D&D 5E No Magic Shops!

[CapnZapp]

Agree... And even if they did the bold, it would remain just as pointless as a single run thru with no records.

Seen this discussion play out may times on many forums for many different games in many different guises.

Some believe their is a "true value" and a "way to determine it" and of them some believe they know it and can do it while others think someone else can do it and they want it.

it is most prevalent on the point-buy games systems forums - hero etc. Some true believers who think their is a perfect math to solve the balance if they can just parse a new set of values and a new algorithm.

But after they have the perfect set or even the good enough set they then acknowledge that it needs to adjust for each setting for each campaign for each deviation from whatever whiteroom-of-sand they built their tower of math on.

balance in-play as opposed to balance on-paper and "value in-play as opposed to value on-paper results from the intersection of "need" and "have". So the value of a dragonslayer vs a giant slayer or even just a wand of fireballs or a restoration potions will vary massively from campaigns that run against the giants vs invasion of the lich lords undead hordes vs the tiamat series vs... vs... vs...

Its the encounter... not the math... that determines the value and an anti-toxin viial might be worth ten vorpal swords.

If i could wave a magic wish and make one change to most RPGs it would be to yank 90% of the crunchy support on item/trait balancing and replace it with good comprehensive advice, recommendations and examples of how decisions on encounters and story and campaign make the balance or break it and some good guidelines and benchmarks for new to medium experienced Gms to get their feet wet without game crashing blow-outs.

EDIT TO ADD: There is a concept called "false precision" and basically it boils down to no matter how accurate your measuring of ingredients is and no matter how precisely you mix them together and no matter how properly refined and pure those ingredients are... if your stove thermostat fluctuates wildly with swings og 50-100 degrees or more at a whim - all that precision does not wind up making you a good cake except by dumb chance when the temp just happens to work out right. **you are likely just as good with spending the money of cheap box cake recipe and a new thermostat.**

And just like all those forums... the poster mistaking all that as argument to not even try... Sigh

One more time: asking for it to be perfect and cover all campaigns equally well is obviously unreasonable and a huge straw man!



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[CapnZapp]

That works great in World of Warcraft, where you've got the data volume to analyze objective outcomes. With a TTRPG:
1) You're relying on the survey respondents' subjective analysis of the results, including both the outcomes of the combats and the value of the items (in other words, respondents are going to rate their 'favorite' items more highly, leading to price lists in which popular, not just effective, items are priced higher).
2) Your N is far, far too low, especially given all the variables
3) You are depending on all these 'playtesters' doing this repeatedly, not just once. In other words, "Everybody please suspend your regular campaigns while you use all your tabletop to playtest these new rules, which most of you don't like anyway."

The end result is that a tiny handful of people do the majority of the testing and their subjective preferences end up determining prices.

I'm not arguing with the theory, just the practice.

Please stop making it look like I am participating in discussions regarding this subject.

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[Fanaelialae]

But now you're losing track of the issue....?

I wasn't saying DR was huge then. I was pointing out how DR shaped the pricing structure of magic weapons.

A price structure that doesn't make sense within 5E.

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I know what you were saying. What I am saying is that the pricing structure of magic weapons wasn't shaped by 3.5 DR, and yet was retained and seemingly worked well enough (even AFAIK for Pathfinder today). Just as with Sane in 5e.

That you want to use a different structure is fine. But IMO if the pricing doesn't work for Sane then it doesn't work for 3.5 either.

 

[Maxperson]

That works great in World of Warcraft, where you've got the data volume to analyze objective outcomes. With a TTRPG:
1) You're relying on the survey respondents' subjective analysis of the results, including both the outcomes of the combats and the value of the items (in other words, respondents are going to rate their 'favorite' items more highly, leading to price lists in which popular, not just effective, items are priced higher).
2) Your N is far, far too low, especially given all the variables
3) You are depending on all these 'playtesters' doing this repeatedly, not just once. In other words, "Everybody please suspend your regular campaigns while you use all your tabletop to playtest these new rules, which most of you don't like anyway."

The end result is that a tiny handful of people do the majority of the testing and their subjective preferences end up determining prices.

I'm not arguing with the theory, just the practice.

1 and 2 )You don't need pools the size of WoW to be useful. No, it's not perfect, but it doesn't have to be. It doesn't matter if you rate your favorite items more highly, because they are using the aggregate and your bias increase will be negated by others.

3) That's what playtesters sign up to do. They WANT to suspend things to test rules, some of which they don't like.

 

[Maxperson]

Good for you.

If you had then made the argument "I don't need a magic pricing supplement for 5th edition, I can do it myself, but I see the value in such a book for others" that would be okay.

The same applies to you and any other DM who isn't indecisive. If you are decisive, you can come up with prices very quickly. If you are indecisive, you are in the wrong business by being a DM. DMs need to be able to make decisions.

 

[Guest 6801328]

You are certainly free to like or dislike whatever you wish.

But that is not the issue here.

There seem to be a lot of issues in this thread.

As long as you don't try to deny others their preferred play styles, have a nice day

Is that a reference to the oft-repeated, never-valid argument "if you argue against options you don't like, you're denying somebody else a preferred playstyle"? BS argument. Scroll back a few pages for reasons.

If I play with a DM who likes the options, then I'm stuck with them. "You can find another table." And so can you. Plus you can just use houserules or 3rd party options to fill in the blanks.

So please don't force your playstyle on me, either. K?

(Or how about we both just abandon that lamest and silliest of arguments...on this topic and others...and simply have at it over the question itself? After all, neither of us is going to persuade WotC of anything.)

 

[Guest 6801328]

1 and 2 )You don't need pools the size of WoW to be useful. No, it's not perfect, but it doesn't have to be. It doesn't matter if you rate your favorite items more highly, because they are using the aggregate and your bias increase will be negated by others.

If you're not correlating the magic item choice to success in combat then it's just a popularity contest. If you are trying to correlate then you can't generate the data, because you need enough data for both the variability of the dice and the nature of the combats (i.e., against a large variety of monsters over a range of CRs). And if you're just holding a popularity contest then it's completely useless:
A) If there were a single, large magic item economy (meaning that all tables shared from the same pool of magic items) then, sure, gauging popularity would give you some kind of baseline of how to price things.
B) But since players aren't bidding against players from other tables, all that matters is the local economy. And if you want to base prices off popularity, use the popularity of your own players (that is, improvise).

I mean, a quicker way to accomplish what you are describing is a website that just displays two magic items. Click on the one you would prefer and get two more. A few million clicks from a few tens of thousands of players and you'll have a decent approximation of relative popularity.

If WotC then wasted pages I paid for on such a survey I'd be PISSED.

3) That's what playtesters sign up to do. They WANT to suspend things to test rules, some of which they don't like.

How many playtesters test that extensively? Again, we're not talking about "does this spell work" we're talking about just generating magic item vs. monster data. No new rules, just repetitive combats using existing rules. Lots and lots of times. Sure, CapnZapp probably would because he really wants this feature, but how many others would, and do we really want CapnZapp determining magic item pricing?

 

[Maxperson]

If you're not correlating the magic item choice to success in combat then it's just a popularity contest. If you are trying to correlate then you can't generate the data, because you need enough data for both the variability of the dice and the nature of the combats (i.e., against a large variety of monsters over a range of CRs). And if you're just holding a popularity contest then it's completely useless:

What makes you think it's one or the other? People don't choose vorpal swords because they look good. They pick them because of combat success. Popular choices are popular for mechanical reasons.

A) If there were a single, large magic item economy (meaning that all tables shared from the same pool of magic items) then, sure, gauging popularity would give you some kind of baseline of how to price things.
B) But since players aren't bidding against players from other tables, all that matters is the local economy. And if you want to base prices off popularity, use the popularity of your own players (that is, improvise).

That's not entirely accurate. The players may not be bidding against each other, but the aggregate will reveal the median price for an item. You will end up with a price that will be closely aligned with all tables, and perfectly with some, and that's all that you really need to do. You don't need perfection.

I mean, a quicker way to accomplish what you are describing is a website that just displays two magic items. Click on the one you would prefer and get two more. A few million clicks from a few tens of thousands of players and you'll have a decent approximation of relative popularity.

This isn't a just popularity contest, though. That's why price tweaking is important. What you describe there would be useless. However, playtesting and then altering prices to shift what people buy and make less popular items more popular will ultimately yield a price list that results in players making diverse purchases.

One player might go with a +1 weapon for 10,000gp. Another might go with two smaller +1/4 weapons and a combat widget for 10,000gp, because he views those 3 items as being as good or better than the +1.

How many playtesters test that extensively? Again, we're not talking about "does this spell work" we're talking about just generating magic item vs. monster data. No new rules, just repetitive combats using existing rules. Lots and lots of times. Sure, CapnZapp probably would because he really wants this feature, but how many others would, and do we really want CapnZapp determining magic item pricing?

Or, they can just run a mini-campaign for a few levels with X wealth by level, Y level appropriate items for purchase, and Z item prices and see what gets bought and what doesn't. Then tweak and run another mini campaign for few levels. When those item prices are tweaked so that the various tables are purchasing a variety of items rather than a select few, you give them a new short level range and new level appropriate items. Rinse repeat until all levels are covered.

 

[Guest 6801328]

Or, they can just run a mini-campaign for a few levels with X wealth by level, Y level appropriate items for purchase, and Z item prices and see what gets bought and what doesn't. Then tweak and run another mini campaign for few levels. When those item prices are tweaked so that the various tables are purchasing a variety of items rather than a select few, you give them a new short level range and new level appropriate items. Rinse repeat until all levels are covered.

Would you do this, if WotC asked us all to playtest magic item prices? Is this how you would spend precious table time? I still stand by my assertion that it would produce worthless data, but that aside...would you participate in this playtest? How many times?

 

[Kobold Boots]

The same applies to you and any other DM who isn't indecisive. If you are decisive, you can come up with prices very quickly. If you are indecisive, you are in the wrong business by being a DM. DMs need to be able to make decisions.

.. and my only argument with this statement is that we've got a good number of people making the argument for prices in this thread and if they're on this site they're in the motivated hobbyist category.

So if it's a DM looking for prices then they shouldn't be a DM by this argument. AND
If it's a player looking for prices it's simply to offset whatever a decisive DM is stating.

Therefore the only other option is that the people continually making a point in this thread are being difficult for the sake of being difficult.

Be well
KB