Fralex
Explorer
For a while, the "Why does 5e SUCK!?!?!" thread was actually just people talking about different aspects of the game in a friendly manner. I'm not sure if it stayed that way, but one thing I got out of it was finally getting a chance to share my ideas on pricing magic items. I'll move it here for safekeeping.
As you can tell, the pricing for permanent magical items (consumable items cost half what they'd be if they were permanent) increases by 5 x 10^(a number related to rarity). Well, except for Common items, which cost 100 gp instead of 50 gp. There are twice as many spell levels as rarity levels, which annoys me, so when pricing spell-based items like scrolls I refer to a chart that includes prices for every spell level. Uncommon items cost 500 gp, and the DMG says they can reproduce spell effects of up to 3rd level. Rare items cost 5000 gp and can produce spells of 5th level or lower. So, since 3rd level = 5 x 10^2 and 5th level = 5 x 10^3, 4th level must equal 5 x 10^2.5, or about 1581.13883. We can just round that up to 1600 gp for convenience's sake. Following that pattern, you get a chart like this:
0 - 16
1 - 50
2 - 160
3 - 500
4 - 1,600
5 - 5,000
6 - 16,000
7 - 50,000
8 - 160,000
9 - 500,000
And you can play around with these numbers by changing how fast the rarity number increases. Like, here's what it looks like if you follow a 2/3, 1, 1+1/3... pattern:
0 - 23
1 - 50
2 - 110
3 - 230
4 - 500
5 - 1,100
6 - 2,300
7 - 5,000
8 - 11,000
9 - 23,000
Right now, I'm keeping as close to the book as possible, to give it a chance, so I'm keeping 1st level at 100 gp and having 0 level be 50 gp. I actually made a little chart on a notecard, including this information along with a bunch of other useful things related to spells and magic items:
It's really handy.
As you can tell, the pricing for permanent magical items (consumable items cost half what they'd be if they were permanent) increases by 5 x 10^(a number related to rarity). Well, except for Common items, which cost 100 gp instead of 50 gp. There are twice as many spell levels as rarity levels, which annoys me, so when pricing spell-based items like scrolls I refer to a chart that includes prices for every spell level. Uncommon items cost 500 gp, and the DMG says they can reproduce spell effects of up to 3rd level. Rare items cost 5000 gp and can produce spells of 5th level or lower. So, since 3rd level = 5 x 10^2 and 5th level = 5 x 10^3, 4th level must equal 5 x 10^2.5, or about 1581.13883. We can just round that up to 1600 gp for convenience's sake. Following that pattern, you get a chart like this:
0 - 16
1 - 50
2 - 160
3 - 500
4 - 1,600
5 - 5,000
6 - 16,000
7 - 50,000
8 - 160,000
9 - 500,000
And you can play around with these numbers by changing how fast the rarity number increases. Like, here's what it looks like if you follow a 2/3, 1, 1+1/3... pattern:
0 - 23
1 - 50
2 - 110
3 - 230
4 - 500
5 - 1,100
6 - 2,300
7 - 5,000
8 - 11,000
9 - 23,000
Right now, I'm keeping as close to the book as possible, to give it a chance, so I'm keeping 1st level at 100 gp and having 0 level be 50 gp. I actually made a little chart on a notecard, including this information along with a bunch of other useful things related to spells and magic items:
| Spell Level | Rarity | Permanent Price | Consumable Price | Max AC/Attack Bonus | Single-Target Damage | Multi-Target Damage | Spell Attack | Save DC |
| 0 | Common | 50 | 25 | 1d10 | 1d6 | +5 | 13 | |
| 1 | Common | 100 | 50 | 2d10 | 2d6 | +5 | 13 | |
| 2 | Uncommon | 160 | 80 | +1 | 3d10 | 4d6 | +5 | 13 |
| 3 | Uncommon | 500 | 250 | +1 | 5d10 | 6d6 | +7 | 15 |
| 4 | Rare | 1,600 | 800 | +2 | 6d10 | 7d6 | +7 | 15 |
| 5 | Rare | 5,000 | 2,500 | +2 | 8d10 | 8d6 | +9 | 17 |
| 6 | Very Rare | 16,000 | 8,000 | +3 | 10d10 | 11d6 | +9 | 17 |
| 7 | Very Rare | 50,000 | 25,000 | +3 | 11d10 | 12d6 | +10 | 18 |
| 8 | Very Rare | 160,000 | 80,000 | +3 | 12d10 | 13d6 | +10 | 18 |
| 9 | Legendary | 500,000 | 250,000 | +4 | 15d10 | 14d6 | +11 | 19 |
