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Fantasy economies


Alytha

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RE: The Inn, it could possibly be used for other Two-riversfolk (like from outlying farms) when staying in town.

I'm from a relatively sparsely-populated area, people actually used to build tiny cottages to stay over for sunday (to go to church) becuase a lot of people just lived too far away to be able to get there and back in a day.

Mind, this is a post-enclosure kind of environment, so it's a bit anachronistic, but still.

and yeah, Geography, not economics :P (Still fondly remembers all those little color-coded maps with icons representing resource extraction sites and primary farming areas...)

So the place is prosperous enough to maintain a fairly luxurious local inn (that is also a monopoly) but not enough for someone to sell them salt more than once a season? Like I said, its not the pure economics of it that bugs me, but the blatant narrative convenience. (though I did start trying to figure out the supply/demand curve for the bloody inn...if its farmers coming to town on business, thats a fairly inflexible demand (and theres one inn, so its a completely inflexible supply. In fact, the inn seems to be mostly empty). Its not like theres tourists. Now, a stay at the inn needs to cost less than whatever the farmer sells, (and we can account for the lost workdays and expenses of the trip itself, horses, danger, etc) or the trips a wash, and a farmer can only haul so much stuff - Rand and Tam are bringing in like 3 casks of cider or something - but they're not planning to stay the night, so they can bring less stuff and still turn a profit. Bran al'Vere is a fairly wealthyish guy - he's the mayor and has the closest thing the place offers to a white collar job, so lets assume he's making twice what the poorest of the outlying farmers is making (awesome Gini coefficient there)....yeah, that way lies madness. ) 

On economics vs geography, come to think of it, maybe authors are doing their economics too well. Theres that fetishistic craving for perfect market balance, which could reflect the weird stasis fantasy books tend to have. Geographic economic models tend to be more about the way things change. Models that propose perfect balanced stasis - like central place theory- very rarely actually work (unless you're living on a completely flat plain and everyone only eats apples, ever. Or apparenly if you're dutch.) Fantasy worldbuilding rarely manages to achieve a sense of the world constantly changing and reacting to the economic drives of their denizens. If I think about it that way, Fanatsy worlds are just really, really strictly centrally planned economies with all the associated ideological baggage. The villages will be quaint. This city will be built of stone, in a swamp. That city will have a population consisting entirely of priests. etc. 

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Like I said, its not the pure economics of it that bugs me, but the blatant narrative convenience.

Well, duh :P

My assumption was always that Gill served as a kind of generic administrator-type (for what little administration needs doing) in his capacity as mayor, and that the inn was more or less a part of those duties (in sweden it was common for certain peasants to be given the status of "postal peasants" which also meant taking care of couriers, etc. it's possibly Gill's position started out as something like that and then just continued after royal administration collapsed)

That is, assuming Gill doesen't have some other kind of business (his own fields to tend, etc.) on the side.

The entire "specialist who only works one job" is *relatively* recent for rural areas, it's mostly that you tend to have a guy who does a job (blacksmith, cobbler, whatever) and also has his own farm on the side.

The Two Rivers is really way less offensive to me than the Shire. I can pretty much fudge the details into making sense.

(unless you're living on a completely flat plain ... Or apparenly if you're dutch.)

Why did you state the same thing twice? :P

- I could buy them lasting maybe two or three years of continous winter, but anything beyond that I just think would equal everyone dead.

My impression was that this was indeed the "regular" "harsh winter" phase, and that to ge ta decade or longer we are indeed getting into "supernatural end of civilization" territory.

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Is it stated how bad the winters get in the south?

Maybe the snow and ice for years on end is only in the north, and in the south it only gets a couple of degrees colder on average, like in the ice ages, and they still get a bit of a harvest done.

Still doesn't solve the problem of supplying the north for a decade. Then again, it's said to be sparsely populated anyway. Or maybe they resort to cannibalism.

On the topic of cannibalism, it does solve a lot of economic problems, like overpopulation and food.

Is it stated anywhere where the dwarwes red meat fresh from the bone comes from? :leaving:

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I don't think the Emond's Field inn counts as "luxurious" at all. It's described by the characters as amazing ... at first. But the minute they get to Barelon, there's alot of stuff about how much better and larger and more amazing that inn is. It's a tavern with some well kept rooms on the second floor. It's nice and clean, but certainly not luxurious.

And I have no idea if Gill also had a farm or anything. I think he brews drinks though.

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On the topic of cannibalism, it does solve a lot of economic problems, like overpopulation and food.

Is it stated anywhere where the dwarwes red meat fresh from the bone comes from? :leaving:

I think its in Guns, Germs and Steel (that i've read) that theres an argument that Papua New Guinean cannibalism practices are due to the island having very few natural sources of protein otherwise...Cannibalism would make good worldbuilding sense. I don't know whats going on with Craster if not at the very least symbolic cannibalism. 

Why did you state the same thing twice?

Actually, I lived in like the one hilly place in the Netherlands for a while, so I may be biased. 

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I think my favourite instance of cannibalism is an african kingdom whose name I can't remember at the moment... Basically, only the king was allowed to eat people, and he only ate slaves. It was apparently a kind of conspicious consumption ("Haha! Look at how rich I am!")

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Guest Other-in-Law

Inns are another thing I intended to post about but forgot in the OP.

The staple of all epic/heroic fantasy is the well-stocked inn in the middle of nowhere or in a tiny village.

How do these places survive?

There's the middle of nowhere, and then there's the middle of nowhere. Inns along major highways or coach roads are needed for travelers, particularly along the really barren stretches. Just because there's a lot of emptiness between points A and B doesn't mean that there's not steady or important traffic through that emptiness.

But in some tiny village way up in the mountains that no one ever heard of, that no travelers would have any reason to pass by, there's not much cause for an inn.

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Math for made up worlds is the best math!

Interesting idea about static economies in fantasy books. I'm not sure if I can think of any examples off the top of my head though.

I think my favourite instance of cannibalism is an african kingdom whose name I can't remember at the moment... Basically, only the king was allowed to eat people, and he only ate slaves. It was apparently a kind of conspicious consumption ("Haha! Look at how rich I am!")

:laugh:

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There is a lot of stuff that doesn't make any sense in the Wheel of Time. How does the Aiel manage to trade with the people from Shara? What, if anything, does the Aiel have to offer? How do they get enough wood to give their several hundred thousand strong army 3-4 spears each? And the Trollocs, how do they survive? They're huge muscle beasts, imagine all the protine they need to eat any given day... yet they all live in the Blight where they can't find anything to eat (if they only eat people from the Borderlands, I'd expect the borderlands to be depopulated a long time ago as there is like over a million Trollocs).

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The Trollocs come from many Blights. Possibly an infinite number of them.

Yeah, the Aiel make no sense whatsoever, though.

Edit: This seems like a thread that's happened at least four times on this board, and every single one of them eventually turned to the Wheel of Time. I guess it's like how certain other threads get overrun by Bakker discussion.

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Yeah, they get several harvests but how much of that food is storable for years and years with Medieval tech? Also, one would burn through a lot of food when none is coming in anymore at all. and you need more calories just to surive the bitter cold. Some other tidbits:

-The winters are describe as incredibly cold, and the snow is said to be very deep, which would basically shut down any sort of land travel. That kind of constant, penetrating cold would kill off any weak people, and would require constant fires to keep homes warm, which would require a hell of a lot of firewood, which better be close on hand, because traveling to get it would be impossible.

Some of that probably happens in the North, where the Winters are brutal. Winterfell has that town near it that fills up in Winter, IIRC.

-All the game and wildlife in the Northern and Central parts of Westeros would migrate South, or die, so hunting and fishing is out.

A lot of the game seems to be "Ice Age" type creatures as well as evergreens that can survive in that type of climate. Unless you're talking about the area north of the Wall, which seems so harsh that I think it's unlike that a forest would survive up there.

-After a couple of years of little to no sunshine, and the same bland diet, people would start to get serious dietary deficiences/health/mental problems, and even more would die.

Where are you getting the "no sunshine" bit from? That might be true up in the far North (near the Wall and beyond), but it doesn't seem to be the case for the Winters farther south.

-The cold weather would shut down the ports except maybe in the Southern Reach and in Dorne, which would severly limit the foreign trade, although I doubt Westeros gets much in the way of food and other essentials from the other parts of the world. Still those cities that survive do to foreign trade money would be in a serious hurting because that revenue would be gone.

I don't think it's that cold - and the areas near sea probably have a more moderated climate. I think Martin said that it only snows "sometimes" in the vicinity of the Neck and so forth, and rarely in the Reach. When you factor in that there are seasons within the bigger seasons (the Summer snows and so forth), they probably have patches of much more mild weather, including periods when they can do harvests of certain things.

The Trollocs come from many Blights. Possibly an infinite number of them.

That's the source of them? I guess it works, although you still have to feed and supply them. Unless they figure the Trollocs won't live long enough to make it worthwhile anyways.

I just figured it was the size of the Blight. If you look at the map of the world in the BWB, the Blight is pretty huge.

As for the isolated inns, most of them would probably just be alehouses and boarding rooms. Basically, a more prosperous farmer with a bigger house and the means to make alcoholic beverages who has an extra room or two for the occasional traveler. The food probably wouldn't be too hot unless there's a lot of game in the vicinity.

To be honest, I think that would be more interesting to see anyways, as opposed to the stereotypical inn. Maybe your old Wizard's specialty is not his magic, but that he seemingly knows a whole ton of people across a wide area, and thus knows all the best boarding homes, etc.

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I think I dimly remember something about the trollocs eating their dead.

Or maybe I just have an unhealthy obsession with cannibalism right now.

To wrench the tread off WOT, does anybody remember how trade was organised in ERAGON?

As it had rivers randomly popping up from nowhere, did the food do the same?

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I think I dimly remember something about the trollocs eating their dead.

Or maybe I just have an unhealthy obsession with cannibalism right now.

To wrench the tread off WOT, does anybody remember how trade was organised in ERAGON?

As it had rivers randomly popping up from nowhere, did the food do the same?

Trying to apply any logic to a book like Eragon is like trying to figure out how the Ewoks defeated a high tech army far beyond our own modern capabilities with sticks and stones in Star Wars.

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Jacen,

Yeah, they get several harvests but how much of that food is storable for years and years with Medieval tech? Also, one would burn through a lot of food when none is coming in anymore at all. and you need more calories just to surive the bitter cold. Some other tidbits:

-The winters are describe as incredibly cold, and the snow is said to be very deep, which would basically shut down any sort of land travel. That kind of constant, penetrating cold would kill off any weak people, and would require constant fires to keep homes warm, which would require a hell of a lot of firewood, which better be close on hand, because traveling to get it would be impossible.

-All the game and wildlife in the Northern and Central parts of Westeros would migrate South, or die, so hunting and fishing is out.

-After a couple of years of little to no sunshine, and the same bland diet, people would start to get serious dietary deficiences/health/mental problems, and even more would die.

-The cold weather would shut down the ports except maybe in the Southern Reach and in Dorne, which would severly limit the foreign trade, although I doubt Westeros gets much in the way of food and other essentials from the other parts of the world. Still those cities that survive do to foreign trade money would be in a serious hurting because that revenue would be gone.

- I could buy them lasting maybe two or three years of continous winter, but anything beyond that I just think would equal everyone dead.

Anyway, it's always been a cool concept so I'm glad GRRM put it in :P

I thought that was the point of Winter Town and the Glass Gardens at Winterfell? Winterfell had geothermal heating that extends to Wintertown and much of the population of the North relocates to Winterfell so that they can survive the very harsh winters (I remember some mention of Wintertown's population swelling hugely during Winter). Perhaps the other Northern Castle sites have similar geothermal advantages. I imagine Winterfell levies some pretty harsh taxes to prepare for the coming cold and then squirrels away as much as possible. The one point I can't get over is the vitamin D Deficiencies that would crop up after years of little or no sun.

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Datepalm, Alytha,

I think its in Guns, Germs and Steel (that i've read) that theres an argument that Papua New Guinean cannibalism practices are due to the island having very few natural sources of protein otherwise...Cannibalism would make good worldbuilding sense. I don't know whats going on with Craster if not at the very least symbolic cannibalism.

Actually, I lived in like the one hilly place in the Netherlands for a while, so I may be biased.

Read Peadar O'Guilin's (the boarder Peadar) book The Inferior for an interesting examination of cannibalism in worldbuilding.

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There is a lot of stuff that doesn't make any sense in the Wheel of Time. How does the Aiel manage to trade with the people from Shara? What, if anything, does the Aiel have to offer?

Well, their most critical export is Algode (cotton). They're the sole producers in the world, and while the Westland countries don't seem to know of it, you can bet the people from Shara do. The Aiel also have loot, as well as sung wood they trade from the Ogier. Plus, their blacksmiths are apparently among the best. All that adds up to allow the low level trading they do with the Sharamen.

How do they get enough wood to give their several hundred thousand strong army 3-4 spears each?

Wasn't there some mention of a desert plant which most Aiel use for spear making? Its supposed to be this stunted thing that grows in abundance in some parts of the waste. Plus, we know they trade with the Ogier, though I doubt the wood they get there is used for spears.

And the Trollocs, how do they survive? They're huge muscle beasts, imagine all the protine they need to eat any given day... yet they all live in the Blight where they can't find anything to eat (if they only eat people from the Borderlands, I'd expect the borderlands to be depopulated a long time ago as there is like over a million Trollocs).

Who said Trollocs can't eat the blighted plants and animals? We know those huge ass worms (jumara) eat Trollocs. What's to say Trollocs don't eat the creepy plants and animals of the Blight? The blight seems like a self-contained biospehere. Its essentially the normal world gone crazy. So tainted grass is eaten by mutant sheep who are eaten by Trollocs.

As for aSoIaF:

Apart from the winter issues, wouldn't extended summers also cause huge forest fires and the like? The whole weather system seems untenable to me.

Also, it never made sense to me that the North had all this silver and was still not considered extremely wealthy. I get it that the Tyrells grow a ton of food and trade a lot. But the Starks are overlords to the Manderlys, who apparently produce all the silver in Westeros. Yet, the wealth of the North is scoffed at compared to the Tyrells.

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Oddly enough, our favorite, ASOAIF has one of the most unrealistic economies in all of fantasy. As in... if Westeros frequently experiences decade long winters they would not have any viable economy, nor people, because a winter that lasted that long would kill off everyone that lived there. One bad winter would shut down the whole system and I just don't see how they would ever recover from just one bad winter cycle, let alone the thousands they've had apparently.

Brian Aldiss's Helliconia Trilogy - essentially the SF forebear to ASoIaF - pretty much has this. Every time one of the decades-long winters arrives most of the population is killed off. The survivors only endure by moving south to the equatorial regions where farming was just about still viable. Even so, about 90% of the planetary population expires during each winter (though their winters are far, far worse than any described in ASoIaF, the Long Night perhaps execepted).

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Also, it never made sense to me that the North had all this silver and was still not considered extremely wealthy. I get it that the Tyrells grow a ton of food and trade a lot. But the Starks are overlords to the Manderlys, who apparently produce all the silver in Westeros. Yet, the wealth of the North is scoffed at compared to the Tyrells.

It's the middle-ages (basically) wealth is land and people to work it.

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It's the middle-ages (basically) wealth is land and people to work it.

Then the Lannisters should also be "poor", no? The much lower prices of sliver compared to gold is a recent development. In the middle-ages, the difference in value would have been lower, and with silver also having no use but for jewelry, I fail to see why there should be such a disparity between the wealth of the North and the Westlands.

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