Moxiane/MiniSystems
Contents
Bureaucracy & Resources
A mini-system designed to give Resources a little more mechanical heft and to give characters with business-related Bureaucracy specialties something to do with them.
Finding Stuff to Buy
The Resources cost of an item is the base difficulty to locate it for sale; the character rolls (Charisma + Bureaucracy) if the item is legal wherever he is, otherwise the roll is (Manipulation + Larceny). This, of course, assumes that the item the character wishes to buy is for sale at all (STs discretion, or roll five dice against a difficulty of the item's Resources cost, success means availability).
- The difficulty is modified according to the size of the population centre that the character finds himself in
- Hamlet (<50 people) = +2
- Small Town (<500 people) = +1
- Large Town (<10000 people) = +0
- Small City (<100000 people) = -1
- Large City (300000+ people) = -2
- The character's dice-pool can also be modified, based on his Backgrounds
- If the character is in an area where his Influence or Connections would apply then add the highest of these to his dice-pool before makes the attempt to locate the item in question.
Buying Stuff
When the character has found the item he was looking for he can purchase it as normal; buying it without incident if his Resources background exceeds the cost of the item, or reducing his Resources by 1 if it equals it. However, he does have other options.
If a character wants to buy something with a cost equal to his Resources, but does not wish to reduce its rating, he can try to raise some cash using a mixture of selling easily liquidated goods, some fast deals and quick loans from friends and relatives. To do this requires some time and a little risk on the character's part.
To do this the character rolls (Charisma or Manipulation + Bureaucracy) against a base difficulty of (Resources). This action takes (Resources * 2) weeks to perform; the time is reduced by one week for every success over the modified difficulty (see below), down to a minimum time of one week - the deals involved simply can't be done any faster than this, barring the use of Charms such as Speed the Wheels.
If successful the character now has a Purse with a rating equal to (Resources); this can be used to buy something of that cost without reducing the background, but the Purse is lost in the process. If he fails then nothing happens, but the attempt has been made (see below). Should the character be unlucky enough to botch then not only does he not raise the money, but deals go south, loans go bad, and (Resources) is reduced by 1.
Characters can pre-emptively create Purses for future use, but he cannot have more than (Bureaucracy) available at any one time (with a minimum of 1, everybody can have some money put aside). Furthermore, attempting to create a Purse puts a strain on the character's finances, the list below gives the time that must pass after creating a Purse before the character can safely make another. If he tries before this period has elapsed then the difficulty is increased , cumulatively, by 1.
||Purse size||Strain|| ||•||A week|| ||••||A fortnight|| ||•••||A month|| ||••••||A season|| ||•••••||A year||
A character who is a member of an organisation or who has significant numbers of contacts within a particular segment of society can try to call on its resources to help him raise the necessary cash. Should he so wish he can add (highest applicable Backing or Connections) to the dice-pool before making the roll. Unfortunately, should the character fail to raise the money then his standing and social currency has taken a hit - his (Backing or Connections) is reduced by 1 dot for a period of time equivalent to the safe time between attempts to create a Purse.
A character can push his finances to the breaking point in order to raise a lot of money quickly, however this doesn't come without cost and the price of failure is high. By making a (Charisma or Manipulation + Bureaucracy) test against a difficulty of (Resources + 2) the character can make a Purse with a rating equal to (Resources + 1), at the cost of reducing his Resources by 1 exactly as if he had bought something with an equal cost. If the character fails this test then any further attempts to raise money while his finances are strained have a +5 difficulty modifier. Should the character be unlucky enough to botch this roll then immediately reduce his Resources by 2 as he begins to fall into bankruptcy, and he still suffers from the +5 penalty for raising cash.
Making Money
A character's Resources will fluctuate over time as he buys goods, takes risks, loses money, and generally lives the life of a PC. If he specifically wants to increase his Resources then he can do so by spending time in the markets, trading and dealing to improve his finances.
The character rolls (Charisma or Manipulation + Bureaucracy) in an extended roll with a difficulty of (Resources). Each roll requires a month and the number of successes needed is (Resources * 5). Should the character wish he can use some of the successes over the difficulty to reduce the time required by 1 week per success, down to a minimum of 1 week.
A character can also use a Purse to increase his Resources background - if he is lucky enough to get one big enough. A Purse rated at (Resources + 2) can be used to increase his Resources by 1 with a simple roll of (Charisma or Manipulation + Bureaucracy); if the Purse is only (Resources + 1) then the roll is at a difficulty of (Resources). Note that whether the character succeeds or fails the Purse is lost.
Comments
Do you mind if I put together my own version of this on the White Wolf wiki? I have some ideas on how to expand it that I want to experiment with, if I can get your blessing. Kukla
