How do your characters deal with potions?

[Zendragon]

1. Horde them for a rainy day
2. Use occasionally
3. Use at least one per adventure, save them for bigger encounters
4. Drink them like Red Bull before going to a rave party

Recently I was looking over all the character sheets and noticed that some of them still have potions they received at 2nd level. The characters are now 11th level. This is not counting healing potions, but potions like Bull Strength, Barkskin, Invisibility. The campaign is slightly less than normal for magic items in DMG 3.5, but potions are common enough.

I tried to emphasize their importance a couple of sessions ago by having the fighter roll saves for them when he fell 30 feet into a trap. This just made the party look for iron flasks to store them in to keep the potions safer. Is this normal or is my group just a little on the cautious side.

 

[Corsair]

most people are loathe to use expendables if they don't have to, and this includes me. At higher levels if I have extra money AND a ready supply, then I'll start using them more freely. (Ditto for wands)

 

[EyeontheMountain]

Put them into the backpack and promptly forget about them, is my party's usual tactic.

 

[WhatGravitas]

1. Use at least one per adventure, save them for bigger encounters

For non-healing potions this option. We'd like to save'em... but if you're facing stuff that kills you, you break out your stuff to avoid this - we're on the better-save-then-sorry side. But we try to reserve them for bigger stuff.

Now, healing potions and wands... get chuffed/used like red bull.

 

[blargney the second]

Depends on the player. I use them all the time. I can stop any time, honest.

 

[Ealli]

I'm very loathe to use my expendibles. So loathe that I never bother buying them in the first place when I have options. In all the older computer role-playing games, at the end of the game I usually still have all the high end and even middle value consumables.

I am getting better at this though. I managed to use a potion of Haste in an important battle instead of holding it back forever.

There are two issues which exacerbate hoarding consumables. First, to apply the power-up takes away your turn's action quite possibly drawing an attack of opportunity. It could often be better to simply continue your attack so finishing the battle quicker and without taking that extra damage. Second, potions are a pain to identify. I don't want to go spending a pearl for a potion that has a decent chance of being worth less than the pearl. Yes, you can Spellcraft it, but that's not entirely reliable.

 

[Dragon Snack]

Wow, my players use them all the time. I bet every one of them has a potion belt (free action to retrieve a potion).

In fact, when I TPKed them, the Dragons Corrupt Water trashing their potions was probably one of the main reasons for the TPK (along with bad tactics and rolls).

Of course, they mainly use Cure potions, some of their buff potions stick around for quite some time.

 

[Michael Silverbane]

Put them into the backpack and promptly forget about them, is my party's usual tactic.

This is what usually happens in my group, as well. I am not sure why.

We did, in one campaign, sell all of our potions. Potions that we had collected from 1st level all the way up to (I think) 13th level. It was quite a haul, considering that potions aren't worth that much... Around 5,000 gp, all told.

Later
silver

 

[Sejs]

By either drinking them in short order after finding them, else forgetting they exist entirely.

 

[Merkuri]

In the last campaign I had I tended to forget I was carrying potions at all. It wasn't that I was saving them, it's just that I forgot they were an option.

I'm trying to be better about it in this campaign, though.