I wonder at the rational for charging the equivalent of over two weeks pay for a skilled laborer and five months pay for an unskilled laborer for a cantrip, a magical spell that can be cast in six seconds an unlimited amount of times. I mean, I'm aware that D&D economics is deeply broken and just gets ported forward without adjustment from edition to edition, but this just strikes me as deeply egregious an example.
Yeah. Now that 6-second cantrip is more costly than something like cure wounds per the 5.0 PHB. (Where it suggested 10-50gp for 1st to 2nd level spells.)
Personally I think it's more reasonable to treat someone with a cantrip like a skilled worker. Hiring an acolyte to travel with your party for a while, even for 10gp a day, seems more reasonable than the itemized list. Just imagine the acolyte coming to your party after travelling with them and being like,
"Okay so I cast light two times and then participated in that battle against kobolds by casting sacred flame three times. (Nevermind they saved against all of them.) And then you were a little hurt so I did one casting of cure wounds and then Jerry wanted a little oomph while questioning a goblin for one thaumaturgy. So all together that'll be, lemme check, 230gp."
At those kind of prices only the richy rich rich could even afford to have some spellcasters on hand. A spellcaster with mold earth charging more for ditch-digging makes sense because he can do it a lot quicker. But for 30gp, like you said, you could just hire 150 unskilled laborers for a day that can do a lot more. So suddenly he's priced himself out of helping to build fortifications unless you're on a time-crunch. Whereas saying, "I'm worth 20 men so that'll be a special rate of 4gp per day." makes a lot more sense.
If someone spills wine on your expensive dress or rug, or you're a very busy merchant and your wagon wheel breaks, you would definitely pay a premium price for an instant and flawless fix via Prestidigitation or Mending. If you're not willing to pay those prices, go fix it the hard and time-consuming way.
The thing about supply and demand is that it really doesn't matter how easy it is for someone to provide you a service. All that matters is how many people need it and how much competition they've got. It's why well-known artists can charge triple digits for sketch commissions.
Last time I had a plumber out he was here for 5 minutes and charged me over £100. You're not paying for the six seconds to cast it, you're paying for the years it took to learn it
The thing about supply and demand is that it really doesn't matter how easy it is for someone to provide you a service. All that matters is how many people need it and how much competition they've got. It's why well-known artists can charge triple digits for sketch commissions.
It does matter though. I make sandwiches for my lunch. I have two main potential sources of sandwiches nearby, and they'd charge me roughly £3 per sandwich. That would be about £15 for lunch. Or I can do it at home for about £2 for the lot. Since it it's so easy to do it myself, I save £13 rather than getting them to do it. They miss out on potential sales every day. Obviously, it's not worth then reducing prices enough to tempt me. If they reduced the price enough, I'd just go get theirs instead.
How easy it is doesn't dictate price - it's one of many factors - but it certainly provide a ceiling and therefore matters for pricing. Make something expensive enough and people will just do it themselves.
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They probably priced it such that spellcasting services cost the same as purchasing spell scrolls, seeing how the service appears to cost roughly double of the scroll crafting cost, and crafting items is typically half as expensive as buying them.
Yeah, I'm not a big fan of that mechanic either, though. Xgp for one use or 2Xgp for unlimited uses seems like a no-brainer choice in most circumstances. Normally, you'd pay quite a bit extra for a permanent thing than a temporary form.
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If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
I wonder at the rational for charging the equivalent of over two weeks pay for a skilled laborer and five months pay for an unskilled laborer for a cantrip, a magical spell that can be cast in six seconds an unlimited amount of times. I mean, I'm aware that D&D economics is deeply broken and just gets ported forward without adjustment from edition to edition, but this just strikes me as deeply egregious an example.
Opportunity costs. The wizard needs to take time out of his schedule to walk to your field, cast Move Earth (or whatever, is that a cantrip?!), then walk back to his tower - and that's time he could be spending, casting far more potent and lucrative spells for better paying customers.
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Blanket disclaimer: I only ever state opinion. But I can sound terribly dogmatic - so if you feel I'm trying to tell you what to think, I'm really not, I swear. I'm telling you what I think, that's all.
I wonder at the rational for charging the equivalent of over two weeks pay for a skilled laborer and five months pay for an unskilled laborer for a cantrip, a magical spell that can be cast in six seconds an unlimited amount of times. I mean, I'm aware that D&D economics is deeply broken and just gets ported forward without adjustment from edition to edition, but this just strikes me as deeply egregious an example.
Opportunity costs. The wizard needs to take time out of his schedule to walk to your field, cast Move Earth (or whatever, is that a cantrip?!), then walk back to his tower - and that's time he could be spending, casting far more potent and lucrative spells for better paying customers.
But for every 10th level wizard who is too busy to cast cantrips for some farmer, there would probably be 10 apprentices who only know cantrips or level 1 spells and would be pretty cheap to hire.
(By the way, I don't know how the Move Earth example got started. That's a 6th level spell)
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
I wonder at the rational for charging the equivalent of over two weeks pay for a skilled laborer and five months pay for an unskilled laborer for a cantrip, a magical spell that can be cast in six seconds an unlimited amount of times. I mean, I'm aware that D&D economics is deeply broken and just gets ported forward without adjustment from edition to edition, but this just strikes me as deeply egregious an example.
Opportunity costs. The wizard needs to take time out of his schedule to walk to your field, cast Move Earth (or whatever, is that a cantrip?!), then walk back to his tower - and that's time he could be spending, casting far more potent and lucrative spells for better paying customers.
But for every 10th level wizard who is too busy to cast cantrips for some farmer, there would probably be 10 apprentices who only know cantrips or level 1 spells and would be pretty cheap to hire.
(By the way, I don't know how the Move Earth example got started. That's a 6th level spell)
It was probably misremembering Mold Earth.
The question of pricing of spellcasting services can only be answered if you know how many casters there are. If there are ten apprentices for every 10th level wizard, that's still not a lot if there are two 10th level wizards in the entire kingdom. Their services will be expensive, especially if they have to travel, since they're probably not anywhere nearby.
On the other hand, if every podunk town has a hedge wizard nearby, it'll probably be a lot cheaper.
It's setting dependent.
Also, the pricing in the books is not an attempt to create a meaningful economy, but to set prices for specifically the PCs.
But for every 10th level wizard who is too busy to cast cantrips for some farmer, there would probably be 10 apprentices who only know cantrips or level 1 spells and would be pretty cheap to hire.
(By the way, I don't know how the Move Earth example got started. That's a 6th level spell)
Sorry - I should have looked that up. Mold Earth, the cantrip. The other spell is a very poor example for what I'm trying to say =D
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Blanket disclaimer: I only ever state opinion. But I can sound terribly dogmatic - so if you feel I'm trying to tell you what to think, I'm really not, I swear. I'm telling you what I think, that's all.
Given that there's relatively few practical applications for cantrips as a service industry, I almost want to say that this is more a "making me spend time on something trivial" fee than anything else. Anyone spending the gold is either rich in dollar and poor in sense and deserves to be fleeced on principle if they're willing to pay such a convenience premium, or they are coming to this service because it's their only good option and so by definition creating a seller's market.
Well, I mean ... if you're building earthworks, I'd say 10 level 1 apprentices casting Mold Earth could do the work of hundreds of men. I'm not entirely sure how much dirt a man with a shovel can move in 6 seconds, but I'm reasonably sure it's less than 5x5x5 feet. The shovel guys would get tired too.
In any game I'm GM'ing, finding 10 random apprentices would be hard, but that's me. In some games I'm sure level 1's are common as muck =)
Maybe the real question is ... what is the price per quantity of moved earth. I mean, for this particular spell.
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Blanket disclaimer: I only ever state opinion. But I can sound terribly dogmatic - so if you feel I'm trying to tell you what to think, I'm really not, I swear. I'm telling you what I think, that's all.
Given that there's relatively few practical applications for cantrips as a service industry, I almost want to say that this is more a "making me spend time on something trivial" fee than anything else. Anyone spending the gold is either rich in dollar and poor in sense and deserves to be fleeced on principle if they're willing to pay such a convenience premium, or they are coming to this service because it's their only good option and so by definition creating a seller's market.
I feel like there's enough that become practical wide-scale to be services.
Damage Cantrips: Hireling that fights for you.
Mending is good for a repairman that can charge normal prices and profit in volume.
Prestidigitation is great for a cleaning service or a chef. (Though in the chef case, gotta each at the restaurant itself.)
Druidcraft is your weatherman putting in reports to the daily newspaper.
Dancing Lights and Light also fit with the entertainer. Though I can understand in this case the idea of "Seriously? You want me to spend my time doing this?" sense if it's not part of the venue's ambiance.
Mold Earth is your digger than can work a lot quicker than others.
Guidance makes sense as a, "For a small donation (not 30gp) I can invoke aid on your task."
Magic Stone is good as a hireling to boost your other hirelings.
Given that there's relatively few practical applications for cantrips as a service industry, I almost want to say that this is more a "making me spend time on something trivial" fee than anything else. Anyone spending the gold is either rich in dollar and poor in sense and deserves to be fleeced on principle if they're willing to pay such a convenience premium, or they are coming to this service because it's their only good option and so by definition creating a seller's market.
I feel like there's enough that become practical wide-scale to be services.
Also, if one is doing worldbuilding, there's got to be a plethora of cantrips and low-level spells that exist to do common, day-to-day tasks that just aren't on the spell list because they're not ones that adventurers would take. Copying text? Some enterprising apprentice worked that one out a long, long time ago. (When my players met some folks doing archaeology, they immediately wanted to learn that spell.) Prestidigitation, druidcraft, and thaumaturgy kind of encapsulate the idea of minor utility magic that adventurers might find useful, but they don't do enough to really fill that space. (This assumes the sort of high-frequency magic world where hiring magic services is an option.)
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I wonder at the rational for charging the equivalent of over two weeks pay for a skilled laborer and five months pay for an unskilled laborer for a cantrip, a magical spell that can be cast in six seconds an unlimited amount of times. I mean, I'm aware that D&D economics is deeply broken and just gets ported forward without adjustment from edition to edition, but this just strikes me as deeply egregious an example.
Yeah. Now that 6-second cantrip is more costly than something like cure wounds per the 5.0 PHB. (Where it suggested 10-50gp for 1st to 2nd level spells.)
Personally I think it's more reasonable to treat someone with a cantrip like a skilled worker. Hiring an acolyte to travel with your party for a while, even for 10gp a day, seems more reasonable than the itemized list. Just imagine the acolyte coming to your party after travelling with them and being like,
"Okay so I cast light two times and then participated in that battle against kobolds by casting sacred flame three times. (Nevermind they saved against all of them.) And then you were a little hurt so I did one casting of cure wounds and then Jerry wanted a little oomph while questioning a goblin for one thaumaturgy. So all together that'll be, lemme check, 230gp."
At those kind of prices only the richy rich rich could even afford to have some spellcasters on hand. A spellcaster with mold earth charging more for ditch-digging makes sense because he can do it a lot quicker. But for 30gp, like you said, you could just hire 150 unskilled laborers for a day that can do a lot more. So suddenly he's priced himself out of helping to build fortifications unless you're on a time-crunch. Whereas saying, "I'm worth 20 men so that'll be a special rate of 4gp per day." makes a lot more sense.
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If someone spills wine on your expensive dress or rug, or you're a very busy merchant and your wagon wheel breaks, you would definitely pay a premium price for an instant and flawless fix via Prestidigitation or Mending. If you're not willing to pay those prices, go fix it the hard and time-consuming way.
The thing about supply and demand is that it really doesn't matter how easy it is for someone to provide you a service. All that matters is how many people need it and how much competition they've got. It's why well-known artists can charge triple digits for sketch commissions.
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Last time I had a plumber out he was here for 5 minutes and charged me over £100. You're not paying for the six seconds to cast it, you're paying for the years it took to learn it
It does matter though. I make sandwiches for my lunch. I have two main potential sources of sandwiches nearby, and they'd charge me roughly £3 per sandwich. That would be about £15 for lunch. Or I can do it at home for about £2 for the lot. Since it it's so easy to do it myself, I save £13 rather than getting them to do it. They miss out on potential sales every day. Obviously, it's not worth then reducing prices enough to tempt me. If they reduced the price enough, I'd just go get theirs instead.
How easy it is doesn't dictate price - it's one of many factors - but it certainly provide a ceiling and therefore matters for pricing. Make something expensive enough and people will just do it themselves.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
They probably priced it such that spellcasting services cost the same as purchasing spell scrolls, seeing how the service appears to cost roughly double of the scroll crafting cost, and crafting items is typically half as expensive as buying them.
Yeah, I'm not a big fan of that mechanic either, though. Xgp for one use or 2Xgp for unlimited uses seems like a no-brainer choice in most circumstances. Normally, you'd pay quite a bit extra for a permanent thing than a temporary form.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
Opportunity costs. The wizard needs to take time out of his schedule to walk to your field, cast Move Earth (or whatever, is that a cantrip?!), then walk back to his tower - and that's time he could be spending, casting far more potent and lucrative spells for better paying customers.
Blanket disclaimer: I only ever state opinion. But I can sound terribly dogmatic - so if you feel I'm trying to tell you what to think, I'm really not, I swear. I'm telling you what I think, that's all.
But for every 10th level wizard who is too busy to cast cantrips for some farmer, there would probably be 10 apprentices who only know cantrips or level 1 spells and would be pretty cheap to hire.
(By the way, I don't know how the Move Earth example got started. That's a 6th level spell)
It's not about that, someone mistook the name of the spell. It's about Mold Earth, a cantrip.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
It was probably misremembering Mold Earth.
The question of pricing of spellcasting services can only be answered if you know how many casters there are. If there are ten apprentices for every 10th level wizard, that's still not a lot if there are two 10th level wizards in the entire kingdom. Their services will be expensive, especially if they have to travel, since they're probably not anywhere nearby.
On the other hand, if every podunk town has a hedge wizard nearby, it'll probably be a lot cheaper.
It's setting dependent.
Also, the pricing in the books is not an attempt to create a meaningful economy, but to set prices for specifically the PCs.
Sorry - I should have looked that up. Mold Earth, the cantrip. The other spell is a very poor example for what I'm trying to say =D
Blanket disclaimer: I only ever state opinion. But I can sound terribly dogmatic - so if you feel I'm trying to tell you what to think, I'm really not, I swear. I'm telling you what I think, that's all.
Given that there's relatively few practical applications for cantrips as a service industry, I almost want to say that this is more a "making me spend time on something trivial" fee than anything else. Anyone spending the gold is either rich in dollar and poor in sense and deserves to be fleeced on principle if they're willing to pay such a convenience premium, or they are coming to this service because it's their only good option and so by definition creating a seller's market.
Well, I mean ... if you're building earthworks, I'd say 10 level 1 apprentices casting Mold Earth could do the work of hundreds of men. I'm not entirely sure how much dirt a man with a shovel can move in 6 seconds, but I'm reasonably sure it's less than 5x5x5 feet. The shovel guys would get tired too.
In any game I'm GM'ing, finding 10 random apprentices would be hard, but that's me. In some games I'm sure level 1's are common as muck =)
Maybe the real question is ... what is the price per quantity of moved earth. I mean, for this particular spell.
Blanket disclaimer: I only ever state opinion. But I can sound terribly dogmatic - so if you feel I'm trying to tell you what to think, I'm really not, I swear. I'm telling you what I think, that's all.
I feel like there's enough information in here to start an "economics of spellcasting in fantasy worlds" dissertation for their Doctorate...
I feel like there's enough that become practical wide-scale to be services.
Damage Cantrips: Hireling that fights for you.
Mending is good for a repairman that can charge normal prices and profit in volume.
Prestidigitation is great for a cleaning service or a chef. (Though in the chef case, gotta each at the restaurant itself.)
Druidcraft is your weatherman putting in reports to the daily newspaper.
Minor Illusion is your party entertainer.
Dancing Lights and Light also fit with the entertainer. Though I can understand in this case the idea of "Seriously? You want me to spend my time doing this?" sense if it's not part of the venue's ambiance.
Mold Earth is your digger than can work a lot quicker than others.
Guidance makes sense as a, "For a small donation (not 30gp) I can invoke aid on your task."
Magic Stone is good as a hireling to boost your other hirelings.
Control Flames is the local fireman.
Thaumaturgy is good as part of a tiefling entertainer's kit.
Shape Water is a local ice sculptor. Could see this being a small custom artwork thing.
Spare the Dying is a local EMT. Could see this one being hire price than others.
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Belolonandalogalo, Sunny | Draíocht, Kholias | Eggo Lass, 100 Dungeons
Talorin Tebedi, Vecna: Eve | Cherry, Stormwreck | Chipper, Strahd
We Are Modron
Get rickrolled here. Awesome music here. Track 48, 5/23/25, Immaculate Mary
Also, if one is doing worldbuilding, there's got to be a plethora of cantrips and low-level spells that exist to do common, day-to-day tasks that just aren't on the spell list because they're not ones that adventurers would take. Copying text? Some enterprising apprentice worked that one out a long, long time ago. (When my players met some folks doing archaeology, they immediately wanted to learn that spell.) Prestidigitation, druidcraft, and thaumaturgy kind of encapsulate the idea of minor utility magic that adventurers might find useful, but they don't do enough to really fill that space. (This assumes the sort of high-frequency magic world where hiring magic services is an option.)