D&D 5E If you aren't buying magic items, where will you spend your gold?

[chriton227]

Not a lot of Ferraris at any used car lot I've ever seen.

Not finding fault with your reasoning, just thought I'd point out this place as a counterpoint: Foreign Cars Italia. They are currently showing 15 used Ferraris sitting on the lot, along with a Lambo and a handful of Maseratis. This is in Greensboro NC, not exactly Beverly Hills or NYC. Whenever you have people with more money than they know what to do with, some of them will use it to try to make more money off of other people that have more money than they know what to do with. You won't find many Ferraris at random used car lots, but you will find places that specialize in exotic thing like used Ferraris. Just like you won't find many magic items at random general stores, but there may well be places that specialize in selling them.

 

[CapnZapp]

Sigh.

It appears the DMG has completely abandoned any notion of calculating an item's price based on its properties.

Now you're only given super-broad suggestions like "a super rare item costs half a million gold".

But rarity is a very poor gauge on an item's value to a group. Balance-wise, it's next to worthless.

It appears that all those groups that aren't interested in campaign-style downtime activities (building castles, managing guilds, etc) are completely short-changed.

Not only aren't the d20/3E playstyle where the gold you loot mainly goes toward improving your personal gear (and thus bonuses)...

...it doesn't seem to care to give any good options on what to spend the gold on instead, assuming you're halfway through an official module, and you don't want to break off the action to do background stuff.


>>> Quick, you have two days in Waterdeep (or Sigil etc) - what do you buy for your several hundred thousand gold? That helps you when you continue your mission, that is. <<<


Will this mean that players (with this mindset) might as well throw away their gold in 5E, once they have amassed enough for mundane expenses?

 

[Tormyr]

Sigh.

It appears the DMG has completely abandoned any notion of calculating an item's price based on its properties.

Now you're only given super-broad suggestions like "a super rare item costs half a million gold".

But rarity is a very poor gauge on an item's value to a group. Balance-wise, it's next to worthless.

It appears that all those groups that aren't interested in campaign-style downtime activities (building castles, managing guilds, etc) are completely short-changed.

Not only aren't the d20/3E playstyle where the gold you loot mainly goes toward improving your personal gear (and thus bonuses)...

...it doesn't seem to care to give any good options on what to spend the gold on instead, assuming you're halfway through an official module, and you don't want to break off the action to do background stuff.


>>> Quick, you have two days in Waterdeep (or Sigil etc) - what do you buy for your several hundred thousand gold? That helps you when you continue your mission, that is. <<<


Will this mean that players (with this mindset) might as well throw away their gold in 5E, once they have amassed enough for mundane expenses?

How are the players coming up with several hundred thousand gold in 5e?

 

[CapnZapp]

>>> Quick, you have two days in Waterdeep (or Sigil etc) - what do you buy for your several hundred thousand gold? That helps you when you continue your mission, that is. <<<

And please, no suggestions from your own campaign.

I'm looking for official support, if any.

What the DMG contains, that is.

Just as you can fix this for your campaign, I can fix for mine. I'm looking for what the DMG offers in support for one of the main playstyles of previous editions, here. And only that.

 

[CapnZapp]

How are the players coming up with several hundred thousand gold in 5e?

Please don't quibble, Tormyr. Feel free to respond, but try not to sidetrack the issue. Thank you.

 

[steeldragons]

Please don't quibble, Tormyr. Feel free to respond, but try not to sidetrack the issue. Thank you.

I don't thionk that's a quibble or side track at all.

You are complaining/seeking sympathies that there is no "official support" for magic item pricing/purchasing in 5e...and that spending gold on non-magic item purchases isn't a viable suggestion.

For this to be an actual concern, the PCs would have to have all of this gold floating around to spend on "something" in the first place. Where in 5e is the "official support" that states PCs should be amassing these huge amounts of gp?

You are complaining the system is not providing you with a solution to a problem that the system does not create.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

Not that this is the focus of this thread, but I can think of lots of reasons that magic item shops aren't realistic.

...

Huh. This litany has convinced me to add magic item brokers to my big cities, sly people in the know who match up their customers. No inventory problems, no theft problems, and it solves the problem of matching buyer and seller. Also, it'll take a day to a month to get any given item once it's ordered. Works for me.

Commissioned deal arrangers is exactly how expensive items like suits of armor were sold in the middle ages.

On the plus side, you get ballpark 90% of the "market price" from selling you items.
On the minus side, getting a fair deal could take weeks or months.

The 3e "sale price" = 50% of "market price" was not really unreasonable in context. You are paying a gigantic commission (50% instead of 10%) but getting your cash quickly. The dealers can turn that around for a healthy profit, and even afford to eat the cost of an occasional dud item.

 

[Tormyr]

Please don't quibble, Tormyr. Feel free to respond, but try not to sidetrack the issue. Thank you.

Sorry.

Okay, unpacking the short question: I feel the question is valid because the scenario given just does not seem like it would exist. Short of raiding an ancient dragon's lair from a 3.5 AP with a reward that is imbalanced even for 3.5, that much money just doesn't sit in one spot. When that much gold does not exist in one spot, the question of what to do with money gets simpler.

It seems like it is too early to fully determine whether the DMG gives indications of how to apply value to items. If the DMG gives indications of how to assign rarity to a magic item and gives value ranges for rarity levels, than it is giving indication indirectly of how to assign value to an item. But yes, it seems like the value for properties tables are gone. Which does not seem so bad to me. It takes up space and time to nickel and dime the value of a magic item when a general assessment is Good Enough (tm).

Rarity is not necessarily a poor determination of value to a party, but it is definitely not tightly coupled. Nor should it be. Each group is different, and sometimes an uncommon or Rare item is just what is needed for someone to become awesome.

It seems like there are values for items in the DMG. Which means that there can be a store. It is up to the DM. This edition has eschewed a lot of "how to play" stuff in favor of "how the DM might set it up" stuff. It looks to me that it will be minimal effort to add the magic store in if it really wanted. Those who want to just buy stuff should still have an avenue for that, even if it isn't laid out in black and white.

But in a few weeks, we will have better answers to these questions.

 

[77IM]

We haven't seen the full guidelines yet, have we? Maybe these prices are just starting points with the expectation that the DM can tweak them substantially based on the needs of the group.

By analogy to a rule in the PHB: you craft 5gp worth of goods per day. But any DM worth his chair will allow a master dwarven smith to craft plate mail much faster. An ability check maybe? I dunno.

I view all rules as guidelines -- especially those phrased as a "absolutes" without a specific step of "(insert DM judgment here)." So don't judge the DMG item rules by what's missing, but by what is there, and how you can use it as a starting point.

 

[S_Dalsgaard]

I did a quick calculation on some of the treasure in Lost Mine of Phandelver. If the PCs find all the treasure before entering the mine, where they are assumed to have reached 4th level, it comes to just over 3000 gp (4000 if they score all the various rewards from the people of Phandalin) plus various magic items. Shared equally in a party of four, that isn't even enough for the fighter to buy a plate mail.