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On page 129 of DMG, the Running the Business chart says "The business covers its own maintenance cost for each of the days. It earns a profit of 1d6 × 5 gp.", for example. I'm a bit confused on this. Specifically:

  1. When it says "each of the days", does it mean each day I spent actively running it, or each day of the month it was operational? So if I only ran it one day, would only 1 day's maintenance be covered, or would my direction make it break even for the month?

  2. When it says "It earns a profit of 1d6 × 5 gp", is that per day that I actively ran it, or for all of the days total? i.e. if I ran it for 30 days, do I make 30d6 × 5gp, or just 1d6 × 5gp?

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    \$\begingroup\$ Hi Anthony--part of your question here is, I believe, answered by this Q&A. (Your last paragraph, basically.) If that's true can you edit that bit out so that answerers can focus on your novel question about whether the rolls represent each day or total time-chunks? And if not, can you edit your post to make clearer how the part about possibly operating at a loss is different from the question I linked? Thanks. \$\endgroup\$
    – nitsua60
    Commented Dec 4, 2017 at 3:04
  • \$\begingroup\$ Related: how much the LMoP could make. \$\endgroup\$
    – nitsua60
    Commented Dec 4, 2017 at 3:06
  • \$\begingroup\$ @nitsua60 I'll move my comment here: It seems like owning a shop, for example, operates at a permanent loss of 2gp/day unless I'm there to man the counter myself. How is that a functioning economy? I would have imagined that each month the business would roll on the D100 chart, regardless of my presence, representing the natural ups and downs of business, and that me actively running the place would increase the odds. But instead if I owned all of the shops in Waterdeep, I'd be broke immediately. \$\endgroup\$
    – Anthony
    Commented Dec 4, 2017 at 6:30

1 Answer 1

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It is not explicitly spelled out, but the intention seems to be that you roll on the Running a Business table every 30 days, regardless of the downtime spent to attend to it personally. I base this on the following two rules:

Maintenance expenses need to be paid every 30 days. (DMG 127)

the number of days spent on this downtime activity (maximum 30) (DMG 129)

There would be no reason to limit the number of days invested otherwise. Also there would be no rules covering the days you left the business alone. So the answers are:

  1. Every day of the month it was operational.
  2. Profits are for one whole month.
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  • \$\begingroup\$ That sounds reasonable to me. Thanks Szega! \$\endgroup\$
    – Anthony
    Commented Dec 5, 2017 at 4:30
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    \$\begingroup\$ Cost per day for shops is 2gp(pays for skilled hireling), DMG page 127. Average shop will lose 10.75gp per 30 days with owner spending zero days of downtime working there. This DOESN'T cover your living expenses unless you live in "Poor" conditions PHB 159. At 30 downtime days, if you buy your own shop and run it while living "poorly" it takes 20 years before you can buy a simple house and you'll NEVER own a house if you pay TAXES! This playtester says you don't have to spend 30 days, you can just spend 1, and if so hunting lodges & farms are best. blogofholding.com/?p=6738 \$\endgroup\$
    – xsithos
    Commented Jun 13, 2018 at 4:06

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