D&D 5E In fifth-edition D&D, what is gold for?

[Caliburn101]

I disagree. And this ties into the "official" rules thing as well. I think that a large number of players play the APs and that the "default" or "official" way to play the game is to pick up an AP, create a party of characters, and play the AP. Once that's done, pick up another AP, create a new batch of characters, and play that one. This is further reinforced by the nature of the AL, with drop-ins for new "campaigns" you'll create a new character, and when you reach a certain point, or come to the next season's adventurers when you need a 1st level character again.

I am sure a large number of people do play the APs - but as the survey here made clear, most players run their own homebrew.

So it is logical to assume that they are not set in a campaign vacuum and that the homebrews in which they appear are suitably modified to fit the rules of that hand crafted game world.

Ergo - the money available and the other rewards will be in context with the pre-decided world norm, and so there will in such cases be no problem, as any Gm who went to the trouble to make an entire world isn't going to find a little adaptation of the gold and magical item rewards in an AP any work at all.

If someone is simply running APs as they come out, then that would best suit an episodic game with little continuity as the levels of the APs are not sequential, in which case, once again the rewards and money are of secondary importance. The gold and magical items they walk away with are essentially a physical expression of their glory as they ride off into the sunset.

I personally don't know anyone running APs as entirely self-contained adventures, including the one game I drop in on which is a 'canon' FR game. The majority of games don't run deep into high levels unless they are long term campaigns, and a GM running a long term campaign would be shooting themselves in the foot to allow a monty-haul to derail their campaign world.

I personally cannot see a version of the way APs are played which creates a problem for a game going forwards due to the levels of reward.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I am yet to see it play out that way.

 

[Ilbranteloth]

I am sure a large number of people do play the APs - but as the survey here made clear, most players run their own homebrew.

Survey? Do you have a link? Just curious.

 

[Ahrimon]

I am sure a large number of people do play the APs - but as the survey here made clear, most players run their own homebrew.

I'd say that survey is a bit biased. It's like going to an auto parts store and having a survey about whether people prefer to fix their own cars or take it to a mechanic. WotC's survey's would be the best way to tell for sure, but unfortunately we don't have access to that.

 

[Uller]

And it doesn't matter what is played more (if I had to bet I would put my money on homebrews). That wasn't my point. The published adventures are WotC's own interpretation of how their rules and guidance is applied. It's not "official" as in "this is the only right way to play" it's official as in "this is how we recommend newer DMs and groups play.

My current group played mostly 3e homebrew sandbox campaigns with occasional published one-shots thrown in. We played D&D Next Ghosts of Dragonspear Castle explicitly because we wanted to play an adventure written by the designers of the new rules. When 5e finally came out I asked my players what they wanted to do...return to a homebrew sandbox or play a published campaign. They chose the published campaign...in the words of one of my players: "To see how they intended the game to be played."

We ran LMoP and then PotA (we're slow because we don't play that often) and they asked that I stick to the adventures as closely as possible rather than throw in a lot of hooks to my own adventures outside the written material.

By the time we started tackling the elemental temples in PotA my players (two in particular) started feeling like they didn't have a lot of good options and grew bored with monetary rewards. As I said, this isn't a huge problem for me. I fixed it on my own with some input from my players on what they wanted. The game moved on.

But when we are told over and over again by people here that this "isn't a problem" or is "a problem with our DMing" it's beyond aggravating. If I were running my own homebrew with my own chosen level of magic and monetary rewards it would have never been a problem. For whatever reason, page 135-136 of the DMG recognizes that players will want to buy, sell and craft magic items but then the downtime activities only give new DMs the tools for two of those. It's a hole. It's not the end of the world. A UA article could solve it. If you don't want a solution because it's not a problem for you then why bother telling others they're just making something out of nothing? Move along.

 

[Caliburn101]

If you don't want a solution because it's not a problem for you then why bother telling others they're just making something out of nothing? Move along.

It would appear that you are stating that it is ok to critique those who don't think there is a problem and for them trying to shut down the debate, and that they are being "beyond aggravating", but on the flipside it's ok to say there is a problem?

Is that what you meant? If this debate had started with a statement in support of the current meta with regards to gold and reward, would having a contrary view have attracted the same criticism?

Any discussion is going to have pro and contra points of view, and the only diametrically contra view to 'there is a problem' is that 'there isn't one'.

It is, surely, no less valid to say 'yes it is' or 'no it isn't' and then explain why you think so and both of these points of view deny the validity of the other.

 

[Caliburn101]

Survey? Do you have a link? Just curious.

Not without trawling - it was about 6 months ago if I remember rightly, and showed Homebrew as #1 at something like 40%+ and Forgotten Realms as second.

 

[Caliburn101]

And it doesn't matter what is played more (if I had to bet I would put my money on homebrews). That wasn't my point. The published adventures are WotC's own interpretation of how their rules and guidance is applied. It's not "official" as in "this is the only right way to play" it's official as in "this is how we recommend newer DMs and groups play.

I don't think the APs are targeted at beginners. The Starter Set is far more angled in this direction. The sandboxy elements of the latest AP and the difficulty of the start of RoT AP seem to indicate they are for the more experienced.

On the one hand, WoTC claimed this edition is to give the GM the tools to do it their way, and they made this very clear as a design goal. Bearing this in mind, aren't the APs merely one iteration of the possibilities encompassed in the rules, and not the 'one true way'?

Is it consistent to simultaneously have a game designed to be as flexible as a GM might need, that claims magical items and rare and special and then regard the APs as the 'only' way to play?

I would argue that such a conclusion is not supported by what WoTC have themselves said and done. I think the APs are demonstrably one way to doing things, not the only way, and that WoTC don't have only one interpretation of how their game should be played - that flies in the face of what they have previously claimed.

 

[Xetheral]

It would appear that you are stating that it is ok to critique those who don't think there is a problem and for them trying to shut down the debate, and that they are being "beyond aggravating", but on the flipside it's ok to say there is a problem?

Is that what you meant? If this debate had started with a statement in support of the current meta with regards to gold and reward, would having a contrary view have attracted the same criticism?

Any discussion is going to have pro and contra points of view, and the only diametrically contra view to 'there is a problem' is that 'there isn't one'.

It is, surely, no less valid to say 'yes it is' or 'no it isn't' and then explain why you think so and both of these points of view deny the validity of the other.

In the realm of discourse, expressing a problem one is experiencing and denying the existance of that problem are not symmetrical. The former is (1) an expression of frustration, (2) a search for a solution, or (3) an attempt to gather other viewpoints. (There can be overlap.) By contrast, the latter serves only to attack the legitimacy of the experiences and opinions of others.

(In case 3, I would consider it appropriate to share personal experiences that differ from the expressed problem, but that's quite different from the inherent hostility of denying the existance of the problem in the first place.)

 

[Uller]

I don't think the APs are targeted at beginners.

Of course they are. They are not targeted _only_ at beginners. But they are most definitely intended for novice DMs to be able to run.

Bearing this in mind, aren't the APs merely one iteration of the possibilities encompassed in the rules, and not the 'one true way'?

Never said it was the one true way. Clarified I wasn't saying it was the one true way.

As you said...they intended to make the game as flexible as possible. Adding an optional downtime activity doesn't take away any flexibility.


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[Caliburn101]

Of course they are. They are not targeted _only_ at beginners. But they are most definitely intended for novice DMs to be able to run.



Never said it was the one true way. Clarified I wasn't saying it was the one true way.

As you said...they intended to make the game as flexible as possible. Adding an optional downtime activity doesn't take away any flexibility.


Sent from my SCH-I535 using EN World mobile app

Some of them are big challenges for beginner GMs.

OK then, maybe I read more into it, but what did you actually mean by "official" or "default" when characterising AP play? These appear to strongly imply that they are the 'right' way to play the game in the manner in which you put them.