Adventurer's Guilds

And Why They Make Sense

So, I was talking to my wife and I asked her a simple question: “What’s the most common type of guild you see in D&D?”

“Thief’s,” she replied, naturally.

“In 25 years of gaming together, have you ever encountered any other type of guild in a D&D game?” I asked.

She paused, thought for a second and she furrowed her brow. “Nope.”

“But,” I conjectured, “the mere presence of a Thief’s Guild implies that the guild system itself exists within the setting. So, you should have smith’s guilds, baker’s guilds, mason’s guilds, and so on. Right?”

“Sure,” she shrugged.

“And we have a fantasy world where adventurers are a fact of life. They’re as present in the setting as those thieves, blacksmiths, and bakers. So, naturally, it’s highly likely you’d have an Adventurer’s Guild.”

She nodded in agreement before being tackled by an adorable 3 year old toddler who demanded cuddles. But this got me thinking. How exactly would an Adventurer’s Guild work?

Well, guilds are businesses. So, I started from how does an Adventurer’s Guild make money? Well, guilds make money through dues. A guild member pays into the guild and receives some benefit.

So, let’s say for simplicity’s sake, the PCs join an Adventurer’s Guild. The guild charges 25 gold pieces per year for a membership fee and 10% of all treasure recovered during guild-sanctioned adventures.

Well, now that begs two questions:

First, what benefits does the guild member receive in return for this fee? Second, and more interestingly, what constitutes a “guild-sanctioned adventure?”

Let’s start with the second question first: What constitutes a guild-sanctioned adventure? Well, I thought on this for a while. What if business owners, nobles, and even private citizens could, for a fee, pay the Adventurer’s Guild to post requests. The local teamsters guild gets together, throws some coin into the Adventurer’s Guild coffers and says “Goblins have been harassing a local travel road and delaying, destroying, or raiding our shipments. We’d like someone from the Adventurer’s Guild to address it.”

The Adventurer’s Guild posts the job at their guild hall and an enterprising group of adventurers can attempt to address it. If they succeed, the teamsters are happy, the guild gets some payout from the PCs’ loot and and everyone’s happy. Simple, right?

Well, things get political really fast.

What if a local noble petitions the Adventurer’s Guild to recover their lost crown from a long abandoned temple that’s become overrun by undead. But what if that crown and that abandoned temple are regarded as sacred ground by a local religion and the Church sees undertaking this adventure as an act of blasphemy. Do the PCs take the job, get paid, possibly earn the favor of a noble - but risk the ire of the local church? What if the party’s cleric is of that faith and the rest of the party wants to take the quest?

Things get even more complicated if you have multiple Adventurer’s Guilds across several cities all under the same leadership of one guild master. What if that guild starts strong-arming lesser upstart Adventuring Guilds? What if one guild starts sending in mole adventurers to intentionally fail spectacularly at quests to make a rival guild look bad? What about alliances and rivalries between different adventuring parties within the same guild?

Suddenly adventuring has become a dangerous business in more ways than just one and your campaign has a whole new layer of depth to it.

Now, what do PCs get for being in the Adventurer’s Guild other than a glorified task board? Well, for starters, the Adventurer’s Guild offers room and board for free to any member at the guild hall. This will make it a raucous place filled with all kinds of wonderful NPCs for your world. Not to mention the conversations and information trading that can go on there. It’s a lot easier to find another Magic-User to teach you how to cast Fireball if you both happen to be crashing at the same guild hall and know of one another by reputation.

Next, I’d offer up a discount to any Adventurer’s Guild member who makes purchases from businesses who have paid in to the guild to post their requests. Local blacksmith paying into the Adventurer’s Guild to post requests? Great, now anyone in that Adventurer’s Guild gets 20% off all purchases!

Security is another consideration. The Adventurer’s Guild can act as a bank, like the historic Knights Templar did. Deposit your 10,000 GP haul after slaying that dragon and they give you a voucher so you can withdraw it at another branch of the Adventurer’s Guild. All for a small fee of say 5% of the amount withdrawn. Suddenly, your PCs aren’t salivating for a Bag of Holding quite so much.

Finally, what if instead of paying out to the guild in gold and treasure, the PCs can pay off their 10% fee in equivalent magic items. So, instead of turning over a pouch of gems, maybe they surrender a trio of Potions of Cure Light Wounds. Well, what’s the Adventurer’s Guild gonna do with those potions? Re-sell them, of course! Suddenly you have an in-world reason for the PCs to be able to purchase magic items. In addition, the guild might offer the PCs the opportunity to pay in advance for spellcasting services later. Pay 100 gold pieces now, and you get a coupon for one Cure Light Wounds spell usable at any of our Adventurer’s Guild locations!

Not to mention, you get to give both the guild themselves and the groups they employ cool names! I have to admit, what I used to dismiss as a really dumb idea has become something I may have to employ them more often in future campaigns.