D&D 5E Is Treasure and Magic Items Important To You?

[doctorbadwolf]

Another thread made me wonder about this.

5e doesn’t make either actually necessary. The only things that rely on money don’t need amounts anywhere near the kind of loot the DMG tells you to hand out, and the game is built so that magic items are purely a bonus.

So how about y’all? Have you run campaigns with little or no treasure incentive? What about campaigns without magic items?

For me, I almost never roll on a treasure table, and I’ve been reducing my usage of magic items in every new campaign. I’m starting to think that waaaay less is more, in terms of magic items. Or at least anything bigger than common magic.

 

[Lanefan]

All those cool fun toys you're not giving out any more? Send 'em on over here. I'll pay the shipping...

 

[payn]

I like magic items that do cool things, not some much ones that do more numbers. I dont miss wealth by level expectations.

 

[BookTenTiger]

I played d20 Conan for a long time, and treasure and magic items were rare and at the best transitory - there was even a rule that forced you to throw a huge party when you had something like more than 1,000 go. We loved it!

That said, treasure is fun! Magic items are fun! For "random" magic items I try to choose things that are thematically appropriate to the adventure and wouldn't dominate a character's identity. However, I do allow players to pick out some magic items that they will find, especially if it matches their character concepts.

 

[el-remmen]

I have stuck to a general "magical items are special" philosophy in every edition of D&D I have run.

As for treasure, some campaigns have had a lot and others a lot less. It really depends on the setting and what the PC goals are. My "Out of the Frying Pan" campaign (3E) had very little treasure because much of it took place out in the wilderness or on the frontier. My "Second Son of a Second Son" (also 3E) campaign was themed around low-birth rank children of lesser nobility becoming adventurers to fill the coffers of their noble houses, bring them glory, and hopefully improve their position by these means, so there was lots of money!

My current game is somewhere between there.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I like magic items that do cool things, not some much ones that do more numbers. I dont miss wealth by level expectations.

Yeah I definitely agree. I don’t ever want to see a +1 sword, but a vorpal sword is pretty cool, and a silver sword that glows with moonlight (counts as daylight for any shapeshifter or undead that is affected by daylight, which is more in my campaign than in the canon critters) and adds radiant damage to attacks, is cool as hell.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I have stuck to a general "magical items are special" philosophy in every edition of D&D I have run.

As for treasure, some campaigns have had a lot and others a lot less. It really depends on the setting and what the PC goals are. My "Out of the Frying Pan" campaign (3E) had very little treasure because much of it took place out in the wilderness or on the frontier. My "Second Son of a Second Son" (also 3E) campaign was themed around low-birth rank children of lesser nobility becoming adventurers to fill the coffers of their noble houses, bring them glory, and hopefully improve their position by these means, so there was lots of money!

My current game is somewhere between there.

This brings up a great point. The campaign themes and goals and such might mean that a lot of treasure or magic is both appropriate and needed!

 

[Iry]

I like magic items that do cool things, not some much ones that do more numbers. I dont miss wealth by level expectations.

This.

Give me a sword that ignites into flame, a wand that creates an illusory Will-O-Wisp you can zoom around like a laser pointer, a pouch of glitterdust that hangs in the air for an hour and strobes like dancing lights, a bag of balls enchanted with magic mouths that utter insults when they roughly impact something, strap on wings with eight feathers that can cast fly 8 times (and then casts a fireball the 9th), a totem that plants in the ground and slowly draws wild dogs to the party... for some reason.

 

[Malmuria]

As a DM, I got the most use out of the "common" magical items in Xanathar's and items that do sort of niche things. They weren't powerful, but they were engaging and funny, and the players were able to use them in creative ways. For example, a hat that made a character look like a drunk aristocrat. Other magic items had important uses in the 'story,' that is were necessary or helpful to complete some goal.

 

[iserith]

In most of my D&D 5e games, treasure is random, based on treasure tables. Typically treasure is earned through engaging in exploration challenges rather than combats. Sometimes, treasure is worth XP. In my current hex crawl, you pay for advancement with gold 1 GP:1 XP with a trainer in town. In my D&D/street-level supers theme game, you get XP for donating gold to the local orphanage (again, 1:1).