Alternative Ways for Awarding Treasure Besides Tomb Robbing?

[Blue]

When getting more money is an inherent part of the core gameplay loop...

I need to speak up here. In 3.x it was inherently part of the play loop, and in 4e is was explicitly part of the character advancement math. Both because of items. But it's not an inherent part of the 5e mechanics at all. You can run 20th level characters without items if you want. And the recommended number of items for the entire party (Xanathar's pg 135) makes it abundantly clear that not everyone will have "+X weapon and armor" and such as expected in earlier editions. It isn't calibrated into the monster math and isn't inherently needed in the game.

Now, there's a lot of things to do with money outside of magic items, but that also varies on the game. For instance I'm running a game where the group are agents for the Imperium and can request any mundane needs, so there's no need to buy horses - they just borrow them from the local Post or pay for lodgings or worry abotu upgrading mundane equipment, etc. And they don't care about money at all. It's not a push for adventure or anything like that.

Hence my question (3 paragraphs to get to the discussion prompt, I know...): If you run a heroic game in a TTRPG system with wealth progression, how do your players get treasure (and magic items etc.)? Do you just accept that in your universe the victor gets all the possessions of the defeated? Do your questgivers handle the majority of the rewards? Did you make item progression abstract in some other way? What are some ways you deviate from the typical tomb robbing/pillaging treasure collection TTRPGs usually assume?

This doesn't mean that it is impossible to have a wealth progression system in a heroic game, of course. Lots of GMs do so succesfully. Hell, I do it in my games all the time. It's just that the overthinking part of my brain dislikes the inherent opposition in these two play styles, and I'm trying to see if alternatives exist to "These guys are selfless heroes who take on morally justified quests, but the majority of their wealth and magic items comes from robbing tombs and taking the possessions of their enemies". Not that the style I just described is inherently bad, I'm just trying to see how we could move past it.

D&D 4e had an eye-opening way to do this, which was treasure packets. Great idea to remove one of the causes of murderhobo-ism. Basically it was like milestone XP but for treasure. Important as magic item upgrades were expected and worked into foe math and it was effectively part of character advancement so couldn't be left up to "did they avoid this combat or not".

Basically, the treasure would make it's way to you whichever way you accomplished goals. Capture bandits - get a reward. Realize the law is correupt and join the bandits - they have a few items they can't use they will sweeten the pot of you coming over, and then a share of coin when they hit the tax collector. Etc. So having bounties for doing things, rewards, and all sorts of mechanisms outside "we killed this and took it's loot" or "we found every treasure in a tomb" was pushed by the rules.

 

[overgeeked]

My first two thoughts would be the finder’s fee idea posted above and repatriation. Reverse the typical setup. Instead of the PCs breaking in and stealing things like treasure and gold, have them returning treasure and gold to the rightful owners. They are then rewarded for this act. Either by the people who wrongly held the treasure or the people getting it back. Way easier to do with a valuable cultural item that’s non-magical as it reduces the PCs’ temptation to simply steal the thing.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

I dig this solution. It can also be used to incentivize doing things that aren't just killing things and taking their stuff. You can just as easily have someone put out a call for help to throw the most epic party ever alongside someone with a bounty on the carrion crawlers that are infesting the nearby peat bog.

So rather than being freelance tombrobbers,

1 the PCs get paid bounties for doing jobs OR work as mercenaries for various Lords/Factions/Questgivers

 

[Fenris-77]

I like to get the PCs spending cash on a headquarters of some kind. Acquisitions Inc is actually quite useful there, as are a number of other supplements like Durnan's Guide to Tavern Keeping. It gives them a stable base and recurring cast of NPCs to help ground the campaign, and developing a stronghold is a great way to both earn a rep and blow wads of cash. On a related note I love the Stronghold rules in Forbidden Lands.

 

[Tonguez]

In one of my D&D settings, the King realised how much treasure there is within his kingdom in old dungeons and monster hordes, that he declared it all Property of the Crown. Adventurers get a "finder's fee" for gathering and turning it in.

It's not any more moral, but it does come approved by the law of the land. And it gives Players the quandary of keeping treasure for themselves, which would be Stealing from the Crown or handing it in, which would come with fame, royal favour, and pressure to do it again.

So more like doubling down on the idea that Adventurers are mercenary tomb-robbers, rather than avoiding it! At least in that setting, It's Official!

I did something similar but via the Church - the Church declared all magic items subject to Church ownership and commissioned the Inquisitors to collect them.
Adventure companies could be sanctioned to do the work on the Inquisitors behalf