You're a shopkeep and someone comes in. They want a discount on something. They grab their pendant, a staff, or some shit from their bag, then do a short chant and hand movements. Even if you don't know specifically the magic they're doing, you know something fishy is up. In my opinion, that's gonna limit the effectiveness by tanking the shopkeep's opinion of you as you cast. Maybe have a friend distract them while you cast so they don't notice, or do some prestidigitation tricks first to get them comfy with you magic-ing in their shop. Too many people treat charm and similar spells like videogames. Pause time, chug 5 potions and eat 12 cheese wheels. Magic casting gets no response unless the end result does damage. If your DM allows that, fine. But IMO the whole "hold up I need to try and manipulate this guy's mind out in public, or in front of their guards, they won't mind if I try that" tends to take me right out of it. And that's without thinking about stuff like wealthy shop owners selling mundane items being able to get an anti magic field, bodyguards, or other options against this sort of thing.

Counterpoint. If she is high enough fey, this creates so many opportunities for the DM to fuck with the player in fun and creative ways. Eg: spell fails, but she pretends it works. Discount applied, item is cursed. Etc. All charm spells cast by user now have inverse effects, and their feet smell bad.


Any time my players try to do stuff like that i have them roll initiative and start a turn order, the "victim" NPC rolls with advantage b/c shop keepers are gonna be explicitly keeping an eye on stuff (unless they are distracted). There's a lot of nuance to it too so each encounter. I do hate making character sheets for every NPC though.

I feel like in the rough and tumble world where anyone walking through the door could be a sorcerer …. Shopkeepers are probably strong as fuck

counterpoint? that is the joke, lol

A shop that can't defend its premises and inventory is just a donation bin for the local thieves' guild.

I imagine most shops don't have anything that anyone with superpowers would find worth stealing. If you want to get a magic item or plate armor, that's going to be more difficult than simply strolling into a shop.

Aww dammit it’s Auntie Ethel again!