I blame martinl for this, which just goes to show how I roll my campaign.
Whereas, the dungeons of Felltower and their environs are full of dangerous monsters and fell beasts of untrustwothy and evil origin;
and whereas, the dumping of the corpses of such monsters in Stericksburg's public facilities are potentially dangerous to the morals, bodies, and souls of the inhabitants of the city aforementioned;
and whereas, the discouragement of bringing said fell creatures into the safe environs of the town is to be encouraged and the encouragement of bring them henceforce and into the environs is to be discouraged;
it is hereby decreed that it shall be illegal, against the law, and against the moral standing of the city, county, and kingdom of New Kingdom to bring such fell beings or their remains into town for the venal profit of profiteers. Any and all monters, human-like or human-unlike, shall be prohibited from sales within the confines of town, as shall be their possession. Various and sundry special exemptions are made for those parts previously allowed to be sold under the Wizard's Exemption* unless the sale of such should cause especially problems for the officials especially charged with the discharge of the taxing and allowance of said special parts.
In other words, sale of anything not listed in the Notes sections of monsters is banned in New Kingdom, aka the Kingdom the Game is Set In. In other words, if a skill roll or prior knowledge doesn't say it's valuable, don't take your chances, there will be legal issues. Leave the monsters, take the coinage.
Aha, well, that is helpful, actually! As one might say, "GOOD TO KNOW."
ReplyDeleteIf this was a modern game, this would be the Patriots Protecting Families Leave Monsters in the Dungeon Act.
DeleteYou can still try Smuggling and Streetwise to get around this, right?
ReplyDeleteOf course, the pay day may not be worth it.
Yes, but in all likelihood it's not valuable. So it'll be a Smuggling roll, followed by Streetwise, and all that may net you is a small bit of change. Not all illegal goods are also high value to the person with the goods. You'd potentially end up paying to get it dumped without your name being involved, which is quite the opposite of why you'd have dragged it back to town.
DeleteOne could probably try skill rolls to get around it, and while the *character* might be successful, the *player* might feel the bound end of Peter's Dungeon Masters Guide.
DeleteThe "law" is a fun veneer of legalese over "this is not that kind of game," from a DM enjoyment and players wasting their time perspective. We ignore it at our peril, I think.
(Which suits me just fine)
Basically, yes. You can ignore it, but if you get the body to town and make your rolls, you'll get crap pay for doing it. And if you fail your rolls, bad things happen. It's just not worth it. The known valuable body parts are just that - the exceptions to the rule above, and that's fine. If you don't know from experience what pays, don't try to sell it.
DeleteWhile "profit by any means" is part of the game, this "means" is just not as fun as the others, so this law waves that away.
Now have a skeevy necromancer contact the PCs and ask them smuggle an intact plague zombie head into town for a big reward.
ReplyDeleteIf they take that money they get what's coming to them.
There are some "live monster" offers out there, but by buyers so powerful it the law wouldn't apply. So if they can figure out how to capture a live, healthy, intact Ravening Eye, they can sell it to Black Jans without repercussions, but they can't just nab random monsters or bits for sale and profit from it.
Delete