Miser saints

Miser saints are a strange and unpopular group of people from all walks of life, usually worshippers of Moradin. Their single tenet is that charity is the greatest good, and money is the best form of charity. Therefore, they seek to make as much money as possible, with the intention of giving it all to charitable causes.

So far, not particularly disagreeable. Miser saints don’t acquire gold and then distribute it immediately however. Most people would agree that giving a coin to a starving child is a good action. Miser saints, however, would disagree. They would argue instead that you could have invested that coin, and thus you’ve deprived another, equally deserving charitable cause of several coins in five years. You monster.

This means that the miser saint will spend their entire life building up an incredible hoard of wealth, leaving strict instructions for it to be distributed on their death to those that need it. On the one hand, this sometimes means that a miser saint will die, and suddenly the town will get a new orphanage, schoolhouse and enough gold to buy food for every resident during the terrible drought. When this happens, the miser saint will truly be remembered as a saint and venerated for both their self-discipline and generosity.

There are quite a few ways for this to go wrong, of course.

Honesty

Miser saints should be frugal, obviously. They’re not ascetics - it’s hard to earn money when you’re starving - but they consider every expense carefully, weighing it up as an investment. This includes things like food and clothes for themselves, so they’re usually plainly dressed and accustomed to unexciting food.

Of course, given no-one will know what’s in their hoard until after they die, it’s impossible to prove someone is (or isn’t) a real miser saint. It’s a very convenient cover story for the evil and greedy, and few people are more posthumously despised than a fake miser saint.

Inheritance

By definition, the children of a miser saint will get nothing, despite their parent being unimaginably wealthy. This can make someone a little bitter. More than one miser saint has been killed and had their hoard raided by their child, usually after the latter has made some unwise investments or run up huge gambling debts.

On very rare occasions, treasure hoards have been handed down through generations as each generation takes the oaths of a miser saint. The risks are obvious, however; it only takes one stupid or unscrupulous descendent to ruin the work of centuries.

Defending the hoard

In a world where laws rarely apply to more than a few square miles, maintaining a large hoard of treasure can be tricky. Moradin does look after the faithful, and stealing from a miser saint is a really good way to never be heard of again. There’s always someone stupid or desperate enough to give it a go, however, and miser saints always need to be on their guard. Best not to ask what happens to the bodies; there can be good money to be made with a spare corpse and an unscrupulous butcher.

Playing as a miser saint

Miser saints make excellent player characters, because they provide another answer to the question “why would you keep adventuring once you’ve got enough gold to retire in luxury?” They’ll merrily keep looting the dungeon and nicking everything that they can find; nailing it down merely means they’ll sell the nails to the blacksmith later.

You could just play them as a fighter with a monomania for treasure, but they also make a really fun warlock variant. Moradin (or your wealth deity of choice) will provide them with warlock-like powers, but they literally have to pay for them. Their debt to their patron isn’t a nebulous bargain; they’ve literally been provided with a loan that they’re expected to repay, through the temple.

Start them off with a thousand gold, and the promise that if they don’t bring back fifteen hundred to the temple in 30 days, the angelic loan sharks will descend. That’ll keep things moving.