Against the 1%, or, a Robin Hood Rule

General ACKS Forums Ask the Autarchs
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1

Pillaging a domain is done on a per-family basis in the domain. Aside from the general population loss due to resistance, accidents, and less wholesome activities, where is the majority of that loot coming from?

There’s a concept in Steven Erikson’s Malazan series that the Malazan empire had often conquered domains via attrition of the nobility - the general population (and more to the point, the merchant class, who often aided and abetted this gambit) were spared at the expense of the nobility of the domain being looted and eliminated.

If one were to want to do the same - loot the stronghold and wealth of the domain ruler whilst leaving the remainder of the settlements and peasantry untouched (as much as possible) - where would one start?

Can we assume the majority of the loot is exactly that?

Or is there a way to take the “Pillaging Supply Bases” section, and between that, the supply cost value of the domain’s garrison, and perhaps some metric based on starting wealth for advanced characters? An example domain I’ve been working on profits at 5,050 GP/month, averaging 11.6GP/family - I don’t necessarily know what static NPCs should be spending their profits on, but some of that ought to be in a dungeon vault somewhere under the keep, or converted to luxury items.

Thanks for any ideas!

2

If you mathematically apply ACKS’ assumptions to create a GDP for a society with a wealth distribution, it works out like this:

Lowest 78%: 20% of wealth
Next 15%: 10% of wealth
Next 5%: 20% of wealth
Next 2%: 15% of wealth
Next 0.5%: 12% of wealth
Next 0.25%: 8.25% of wealth
Next 0.1%: 6% of wealth
Next 0.03%: 4.5% of wealth
Top 0.01%: 4.25% of wealth

Or, simplified:
Lowest 78%: 20% of wealth
Middle 20%: 30% of wealth
Top 2%: 50% of wealth

3

Huh.

Sometimes I feel like I’m just daring you to come up with simple solutions to off-the-wall questions.

I’ll spreadsheet that out and throw it back here.

4

OK. I apologize for the intensely horrid table formatting. It’s vexed me.

For a domain of 1330 families, with a Class IV urban settlement of 961 families (there’s a rounding oops somewhere, Alex, the ‘complex’ percentages come out to 100.89%)

Domain:


Families…Wealth…Wealth Per Family

1037…2793…2.69
199…1397…7.02
66…2793…42.32
26…2095…80.58
6…1676…279.33
3…1152…384.00
1…838…838.00
0…628
0…594

Settlement:


Families…Wealth…Wealth Per Family

750…2018…2.69
144…1009…7.01
48…2018…42.04
19…1514…79.68
5…1211…242.20
2…832…416.00
1…605…605.00
0…454
0…429

Combined:


Families…Wealth…Wealth Per Family

1786…4811…2.69
343…2406…7.01
114…4811…42.20
45…3608…80.18
11…2887…262.45
5…1985…397.00
2…1443…721.50
0…1082…
0…1022…

So there’s that. However, the ruler of that 1330 family domain actually has an entire realm of 47,280 families, in which case:


Families…Wealth…Wealth Per Family

36878…99288…2.69
7092…49644…7.00
2364…99288…42.00
945…74466…78.80
236…59573…252.43
118…40956…347.08
47…29786…633.74
14…22340…1,595.71
4…21099…5,274.75

So there’s that. Pretty much wherever you go, if you knock over some peasant’s hovel, you’ll pull ~3gp out.

And from that you figure if you as DM can estimate in what cohort the target is, you can make a guess as to treasure lying about during a robbery of the target’s demesne, perhaps.

I’d got to thinking about robberies, and the western trope of the payroll wagon, etc. Given all that coin that has to travel from through local lord “A” to realm ruler “B”, I was thinking perhaps that (2d3*10) percent of the realm’s revenue could be in situ at the stronghold, on it’s way back out for garrison pay or tithe or taxes up a level. Too much?