Building (and gaming in) worlds that have infinite resources

[Wordman]

This post takes a bit of time to get to the point. It will start using D&D as an example, but is really a post about world-building, not the specifics of the example. So, please bear with me.

In some games, it is possible to exploit the rules to develop what many call "infinite wealth". One of the more famous of these is the "Wall of Iron trick" in D&D 3.5. The "theory" works like this:

1) Spend 50gp on specific material components.
2) Cast Wall of Iron, generating a permanent, very large wall of iron.
3) Dismantle the wall into chunks of iron and sell them for 25gp per pound.
4) Repeat to gain "infinite wealth".

Most consider such things to be "broken", but in reality what is more broken in this scenario is the economic system being assumed. In a "real" economy, tricks like this wouldn't generate infinite wealth.

One flaw in the theory is, of course, that it assumes that the price of iron stays constant. Naturally, it wouldn't. After just a few iterations, the price of iron would collapse pretty quickly towards zero. It wouldn't hit zero, though. Economists would assume that the market would "reach equilibrium", such that the price for the entire wall of iron would approach the price required to produce and store it (50gp for the whole wall, in this case, minimum). A "rational" caster wouldn't sell it for less.

Another flaw is that the theory assumes a buyer will always exist for the iron. But in any given D&D location, how many buyers will you be able to find for that much iron? It's possible that there would be an endless train of demand, but this is not likely. In other words, it is possible to have "too much iron".

One last flaw is that the theory (and, indeed, the game world) assumes that no one else has ever used the trick before. That is, it starts on the assumption that no other mage has already collapsed the iron market by doing the same thing. This is possible, but unlikely. Economics is essentially built around the idea if something is exploitable, then it has already been exploited, or rapidly will be. (This is the "invisible hand" that make prices "optimal".)

The actual end result of such "exploits" would be a decent amount of wealth for the first caster to try it, but not really much "infinite wealth".

You would, however, have a world that was close to having "infinite iron".

And that is what I want to talk about.

Once you assume that magic can conjure up materials cheaply, if you follow it to its logical conclusion, you get a world with nearly infinite abundance of anything you like. Since there is almost no frame of reference for this in our world, I'd like to hear opinions about what such a world would be like. Also, what would a game set in such a world be like?

Note that there are a few variations on this idea that I'm actually not talking about here.

One of them is the "single commodity abundance". That is, I'm not interested here in a world where, say, only iron is infinite. You might be able to turn this into an interesting game concept, but even our world has examples of this abundance. These days, for example, we essentially have "infinite salt", but this was certainly not always the case, only happening in the last century or so. Interesting, but not what I'm after here.

Another option I don't care about is the "cartel solution", where those with the ability to conjure up stuff keep it very secret and derive wealth and power by controlling the supply. This is also interesting, and could make a good game, but not what I'm going for here. This also happens in the real world; the value of diamonds, a fairly common gem, for example, is maintained largely through control of the supply. Whatever else they might be, such cartels are essentially maintaining the status quo of the economy; I'm looking for worlds that overturn it completely.

So, what really happens in worlds where materials are easily created and/or available to pretty much anyone who wants them?

How does this change the nature of, and reasoning for, war?

What happens to the concept of economic class?

What happens to the concept of labor? What do people actually do in such worlds?

What standard gaming mechanisms fail in such a world? Which continue to work?

[Patrice]

There's the whole issue of where does the materials come from in it. If I take your example, the game system provides a bit of answer when it states the spell as being a conjuration. When you cast a spell to conjure something you don't shape it from the nether, you draw sheer raw power from an elemental plane and you shape it according to your will.

Now the question is more "What would happen if individuals gifted with this capacity were plenty?". What would happen is that currency would change from material to more subtle types. The components might become the currency, because it's the underlying currency anyway. Or maybe control of plane portals would become as important as control of oil wells these days, causing wars and changes in power, raising empires and crumbling them to dust. The empires could be connected to different planes, or they might rely upon the power of their respective conjurers.

People would need a currency, that's my point. The currency would simply change from material to somewhat magical, or the materials of the currency would change but there would be one. Maybe such a withdrawal of elemental energy would cause wars between elemental planes and the world itself.

[chronoplasm]

Sure, raw materials may be infinite, but...
Is man-power infinite?
Is habitable land infinite?

Imagine the following two worlds:
1) There is plenty of food to go around, but the vast population is packed tightly into a very small area surrounded by hostile wasteland.
2) Food just piles up and rots because there is hardly anybody around to eat it. There are more swords than there are warriors to wield them. The land is covered in endless urban sprawls that stretch into the horizon, but most of those buildings bereft of life. The city is populated by things; humans are scarce.

[Bert]

A major point, going back to the iron example, is this: nobody would mine iron.

"No, the dwarves stopped living underground in mines ages ago, not long after the Wall of Iron spell was invented. Now they live in dirty great rusty iron castles."

Mining, refining and smelting iron is resource heavy and a pain in the ass. Everybody with a need for iron would hire a wizard or buy it off a wizard. The wizard would make less than a miner, because they would have lower overheads and competition would be fierce. Iron would be cheap as chips and wizards two-a-penny. This would not lead to infinite iron, because you would only ever create as much as the market requires. However, a craftsman could still make a mint.

If you extend this to other things, you'd end up with a world having no primary production industries. The magical production of food is a good example. Who would bother with endless backbreaking food production when you can read a scroll instead? Now add teleportation to the mix and you lose the entire transport industry as well. Horses. Ships. Roads. It strikes me that a world in which this kind of magic is common you inevitably end up with this kind of situation. Would it be paradise or hell?

Bert

[chronoplasm]

A major point, going back to the iron example, is this: nobody would mine iron.

"No, the dwarves stopped living underground in mines ages ago, not long after the Wall of Iron spell was invented. Now they live in dirty great rusty iron castles."

Mining, refining and smelting iron is resource heavy and a pain in the ass. Everybody with a need for iron would hire a wizard or buy it off a wizard. The wizard would make less than a miner, because they would have lower overheads and competition would be fierce. Iron would be cheap as chips and wizards two-a-penny. This would not lead to infinite iron, because you would only ever create as much as the market requires. However, a craftsman could still make a mint.

If you extend this to other things, you'd end up with a world having no primary production industries. The magical production of food is a good example. Who would bother with endless backbreaking food production when you can read a scroll instead? Now add teleportation to the mix and you lose the entire transport industry as well. Horses. Ships. Roads. It strikes me that a world in which this kind of magic is common you inevitably end up with this kind of situation. Would it be paradise or hell?

Bert

Now imagine this:
What would happen if the magic stopped working?

[Bert]

OMG

If it had been going on long enough nobody would know how to mine, smelt and refine iron. Nobody would know how to grow crops and would probably be revolted by the idea of raising and slaughtering animals for the table. There would be starvation. A world with no roads. No ships. No horses. Nobody would have the faintest concept of geography. The whole world would need exploring again. Libraries, filled with ancient knowledge in dead languages, would suddenly become vastly important - and the few surviving speakers of those languages would have serious status. Things would have to be invented all over a gain. Commonplace articles of the previous age, such as iron weapons, would fast become treasures of immense worth and the object of wonder. It would become a world of isolated city states, each with their own distinctive character.

How amazingly cool is that!

Jerry Pournelle who wrote a book in the 1970's called 'And the magic went away' about a fantasy world where magic suddenly stopped working. I've got it on my bookshelf but haven't got round to reading it. That will change very soon...

Bert

[Vulpinoid]

Back to the original topic at hand...

So, what really happens in worlds where materials are easily created and/or available to pretty much anyone who wants them?

How does this change the nature of, and reasoning for, war?

What happens to the concept of economic class?

What happens to the concept of labor? What do people actually do in such worlds?

What standard gaming mechanisms fail in such a world? Which continue to work?

The essence of storytelling is conflict (and the essence of most games is an attempt to simulate some type of conflict). How would you envision conflict occuring in such a world.

Consider a game like Amber, where the players take on the roles of beings with power unimaginable by mortals. Material possessions fade into insignificance, but concepts like honour, boons and prestige become the lifeblood of the conflict. Characters may have limitless power in certain fields, but they also have slightly less power in fields where their rivals outshine them. One player thrives on producing order, another subverts things through insidious chaos. Everyone has something they need, something that they can't attain for themselves, and this is where they need to interact with others. Once you consider what people need, you start to get a good idea for where the conflicts might arise.

This becomes the essence of the game setting described.

Just some ideas...

V 

[Krippler]

@Bert: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilium/Olympus

[JoyWriter]

When there are no constraints on what can be built, the only problem is when someone else is building where you want to. There is also the question of information; if you have all these raw materials, you still have to shape them, so design becomes very important; favours could be exchanged for inspiring models, that show people how to solve problems they have been having.

There's loads of post-scarcity sci-fi about, but off the top of my head I can only think of the culture books and The Cassini Division. I must be in a Scottish mood!

[Luke]

Would it be paradise or hell?

Would it be paradise or hell?

This, to me, sounds like the premise of a cool fantasy game. It's not that you can create anything for nothing, it's about what this does to the world. How do people live? What's exciting? What's art like?

If you go with the more advanced idea you proposed and take the magic away, you're answering the question for people, depriving them of exploring the choice. You're saying, "I think it's Hell. Here's why." That's far less interesting than letting them decide that this perfect world with all its rules bent of out of shape is, in fact, hell for them, but paradise for other people.

Good games ask questions and leave it up to the player to answer them.

==

Also, to nerd out for a moment: You're assume rational actors all the way down the line. But modern economics knows that people do not always act in a rational manner. First thing I would do in your mad world is going stark raving mad and keep creating walls of iron until I reached the moon. Markets be damned. I want a pile of iron as high as the moon.

[Mikael]

Freemarket is a game about a space station without material scarcity and nowhere to go. If I understand correctly, the currency there is Flow, representing social relevance and goodwill.

[Hasimir0]

A similar situation (abundant if not infinite resources and labor) almost lead to humanity's extinction in Frank Herbert's DUNE.

The idea was:
- advanced technology provided almost endless resources
- it also provided mechanized (robotic) labour

This meant the death of A LOT of "needs" and "talents".
If you have no practical reason to learn a skill, to do a job for living, etc ... then it will be short time before you eskew such knowedge and activities alltogether.
They become pointless!

On the other hand, you still need SOMETHING to do the thing you no longer bother with.
This creates a very strong and deep dependancy.
Pre-Jihad humanity was a very decadent lot

Now, this leads basically to stagnation.
Have you seen "WALLE" ?
In a very childish way that's what you get when you "have everything" ... fat people that don't ever need to actually MOVE to do/have anything ... it's surprising they actually didn't go "full-virtual-paradise"

...

And along HAS to come the screw-up.
Because realistically something HAS to screw up ... that's entropy for you.
Or just take the narrative approach and realize that if nothing went ever wrong it will all be damn boring ... and boredome leads to creatively stupid behaviour ... that in turn screws things up

This is actually the reason behing The Matrix ... remember?
"We tryed giving humand HEAVEN ... it didn't work"

Or ... you become lethally vulnerable.
Space Humans in Asimov's books were so self-sufficient and isolated that they were basically helpless when an external threat reached them ... no one to help you, no one to alert you of the danger, no one to give you ideas different from your own so if YOU were unable to solve a problem it became unsolvable.

Same thing with Herbert's DUNE.
The moment a bunch of bored morons decided to "play war" to have some fun a military AI went zig instead of zag and suddenly Machines almost wiped out Humans
You know, just because no one programmed the fucking robot to stop when the player died ... they kept playing ... and winning.

To go on a fantasy route... ERAGON.
In that universe the magik works on a very applied-force way ... so it is hard to create something from nothing, but it is peach-easy to do something that anyone could do given time and skill.
Elves pro-actively AVOID using magic because otherwise they would be bored to death ... anyone could make a PERFECT sword with magic, but you still get prise and recognitiong if you learn smithing skills and produce a GOOD sword.

In ELDEST someone actually did some economic stuff and screwed up the economy of a whole reign in just a few months ... hey what is the most valuable product "because it requires ginurmous time and skill" ? ... ah, so that's it? cool, I can mass-produce that stuff with magic ... how about this?

...

Bottomline:
- either you accept the "paradise" scenario and shift your attention to other things (honour, fun-hunting, whatever)
- or you start FROM the paradise scenatio and then land the "screw up" on it ... and see what happens