D&D 5E Is there too much gold/reward?

Ancalagon · Mar 18, 2016

shidaku said:
My players are thoroughly interested in building towns and castles. I can't wait till I show them how much that costs!

HA!

It's also interesting - if we combine it with my other thread on reward/taxes - to see what kind of castle can a population support. Let's say that 10% of the budget is the most a community can afford to spend on a castle/fort etc. It's worth doing for defensive reasons and the lord probably really wants it, so it seems like a good number.

So at 2 gp/person/year, a fortified tower requires about 4500 people to maintain, a fort about 9000 people, and a large castle would require a city of 73 000... this seems a bit high. Either a large castle is *enormous*, or cities/villages are willing to devote more than 10% of their budget to the "maintain the fort" fund...

S'mon · Mar 18, 2016

Ancalagon said:
HA!
So at 2 gp/person/year, a fortified tower requires about 4500 people to maintain, a fort about 9000 people, and a large castle would require a city of 73 000... this seems a bit high. Either a large castle is *enormous*, or cities/villages are willing to devote more than 10% of their budget to the "maintain the fort" fund...

Those look fine (low, even) for total domain populations. A medieval city of 73000 probably has a hinterland with over a million people. A domain of 73000 is just a large barony.

S'mon · Mar 18, 2016

I like it that in 5e PCs don't have to be money-grubbing to keep their gear optimised, indeed they can be generous, giving money & treasure away freely. And if they don't care about gold at all, the game still works.

nswanson27 · Mar 18, 2016

AaronOfBarbaria said:
Unless you are claiming DMs are forced to run Adventurer's League sessions against their will, then that falls within "ways they choose to restrict them self."

But this just argues against the whole idea of AL to begin with. The fact is AL characters can't just go in and out of AL rules at will and still be "AL legal".
This is like the joke where you tell the doctor "It hurts when I do this" and the doctor respond "Well then don't do that." You're not fairly addressing the problem by saying this.

AaronOfBarbaria · Mar 18, 2016

nswanson27 said:
But this just argues against the whole idea of AL to begin with.

No, it most certainly does not.

There are advantages to choosing to participate in AL play. There are also disadvantages in that choice. Pointing them out is not an argument against anything, it's just providing information.

nswanson27 said:
This is like the joke where you tell the doctor "It hurts when I do this" and the doctor respond "Well then don't do that."

Except that in the doctor joke, the action is usually something actually required in the daily life of a "normal" person, like "Doctor, my leg hurts when I am walking." While in the case of DMing in the AL is analogous not to any activity that a person normally does, even though it is something that someone might frequently choose to do, like "Doctor, my shoulder hurts when I go rock climbing."

nswanson27 said:
You're not fairly addressing the problem by saying this.

Yes, I am. Anyone competent enough to DM in the AL can say "hey guys, how about we have a non-AL campaign?" to the folks gathered around their table.

In fact, I expect meeting new players and forming new "home" groups via the AL is even easier than how I have constantly built gaming groups every time I've moved to a new city. Not that building my groups has ever been actually difficult, since at worst it required chatting with co-workers at a new job and the cashier at a local non-gaming-specific book store and is usually as easy as what the AL basically is (showing up at a FLGS, hanging out for a while, and asking folks that show up if they are interested in playing some D&D).

nswanson27 · Mar 21, 2016

AaronOfBarbaria said:
No, it most certainly does not.

There are advantages to choosing to participate in AL play. There are also disadvantages in that choice. Pointing them out is not an argument against anything, it's just providing information.

You're still not addressing the issue. If someone wants to play AL, they must stay inside of the rules. I'm trying to raise issue and discussion to make AL better (i.e. fix the broken economy) within that context. You're basically saying, "Take it or leave it". That's not helpful, and from an argumentative standpoint, this is an "is-ought" fallacy. I'm trying to make things better, not throw the baby out with the bath water.

AaronOfBarbaria said:
Except that in the doctor joke, the action is usually something actually required in the daily life of a "normal" person, like "Doctor, my leg hurts when I am walking." While in the case of DMing in the AL is analogous not to any activity that a person normally does, even though it is something that someone might frequently choose to do, like "Doctor, my shoulder hurts when I go rock climbing."

To use your language, I'm actually trying to come up with a solution to my shoulder hurts when I rock climb, not just admit defeat and not rock climb at all.

AaronOfBarbaria said:
Yes, I am. Anyone competent enough to DM in the AL can say "hey guys, how about we have a non-AL campaign?" to the folks gathered around their table.

In fact, I expect meeting new players and forming new "home" groups via the AL is even easier than how I have constantly built gaming groups every time I've moved to a new city. Not that building my groups has ever been actually difficult, since at worst it required chatting with co-workers at a new job and the cashier at a local non-gaming-specific book store and is usually as easy as what the AL basically is (showing up at a FLGS, hanging out for a while, and asking folks that show up if they are interested in playing some D&D).

But again this doesn't help players who want to stay in AL. You might as well just say, "Hey, why don't we play scrabble instead?". Suggesting non-AL as a fix for the AL economy problem isn't a solution for the AL economy problem.

ExploderWizard · Mar 21, 2016

S'mon said:
Those look fine (low, even) for total domain populations. A medieval city of 73000 probably has a hinterland with over a million people. A domain of 73000 is just a large barony.

Most D&D like fantasy world populations are really low. I remember many years ago when S.John Ross calculated that the world of Greyhawk (as presented in the 1E boxed set) had a whopping 1.2 people per square mile! :lol:

That is a desolate and lonely place.

Ath-kethin · Mar 21, 2016

delericho said:
Alternately, it highlights an absurdity of the 3e/4e model where the PCs risked life and limb to get treasure in order to buy magic items in order to risk life and limb to get treasure. It's madness - even someone desperate enough to go on one adventure should never go on another, since their haul would give them enough money to live the rest of their days in luxury.

Maybe the system was intended as a commentary on U.S. capitalism?

ExploderWizard · Mar 21, 2016

nswanson27 said:
You're still not addressing the issue. If someone wants to play AL, they must stay inside of the rules. I'm trying to raise issue and discussion to make AL better (i.e. fix the broken economy) within that context. You're basically saying, "Take it or leave it". That's not helpful, and from an argumentative standpoint, this is an "is-ought" fallacy. I'm trying to make things better, not throw the baby out with the bath water.

To use your language, I'm actually trying to come up with a solution to my shoulder hurts when I rock climb, not just admit defeat and not rock climb at all.

But again this doesn't help players who want to stay in AL. You might as well just say, "Hey, why don't we play scrabble instead?". Suggesting non-AL as a fix for the AL economy problem isn't a solution for the AL economy problem.

1) You want to keep playing AL adventures.

2) AL adventures are essentially self contained one shots. There may be a connection but since you have no idea who will show up and who will play, the adventures aren't remotely like home campaign play.

3) An "economy" only makes sense to worry about at all IF you are playing in a regular campaign where events build on one another from session to session.

4) AL play is NOT a campaign per se.

5) Suppose someone shows up to play in an AL adventure. They get 500 gold as their share of the loot for that session. That player then never shows up again. Do we really care what happened to that 500 gold?

6) If you are playing AL for the adventures then just ignore most treasure and say that it gets donated or something. Without an ongoing campaign, the whole concept of an economy is meaningless.

7) So play and enjoy the adventures and don't worry about the treasure. Getting rich means nothing for a character who isn't part of an ongoing campaign.

AaronOfBarbaria · Mar 21, 2016

nswanson27 said:
You're still not addressing the issue. If someone wants to play AL, they must stay inside of the rules. I'm trying to raise issue and discussion to make AL better (i.e. fix the broken economy) within that context. You're basically saying, "Take it or leave it". That's not helpful, and from an argumentative standpoint, this is an "is-ought" fallacy. I'm trying to make things better, not throw the baby out with the bath water.

To use your language, I'm actually trying to come up with a solution to my shoulder hurts when I rock climb, not just admit defeat and not rock climb at all.

But again this doesn't help players who want to stay in AL. You might as well just say, "Hey, why don't we play scrabble instead?". Suggesting non-AL as a fix for the AL economy problem isn't a solution for the AL economy problem.

I agree with what [MENTION=66434]ExploderWizard[/MENTION] has said in reply to your quoted post.

Also, if you are wanting Adventurer's League specific talk, you should probably post in the Adventurer's League section of the forum - putting a thread in the general 5th edition section makes it look like you are talking about 5th edition in general, where my comments are entirely appropriate answers to the issues you've raised.