Colors: Gold and Silver
Current Guild Leader: Othor Millen, Order of the Coin
Requirements to Join: Sponsorship of a Guildmember, must be able to prove that an industry is needed or a new market is open.
Requirements of Membership: 10% of all profits for the year, must make a profit at least every other year.
Majority Composition: Merchants
Minority Composition: Rogues, Tinkers, Bards, Worshipers of Rissir
On the Guild Council?: No

Of all of the guilds, I found the Merchant’s Guild the hardest to track down. Even the ‘sedentary,’ members are often off in other districts, and there are fewer members than most of the other guilds. The apprentices I found manning the shops were of little help, so it took quite a bit of time to garner real information on the organization.

The purpose of the Merchant’s Guild is simple: make a profit. Most members do not actually produce anything, but distribute goods from one area to another. This is evident in the policy of who is in charge of the guild. Whoever makes the most profit over a ten-year period, and profit or loss is continually documented, is put into the position of power. This leads to many crafty representatives, and the Merchant’s Guild is known for it’s slick talkers. Thus, it is surprising that the Guild is not on the Council, although this may be because when they last had the seat, the replacement was worried that he could not keep his business up and running and dropped out of the race. In the two subsequent elections, neither Guild Leader for the Merchant’s Guild showed much interest in running, but that may change, as the leader for the Guild changes every 10 years.

The Merchant’s Guild seems to have begrudgingly good relations with every guild. By this, I mean that the Merchant’s Guild has good relations, but as members do tend to take advantage of bad situations and be slick talkers, few of them are well liked or trusted by the other councils. The exception to this rule are the Porter’s Guild and the Sailor’s Guild, who earn a good portion of their income from Merchants going across the seas or needing to move goods from place to place.

The Order of the Coin

Unlike any of the other orders of Torodan, the Order of the Coin does not operate without a specifically sanctioned license from the Guildmaster. The Order of the Coin is responsible for the creation and conversion of currency in Torodan, and operates only through specifically licensed and sanctioned coin houses, where currency is taken, standardized, stored, and redistributed. Coin houses are both presses and vaults, holding the reserve currency of Torodan so that it may continue to fuel its economy during a crisis situation, and that it may update and take in new coins. The Order of the Coin works directly with the Miner’s Guild, and often competes lightly with the Order of the Gem for precious metals, although restrictions placed by government policy, practical limitations, and tradition, keep the competition from anything more than light negotiating. The Order Leader, Ms. Yolanda Millen, is the daughter of the Merchant’s Guild’s Guild Leader, and the two of them alternate running a singular coin house while the other is off on business. Despite a split in profits, they are still rich enough to maintain their positions in the Merchant’s Guild, Othor earning slightly more than his daughter due to long-term investments.

The Order of the Trade

Symbol: A silver building on a gold field
Current Order Leader: Zachary Lines
Requirements to Join: Sponsorship
Requirements of Membership: Must maintain work at a currently operating Trading House

Originally created in areas where there were neither enough smiths for the people to fit all of their needs or enough people to justify a market, trade houses and the Order of the Trade were originally created as places where the public could pick up or Order general goods, from weapons and armor to food and drink to horseshoes and explosives, the Order of the Trade has since expanded Trade Houses, creating places where the general population could obtain goods outside of smithies and markets. With smithies often being unavailable and few markets running continuously throughout the week, the Order of the Trade provides valuable and vital service to the people of Torodan, and increases its profits more and more each year, as more and more Trade Houses open up across Torodan, a few even existing in other countries. With each Trade House, merchants are forced to either diversify their markets, their products, or to get out of town, and many traditional merchants see Trade Houses as detrimental to the traditional markets and trading practices of Torodan. Given the few sentiments normally held about “tradition,” in Torodan, particularly by members of the Merchant’s Guild, those who claim this are often thought of as simply whining about the loss of business.

The Order of Travel

Symbol: A silver cart on a gold field
Current Order Leader: Saelin Dars
Requirements to Join: Apprenticeship under a currently operating merchant traveler
Requirements of Membership: 5% of profits must go to the Order, prior to guild profits

The traditional merchants of Torodan are found in the Order of the Travel, and the Order of the Travel is probably the richest single Order in Torodan, member by member as well as the Order itself. Buying and selling everything from scrolls to horseshoes, the Order of Travel’s merchants travel from town to town, buying from known producers of goods and selling them to towns where such goods don’t exist. Responsible for much of the economic prosperity of Torodan, the Order of Travel has maintained the traditional practice of market day, normally on Sunday, when merchants take to the streets, selling their wares to all who come to see them. In the smaller towns, usually only a merchant or two, if any, will show up on market day, and said merchants usually have a variety of low quality goods, with a few higher quality ones. In the larger cities, merchants sell specific goods, with some merchants specializing in lower quality items and bulk purchases, and others specializing in decorative items, and others specializing in high quality goods such as explosives, scrolls, masterworked weapons, and sometimes even mithril.