Gift of the Wily Broker

Rules

Performing the Ritual

Performing this ritual takes at least 2 minutes of roleplaying. The character who controls the target business must be present throughout.

This ritual is an enchantment. A target may only be under one enchantment effect at a time.

Effects

The target business provides additional wealth over the next season, in addition to normal production.

At the start of the next season the target business provides one dose of liao; one ingot each of orichalcum, tempest jade, weltsilver and green iron; one measure each of iridescent gloaming, ambergelt, dragonbone and beggar's lye; and one dram each of the herbs Imperial Roseweald, Marrowort, Bladeroot, True Vervain and Cerulean Mazzarine.

The effect lasts until the start of the next Profound Decisions Empire event. If the owner of the resource does not attend the next event, then the additional production provided by the resource is still added to that character's inventory.

Additional Targets

This ritual can affect additional businesses in the same territory. Each additional business increases the magnitude by 12. The character who controls each business must be present throughout the ritual.

Description

As with rituals such as Rivers of Gold and The Lure of Distant Shores, this enchantment subtly influences the flow of trade, gently warping the effects of chance and synchronicity to encourage people to visit, and spend time in, the target business. Rather than directly improving profits, however, the ritual manipulates chance to provide the owner with a range of valuable goods that can be used for a variety of purposes or sold-on at a profit.

As the name implies, the ritual is popular with Navarr brokers who use it to improve their options when it comes to arranging small trades. It is also popular in The League - but much more with mountebanks then members of the troupes. It allows the streetwise mountebanks to accumulate useful materials for their various schemes, and supports their images of themselves as clever traders and experts at acquisition. They tend to call it Gift of the Cunning Mountebank.

Common Elements

This ritual attracts wealth and opportunity, and the performance is often accompanied by coins and other precious items. In The Marches and The Brass Coast, coins taken from the previous season's profit are often used as a way to 'prime' the enchantment and attract more wealth, while in The League the ritual often involves complex echanges of masks, items or symbols - often combining sleight-of-hand with disingenuous invocations. The rune Pallas is often evoked, but so are subtle rune of plots and the serendipitous rune of chance. Symbols of Prosperity are also common, often with an invocation highlighting the rewards of clever trade rather than hard work.

.. so then I traded him a handful of bladeroot for two bottles of beggar's lye, but on my way back to my digs, I bumped into Lupo who was after losing some tattoos quick-smart for some reason, and he offered to trade me some orichalcum ingots he'd come across in return for one of the bottles, but I'd need to collect them myself for Lucia. I said yes of course - any excuse to visit Lucia's place, and while I was there we got talking and I let her keep most of the orichalcum in return for an invitation to the Bishop's big feast, and that all got very interesting because that Navarr fellow - you know the one, the trader - was there and wanted to talk ambergelt. I've never had much use for the stuff but I know Thierry was after some for a wand, so we made an arrangement and he tipped me some of the yellow stuff and a few coins but while I was leaving the Bishop wanted to know what the Navarr wanted and I asked him for the anointing of Ambition, cheekily like - he said he was too busy but he gave me a pot of liao to get it done myself - I reckon there was more going on with the broker than I'd understood, there usually is. So there I was with my satchel filled to bursting, in the rain down by the river - and I'd only gone out to look into some true vervain for Maria ... which I did get hold of, true, but ... well there's a bit more story to go, and the next bit happens when I'd got back to the shop to find three Iron Tide fellows with long faces and a tale of woe involving magic swords and green iron and a pouch of tempest jade and dragonbone they'd picked up in the east ..."