They are serious about ending expected wealth by level!

[Obryn]

Yeah, as long as you need to buy a better armor class with supernatural armors and there are magic weapons that give you +x to-hit, they haven't removed wealth-by-level at all.

I'd like to see some consistency on this point - preferably on the "no, you don't need to buy a better AC" side of the coin. As I mentioned in another thread, bake in AC improvements as a class feature.

-O

 

[tlantl]

Hummm...this will make it tougher for inexperienced DMs to set equipment guidelines for PCs not starting at 1st level.

Except that the section in question then goes on to give some guidelines for dishing out treasure by difficulty and by level. It's pretty straight forward.

The thing about expected wealth by level that was so distasteful for me was that I really had no control over the treasures I gave out. if I didn't follow those rules then the monsters were too powerful for their encounter level and the players suffered.

I hated the idea that the players needed certain gear to function at their peak. I like to give stuff that is meaningful to the plot or the story as the group adventures. Filling every available magic item slot with a specific item that was merely upgraded over the course of their careers rubbed me the wrong way and I resented it.

Things like that made DMing a chore. It took away the fun I had designing dungeons.

 

[Stormonu]

I hated the idea that the players needed certain gear to function at their peak. I like to give stuff that is meaningful to the plot or the story as the group adventures. Filling every available magic item slot with a specific item that was merely upgraded over the course of their careers rubbed me the wrong way and I resented it.

Things like that made DMing a chore. It took away the fun I had designing dungeons.

And having to make NPCs that were laundry lists of magic items that just became PC junk to sell (as it was often inferior to what the PCs had).

 

[the Jester]

I'll believe that they removed expected wealth by level when a playtest shows off the magic item rules and proves that +x items have been removed from the game... Of course, they also need to get rid of things like 5000gp Dragon Scale and Plate armors that are vastly better than previous armors with the only drawback being cost.

Yeah, as long as you need to buy a better armor class with supernatural armors and there are magic weapons that give you +x to-hit, they haven't removed wealth-by-level at all.

I'd like to see some consistency on this point - preferably on the "no, you don't need to buy a better AC" side of the coin. As I mentioned in another thread, bake in AC improvements as a class feature.

I think that you guys are missing the point- much like in early D&D, magic items/better armor/etc. are bonuses now- they are "wow, I'm awesome!" items instead of "wow, I don't have a level-equivalent weapon, I suck!" items.

Tied to this: I really hope that we return to the days when the idea that your gear might be broken, destroyed, lost, stolen, dissolved or rusted into nothingness was a significant element of the game.

 

[Dice4Hire]

I would like to go back to that amount of reality also, where green slime actually destroyed items.

 

[Mishihari Lord]

Yay! I hated the idea that players were entitled to X gear because they were Y level. It changed magic items from something cool and exciting to something that was just expected.

 

[JasonZZ]

Yay! I hated the idea that players were entitled to X gear because they were Y level. It changed magic items from something cool and exciting to something that was just expected.

Confound that 1E D&D, with it's low-level monsters with immunity to non-magical weapons!

More seriously, wealth by level was there from the beginning--it was only formalized by 3E. Before that, you had to more-or-less guess.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I hated the idea that players were entitled to X gear because they were Y level.

I never took those charts as an entitlement, just as a guideline. I couldn't get beyond the fingers of one hand counting the number of times I- or any DM I played under- ran a campaign that followed those charts closely.

 

[Li Shenron]

The section on treasure explicitly mentions that there is no expected wealth by level. Hurray!

Also, the section on encounter design seems to make clear that they are supporting parties with a broad level spread. Hurray again!

These two things really excite me.

I am very happy too about both of them!

Hummm...this will make it tougher for inexperienced DMs to set equipment guidelines for PCs not starting at 1st level.

Inexperienced DMs should do just that: start at 1st level and get some experience.

OTOH if the game truly doesn't imply any wealth level, then the consequence is that any wealth level is fine, so the inexperienced DM who still wants to start at higher level shouldn't worry too much about making a bad wealth level choice.

 

[slobo777]

Not necessarily, but it may require Wizards to provide some guidelines on the power of gear that could be purcahsed with various wealth levels at given level intervals.

A guide could look like this:
At 5th level a character with the following wealth can afford the following types of equipment, provided they are available in your game:
5g: Rusty sword.
50g: Normal, non-magical equipment
500g: Normal equipment and a masterwork item.
5000g: Mostly +1 magical gear.
50,000g: Mostly +3 magical gear.
500,000g: Mostly +5 Vorpal Swords of Epic Pwnage.


That way DM's could go and say "oh, well I expect my players to have on average some basic magic gear." And then give their players wealth for the expected gear value.

I like this chart.

You could cover another half of the issue with simple advice: When deciding on treasure, check that it is possible to allocate it fairly amongst the player characters, and avoid handing out magic items that create a long term imbalance between PCs.

Or shorter: Don't give out single powerful items that benefit just one character, and that leave the others behind in the long term. However, If the players decide to use all their money on one character, that's fine.