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Generic Merchant

Role: Trader, broker, fixer, information conduit
Threat Layer: Intentional → Political
Design Goal: Socially resilient, economically dangerous, physically fragile

Merchants survive by remembering, leveraging, and redirecting risk.
They do not win fights. They win aftermaths.

Attributes

Attribute Sum: 9 (competent professional, non-physical)

Attribute Value Justification
Vigor 1 Sedentary, avoids danger
Finesse 1 Not athletic
Will 2 Long-term planning, memory
Cunning 2 Quick thinking, reading situations
Presence 2 Social presence, credibility
Influence 1 Short-term persuasion
Sorcery — None (usually)

This spread makes merchants hard to corner socially, easy to intimidate physically, and very good at surviving negotiations.

Skills

Merchants are specialists in people, value, and leverage.

Core Skills

  • Negotiation (Influence): Apprentice (+4)

  • Society (Presence): Apprentice (+4)

  • Con (Cunning or Presence): Novice (+2)

  • Crafting (Cunning) or History (Will): Novice (+2)

Optional Skill (pick one):

  • Skullduggery (+2)

  • Performance (+2)

  • Strategy (+2)

  • Discipline (+2)

Untrained skills: +0

Fixed Social Benchmarks

Merchants should almost always use fixed values unless a PC is actively pressing them.

  • Routine negotiation over price or terms
    12.5 + Influence 1 + Negotiation 4 ≈ 17.5
    → Treat as 16

  • Resisting manipulation or bad deals (Discipline untrained)
    12.5 + Presence 2 + 0 ≈ 14.5
    → 14

  • Reading social context (Society)
    12.5 + Presence 2 + Society 4 ≈ 18.5
    → 16–18, depending on familiarity

  • Lying casually or omitting truth (Con)
    12.5 + Cunning 2 + Con 2 ≈ 16.5
    → 16

Merchants lie the way guards intimidate: professionally.

Equipment

  • Ledger(s), contracts, seals

  • Coin, trade goods, samples

  • Personal guards or good relationships with guards

  • Letters of credit, favors, or debts

The ledger is more dangerous than any weapon.

Health

Uses standard PC wound rules.

Merchants:

  • Avoid physical conflict

  • Yield early under threat

  • Retaliate later through influence

A wounded merchant creates ripples, not revenge swings.

Behavioral Doctrine

Default Posture

  • Polite

  • Curious

  • Guarded

Merchants always ask why before asking how much.

Under Pressure

  • Stall

  • Redirect

  • Offer alternatives

  • Promise future solutions

They buy time instinctively.

Disengage Triggers

  • Direct violence

  • Reputation damage

  • Legal exposure

  • Loss of plausible deniability

They flee situations, not rooms.

What Merchants Punish

  • Bad faith

  • Unreliable partners

  • Public embarrassment

  • Disruption of trade routes

Punishment is indirect:

  • price changes

  • missing goods

  • rumors

  • closed doors

What Merchants Reward

  • Reliability

  • Discretion

  • Repeat business

  • Useful information

Merchants remember names longer than faces.

Scaling the Template

Small-Town Trader

  • -1 Cunning

  • Negotiation fixed 14

  • Strong local ties, weak reach

Guild Merchant

  • +1 Will

  • Strategy (+2)

  • Access to institutional pressure

Black Market Broker

  • +1 Influence

  • Skullduggery (+4)

  • Violence nearby, never personal

Merchant vs Guard vs Militia

Aspect Guard Militia Merchant
Power Legal Violent Economic
Memory Long Short Very long
Escalation Procedural Emotional Strategic
Violence Controlled Explosive Avoided
Retaliation Open Chaotic Invisible

This triangle is extremely stable for world-building.

GM Guidance

  • Merchants turn success into opportunity.

  • Merchants turn failure into cost.

  • Merchants make consequences linger.

If players solve a problem loudly, the merchant notices.
If they solve it quietly, the merchant remembers.

Design Summary

  • Physically weak

  • Socially durable

  • Politically dangerous

Merchants are how small actions gain weight.