Ephisis' Scale

Rules

Performing the Ritual

Performing this ritual takes at least 2 minutes of roleplaying. It targets an opaque container no more than 8" in any dimension. The ritual can only be performed on a Friday or Saturday during an Empire event.

Effects

This ritual can only be cast on Friday and Saturday during an event. When the ritual is performed, the ritualists put any amount of unliving material inside an opaque container up to 8" by 8" by 8" maximum volume. After casting the container disappears, leaving the ritualists with a unique token in its place that represents ownership of the box and its contents.

On Sunday afternoon, beginning at 1 pm, representatives of the City of Gold and Lead will come to the Hall of Worlds and meet with the covens who have submitted boxes via the ritual. They will have used the peculiar temporal mechanics of the Autumn realm to seek offers for the contents of each box, and will present them to the magician who presents the appropriate token. There will often be some leeway for negotiation depending on the nature of the offer, and it is entirely possible that not everything in the box will be considered for trade, or an agreement reached for only part of the contents.

If an agreement can be reached, the heralds will return the box and the agreed on price for its contents. If an agreement cannot be reached, the box will be returned along with whatever the magicians had put in it. Obviously, the magicians will need to bring the token that marks them as the owner of the box. If they do not, the heralds will not deal with them.

In the event a box is not claimed for whatever reason (the token has been lost, or nobody arrives to bargain with the heralds), the heralds will claim the items sent and arrange for payment to be sent to the caster of the ritual later. (OOC Note: In this case, an appropriate payment will be added to the one of the caster's inventories and the box and any props will be put in lost property.)

The best things to trade using this ritual are game items such as materials or coins, ribboned items such as magic items (provided the physrep will fit in the box of course - it is impractical to fit a one-handed weapon or a suit of armour in an 8" square container), lammied items such as potions or other consumables, or items with cards such as herbs or artisan's oil. Examples of things that are usually ignored by the City of Gold and Lead are unribboned and unlammied food and drink, ribbons that have expired or that expire at the end of the current event, ribbons without appropriate phys-reps attached, unribboned props, and written items such as scrolls or notes that do not have a ribbon ID on them.

This ritual is sometimes used to arrange unique trades with the City of Gold and Lead, other Autumn eternals, or mortal magicians who have negotiated a deal with Ephisis or her heralds. In this case, there will usually be a token that can be placed in the box to indicate that the contents are part of a specific deal. For example, in the past there have been cases where including specific items and something marked with the Lann rune results in a pre-arranged exchange. These are invariably related to opportunities.

Guidance

• The City provides guidance on what citizens might hope to expect if they offer goods up for sale or purchase

Commodity	Ephisis Buys	Ephisis Sells
Ingots and Measures	High	Very High
Wains	Low	Average
Food and Drink	Very Low	Not Available
Common Trade Goods	Very Low	Low
Unique Trade Goods	Very High	High
Artefacts	High	Not Available
Storied Artefacts	Variable	Not Available
Storied items	Variable	Not Available
Newly made Magic Items	Low	Average
Exhausted Magic Items	Zero	Not Available
Mana Crystals	Average	Average
Autumn Vis	Very Low	Low
Other Vis	Very Low	Very High
Herbs and Liao	Low	High
Common Potions	Very Low	High
Drugs and Narcotics	Low	Low

The City of Gold and Lead will always offer a price for something, provided they can find a buyer for it, but some commodities and resources are in high demand in the City and should fetch a good price, while others are not. Some things are nearly worthless - even if the City offers a price for them, it will be a matter of a few rings at best. Exhausted magic items are completely worthless as they have no value, so the City can offer nothing in exchange for them.

The prices offered by the City are influenced by local market prices, but they are not set by them. The City of Gold and Lead takes the goods sold to them in Ephisis boxes and sells them on elsewhere, either to other cities in the Iron Labyrinth or to other locations in the mortal world. Ultimately the price they are prepared to offer is set by what the heralds believe they can get for the resources they acquire and not by prices in Imperial markets. Offers may be influenced by the value of goods at Anvil - the heralds may lower their offer if they believe they can offer less and still make a deal.

Some merchants are surprised to discover they are being offered a price for their goods below what they could get in Anvil, but that is to be expected. If Imperial traders are offering goods from all over the Empire, then it's perfectly normal that the heralds won't always be able to match local prices for everything.

The City publishes guidance for the various resources and commodities they are commonly offered. The first column indicates the price at which Ephisis will attempt to buy goods they are offered - it is the price a merchant might hope to get when selling goods to Ephisis. The second column indicates the level of prices the City would demand if offering to sell goods to Imperial merchants at - which can be useful if a merchant is seeking payment for their own goods in that currency. There is never a guarantee of profit - these ratings are comparative to each other, not comparative to Anvil prices.

The published guidance is good for small volumes of materials - huge bulk offers will usually distort the market resulting in lowered prices. If a merchant puts 500 mithril in their box and sends it to Ephisis they can expect to be offered less per wain than a citizen offering to sell 5 mithril.

Ingots and Measures

• Ingots and measures fetch good prices in the City of Gold and Lead

Ingots and measures, including ingots of ilium are always valuable in the Autumn realm, because the heralds can sell them to agents of the Sovereign Lord of the City of Fire and Stone. For that reason, it is rare for the City to offer such materials and merchants looking to acquire them from the City should expect to pay handsomely for them.

Wains

• Wains are on offer for sale or purchase whenever the City believes it can make a profit

Wains of Materials, while valuable within the Empire, are harder for the autumn realm to trade to other lands, as the bourse certificates represent large amounts of materials sitting in Imperial warehouses. While the City regards bourse certificates as a wonder of the world, they only function perfectly within the Empire. The further you travel from the Empire's borders, the more value they lose. The city's heralds will buy or sell wains, but only when they believe the price favours them - which usually means they will only buy at a price below the highest sale price in Anvil. Sales are a little easier, since heralds are always looking to dispose of bourse certificates they have acquired in the Empire where they can, so citizens looking to buy wains are encouraged to try their hand.

Food, Drink and Services

• These goods hold no value to the City

Food and drink spoil quickly in the City of Gold and Lead - they cannot be placed in vaults and held until a customer is found without hiring the expensive services of experts from another City. For this reason, they are worthless to the Invisible Hand. Likewise, offers of services are not currently of value, the City trades in goods - while they appreciate that an offer of services in the future has value, it is not a market they trade in. In all cases, the City requests that Imperial merchants do not put these things into an Ephisis box.

Common Trade Goods

• Goods readily available for purchase in foreign ports are in low demand in the City

Imperial fleets often acquire unusual goods in foreign ports, such as Oilybrag, which can be bought in Zemeh. The City of Gold and Lead has opportunities to trade in all the major cities of the world, so they can already purchase these common trade goods at the same price Imperial merchants paid for them. As a result heralds rarely offer good prices for these goods - Imperial merchants should be better off disposing of them at Anvil rather than trying to sell them to the Autumn realm. It is only worth sending them to the City of Gold and Lead if you need to dispose of them at any price.

Unique Trade Goods

• Unique goods produced in the Empire command a high price the first time they are sold
• Unusual or unique goods from difficult to access ports will fetch a good price the first time they are sold

While common trade goods are rarely value, unique trade goods are a different matter. If a trader has goods produced in a foreign port which is difficult to access, or which are unique to the Empire, then they will command a good price. The only problem is that the more of such resources the Empire sells, the less valuable the thing becomes. The first one is unique, the second one is not - so prices rapidly fall off.

Herbs, Potions and Consumables

• The Autumn realm will buy herbs and liao, but rarely if ever offers them for sale
• Most potions command a poor price when offered for sale to the City
• Unusual consumables including drugs and narcotics sell well and offer a chance for a good profit if they are put in a box by themselves

Herbs are always in demand in the Autumn realm, since they can make use of them, but they don't grow well in the realm if at all. For this reason they command a good price when offered for sale to the city, though it is expensive to buy them from the City. Likewise, liao is often in demand; as a refined substance, it keeps well, and the Sumaah - being the only other great power that produces it - only engages in face-to-face deals with the City. Surprisingly, most other potions are not worth offering to the City. It is time-consuming to identify them and most heralds have little interest in trading them on, so they offer only very low prices for them.

Unusual consumables, including drugs and narcotics do sell in the Autumn realm but there are few buyers and that does depress the sale price. The Silent Market, a trading operation in the City can offer a price for them, and will also offer them for sale in the right conditions. Drugs that are illegal in the Empire are usually the most profitable for merchants trading with the City.

The Silent Market, is a trading desk that only deals in unusual items, drugs, narcotics, and storied items. They handle all this trade that comes from the Empire. As a result, these things are always best put in an Ephisis box by themselves so that the Silent Market can assess them and make an offer. Including 20 ambergelt alongside thirty doses of Bite is a recipe for disappointment, because the Silent Market will buy the Bite but they don't want the ambergelt. Their rivals in the City want the ambergelt but not the Bite. Thus the best way for Imperial citizens to get the best possible price is to put drugs, narcotics and storied items in a separate box.

Magical Items

• Permanent magical items with a storied history can fetch an excellent price when sold to the City
• Storied items with history but no actual magic power rarely do so
• Magic items with a year's duration to run have a known value, but
• Magic items that are close to expiring are worthless to the City
• Storied items need to be put in a box by themselves to get the best price

Permanent magical items are valuable throughout the world and the City will always try to offer a good price for them based on the amount of materials needed to create one. When such items have a storied history - that can increase the price significantly, assuming the City knows of a buyer who is in the market for such a curio. Items with history but no notable magical properties are obviously less valuable - but could be worth something to the right buyer. In either case, the price offered by the heralds is highly variable, merchants are welcome to offer them for sale but should be prepared for the possibility of a low offer. Regular magic items with a year's duration to run are worth less than what their ingredients are worth as they have already lost a seasons worth of use - the Autumn realm are unlikely to offer more than this, because they can buy most magic items from the Forgemistress. Items that are close to expiring are as worthless to the City as they are to the mortals trying to dispose of them.

Mana and Vis

• Mana is always in demand all across the world, so crystals fetch reasonable prices in the City
• Autumn vis is produced in large amounts in the Autumn realm and can be had at a good price from the City's heralds
• Vis from other realms often spoils if kept too long in the Autumn realm, so the City rarely offer good prices for large quantities

Mana is the currency of magic, there are even some desperately primitive societies in the world that actually use it in place of money! Most of the city's heralds are currently offering to buy mana crystals for around 24 rings a crystal and to sell it at 26 rings each. Vis can spoil if kept in the Autumn realm too long, so the City has little interest in trading it, unless there is a large outstanding contract to be fulfilled, otherwise heralds will be loathe to buy or sell it. Autumn vis is the one exception - huge amounts are produced in the Autumn realm and can usually be bought for a good price from the City's heralds, but of course, they offer low prices to buy it back.

Assurance

This ritual draws directly on the eternal Ephisis for its power. As with most such rituals, there is an agreement that certain behaviour will cause it to become nonfunctional. Following the Winter Solstice 385YE this assurance was confirmed to be that the Empire must continue to publicly auction as Imperial positions at least one mithril, one weirwood, one white granite, and one ilium Bourse seat each year. Should a calendar year pass (spring through winter) in which no seats of a certain material are auctioned publicly to any Imperial citizen, the ritual would either lose its power or the denizens of the City of Gold and Lead would be freed from their agreement to offer equitable trades. While it is certainly possible for the eternal to empower the ritual again should the assurance be broken, there is no guarantee that it would work the same way it did previously.

Despite the relatively small size, it's possible to fit a lot of valuables in an "Ephisis Box".

Description

This ritual allows magicians to engage in measured trade with the realm of Autumn, specifically with the eternal Ephisis and the denizens of the City of Gold and Lead. These denizens often act as brokers, finding potential buyers from their City, the other cities of their realm, or even mortals who use similar rituals to trade with them. They are known to be scrupulous in their commitment to fair trades - wherever possible, the goods offered are considered to have at least equal value to the goods that have been offered. Sometimes this assessment is unbalanced, most often because of complex economic factors of supply and demand. Some ritualists attempt to influence the counter-offers by including a scroll or letter with the submitted goods, but there is no guarantee that such documents will have any impact.

Common goods offered for past trades using this ritual have included examples of all the special materials known on the Mortal realm, as well as herbs, potions and other preparations (even liao on a few occasions), coins both Imperial and (occasionally) otherwise, magic items (especially talismans), and vis (most often warm ashes but occasionally other kinds as well).

More exotic items reported over the years have included unique substances; unfamiliar potions and narcotics; unique gemstones unknown in the mortal realm; scrolls of unknown ritual magic; deeds of ownership, sometimes Imperial sometimes otherwise; a miraculous mechanical golden bird that whispered prophecies to its owner for seven years before slowly winding down; a copper-and-agate beetle with the ability to diagnose and treat illnesses; and a pair of rings that allowed instantaneous communication with no apparent limitation of distance.

One element that troubles some Imperial citizens is that the City of Gold and Lead seems unbothered by questions of legality. They are equally happy to deal in illegal goods, both accepting them via this ritual and potentially offering them in exchange. This is not a result of ignorance; indeed a herald might cheerfully point out that an item offered in trade is illegal or take steps to ensure that the trade does not attract undue attention. Questions of local legality simply do not seem to concern them in any way.

Some ritualists have bargained with Ephisis for larger containers in which to place goods. For example, the Marcher mage-smith Alan of Cotter's Barn was known to possess a weirwood case 6' long and 2' wide and deep with which he traded the fruits of his crafting with Ephisis. It is also possible to arrange special agreements with Ephisis or her factotums. The League apothecary Helena Jung von Holberg apparently possessed an oak-and-brass potion case, for example, that ensured that trades offered for potions would always involve herbs or other potions.

Once the trade is made, the heralds of the Autumn realm replace the offered contents with the agreed payment, as seen with this box belonging to Freeborn magician Iñez i Azul-Mar i Erigo.

As with Missive for Sadogua and similar eternal-themed rituals, 'Ephisis' Scale' uses a small amount of mana to open a conduit to the eternal in question, allowing a small amount of material to be transferred. The additional magnitudes reinforce or recognise the nature of an agreed pact - in this case that Ephisis or her factotums will consider an object or objects offered in trade and offer something of equal value in return. The Freeborn scholar Serval i Riqueza of the Unfettered Mind, who made a study of several of these rituals, posited that the additional magnitude served as a 'handling fee' for Ephisis, to ensure that the eternal always made a slight profit even when the suggested trade was not accepted.

Almost every other nation, foreign and barbarian alike, has access to some variation of this ritual; the City of Gold and Lead is very keen to facilitate trade with mortals. The nature of the agreement that maintains access to the ritual, and some of the details about how it is performed may vary (sometimes even between different factions within a nation), but the essential ritual seems to be common throughout the known world.

Prior to Summer 385YE, the ritual worked somewhat differently. Trades were arranged in an hour, but there was no capacity for negotiation; the contents of the box were merely "swapped" for other valuables and the ritualists had the choice to accept the offer in its totality or reject it. It is unlikely to be a coincidence that the reassessment of the ritual took place as Imperial magicians performed a potent Autumn enchantment that covered the entire Empire. There was some discussion that the heralds of the City of Gold and Lead wanted to explore different ways to trade with Imperial citizens - and after what was presumably a successful experiment, permanently changed the way the ritual worked starting with the Winter Solstice. Indications from foreign nations such as Jarm, Faraden, and the Commonwealth suggest that their versions of this ritual have been altered in a similar fashion.

This box, belonging to Richardo Glostari di Sarvos, is marked with the Rune of Bargains; the Rune of Conspiracy is often used for boxes employed in more dubious deals.

Common Elements

A box or sack, often of rare woods. fine silk or velvet, is the obvious focus used with this ritual, A coven or ritualist often has a specific container that they favour for use with this ritual, of the standard dimensions. The container is often inscribed with the rune Lann, or sometimes with the rune Queros when used to offer items that are either of dubious legality in the Empire - or even flat out illegal. Sigils representing Prosperity (apples and sheaves of wheat are common, piles of money are often considered a little gauche) or the tools and transportation methods of merchants - weights and scales, ships, wagons, and market stalls. Ink and parchment may be used to write down the exact contents of the box; it is common to draw attention to any special provenance or properties of the offered goods that might otherwise be overlooked.

A dramaturgical ritual commonly takes the form of a scene set in the Counting House, in which a Cup, Coin, or Ring is placed in a container and then becomes the focus of an intrigue, trade, or misunderstanding. Mummers and guisers both are known to favour a broad face full of mistaken identity and confusion where the container ends up in the wrong hands, or is mixed up with other containers; League magicians tend to favour more serious, intrigue-laden plots in which the container gains value due to the lengths rivals are prepared to go to to claim it.

A blood mage is likely to anoint the container with blood donated by a cambion or a respected merchant, with the cut often made at the thumb, the side of the eye, or very rarely the tongue itself. Winding patterns representing the idea of the container passing from hand to hand until it finds someone prepared to offer a fair trade resonate well with the ritual.

It used to be common practice for ritualists who mastered this ritual, and planned to engage in it often, to place a gong, bell or chime next to or on top of the container in which their trade goods were offered. The magic of the ritual caused the gong, bell or chime to ring when the transaction progressed to the next stage. Even with the changes to the way the ritual works, and the trade is made, some ritualists still incorporate such devices into their performance, sounding their gong (or what have you) to indicate the ritual is complete and the spirits of the City of Gold and Lead may lay claim to the enchanted box.