Season 8 will switch to the Organized Play rules presented in XGTE

[nswanson27]

I suspect, given that the 'new' system would allow you to collect 'points' to 'buy' a magic item from a pre-defined list, that the need to trade magic items would effectively go away, so there would no longer be a need to support trading items.

Exceptions could be made for things like Fai Chen's, which seems popular, but it's likely Fai Chen's will change as well to better support the new rules, and that the bazaar would be less a magic item trading house and more a place to buy flavor items for your characters.

This, of course, presumes the AL changes the magic item system to that noted in Xanathar's Guide, but if you don't have Xanathar's Guide, just download the Pathfinder Society rules; they are surprisingly similar.

--
Pauper

Good to know. Thanks.

 

[CapnZapp]

My article on the potential changes, from November: https://merricb.com/2017/11/13/are-the-dd-adventurers-league-rules-about-to-change/

Regarding No More Experience Points: shrug. It was a long time ago I realized experience points are just pointless clutter. I'm going to level up when the DM deems it appropriate; everything else is just self-deception. Those checkpoints looks like a reasonable implementation; in a home game you'd just say "level up after about three game sessions" (or whatever).

Of course, in a home game things would get out of whack if you just sit tight back at the inn in the hopes you'll level up and out of the challenge zone of the actual adventure. But in practice, does that ever happen?

In organized play, it's not an issue. Sure, one group decides their own voices are more interesting than the actual adventure. But four hours later that's irrelevant (even if the DM was bored), and everybody goes on to new adventures.

Regarding No More Gold in Adventures: I vehemently disagree "No gold in an adventure isn’t a big change". Not providing any "uptime" outlets for your gold is this edition's biggest failing, and "gold tends to just pile up after the first few levels" is an unacceptable problem that needs a proper fix, rather than resigned acceptance!

Just not doling out any gold is a huge cop out, and I'm sure the design team has underestimated exactly how fun people find loot and treasure awards.

Implement a proper magic item economy already!

Regarding No More Magic Items in Adventures?: No this isn't bigger than "no more gold". Most people are already used to MMOs where you get "dragon kill points". I have no issue with this line of thinking.

My concern is instead those lists. Nobody will ever pick a quirky fun but ultimately circumstancial item if the opportunity cost is not getting a generally more useful item.

I hope the AL brass will realize they need to create at least two lists for each treasure type, especially the "permanent" lists (list F thru list I).

Standard stuff should go on the "A list": +1 swords, armor, rings of protection and the like.

Non-standard stuff should go on the "B list": the Tridents of Fish Command, Pipers of Sewage, Wands of Secrets, and Medallion of Thoughts of magic items. And this list should come with a hefty discount. Perhaps -2 treasure points.

Actually, AL generals probably realize they have a massive bounded accuracy nightmare ahead of themselves if they don't do something about the specific stacking issues created by a la carte magic "shopping". Those paltry pages of XGE certainly luxuriates in ignorance...

Just to pick the most obvious example: +3 armor and +3 shields wreck games

+3 bows and +3 ammunition would have wrecked games if ammunition weren't insanely overpriced (if I understand things correctly you gain no discount in treasure points which is even worse than the already ridiculously bad deal of "half price" per the standard (gp based) rules).




Regarding I think that treasure points can’t be saved up – they must be spent immediately that an adventure ends: while I think you are correct (XGE says you "must" spend your treasure points) it doesn't mean you're restricted to the points you just earned. XGE allows for "deposits" where you pay off part of an item, and when it's fully paid for you get said item.

Why they try to force players to decide what item to go for already with their first few treasure points, instead of simply saying "you can save treasure points but you can only buy a single item after each adventure", I cannot say. It appears to be added bookkeeping for very little gain...?

 

[CapnZapp]

I don't have it in front of me - does it deal specifically with trading magic items between characters?

Yes, it specifically prohibits characters from selling their items (which presumably means you are not allowed to give them away for free either).

"Bind on pickup", in short.

There is no "vendor trash". Or rather, "weapons, armor, and other gear used by enemies are considered too damaged to have any monetary value" to quote XGE directly.

 

[Warmaster Horus]

I agree about not getting rid of gold. Treasure is one of the core premises of D&D. I like getting gold, even if there aren't outlets for it (which there SHOULD be). I'm leery of pick-n-pay magic items. As was mentioned this will just lead to very focused optimization. I like to optimize my characters to some level but I also like the luck-of-the-draw feeling we have now. If I were doing this I would require that players put 6 same-cost items in a bag and draw (roll) one out to keep it somewhat random - the players get to choose what goes in the 'bag' but don't know until the roll what they're getting.

 

[CapnZapp]

I agree about not getting rid of gold. Treasure is one of the core premises of D&D. I like getting gold, even if there aren't outlets for it (which there SHOULD be). I'm leery of pick-n-pay magic items. As was mentioned this will just lead to very focused optimization. I like to optimize my characters to some level but I also like the luck-of-the-draw feeling we have now. If I were doing this I would require that players put 6 same-cost items in a bag and draw (roll) one out to keep it somewhat random - the players get to choose what goes in the 'bag' but don't know until the roll what they're getting.

I would probably generate standard lists as per XGE but then also have "themed" lists for each adventure / group of adventures / location / season.

And the themed lists would be cheaper but maybe less geared towards general optimization.

Actually you don't need to mess with the price of the lists (in treasure points). You can simply place items on lesser lists. For instance, an ocean-themed adventure placing a Trident of Fish Command on table C (instead of table F, where it "should" appear). Do you pick up a trident for 4 tp or do you save up for the 8 tp cost of a +1 Longsword?

 

[Nutation]

Regarding Regarding No More Gold in Adventures: I vehemently disagree "No gold in an adventure isn’t a big change". Not providing any "uptime" outlets for your gold is this edition's biggest failing, and "gold tends to just pile up after the first few levels" is an unacceptable problem that needs a proper fix, rather than resigned acceptance!

Just not doling out any gold is a huge cop out, and I'm sure the design team has underestimated exactly how fun people find loot and treasure awards.

Agreed. I like story awards and I like the interaction when people count up magic items and determine who's eligible to get the +1 thingie.
It's also another incentive to complete story objectives.

My concern is instead those lists. Nobody will ever pick a quirky fun but ultimately circumstancial item if the opportunity cost is not getting a generally more useful item.
...
Actually, AL generals probably realize they have a massive bounded accuracy nightmare ahead of themselves if they don't do something about the specific stacking issues created by a la carte magic "shopping". Those paltry pages of XGE certainly luxuriates in ignorance...

Just to pick the most obvious example: +3 armor and +3 shields wreck games

Plus the ring of protection and the ioun stone and the manual of +2 dex (if any are offered, don't know), and so on. Even now, I see few weapon users in Tier 2 without a magic weapon and none in Tier 3. That monster resistance vs. normal weapons is almost purely fluff after Tier 1, and this will guarantee it.

Regarding I think that treasure points can’t be saved up – they must be spent immediately that an adventure ends:

I imagine that you will have to spend your points on tier-appropriate items. Otherwise, grab +1 armor/weapon and use it until you have saved the points for +3.

 

[CapnZapp]

I imagine that you will have to spend your points on tier-appropriate items. Otherwise, grab +1 armor/weapon and use it until you have saved the points for +3.

If the goal is simply that you shouldn't be able to buy that +3 Longsword as soon as you level up to level 17, but after 10 hours of playing at tier IV... why not simply say you can't buy table H items until level 18 instead?

Because... after 10 hours of playing at tier IV... you are level 18 anyway!

Yes, that's right. If you're not allowed to start saving tps for table H items until you've reached tier IV that means you will never be able to buy table H items while you are level 17!

It simply makes zero sense to me to impose that restriction, since all it means is it shifts every tier up one level.

Much better to drop the bookkeeping of forcing everybody to keep track what exact item they're "making a deposit" for, and simply say "you can save treasure points but you can only buy one item after each adventure" (and of course, you can't buy from higher tables than your tier).

Even if for some unfathomable reason the powers that be find it unbearable that you could buy a tier IV item right after leveling up to tier IV... how about then instead simply switching the steps outlined by XGE?

Instead of

Players must spend treasure points at the end of a play
session, immediately after determining whether their
characters have gained a level. The order of these steps
is important, since a character might enter a new tier
because of the level gain.​

we do

Players must spend treasure points at the end of a play
session, immediately before determining whether their
characters have gained a level. The order of these steps
is important, since a character might enter a new tier
because of the level gain.​

This way you need to have at least one adventure at your new tier before you can buy that tier's magic items.

Still much easier and simpler and therefore better than forcing players to keep "deposit notes" which treasure points go towards what items.

 

[Pauper]

Regarding No More Experience Points: shrug. It was a long time ago I realized experience points are just pointless clutter. I'm going to level up when the DM deems it appropriate; everything else is just self-deception.

I used to think that. Now, having played in a few milestone-based campaigns (not AL), I find I miss tracking XP -- I miss the satisfaction of seeing a growing total of XP on my logsheet, I miss commiserating with other players when I or they end up *just* short of the next level.

It may be that milestones are the future, but I'll miss the old system when it's gone.

Implement a proper magic item economy already!

Disagree -- a magic item economy is about the laziest thing they could do other than have no economy at all, plus it would enable even more munchkinism than already exists.

If the campaign is going to hand out gold, then it should also provide a need for gold -- actually track expenses, enforce downtime expenses, have rules for armor and weapons wearing out and breaking (and thus needing repair and replacement). This would also motivate players to develop non-combat skills (either to repair/replace their own equipment, or to raise additional gold to afford to pay others to repair it), give characters motivation to seek home-bases (because not everything you need to run a smithy or tannery is easily portable), and generally allow players to invest in not just an individual listing of stats and weapon traits, but in the world of the game.

If you're not going to do this, then simply giving up the pretense that gold has value seems to me more honest than trying to invent a non-abusive use for it.

My concern is instead those lists. Nobody will ever pick a quirky fun but ultimately circumstancial item if the opportunity cost is not getting a generally more useful item.

I think you vastly overestimate the portion of AL's player-base that is looking to optimize, versus those who are drawn to the game via online games like Critical Role -- at the last couple of conventions I've been involved in, Fai Chen has done way better with things like special familiars and 'character fluff' than with magic weapons and armor.

However, I'll accept that your statement should be read as "*I* will never pick a quirky item when a more useful item is available."

Standard stuff should go on the "A list": +1 swords, armor, rings of protection and the like.

No real need, so long as standard armor and weapons are still available via factions.

Non-standard stuff should go on the "B list": the Tridents of Fish Command, Pipers of Sewage, Wands of Secrets, and Medallion of Thoughts of magic items. And this list should come with a hefty discount. Perhaps -2 treasure points.

Negative on the discount -- this just opens up the list as another optimization tool. Magic items of the same tier should have the same cost, and if some items are less popular, that's just a reflection of the perception of the item, not its underlying utility.

Actually, AL generals probably realize they have a massive bounded accuracy nightmare ahead of themselves if they don't do something about the specific stacking issues created by a la carte magic "shopping". Those paltry pages of XGE certainly luxuriates in ignorance...

I think the admins realize this -- I'm not sure the WotC folks do. Mearls in particular has stated many times on Twitter that some specific +1 bonus "wouldn't break the game", without realizing that, once you get enough +1 bonuses together, that's exactly what happens.

Why they try to force players to decide what item to go for already with their first few treasure points, instead of simply saying "you can save treasure points but you can only buy a single item after each adventure", I cannot say. It appears to be added bookkeeping for very little gain...?

My guess is that it's enforcing the style of game -- you generally don't have a character walk out of an adventure suddenly possessing a greatly improved magical weapon, suit of armor, and other useful item all at once. By enforcing relatively incremental changes, the theory is that the impact of those changes are reduced. (Granted, there are arguments to be had about that theory, and I think it would be more useful to say that the restriction should be one permanent item per level rather than one per adventure.)

--
Pauper

 

[CapnZapp]

I should add that I want the general D&D rules to provide a magic item economy.

I wasn't talking about tournament play specifically in that instance. I am certainly not attempting to impose a magic item economy on anybody else's campaign, organized or not.

If the campaign is going to hand out gold, then it should also provide a need for gold -- actually track expenses, enforce downtime expenses, have rules for armor and weapons wearing out and breaking (and thus needing repair and replacement). This would also motivate players to develop non-combat skills (either to repair/replace their own equipment, or to raise additional gold to afford to pay others to repair it), give characters motivation to seek home-bases (because not everything you need to run a smithy or tannery is easily portable), and generally allow players to invest in not just an individual listing of stats and weapon traits, but in the world of the game.

If you're not going to do this, then simply giving up the pretense that gold has value seems to me more honest than trying to invent a non-abusive use for it.

Adding mundane book-keeping such as expense tracking would be horrible. We don't need that in the D&D game, there's already the IRL game for that.

There's nothing inherently abusive in an magic item economy, but since I'm not talking about it in the context of organized play, let's drop the subject in this subforum.

Negative on the discount -- this just opens up the list as another optimization tool. Magic items of the same tier should have the same cost, and if some items are less popular, that's just a reflection of the perception of the item, not its underlying utility.

Come on. Most items in the DMG are only useful as random loot. Out of any given magic item treasure list of the DMG maybe nine tenths would never get picked if it means not picking the remaining tenth of items.

You may be fine with a tournament where nine out of ten players sport the same dozen items over and over, but that would be horribly boring to me. Not to mention how any attempt at roleplaying and characterization would be actively penalized: "so you want a Trident of Fish Command? Sure, you just need to be prepared for everybody else having a +1 weapon while you don't. That's just a cost you have to suck up."

Besides, the "collect them all" mentality would disappear if any adventure can yield any loot, and there is no specialness to having played a particular adventure. "Oh, she's sporting Efreeti Chain, that must mean she's played through the City of Brass series of modules...". Not that I think the AL will make the mistake of reusing the DMG treasure tables as is.

Anyway. Hopefully AL won't entirely drop random loot, and just add this treasure buying scheme as a back-up, as a way to make bad luck much less of an issue, since that's its main purpose if I understand it.

 

[CapnZapp]

My guess is that it's enforcing the style of game -- you generally don't have a character walk out of an adventure suddenly possessing a greatly improved magical weapon, suit of armor, and other useful item all at once. By enforcing relatively incremental changes, the theory is that the impact of those changes are reduced. (Granted, there are arguments to be had about that theory, and I think it would be more useful to say that the restriction should be one permanent item per level rather than one per adventure.)

But again that's not what would happen given the XGE rules!

You generate LOTS of treasure points, many more than you would need to save up in order to purchase that tier IV "upgrade" on day one.

The difference would be minimal.

Character A purchases +1 plate, then maybe a dozen various items... then +3 plate at 18th level.

Character B purchases +1 plate, then maybe eleven various items... then +3 plate at 17th level.

Spot the difference?

And no, the important difference isn't the exact timing of the +3 plate. The important difference is that character A was saddled with cluttery administration of what each deposit goes to... while character B doesn't need to do any of that.

Both still have the ability to upgrade from +1 to +3 right away without passing +2. Though none of them are defined by it, since they both likely have plenty other items in the meanwhile. Even if player B "abuses" the system by saving all his treasure points... it nets him... maybe ten levels of gaining no new item for no advantage.

Maybe - just maybe - he can then splurge to buy table H and I items for every tier IV level... but where's the harm in that? And to do so he had to spend almost his entire career with no fun items!

Look I completely understand the natural inclination to simply assume a rule is there for a reason. If WotC makes us write down each deposit and what item it's for, they must have identified something undesirable to avoid! Right?

Well, to me those XGE rules seems to solve a problem that just isn't there, creating needless and wasteful book-keeping chores for no reason and very little gain. But I'm prepared to be corrected. ENWorlders, what am I missing here?

Hopefully the AL admin team won't blindly add it unchanged, and if they do add it, that they explain to people like me why.