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Who said anything about "all the time"?
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That gold ceases to be a motivator and have value is THE FRIKKING PROBLEM that this variant sets out to solve
And somehow you translate that into general criticism...?
Can anyone explain to me why anyone takes the time and effort to write essentially a post on "six reasons NOT to do what the thread is about"...
This thread is for those interested in xp for gold. It is not a thread for those that need to be cautioned against using xp for gold.
I see it being fun for a specific campaign, or even for one or two adventures in a campaign, and... that's it. Its suitability on other campaigns is of no concern because it is fun for this specific campaign you're running!
Putting this first because it's the important part. Your only limitation for using this rule is: "This assumes a sandbox type of campaign, where you explore the map and involve yourself wherever you like. And walk away from anything you don't like to do."
You never state that that this was a rule for a specific type of campaign where all the PCs are primarily motivated by accumulation of wealth. That is the only limitation you place on the rule, and that description covers a much broader range of campaigns than just one that involves adventuring for gold. I've played sandbox campaigns with Paladins that are focused on fighting evil and righting wrongs, Wizards who are seeking ancient spells and knowledge, ascetic Monks, Druids who are fighting for the survival of the wilderness or alignment balance, Clerics seeking to spread their faith, Barbarians only seeking to test their mettle, Dwarves looking for a lost family relic, Elves seeking ancient oracles, etc. In other words, a bunch of goals that money won't really help with. In my experience, a campaign where every character is motivated by gold is rare, and since you never state that as a restriction on the campaign and never make any attempt to correct the problems it causes, these are all fair criticisms. And, no, it's not obvious that you'd use this rule in a limited subset of campaigns where every PC is focused on wealth accumulation because gold = XP was the original rule used with D&D.
If that's not what you meant that's fine, but don't get mad at me for reading the rules exactly as you presented them. I'm not a mind reader.
I agree. However, you presented both in the same post, so I'm criticizing them in the same post. Indeed, gold/XP for magic items was a significant element of the rules you presented. You introduced buying magic items at the same time as using gold for XP. That was your choice for your rules, so your gold = XP rules are going to get criticized for using gold or XP for magic items. That's something which a lot of people disliked about 3.x and 4e, and a lot of people are not going to be interested in it. You opened the door to the criticism.
You might want to have a magic item economy (where magic items are offered up for sale) to increase, not decrease, hard choices. But you don't have to - you can still run the game so any items must be found, not bought.
But.
If you can buy a +1 Longsword for the same amount of gold that would give you a whole level's worth of XP, what do you choose? This can ideally be incredibly difficult decisions
Ideally the game would then differentiate between +1, +2 and +3 items just like in the good old days, so that even after you finally splurge on a +1 Longsword, you will eventually have to redo the entire decision point when at mid-level monsters start becoming resistant to any weapon not +2 or more... so you again need to choose between xp and magic items.
You say, "This creates hard choices." How? It didn't seem hard with 3e's item crafting, 3e's magic shops, and 4e's player selected loot (which had the problems of both 3e systems). Players do a cost/benefit analysis prior to the game, planned their characters and items to level 20/30, and bought/crafted/selected the most advantageous items they can. Zim, zam, zoom, you get a-la-carte abilities tailor suited to your specific character build. Then you take all the spare loot you get and feed it into more items you can craft or buy like you're playing Hearthstone and grinding cards to dust. What is hard or interesting about this choice?
I'm saying that your ideal is probably not achievable without a lot of nuance you didn't include in your post and a lot of cooperation from the players which not every DM is going to have from every player. No matter how you structure the system, you'll end up with things that are not hard choices because the game was never intended to contrast character abilities with magic item abilities. 5e was never designed with that in mind. We did get to choose between magic items and XP in 3.5, and -- at least in my experience -- magic items were always the way to go until you got pretty deep. The only reason not to chose magic items was a) limited time, and b) limited gold. Now, sure, you can jack up the prices of magic items. Then they're essentially never worthwhile beyond the bare minimum, which is how 1e/2e and 5e's Downtime UA try to handle it. Now it's not worth the time or gold unless you need a specific item. But that's a wholly different ball of wax than using gold/XP as straight currency for players to select all their magic items which is exactly the system you present.
It's not worth four levels, but it's certainly worth quite a bit. If you're a level 6 Fighter, you might be already at 20 Str. You're not getting another +1 attack until level 9, and your damage bonus is capped. Why wouldn't you invest your XP into a magic weapon? It effects the 2-4 dice you plan to roll every round of every combat. It'll pay off sooner, you'll be much more powerful against a much broader range of enemies, and your next level is still only 9,000 gp off. It's win-win. Heck, you get to Fighter 13 or so, and you're basically capped except for the HP. You get one more +1 to hit, another attack way off at level 20, and that's really it except for magic.
"The campaign is focused on accumulation of wealth" means that in normal D&D a party of 5 adventurers needs to accumulate 70,000 XP to go from level 8 to level 9. They can do that by killing monsters, aiding peasants, etc. and they don't need any material rewards for doing it. In gold = XP, a party of 5 adventurers must accumulate and spend 70,000 gp to go from level 8 to level 9. It means that instead of doing things that gain XP, the players do things that gain gp.
The DMG doesn't require adventuring parties to spend all their gold immediately in order to level up. Neither does it give out gold in the volume necessary to equate gold and XP as well as pay for magic items.
That's why I listed it as a criticism. It's not that it's difficult to fix, but it's something any DM using it has to be aware of. The problem is that you didn't address it.
No, with absurd levels of gold you start to buy absurd things. Expensive spell components, ships, fortresses, favors, hirelings, etc. There is always a way to spend gold, but expecting that there's a place you can spend the 100,000 gp that a mid level party needs to spend on carousing in any reasonable amount of time is absurd. The annual output of a large town is going to be like 1,000,000 gp. They don't have 100,000 gp of stuff on the market at any one time! The game turns into Brewster's Millions.
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