Strive, toil, and claim the just rewards of your labours.
Enjoy the fruits of your labour today; no one knows what the morrow holds.
There are three things that should never be made: Food that goes uneaten, coin that goes unspent and magic that goes unused.
The Prosperous are not selfish; all that is worthwhile is shared with those who deserve it.
Despise the thieving bandit, the lazy wastrel, the grasping miser and those who take without giving.
Hi and we’re into the home stretch of our 3 things about the virtues series with today’s virtue Prosperity. So if you’re dedicated, a priest or just a fan of Prosperity tell us your 3 things you’d tell a new player about how you have fun with the virtue and where the game can be found with it.
As in the other threads try not to get into the meat of the IC arguments around Prosperity too much, but an introduction to some of the questions you might start off asking is fine.
It’s not all about money. Finding ever new ways to explain that to people is 90% of my Prosperity-based fun.
You are totes allowed to smite misers. Good Walder says so. As well as the carrot, it’s fun to embrace the Prosperity stick too (in a very literal sense >:-) )
My character dedicated to prosperity at her(and mine) first event, E3, and decided to go on a “pilgrimage” at E4 to talk to a priest of prosperity from every nation for their view on the virtue. Being a new LARPer, an OC introvert, IC extrovert, this was both a mental, time consuming and financial challenge; being from the Brass coast coin was obviously exchanged for such useful knowledge. But it was defiantly well worth it. Not only did I meet wonderful Priests and get invited to a meeting; It really helped me get into caricature and more confident in anvil. What I learned:
Prosperity is the continues movement of trade, to hoard money with no intention to spend it is unprosperous.
Money is not the only thing that can measure if someone is prosperous, objects (and friends/family from the Veruscan priest) are also ways ones prosperity can be measured.
All the different Nations view on the meaning varies greatly even within a nation there are clashes in Priests beliefs. However similarities are often found in unusual places so don’t Judge the nation by the cover.
It’s not all about money (I know Daisy said that but it’s important and worth repeating). Prosperity is wealth and enjoyment and comfort and contributing and lots of other things. Money is a tool, how you use it is Virtue.
For me, it’s one of the easiest Virtues to flip and stretch depending on your nation. Think about how your particular nation would intersect with the Virtue.
(Note: what follows is my characters’ interpretations, other views are available!)
In Dawn I had a good line in “… each contribute according to their status”; it re-enforced the segregation between noble and yeoman, each had their part to play in the shared Prosperity of the House/Nation.
In Varushka it was about family and making sure that your kin were supported and could make it through the winter.
In the Brass Coast it’s about what that money can buy you, how you can enjoy it to the best of your ability.
Prosperity, to me, is the least selfish of the Virtues, and the one that makes you appreciate what you have around you.
I’ve been waiting for this one, because I’ve not got a good grasp of what is, ostensibly, my characters main Virtue.
To quote (Making Money, by Pratchett): “Money doesn’t want to sit around, it likes to get out there, meet new friends, go on adventures!” If you have riches, then spend them, somehow. By all means, stick it in large pile and tell short tales of how you have brought wealth back to your Clan/Hall/House/Spire…and then DO something with it. Enchantments, artifacts of power, deeds of virtue, gifts, donations, investments… Wealth is a tool. If you’re going to sit on it and do nothing with it, buy a cushion. It’ll be comfier.
Prosperity, like all the virtues, is not isolated, It touches on the others. Take Courage in attaining Prosperity. Take Pride in it when you have achieved it. Be Loyal with your comrades on this journey and in where the fruits and rewards of your labours go. Be Vigilant that your Prosperity does not go to the undeserving or thieves. Be Wise in how you deal with Prosperity, neither lusting after it nor dwelling on it overmuch. And be Ambitious in what you wish to achieve, and how Prosperity can help you.
Invest not in yourself, but in your comrades. Invest in your nation, and in those around it. You cannot build yourself a tall pillar on which to stand with Prosperity (Pride is another matter). You can build your friends and family up so that you rise by association. Prosperity is not about winning the game of Me. It’s about winning the game of You.
Groups and people are not known for Prosperity, more for what they do with it. The Butcher Bank, for example, may be a very wealthy group. But they’re more known these days for the road network they’ve been building than for the wealth.
(The Academy is also quite wealthy. But they aren’t Imperial Citizens. They can’t do something like… oh… give a pile of cash to someone to buy a Bourse seat on their behalf… and of course they haven’t done so…)
I try to steer my group towards the Cohen the Barbarian (again, thank Terry Pratchett) method of Prosperity: Leave home. Acquire shinies. Bring shinies home. Spend shinies. Repeat.
I’m playing in Dawn… not a particularly prosperous nation. We took ages to scrape together the funds for our 4th army, and I doubt we’ve have managed to hold onto the money for anything less Dawnish. My character has complained: “We have silk banners and silvered helms… and no actual cash…”
It’s proving pretty interesting, especially where it ties in to Ambition and Loyalty and… but that is another story
Your toil is not free. You made an Axe? Great get paid for it. The payment may not be monetary (This is important!), but that your toil is recompensed in some way. On the other hand, Don’t expect some one to do something for only thanks, and a favour may not be worth as much as you think.
Mercenaries. There some IC and OC points to this. The OC warning first. It is hard to be paid regular as a merc and many people will do what you are offering for free. There is a LOT of foot work in finding your market and then getting the price you can. I can not recommend a new player/group being merc’s without learning the system a bit. Go around saying your mercs and some generals will buy your Military Unit for a specific task (Sending people to a spy network, supporting an army or other specific unique opportunity).
On the IC part, people will come and not demand you to fight but just expect you to. In some cases this is insulting and unvirtuous. They shall espouse loyalty to your nation, and wisdom of helping your friends and neighbours. And in some ways this is correct. But your loyalty may be split or sundered even if your loyalty has been spurned, to the people dependant you or to other more desperate fights.
Spend your wealth. Our group makes a habit of hiring bards, musicians and dancers. We open our fire and invite people to come and share drink. Don’t thrift it away but spread some of it around.
(One caveat. I will come back and rewrite a part of this later after I have let it digest. I know mercs are an awkward part of the game but that means what I say needs to be…more…something)
Wealth is not prosperity any more than a statue is a dance.
Prosperity is fluid, it moves, it ducks it dives, it moves from one place to another and leaves everyone it touches smiling.
Wealth is a pile of coin that squats, cold and unfeeling, in the vaults of someone who has mistaken gold for sunlight.
Money is not prosperity in the same way that a map is not a mountain.
Money is an abstract, a picture of value or worth. Trade a ribbon for an apple, an apple for a poem, a poem for a pint, and a pint for a helping hand.
Prosperity is served well without the appearance of a single coin.
Trade is best when it benefits both. If I win it does not imply that someone else must lose.
If I have two swords, my friend has two shields, trade makes us both richer.
Don’t try to jostle and push to grab the largest slice of the pie.
Work every hour the day brings to make the pie bigger. Then take your fair share with pride.
Unseemly profit is not prosperity, offer fair value for fair value.
The friendship of a buyer is worth more than a few extra coins.
It’s better to have friends than money. You can’t eat money…
There is a shame in begging, a shame that bows a fellow’s head and makes sun itself grow cold.
But the shame is not upon the poor unfortunate in the gutter, the shame is on whoever put them there.
For myself I will never put a single coin in the bowl of a beggar.
But I will never pass a begger by without offering what I can, a job, an opportunity, a chance…
Draughir ?
No not I. Ordinary human.
Mother was an ordinary human, grandmother was an ordinary human.
Father was a bear, mind. So there may be some influence from him…
It is all about the money.
Grab all you can and use it to get more.
Never rest in your striving for wealth and never let your money rest.
Take what everything you can, they should have been more vigilant.
Make deals with the drunk, get their signatures.
Use your cash to bribe your way into power, use the power to get more cash.
Exploit every weakness and die rich.
