Jonathon Robinson
First Post
It was good. I checked it when I did it.
The conclusion was that an average party should find about 6 non-consumable magic items per PC over their career in hordes if you follow the DMG guidance. About half will be attuned. Beyond those, PCs will get enough money to buy items, but what they can find to buy (or trade for) is totally up to the DM.
If you follow the probabilities and tables from the DMG guidance, the chance the PCs find one of those rare wands is about 1 in 3 *over their career*... and that could be fireball, paralysis, slow...
Another thing to consider: Whena wizard can first cast fireball at 5th level, the DC is likely to be 14 or 15. It is likely to climb at levels 8, 9 13, and 17 - and will end up around 19. The DC of the wand is always right there at 15. By 11th level, the damage is about that of a cantrip when the save is made.
I'm not arguing it starts to feel underwhelming by 11th level. I was asking if it felt overpowered for its rarity (rare) which starts getting handed out at level 5 (possibly sooner if you're a 3-4 level party fighting a CR 5 dragon) and what did your table do about it.