as I haven't tested the price points for carving goblets out of any other material except copper bearing sandstone, but I was pulling in over five times the profit making sandstone chunks into goblets, compared to if I sold ore directly to Dylan on my miner, Metzli. If it's just a "copper" problem, I think this is less of an issue. But it might be worth comparing goblets carved from other ore laden stones to copper/sandstone.
"You hear the Woses, the Wild Men of the Woods... Remnants of an older time they be, living few and secretly, wild and wary as beasts."
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