Money, Possessions & Daily Life

Daily life runs on coin, goods, and knowing the difference between holding something and owning it.

Money lives in separate purses

Your personal coin is yours. Your household's shared funds, a business's operating money, an organization's treasury, and a realm's coffers are each their own — and money never drifts between them on its own. Every movement is a real event: a payment, a contribution, a theft, a gift.

A wage you are owed is not coin in your pocket. It becomes yours when it is actually paid.

Possessions: hold, carry, own

You may own, carry, borrow, be issued, or simply use a thing — and each means something different. The guard's spear may be issued. The smith's forge may belong to the employer. The borrowed horse goes back. Check, when it matters: does this exist, who owns it, why do I have it, and must it be returned?

Skill never grants possessions. Being able to ride does not produce a horse; knowing smithing does not produce a forge.

Markets and availability

Being able to afford something does not mean it exists or that anyone will sell it. Goods depend on season, harvest, craft, distance, law, custom, and who is willing to trade. A village may simply not have what you want at any price — and a town market may have it only when the roads are open and the season is right.

Your world sets its own prices, wages, and coinage. This book gives no universal price list, because none exists. Learn what things cost here, this season, from these people.

Debt and obligation

Borrowing, credit, and owed wages are real and persistent. Debts do not vanish because time passes. Handle them deliberately: repay, renegotiate, work them off, or face the consequences your world's law and custom provide.

In Play

Live within your means. Know which purse you are spending from. Do not assume the shop has it — ask. And remember: the richest person in the room is not always the one with coin in hand, but the one whose household, business, and relationships are sound.