D&D 5E No Magic Shops!

[Guest 6801328]

Oooh, ooh! I have a great formula for this!

Let Y represent the desired magic item.

Let Z represent the desired magic item, if a holy avenger.

And let X represent the total amount of money that the party has right now.

Then, at any given time-

Y = 10(X)

Z= 10^10^10^10^10^10(X)

A googol^googol? Sounds about right.

You joke (maybe...?) but in general if you're actually going to make a magic item be for sale, I'd have the price be something that character/party currently doesn't have. If it's just gold, it should be more gold than they have. But maybe it's some very rare or very unique object (...or person/creature...) that they have to go get.

 

[Satyrn]

Just for argument's sake . . .

I'm not interested in arguing this. It will accomplish nothing. It won't help me.

I know I waded into this thread long after it became more of an argument than a conversation, but that hasn't stopped me from quixotically expecting to have a conversation.

So, I've described a couple ways using a list can help me. I'll recap (and maybe clarify) :

1) By having a specific price in the book, I don't have to rely on my poorly organized notes to maintain a consistency between what I said a month ago and now.
2) It makes tbe decusion for me, so I don't have to make up a number, while providing me as an easy way to pass off the effort of looking up the details to my players why I deal with some other bit of DMing.

Of course, that's not the entirety of how I handle buying and selling items, only a couple ways that having a list of prices can help me.

In the absence of such a list, how do you handle deciding the price of a an item, how do you keep note of the decisions you've made in the past, how do handle this stuff in the middle of a session?

 

[cbwjm]

Having only a basic memory of what's said in this thread, it sounds like it can be broken down to the following:

1. WotC should create a magic item price list!
2. I don't need a price list, I'm happy to just make it up but I guess if there was one then maybe I'd use it.
3. I don't need a price list and WotC shouldn't waste space on one!

I'm a 2. I'm happy to make up the price if it ever comes up. I don't really need a price list but it might come in handy at some point, I even have a copy of the sane price guide floating around somewhere on my PC.

 

[Guest 6801328]

I'm not interested in arguing this. It will accomplish nothing. It won't help me.

I know I waded into this thread long after it became more of an argument than a conversation, but that hasn't stopped me from quixotically expecting to have a conversation.

Ok, I used the rhetorical phrase "for arguments sake" but...being 100% honest here...I'm trying to whittle things down to the bare essence here to better understand where we differ. I do love to debate, but I've also learned a lot in this thread, both in how other gamers think about things, and in clarifying my own thinking.

So, I've described a couple ways using a list can help me. I'll recap (and maybe clarify) :

1) By having a specific price in the book, I don't have to rely on my poorly organized notes to maintain a consistency between what I said a month ago and now.
2) It makes tbe decusion for me, so I don't have to make up a number, while providing me as an easy way to pass off the effort of looking up the details to my players why I deal with some other bit of DMing.

Of course, that's not the entirety of how I handle buying and selling items, only a couple ways that having a list of prices can help me.

In the absence of such a list, how do you handle deciding the price of a an item, how do you keep note of the decisions you've made in the past, how do handle this stuff in the middle of a session?

So it sounds like it's primarily of organizational interest to you, not that there is an objectively "right" price. Whether the official price for a Bag of Holding is 500 or 5000 gold, you don't really care, as long as three months later it doesn't change between the two, and you don't have to worry about tracking it.

Is that correct? Or is having a price that is somehow also balanced against other magic items and the presumed economy also important?

Can I ask why you want the number to be consistent?

To answer your question, I would make up a number on the spot. "Um....he'll give you 1200 gold for it." (I probably wouldn't have one for sale, so I can get my head around a sell price more easily.)

Let's say a year later the players regret selling the bag and want a new one. They put some good work into tracking one down and I (grudgingly) agree they find one for sale. I have no idea what I said last time so I make up a new number. "Ummm...she wants 7,000 gold for it." The players, however, remember these things and say, "What!?!?! When we sold it it was only 1200."

I honestly don't care. "Yeah, well, you probably should have found a wealthier or more desperate buyer." Or, "This bag was carried by the famous wizard Xakanaxa....". Whatever. If I think it will improve the story for them to have it the price will be cheaper. Or vice versa. If they roll some good social skills maybe the price will come down. Or maybe the seller will offer to trade for something she needs.

These are rare, wondrous magical items, not soybean futures. There is no stable, consistent market. I don't feel the need to remember anything about prices.

 

[Lanefan]

Just for argument's sake, what would be the problem with totally making up a number without putting any thought into it? Or even rolling percentile dice and multiplying by 1,000 gold?

Let's say the official price in the rulebook would have been X, but in the absence of such a number you quote X/3. Or 3X. (You can replace the 3 with a 2 or a 10 or whatever.) What's the downside to pricing it too high or too low?

If you price it too high the player might grumble and either buy it or not. If you price it too low the player will get a screaming deal. But still for more gold than if he/she had looted it in a dungeon. How does this actually affect the campaign?

Is literally the only benefit of the list that it saves you the time of making up the number?

Making up the number would be the trivially easy part.

A little more annoying, and only very slightly less easy, would be to write that number down for future reference.

More annoying, and a random amount more difficult, would be finding that note some years later when another of the same item came on to the market.

And maybe less annoying but orders of magnitude more difficult, would be to set the price of the next random item found in any sort of reasonable scale with what I'd generated for the first one; and that's what professional designers are for.

Lanefan

 

[Guest 6801328]

Having only a basic memory of what's said in this thread, it sounds like it can be broken down to the following:

1. WotC should create a magic item price list!
2. I don't need a price list, I'm happy to just make it up but I guess if there was one then maybe I'd use it.
3. I don't need a price list and WotC shouldn't waste space on one!

I'm a 2. I'm happy to make up the price if it ever comes up. I don't really need a price list but it might come in handy at some point, I even have a copy of the sane price guide floating around somewhere on my PC.

Um, I think there's a 4: "Putting official prices on magic items would potentially (probably?) have a detrimental* effect on the game because it would normalize the idea that magic items are easily bought and sold. Future arguments about 6e, 7e, and 8e would cite the existence of prices in 5e as evidence that there are supposed to be magic stores."

*Admittedly, by my biased definition of 'detrimental'. Sort of like the Rapier. YMMV.

 

[Guest 6801328]

Making up the number would be the trivially easy part.

A little more annoying, and only very slightly less easy, would be to write that number down for future reference.

More annoying, and a random amount more difficult, would be finding that note some years later when another of the same item came on to the market.

And maybe less annoying but orders of magnitude more difficult, would be to set the price of the next random item found in any sort of reasonable scale with what I'd generated for the first one; and that's what professional designers are for.

Lanefan

Ah, ok. So you (and I believe Satyrn) put waaaaay more importance on pricing consistency than I do.

I still don't understand why consistency is important to you (and would love to understand it) but enlightenment seems just around the corner.

 

[cbwjm]

In DnD I am for consistency in rulings, in pricing I don't think it really matters. The same magic item could be different prices depending on the circumstances.

Sent from my [device_name] using EN World mobile app

 

[cbwjm]

Um, I think there's a 4: "Putting official prices on magic items would potentially (probably?) have a detrimental* effect on the game because it would normalize the idea that magic items are easily bought and sold. Future arguments about 6e, 7e, and 8e would cite the existence of prices in 5e as evidence that there are supposed to be magic stores."

*Admittedly, by my biased definition of 'detrimental'. Sort of like the Rapier. YMMV.

That sounds possible but I don't think it would be probable, particularly if this is considered DM content. Each game is different, some will have magic shops, some will say that magic items aren't typically for sale just as it is now. 5e is quite different from 3e and 4e where having X items by Y level was essentially part of the game math so I don't think having a magic item cost list will be detrimental to 5e. Of course, I'm happy to make up the numbers so I also don't really see the need for a list.

 

[Satyrn]

Ah, ok. So you (and I believe Satyrn) put waaaaay more importance on pricing consistency than I do.

It's really just that I'd rather have the decision already made for, rather than having to pick from a range. This list is a tool that I actually would use, and so I'd rather have had it included in Xanathar's instead of the other stuff I never will
(like the expanded, detailed tool uses stuff; I prefer a skill/tool system left totally up to my DM discretion)