I have to admit the 'Wealth' system is a bit weird, and doesn't really seem to have been thought through properly. It would work if wealth is never important or a motivating factor, but then adventures like the ones in the rule book go and insist on having a situation where the PCs may or may not want to pay for the spells that a NPC can cast. This is a bit of a no-brainer, unless money is a constraint or motivating factor for the PCs.
Under the rules given there (i.e. pay 1 point of wealth ability), a stickpicker and the Lunar Emperor have equal ability to afford the spell. Which kind of hits my suspension of disbelief below the belt.
I'm toying with the idea of allowing wealth to be run as an extended contest, for those characters that care about it (e.g. merchants, farmers struggling for a living, kings planning a military campaign). This would be like the example in the rule-book of a character wooing a wife over the course of a whole campaign.
In other words, you start out with a number of wealth action points (WAPs) equal to your wealth ability rating. You can win or lose these points in suitable contests, and the total carries over until the end of the episode (or maybe campaign, in the case of the king). If you run out before then, you are broke. If you end up with more WAPs than wealth skill at the end of an adventure, you can pay a hero point to fix your wealth rating at the corresponding level.
If you play a character that doesn't worry about wealth, you just use the unmodified wealth system, in quick contests only.
Richard
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