Businesses are divided into several classes of business:

• Agriculture. Any business that is primarily agricultural in nature. Examples include: farming, owning an orchard, or raising animals.
• Retail. This encompases most resale shops stocked with goods that are either imported or made by someone else. Examples include: Furniture shop, fishmonger, imports resale.
• Entertainment. Any establishment related to food, drink, or performance. Examples include: Taverns, theaters, museums.
• Crafting/Construction. This includes all businesses that seek to build or craft items. Examples include: Shipwright, blacksmith, carpenter, brewer, alchemy.
• Maritime. Any business related to to usage of ships. Note: It is not currently possible for players to own ships which can travel beyond the Fog. Examples include: Fishing, whaling, barge services.

All businesses begin as a Class C business. The percentile chart for class C businesses represents the difficulty of getting a new business off the ground, securing supply lines, and other assorted costs.

After six months of running a Class C business, a business automatically becomes a Class B Business.

To advance to a Class A business requires at least one full year of operation, as well as significant investment in the business itself. It might mean that you spent several thousand gold remodeling the kitchen of your tavern, or perhaps you expand your farm to be able to breed horses instead of just growing grain. A DM will work with you on what expanding your business means, and the costs associated.

For buildings, upkeep costs are derived from business type and business class. For ships, Costs are derived by Ship type and fluctuate with the ship upkeep modifier. The upkeep modifier is multiplied by the base upkeep cost of a business.

Upkeep is paid after the percentile roll.

A business may have only one owner. Owners may employ other player characters if they wish, and if so, those employees may work at the business and live at a modest lifestyle for each day worked.

It is possible to gain a bonus or bonuses to the percentile roll for a given month. It is also possible to incur a negative bonus. All time spent working at the business and bonuses to rolls must be declared before the percentile dice is rolled.

Your business requires your personal touch, and you must work at your business for 15 days a month to keep it running smoothly. For each additional day per month you work at your business, you gain a +1 bonus to the percentile roll. For each day less than 15 that you work at your business, you incur a -1 penalty to the roll.

For each 2 gp spent on advertising your business per month, you gain +1 to the roll. The maximum benefit of this bonus is +30.

Each business class also has its own way of generating an additional bonus. If you opt to pay double the upkeep of your business, you may gain +5 on your roll. In terms of theme, this can for example represent better pay for your workers, better food, and longer breaks, better equipment, or the like.

If you are unable to cover the cost of upkeep for a business, you go into debt, and incur a -15 modifier to the percentile roll for the next month. Each additional debt stacks, and also adds a -15 modifier to subsequent rolls, to a maximum of -45.

As your business grows, it is possible that you will run into complications. Business rivals may sabotage your equipment. Perhaps you’ll be robbed, or maybe your fishing boat will sink. Each month, the Dungeon Master will roll to determine if there is a complication, and will let you know what, if anything, the complication entails. The chance for complications increase as the size and complexity of your business increase, and as you go into debt.

Each outstanding debt incurs a -5 penalty to the DM roll made for complications, and debt penalties stack until they are paid off.

Additionally, complications become more likely as you are away from your business. The negative modifier from being away from your business for more than 15 days is also applied to the complication roll made by the DM. So for example, if you are away from your business for an entire month, a complication for a Class A business occurs on a roll of 1-25 instead of 1-10.

Once a business is upgraded to Class A, the type of business also matters for the purposes of determining final profit.

If a profit is made on the percentile roll for a month, that number is multiplied by the type of business to determine the final profit.

If you incur enough debt, it is possible to lose your business. After four consecutive months of not paying upkeep, your business is repossessed by your creditors.

Profitability has no bearing on if you keep your business. So long as you can pay your bills, you can stay in business as long as you wish!

Unlike many downtime rolls, business rolls are not optional. If you adventure at all during a given in game month (real time week), a roll MUST be made for your business. Additionally, making a business roll locks the character for the rest of the adventuring month. For example, if you adventure on Sunday, and make a business roll on Monday over Slack, that character may not be used on Wednesday.

No rolls are made if the business owner has not adventured during a given in-game month (real time week).

Values may change once we get the chance to test all of this out. We appreciate your patience!