Found by the Wish Well in Wizard City Hexcrawl.
Cruel as Wizard City is, it is not without minute capacity for empathy for the plight of the impoverished. Historically, when the number of wizards in poverty achieves critical mass the city tends to boil over into rebellion, and rebelling wizards are particularly hazardous for capital.
So, after the Second Giant Fist Rebellion of 579, a process was instituted for residential districts to shoulder virtually all the responsibility of assisting the poor... Which naturally gravitated towards the lowest bidder. Districts periodically form assemblies constituting of various property owners to auction off the assignment of handling poor wizards short on magic, known as Poor Auctions. Anyone can partake in these Auctions, provided they can convince the assembly that they're actually doing what they say they'll be doing... Or sometimes not. (Exploitation and fraud are common in these auctions. Nobody's brought them to Suit Court yet, though.)
The resources and facilities provided by these Poor Auctions, while technically free, are notoriously inadequate and inhumane. Anyone can access them, provided they seem impoverished enough.
WHAT ACCOMODATIONS FOR THE MAGICALLY IMPOVERISHED?
d12 | Eating... | Clothing... | Living In... | Medical... | Funeral... |
1 | Transmuted Krill | A used bath towel | An Enlarged Hand-Me-Down Shoe | One shot of cheap whiskey per night. | Thrown in the river. |
2 | Table scraps, like a dog. | Conspicuous bright orange jumpsuit | A lowest-bidder poorhouse | The communal bandages and splints. | Tossed in the Bottomless Pit. |
3 | Whey. Nothing but whey. | Bloodstained smock | An extradimensional closet. | Whatever gets scavenged from The Junk Pile | Fed to stray dogs. |
4 | One half-loaf of moldy bread per day. | Amateur avant garde rejected prototype jerkins | A sewer junction | Whatever gets scavenged from Surgeon Row | Doubled up into an already occupied grave. |
5 | Thin watery gruel. | Clownishly oversized pantaloons | A sweatshop | Free test samples from medical companies. | Shredded into plant fertilizer. |
6 | As many roasted rats as you can catch. | Regulation army surplus underwear | The Poor House | Expired serums. | Zombified for work detail. |
7 | Compacted cockroach protein bars. | Bags N’ Rags | Inexplicable trash cave | “Nothing a little fire won’t cure!” | Donated to science. |
8 | Anything Soup | Reject ‘Intelligent’ Clothing | A decent cage, as far as cages go | Free amputations. | Adorn a serial-killer’s trophy room. |
9 | The leftover sticks from Meat-On-A-Stick | A single leaf for modesty | Literal house of cards | Someone shouts at you to ‘just feel better’ | Buried in the Junk Pile. |
10 | Gruel cut with sawdust | Newspaper toga | Gingerbread lean-to (doubles as food!) | A bucket full of anti-louse powder | Catapulted into another district. |
11 | Grass clippings mixed in water | Louse powder and a burlap sack | A whale’s mouth | Cold showers | Rendered into luxury soap. |
12 | Get your own food! | Two tank tops | Not-So-Horrible Black Void™ | Medical, what medical?? | Properly buried, but nobody cares to recall their name. |
> Someone shouts at you to ‘just feel better’
ReplyDeleteAh, just like Boarding School
I think this table needs a 13th entry. "Prayer" all across the board.
ReplyDeleteThis is so horrible that it loops around into hilarity.
ReplyDeleteWhat gets transmuted into the krill?
ReplyDeleteOr rather, what *doesn't*? Pretty sure the fifth column might be involved...
Oh no! Bodies are way too valuable to become krill. Flesh is always in high demand from biomancers and necromancers. Things become krill that wouldn't even make it into a sausage.
Delete