Economic Impact
FROM THE KORRANBERG CHRONICLE — Business Section, 997 YK: "The question is not whether the war was expensive. The question is who paid for it and who profited from it. The answers to those two questions are not, as a rule, the same people."
The Last War reshaped the economy of Khorvaire in ways that a single treaty could not undo. A century of wartime production, diverted trade, and shifting borders produced artificial booms in some sectors and deep, uneven collapse in others. Certain families and factions grew rich. Far more were left in poverty, debt, or ruin. The Treaty of Thronehold brought an end to the fighting, but the economic instability it inherited from a hundred years of conflict remains the defining condition of postwar Khorvaire — and two years after the treaty, the recovery has barely begun.
The Houses in the War
The dragonmarked houses occupy an unusual position in any accounting of the war's economic history: for most of them, the Last War was a period of vigorous growth. Ostensibly neutral, the houses sold services and materiel to every nation involved in the conflict, and their unique monopolies — enforced by the dragonmarks themselves, which cannot be replicated by any other institution — made them indispensable to all sides simultaneously.
House Cannith manufactured arms, arcane equipment, warforged, siege staffs, and blast disks, its gorgon-marked forgeholds using streamlined production to supply every nation that could pay. House Orien managed the movement of troops and supplies across the lightning rail network, and its couriers and caravans provided the logistical backbone for campaigns that could not rely on rail alone. House Sivis provided secure communications through its speaking stone network and message stations, linking officer corps and crown ministers across the continent. House Kundarak, the dwarven banking house, underwrote war loans and held national treasuries in its iron-warded vaults — the Mror Holds' refusal to take sides in the conflict gave Kundarak the credibility to serve as a neutral financial intermediary, and the house's contracts with every belligerent made it, in effect, the bank of the war. House Lyrandar ran the elemental galleons that moved supplies by sea and, in the war's final years, the airships that promised to transform logistics entirely. House Jorasco healed the wounded on every front, its griffon-marked healers charging for services that no army could do without. House Deneith provided mercenary forces through its Blademark Guild, selling soldiers to nations that needed more bodies than their own populations could provide.
For each of these houses, the war years were, in many respects, the most lucrative in their history.
Nations desperate for supplies or enchanted assets granted the houses long-term contracts and concessions — some of which remain legally binding two years after the Treaty of Thronehold. This dynamic entrenched the houses as extranational corporate powers increasingly difficult for any single nation to regulate or challenge. The Korth Edicts — which had once given united Galifar meaningful leverage over the houses, barring them from owning land, holding noble titles, or maintaining standing armies — were designed for a kingdom that no longer exists. No fragmented successor state can afford to enforce them. A crown could win or lose territory; a house simply continued operating across the new border.
But the houses were not untouched by the war. House Cannith suffered particularly sharp losses near the conflict's end. The Mourning destroyed its headquarters in Cyre, along with many of its foundries, its leadership, and its most advanced research facilities. The Treaty of Thronehold forced the house to dismantle the creation forges that had produced the warforged — its most profitable product line, eliminated by treaty. Worst of all, the destruction of Cyre left Cannith without a recognised central leadership, fracturing the house into three semi-independent branches — Cannith East under Zorlan d'Cannith in Korth, Cannith South under Merrix d'Cannith in Sharn, and Cannith West under Jorlanna d'Cannith near Fairhaven — that remain in uneasy competition. Despite this, the house's combined revenue has increased for six consecutive quarters, driven by sustained demand for reconstruction materials and its monopoly on warforged maintenance services. The war destroyed Cannith's head office. It did not destroy Cannith's customer base.
The war also drove a permanent schism within House Phiarlan, when the conflicts of interest inherent in serving multiple warring nations simultaneously — gathering intelligence for all of them through its Serpentine Table while maintaining the appearance of a neutral entertainment house — led to the breakaway formation of House Thuranni in 972 YK. Even wealth, in Khorvaire's last century, came with costs.
"My house built the modern world. Orien may drive the lightning rail, but it's Cannith who builds the cars and lays the stones it travels on. Cannith makes the everbright lanterns that hold the night at bay. Smith, carpenter, alchemist — the best all carry my seal." — Baron Merrix d'Cannith
Wartime Inflation and Profiteering
Years of sustained military spending put enormous pressure on the economies of the Five Nations. Governments extended credit, drew down reserves, and made long-term material commitments that assumed eventual victory — a victory that, in the end, came for none of them. As wars dragged on past any reasonable projection, the costs were passed down the supply chain and ultimately onto civilians through rising prices and diminished availability of basic goods. Merchants and nobles used letters of credit drawn on the reserves of Kundarak's dwarven banks for large transactions, but most day-to-day commerce used coins of precious metal — and as the war continued, the purchasing power of those coins eroded.
Where scarcity created opportunity, profiteers followed. Price manipulation, bribe-based supply chains, and engineered regional shortages allowed certain merchants, quartermasters, and trading companies to accumulate significant wealth while civilians rationed or went without. Arms dealers with connections to multiple national militaries were particularly well-positioned; they could play competing governments against each other to drive up contract values. Few of these individuals faced meaningful accountability, especially in nations where wartime profiteers had become embedded in government advisory roles or held significant debt over crown ministries.
The dragonmarked houses occupied a more ambiguous position. Their contracts were generally legitimate and their pricing defensible under wartime conditions — a house that charges the same rate to every customer is not, technically, profiteering — but the structural effect was the same: the house grew richer and more indispensable while the nations that depended on them grew correspondingly weaker and more indebted. Cyre's tragic arc illustrates this dynamic perfectly: the nation that funded more of Cannith's warforged research than any other was eventually outbid for its own creation when Cannith sold those same warforged to Cyre's enemies at standard rates.
LEDGER ENTRY — recovered from a war-surplus dealer's records, Wroat, 997 YK: "12 Aryth: Purchased lot of 200 Aundairian force-blast wands (surplus, minor cosmetic damage) — 14 gp/unit. 15 Aryth: Sold 80 units to Brelish Crown Quartermaster at 35 gp/unit. 19 Aryth: Sold remaining 120 units through intermediary to unnamed Karrnathi buyer at 42 gp/unit. Net profit: 8,440 gp. Note: Neither buyer knows about the other. Recommend maintaining this arrangement."
Postwar Economic Collapse
The end of the war left most nations deeply in debt, with large standing armies, disrupted agricultural sectors, and no clear transition plan for a peacetime economy. State-run foundries that had operated continuously for decades suddenly had no contracts to fill. Entire towns built around military logistics — transport hubs, repair depots, provisioning centres — found themselves without purpose almost overnight. The surplus of returning veterans created additional pressure on labour markets already strained by a century of population loss.
The warforged presented their own category of postwar disruption. Created by House Cannith as tireless soldiers, they were granted freedom under the Treaty of Thronehold — but freedom without land, accumulated savings, recognised legal status in practical terms, or any particular social infrastructure to receive them. The sudden presence of thousands of warforged in civilian economies, competing for work in the same trades they had previously served as military labour, generated friction that remains unresolved. In Karrnath and Thrane, warforged labour under conditions of near-indentured servitude. In Breland, warforged in the Cogs districts of Sharn work foundry shifts for maintenance rather than wages. Unscrupulous employers have found that beings designed to follow orders and unfamiliar with the concept of refusal are easy to exploit.
The destruction of House Orien's lightning rail line through what is now the Mournland cut the most direct ground transport route across central Khorvaire. The wondrous system that once linked the far reaches of the kingdom is now divided into eastern and western circuits, with no conductor-stone path running through the dead zone. Baron Kwanti d'Orien has spent the years since the Treaty attempting to raise funds for rebuilding, so far without success. Reestablishing the line is often discussed in the halls of power, but formidable challenges — the Mournland's unpredictable magical effects, the cost of laying new conductor stones, the question of who would protect a rail line running through a wasteland — have prevented any progress. The gap leaves an invisible tax on the recovery of every nation the line once served, forcing detours and increasing costs for goods moving between east and west.
Breland and Aundair have both attempted reconstruction programmes, with mixed results. Aundair contends with the permanent loss of the Eldeen Reaches — agricultural land that seceded during the war and whose independence was ratified at Thronehold — and the Crying Fields, a region along the Thrane border permanently scarred by battle magic and haunted by restless spirits. Karrnath, which suffered the most severe food crises of any nation during the war, experienced another significant famine as recently as 996 YK, caused by a combination of an early winter and governmental mismanagement, with hoarding by regional warlords making things worse — proof that the infrastructure which failed the nation during wartime has not yet been adequately rebuilt. The Code of Kaius mandates rationing that the populace accepts as a matter of national discipline, but discipline does not grow food.
FROM THE SHARN INQUISITIVE — Letters to the Editor, 997 YK: "Sirs: My foundry in Ashblack has laid off sixty workers since the treaty was signed. Cannith's military contracts are gone. The reconstruction contracts they promised haven't materialised. I have warforged applying for the positions my human workers held, offering to work for maintenance costs instead of wages. I do not blame the warforged. I blame whoever decided to create a tireless labour force and then free it into an economy with no jobs. The treaty freed the warforged. It did not free the rest of us from competing with them." — Unsigned, Ashblack district, Sharn
The Rise of Black Markets
Weakened borders, overwhelmed law enforcement, and a continent full of surplus military equipment created ideal conditions for black markets to flourish. The war had reduced constabulary forces across Khorvaire as able-bodied personnel were redirected to military service; criminal organisations had decades to root themselves into logistics networks, bribe local officials, and establish operations that outlasted the conflict.
The most powerful of these organisations operated in plain sight long before the war ended. The Boromar Clan, a halfling syndicate with roots in Talenta Plains immigration, had already built a stranglehold on smuggling, gambling, and theft in Sharn over multiple generations. The clan's criminal nature is an open secret — and in some districts, the Boromars are seen as hometown heroes: immigrants who made good, common people who have risen to rival the barons and kings. They give the people what they want, whether it is untaxed gambling, cheap spirits, or dreamlily. The clan controls warehouses in the city's docking districts of Precarious and Cogsgate, owns taverns and inns throughout the city, has a considerable interest in the shipping trade, has blood ties to House Jorasco through the marriage of clan patriarch Saidan Boromar to Mala Boromar d'Jorasco, holds a seat on the Sharn City Council through Councilor Ilyra Boromar, and has so thoroughly woven its network of extortion, bribery, and blackmail into the fabric of the city's economy — from Lower Dura to Skyway — that many residents simply treat it as another form of tax. The Boromars have been bribing Watch captains for generations, and this is largely taken for granted. The war years accelerated the clan's reach as traditional legal trade was disrupted and demand for untaxed goods and contraband grew. Smuggling has become increasingly important since the war disrupted traditional lines of trade; the clan's primary import is the narcotic called dreamlily, but the Boromars traffic in everything from arcane weapons to foreign luxury items made scarce by embargoes — including, notably, Aundairian wine, which is forbidden to sell in Breland under Boranel's law.
The Boromar Clan's longstanding dominance has recently come under serious challenge from Daask, the Droaamish criminal organisation that has been launching increasingly bold raids against Boromar holdings. The clan is hampered by its size — Daask uses guerrilla tactics that a large, established operation struggles to counter — and its enemies on the City Council have refused to deploy Sharn Watch resources against Daask, hoping the monstrous guild will bring the Boromars down. The feud between the two organisations is one of the defining tensions in Sharn's underworld, and adventurers in the city will likely find themselves caught between them sooner or later.
Beyond the major cities, black markets fill critical gaps in regions where legal commerce has not recovered. Veterans sold stolen wargear to survive. Unlicensed enchanters operate in border zones and mining towns. Former military logistics routes that were never officially decommissioned have been quietly absorbed into smuggling networks. In the Mournland border regions especially — where neither the rule of the Five Nations nor any recognised authority holds consistent sway — the informal economy is frequently the only economy at all.
What distinguishes the postwar black market from its wartime predecessor is scale and permanence. These are no longer opportunistic operations filling a temporary gap — they are institutional alternatives to legal commerce, with their own hierarchies, enforcement mechanisms, and supplier relationships. They are, in many places, simply the market.
"You want Aundairian wine in Sharn? That's illegal. You want it anyway? Talk to Sundry in the Bazaar. Tell him the Rake sent you. Don't ask for a receipt." — Overheard in a Lower Dura tavern
