D&D 5E What's the point of gold?

[Remathilis]

Okay, so the party sends in the member with the correct race to commission an item. The knowledge is there, there are just a few more barriers for the PCs to access it.

Assuming the PCs could find someone to make it. Elves might not sell their magical rings, and dwarves won't given dwarven weapons to humans (Think about how the elves in the Hobbit scoffed at Thorin carrying an elven blade). Or that elves only make X amount of rings per decade, and they are under strict tradition/punishment not to exceed that.

So someone had to make magic item on a regular basis as otherwise the god could not bless some of them or a fluke can't happen. Again, the knowledge is there.

But its incomplete knowledge: if you can't seal the deal, then all the knowledge you have is useless. These are less "why can't I make anything" and more "I want to make X item. Here is 50,000 gp. Yay!, I now have X" concerns.

And again, the knowledge is there, the price will only be higher. On the upside it is now rather easy to know where you likely will get certain magic item. Want a stave? Visit city near the valley.

If its even for sale. The only vorpal swords are those in the dungeons, unless you are willing to sell your soul for the knowledge to make them. Or that the rare wood from staves can only be harvested from trees once every ten years. Or that the Fromzan (who is currently exploring the Isle of Dread on the Elemental Plane of Water) can even be reached to be asked.

That is just another way of saying "Modern people simply can't do that stuff without any real reason. Deal with it". But as with all other points, the knowledge is there and a D&D adventuring career is usually short enough that such a magic item would last at least 10 levels if not more.

Its there because you, as the DM, says it is. I neglected option 11: That item doesn't exist and nobody can ever make it since I figured it was obvious.

Again, I don't care if crafting rules exist. *I* want control as to WHAT can be made and HOW its made. 5e gives me those options. 3e took them from me and said "Here you go players; you need X, Y and Z to make magic items and everything with a price tag is kosher!"

If a player wants to make a quest out of creating a Cloak of Displacement, then great. Adventures flow from that. I don't want "Ok, I spent 24 days, 12,000 gp, and 480 XP, here is my cloak. What will I make next?"

 

[Belisarius76]

Kind of funny actually. Gold in 5e is primarily used for the things that are usually glossed over in other games/editions. More book keeping like upkeep, running businesses, paying rent for homes, training etc etc. Most of what others have said. It seems to run counter intuitive to the philosophy of 5e, making things simpler. It can be argued those things are optional via the modular nature of the game.... but then gold actually does become worthless.

It doesn't run counter intuitive, because as a DM you either implement those items or you don't, that's the beauty of it. You as the DM can have as simplistic or hard core realism as you and your players like

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Yes we have through the magic of Engineering.

Well, duh!

Still, as of 2009, nobody had successfully explained precisely how the 200 million tons of basalt- much of it in 50 ton columns- were moved to make the ancient city of Nan Madol on an artificial island of crushed coral.

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/nan-madol-the-city-built-on-coral-reefs-147288758/

Not to mention other ancient landmarks. Certainly, it was by human engineering, but the details of HOW matter, and as yet, are unknown.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I'd say the difference is simply scale though. You'd end a campaign where you lost half the group. Celtavian would end the game if he lost one. The difference is where you draw the line, not that the line exists. The DM is still, as you say, "held hostage" to the players. The difference being in Celt's game, one player can make the difference, in your game, it would take two or three (or however many). At the end of the day, the DM is still forced to either compromise with the players or not run the game.

Which brings us back around to fungible magic items. If the group advocates that buying and selling magic items works in a certain way, and the DM wants to go in a different direction, the DM has to get enough players on board with his idea to keep the campaign going (presuming of course that this is an important enough issue that players would stop playing over). DM's rarely can make any sort of campaign decision completely in a vacuum. The DM is pretty much obligated by the social contracts of the table to keep at least half an eye on the players before making any changes. A DM who doesn't quickly finds that no one wants to play in the campaign.

Celtavian's group differs in more than mere scale.

In his group, there is a dialog involving compromise. If one doesn't like the rules or the system, they discuss possible changes. There is a continuum of possible modifications. If and only if the group cannot come to a compromise is the game cancelled.

In our group, there is no such discussion. Players take what the prospective DM offers or they don't play. No compromise is even suggested. There is no continuum of possible modifications, only play or don't.

(And, like I said, there's no hard feelings about this, even if the non-participants sit out 18 months or more.)

As for fungible magic items...to date, I have not seen an issue arise with how it gets handled proceed to the point of disrupting a campaign or caused even a single player to walk away from a game.

 

[Shasarak]

Well, duh!

Still, as of 2009, nobody had successfully explained precisely how the 200 million tons of basalt- much of it in 50 ton columns- were moved to make the ancient city of Nan Madol on an artificial island of crushed coral.

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/nan-madol-the-city-built-on-coral-reefs-147288758/

Not to mention other ancient landmarks. Certainly, it was by human engineering, but the details of HOW matter, and as yet, are unknown.

It really is amazing what humans can do with 500 years of time and the power to fly 50 tons of basalt across an island.

 

[Belisarius76]

Magic items. A party of level 5, just out of apprentice tier doing the typical 7 fights/day, will be making more than 1k/day in gold. By level 11 you'll be making enough gold a day to destroy the economy of large towns. So, buy magic items, or be the villain and destroy economies. Your choice.

7 fights per day with 1000+ gold / day lol, I think you had better reconsider the economy and how much physical gold, silver etc coin would be actually in circulation. You should also look at fatigue and how realistic 7 fights per day would be wielding heavy weapons, would be impossible in real life, even in a medieval fantasy setting based on our existence.
It's crazy to hand out so much gold per day tbh, the game becomes boring with no real meaning in terms of goal setting. And hence why, even since the D&D Next playtest packets, there has been hints on all this, cutting gold down and magical item availability to actually spice the game up, because the characters involved have to struggle to get anything, making it more interesting and perilous. Numerous rule changes, such as no "+" magical item stacking like old editions directly points towards this mindset, along with modest treasure, even for major dragon encounters in Hoard of the Dragon Queen and Rise of Tiamat, far far less than previous editions.

 

[Jester David]

Yeah, despite my love for the fantastic I read little fantasy fiction since so much is just one cliche after another and most are farmboy becomes hero of the world schlock. Ugh. Tried reading the FR fiction my brother loves and man was it just not for me. Oh well.

There are cliches and then there are archetypes. Some things work because they're recognisable. Or for structural reasons; the poor farmboy trope works so well because it helps explain the world and backstory to readers.
The poor unknown who becomes a rich champion is an element of the heroes journey, a part of Joseph Campbell's Hero of a Thousand Faces. That story goes back to Gilgamesh.

The rich hero isn't unknown but it's far less common. Found a couple examples:
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/GentlemanAdventurer
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CrimefightingWithCash
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/NonIdleRich
It's much more modern and tied to pulp characters.
D&D comes up as an example in a couple places, likely owing to modern editions. And it references an Order of the Stick strip I vaguely remember (but cannot find, to link to) where it jokes about party not having a better inn room because that would be suspicious, as adventurers never spending any money on that.

 

[Hussar]

Celtavian's group differs in more than mere scale.

In his group, there is a dialog involving compromise. If one doesn't like the rules or the system, they discuss possible changes. There is a continuum of possible modifications. If and only if the group cannot come to a compromise is the game cancelled.

In our group, there is no such discussion. Players take what the prospective DM offers or they don't play. No compromise is even suggested. There is no continuum of possible modifications, only play or don't.

(And, like I said, there's no hard feelings about this, even if the non-participants sit out 18 months or more.)

Well, sure, but, the end result is the same. You have a choice, as a DM, if enough players don't like your idea, you either change your idea or don't play that game. I'd be pretty surprised if a DM, after pitching an idea, would absolutely refuse to compromise anything if he didn't have any players who wanted to play that idea. Even if the compromise is, "Well, ok, how about this idea?"

As for fungible magic items...to date, I have not seen an issue arise with how it gets handled proceed to the point of disrupting a campaign or caused even a single player to walk away from a game.

Yes, the old saw about how if you personally haven't seen the problem, the problem cannot possibly exist.

Do you believe that people are lying to you when they claim to have these problems? Or that they are so incompetent that these problems are always entirely their own fault? Do you believe that these issues never actually exist?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Well, sure, but, the end result is the same. You have a choice, as a DM, if enough players don't like your idea, you either change your idea or don't play that game. I'd be pretty surprised if a DM, after pitching an idea, would absolutely refuse to compromise anything if he didn't have any players who wanted to play that idea. Even if the compromise is, "Well, ok, how about this idea?"

(Emphasis mine.)
Sorry to surprise you, but that is exactly what happens in our group. The prospective GMs present the game they'd like to run, like it or leave it. Nobody bites, the campaign gets shelved, and someone else gets to step up.

Yes, the old saw about how if you personally haven't seen the problem, the problem cannot possibly exist.

(Emphasis mine)

Shame on you Hussar, for even suggesting that. You know full well from our past discussions of the 15 minute workday that I do not and never will espouse that false position.

Do you believe that people are lying to you when they claim to have these problems?

No.

Or that they are so incompetent that these problems are always entirely their own fault?

"Incompetence" is not a word I'd typically use in this case.

I would say it's more like being unable to see a different way of doing things, usually because they've never seen someone do it a different way- they're hindered by "perceptual blinders" if you will.

Humans are always hindered by perceptual blinders. Who hasn't had the experience of doing something one way, and suddenly having someone show you a completely different and possibly easier way of doing the same task.

And it's really irksome if the new way seems SO obvious in retrospect.

Do you cook, Hussar? Ever had to separate yolks from egg whites? For centuries, people have used cups, spoons or even the eggshells themselves for the task. It takes a few minutes.

Then this:

[video=youtube;_AirVOuTN_M]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_AirVOuTN_M&sns=em[/video]


TL; DR: If I thought it was incompetence, I wouldn't be trying to suggest possible solutions.

 

[mlund]

7 fights per day with 1000+ gold / day lol, I think you had better reconsider the economy and how much physical gold, silver etc coin would be actually in circulation.

Actually, I think Wizards dropped the ball yet again on Gold Pieces. They are ridiculously inflated vs. proper scarcity in D&D in terms of daily earnings of dirt-farmers and burghers and lifestyle expenses for nobility / aristocracy. An aristocrat living in a city without the benefit of hospitality or his own property within the city, is burning out 3,650 gold pieces a year -minimum-, which is a farce. Everything in regard to generalized income and expenses is off by at least one decimal point, but Wizards wasn't willing to move to a silver piece consumption standard since "GPs" are a sacred cow.

So the core economies are already inflated by 1000% over what could be considered "normal," but if we adjust for fantasy inflation it's not too terrible outside of that. I mean, think about how many petty nobles and wealthy merchants reside in a large town, representing somewhere between 1,000 and 4,000 Gold Pieces per person per year just in personal consumpion. Adventuring days of 7 encounters that challenge 5th level adventurers would likely be exceedingly rare events (unless you're slapping 12 or more levels of PC classes on every noteworthy NPC with the assumption that they got their levels the same way as players).

Marty Lund