Tradesguilds#
A sword you bought is a sword. A sword you made is a promise, and everyone who sees it knows whose.
What a tradesguild gives you
A tradesguild is a trade your character practices: what you can make, mend and sell. You belong to two at most. Each trade has six ranks, and every rank lets you make better work and sell it for more.
Joining a guild#
Each guild keeps one hall, and its guildmaster trains every rank there, inquirer to artisan. You join by walking in and asking. You start as an inquirer, and every rank after that takes a quest, so you go back to the hall each time you’re ready for the next.
You belong to two guilds at most. Pick them as a pair: most trades lean on another for their materials, and the pairs below are the ones that supply each other best.
Leaving a guild
You can leave a guild whenever you like, and you lose every rank you earned in it. If you ever come back, you come back an inquirer.
Six ranks#
Each rank opens at a level. From that level on you can ask your guild’s hall for the rank’s quest, and passing it raises you. Failing costs nothing but the time and the material. Each guild’s page has the quest its hall sets for every rank.
- Level0Rank 1: Inquirer
Trash to Shoddy · ×1 worth · 1d6 craft roll
Walk into a hall and ask. The hall gives you a bench, its cheapest tools and a week of sweeping, and watches whether you come back.
- Level20Rank 2: Hobbyist
Crude to Inferior · ×1.25 worth · 2d6 craft roll
Make something the hall can sell, and sell it.
- Level40Rank 3: Apprentice
Shoddy to Acceptable · ×1.5 worth · 2+3d6 craft roll
Fetch a material the hall can't buy, from somewhere it won't send its own people.
- Level60Rank 4: Journeyman
Poor to Fine · ×1.75 worth · 4+4d6 craft roll
Take a commission from a stranger and deliver it on the day you promised.
- Level80Rank 5: Master
Inferior to Flawless · ×2 worth · 5+5d6 craft roll
Make the piece the hall names, from material you gathered yourself.
- Level100Rank 6: Artisan
Adequate to Masterwork · ×3 worth · 6+6d6 craft roll
Make something the guild has never seen. Only a hall that trains artisans can judge it.
Making something#
Everything a trade makes has a DC on the trade’s page. To make it, spend the material and roll your rank’s craft roll.
- Under the DC, the work is ruined. The material is spent and what’s left is trash.
- At the DC, you make it at the worst craftsmanship your rank makes.
- Every 3 points over the DC raises it one grade, up to the best your rank makes.
What each rank makes, worst to best. A rank never makes worse than its first grade or better than its last.
| Grade | Damage | Inquirer | Hobbyist | Apprentice | Journeyman | Master | Artisan |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Trash | +0 | ||||||
| Crude | +1 | ||||||
| Shoddy | +2 | ||||||
| Poor | +3 | ||||||
| Inferior | +4 | ||||||
| Adequate | +5 | ||||||
| Acceptable | +6 | ||||||
| Average | +7 | ||||||
| Fine | +8 | ||||||
| Exceptional | +9 | ||||||
| Flawless | +10 | ||||||
| Masterwork | +11 |
Selling what you make
A merchant pays what an item is worth times your rank’s worth, from ×1 for an inquirer up to ×3 for an artisan. Craftsmanship does more than sell: a weapon adds its grade’s damage, +1 for crude up to +11 for masterwork, and from average up a piece can come out magical. Craftsmanship has the rolls.
The eleven guilds#
The trades fall into four kinds by what they work. Pick a guild to read its page: its guildmaster, the quest for every rank, how the work is done and everything it makes.
Fire and metal#
The trades of the forge, and of the ore and sand it melts.
Mining
The trade of ore, stone and the gems inside them.
Blacksmithing
The trade of metal worked by hand: weapons, armor, tools and everything else that has to hold.
Jewelcrafting
The trade of rings, amulets, circlets and the gems set in them.
Sigildry
The trade of glass, clay and sigils.
Hide and thread#
The trades of what you wear when it isn’t metal.
Leatherworking
The trade of hides: skinning, tanning and turning leather into armor, boots, bags, belts and bridles.
Tailoring
The trade of fiber, yarn and cloth: spinning, dyeing, weaving, knitting and sewing them into clothes, costumes, packs and armor.
Timber#
The trades of wood, from the tree to the wagon it ends up in.
Fletchery
The trade of wood that flies: felling trees, shaving arrows, carving arrowheads and making bows, staves and the other wooden weapons.
Carpentry
The trade of furniture: chests, cupboards, chairs, beds, tables, thrones and everything else that fills a house.
Engineering
The trade of things bigger than one craftsman: carts, wagons, carriages, boats, ships and siege engines.
Living things#
The trades of herbs and animals, gathered and tamed in the wild.
Alchemy
The trade of potions, pills and applicants: brewing herbs, metals and powders into things that heal, harm or put magic into a weapon or armor.
Animal Husbandry
The trade of animals: taming them, teaching them, breaking them to ride and keeping them shod and healthy.
Good pairs#
Two guilds isn’t many, and most trades need another’s work before they can start. These pairs supply each other.
+Dig your own ore and smelt your own ingots, and your forge never sits cold waiting on a supplier.
+Prospecting turns up the gems a jeweler cuts, and the gold and silver to set them in.
+Between them they make every piece of armor that isn't metal, and the packs to carry the rest.
+A fletcher fells the trees a carpenter needs, and both work with the same chisels, lacquer and polish.
+Most of a wagon or a siege engine is metal parts, and an engineer who forges them waits on nobody.
Which guild suits my class?#
Pick a class to see every guild ranked for it. Any class can join any guild. A natural fit is a trade whose work is close to what the class already does, and one that works well gives the class something it can use.
Where the guilds train#
Every guild has one hall, kept by its guildmaster, and every province on the surface has at least one. The trade you pick decides where you travel: a miner goes to the mountains of Jewall, an alchemist into the jungle of Menusia. Narsis and the rest of the Bleak keep none.
The guildmasters#
The halls in each province#
- Narsis
- No hall
Menusia has no towns, so its hall is a grove in the jungle and a log to sit on.
