The Butcher, the Baker, the Candlestick Maker: Part I

Annibale Carracci's "Butcher's Shop" (1580)

Most fantasy settings include something so fundamental that many people miss it and its ramifications. That is that the extraordinary has always been a part of the setting. Therefore, the unusual should influence even the most “ordinary” aspects of a setting. A series of three articles will describe “mundane” shops – the butcher, the baker and the candlestick maker – each touched by the fantastic and each shop may add some flavor to your game. This article describes the butcher shop while other articles in this series will describe the baker and candlestick maker shops.

Rudkus’s Fantastical Meats & More

A charming young man operates this butcher shop, which buys and sells both mundane and fantastical meats.

What People Know

A character knows the following information about Rudkus Meats with a successful Streetwise skill check.

• DC 14: One of several butcher shops in the city, Rudkus Meats provides decent cuts at good prices.
• DC 16: Upton Rudkus, who owns and operates the shop, is good at his job and a proud member of the city’s butchers’ guild. A deeply ethical butcher, he is prone to go on and on about how much the guilds do for “the little guy.”
• DC 18: The butcher hires adventures to procure rare and exotic meats for sale in his shop, such as cuts of wyverns and hydras.
• DC 20: Rudkus is something of a lothario, giving a discount in sales (or good purchase prices) to women. This has made a number of husbands jealous, potentially murderously so.

The Butcher’s Shop

Located close to a large market in the city’s commercial district, a two-story brick affair houses Rudkus Meats. The meticulously clean shop and workplace are on the ground floor and Rudkus’s private residence is on the second floor.

A friendly man, Rudkus himself (half-elf male, 6th level Ranger, Good) will be selling or purchasing meat, butchering a carcass or cleaning the shop during a business day. He keeps a list of prices for the purchase and sale of meats posted on a wall in the shop.

Monster Meat

Rudkus purchases (usually for half its sale price), and sells meats from a wide variety of sources. The prices below are listed per pound, and characters must eat at least a 1/2 pound per serving for their to be any beneficial effects. The effects of eating multiple servings of monster meat does not stack.

Basic Animals (5 sp/lb)

• Basic animals include cow, dog, fish, goat, horse, pig, sheep and wild game, such as bear, deer, moose and rabbit. Other than nourishment, these meats offer no special effects.

Macetail Behemoth Mincemeat (Level 1 Monster Meat; 25 gp/lb.)

• Consuming this fatty meat temporarily grants increased physical force.
• Power (Consumable * Natural) Standard Action. Eat this meat and gain +1 to melee attacks until the end of the encounter.

Owlbear Cube Steak (Level 1 Monster Meat, 50 gp/lb.)

• Eating this oily meat briefly grants improved physical durability.
• Power (Consumable * Natural) Standard Action. Eat this meat and gain +1 to Fortitude saving throws until the end of the encounter.

Bulette Sausage (Level 1 Monster Meat, 50 gp/lb.)

• Consuming this dry meat temporarily grants a special and acute sense.
• Power (Consumable * Natural) Standard Action. Eat this meat and gain tremor sense until the end of the encounter. The character can perceive creatures and objects within range and in contact with the ground or another shared surface (such as a web or water) as if it has line of sight, without needing to make a Perception check.

Wyvern Steak (Level 4 Monster Meat, 50 gp/lb.)

• Eating this learn meat briefly grants durability special resistant to harm and damage.
• Power (Consumable * Natural) Eat this meat and gain +2 to saving throws against poison until the end of the encounter.

Fen Hydra Chops (Level 4 Monster Meat, 75 gp/lb.)

• Consuming this gamey-flavored meat temporarily makes one more nimble.
• Power (Consumable * Natural) Eat this meat and gain +2 to melee Reflex saving throws until the end of the encounter.

Butcher’s Work

Harvesting meat from any creature is a skill challenge, requiring one success per 10-pounds of meat successfully harvested while a failure means 10-pounds of meat is lost. It is usually possible to Take 10 when butchering a carcass. Unless somehow preserved fresh meat will spoil in two days. The type of the creature determines the particular skill required for harvesting meat from its carcass.

The level of the creature determines the DC for harvesting meat from its carcass.

The size of the creature determines the maximum amount of harvestable meat.

Example

A fen hydra (large size creature) possesses 250-pounds of potentially harvestable meat. Butchering the carcass would require a Nature skill check (natural beast), at DC 15 (level 12) and 25 successful checks would be required to harvest all the meat.

Adventure Hooks

• Hunting: Rudkus hires the (low level) PCs procure wyvern meat and return it while it is still edible.
• Anthropophagy: Rudkus is a thoroughly ethical man by the standards of his profession. He suspects another butcher to be guilty of selling the meat of sentient creatures (humans, elves, orcs, etc.) which is illegal in the city and Rudkus asks the PCs to investigate.

Edited by Jonathan Jacobs