Andy Collins: "Most Magic Items in D&D Are Awful"

[wayne62682]

I thought that 3.x had the ASSUMPTION that you could buy magic items in shops, rather than the 1/2e mentality that it's insanely hard to craft and that you had to find them?

 

[charlesatan]

There are lucrative markets around the buying selling of F-18's and nuclear weapon technology too, but they aren't exactly the easiest markets to break into if you happen to be well, just about anyone. My assumption has always been that there is essentially infinite demand for magic items, but essentially zero supply because the major brokers of power try to horde magic items for thier exclusive use. So, you can always find a major religion, nobleman, or government that wants to add to thier collection, but you can almost never find someone willing to sell a magic item that they own any more than you can normally find people who'd willingly sell thier own XP. This is actually pretty easy to justify. If you dry the market up, what you'll discover is that PC's don't sell magic items that they could reasonably at any point in the future have a use for, because they recognize that such items are essentially irreplacible. You'll also notice that high level characters that can produce high level magic items are rare, and when they do make something its for thier own use or the use of a close ally. How do we know that? Because that's exactly how the PC's operate. Moreover, if you assume a living system, then no one really wants to put magic items on the open market because everyone knows that if you put it on an open market there is a very good chance that that item will come back in the hands of an enemy. Try this excercise. Every time the PC's sell an item on an open market (open meaning that they are selling it to someone who is acting as a distributer), dice for the chance that the item is purchased by one of the sinister organizations that the PC's are up against. Then, if the PC's get unlucky or just stupid, add that item to the enemies wealth above and beyond thier CR. Doesn't take much time for your average PC party to realize that selling the +2 unholy flail to that merchant they met was maybe a bad idea - tidy profit or not. So, my assumption is that all the markets for magic items are basically closed ones, and would only be available to the PC's if they had a close alliance with a major broker of power.

The argument goes both ways. Ultimately, it depends on the setting of the GM. I mean in Forgotten Realms and in Greyhawk, it can easily be conceived that shopping for magic items is readily available. In other settings, not so much.

And speaking of, just what do you think PC's in my experience tend to do with thier money?

It was a relevant question because for some people, shopping for items is indeed fun (as is actually spending on wealth for something they'll actually use). Different people get different kicks -- some prefer their treasures "randomly" placed in a treasure horde, others get the satisfaction from "earning" their magic item by saving up for it and actually managing to purchase it.

 

[Andor]

It was partially remedied in Weapons of Legacy (and one of the prestige classes in Unearthed Arcana) since hindsight is indeed 20/20 (and IMO I think 3.5 is really only 3.5 as of late thanks to new concepts like swift/immediate actions, substitution levels, etc.) although I expect it'll be somehow incorporated at some later date (i.e. when 4th Ed finally comes out).



The problem with the other utility magic items is that their use varies from campaign to campaign. Look at Dungeonscape: the book has a section devoted to magic items that are great in dungeons and whose applications aren't always as obvious (dust of absorption, bag of tricks, etc.). The strength there is that they have uses. The problem is that it's limited to a dungeon setting (imagine bringing a 10-foot pole to an underwater environment).

Sure, that's why I mention the "How to adapt this to your campaign" section. Of course a lot of people don't like house ruling.... Perhaps it would be best to designate a few categories of items (weapons, armour/defense, stats, movment, utility, summoning, casting, new abilities, misc) then have a few official power levels. (Low/Default/High magic campign settings) So any player will know that a helm of underwater action works at 3rd level in a Default campaign but not till 6th in a Low magic campaign.

 

[Ealli]

There are lucrative markets around the buying selling of F-18's and nuclear weapon technology too, but they aren't exactly the easiest markets to break into if you happen to be well, just about anyone. My assumption has always been that there is essentially infinite demand for magic items, but essentially zero supply because the major brokers of power try to horde magic items for thier exclusive use. So, you can always find a major religion, nobleman, or government that wants to add to thier collection, but you can almost never find someone willing to sell a magic item that they own any more than you can normally find people who'd willingly sell thier own XP. This is actually pretty easy to justify. If you dry the market up, what you'll discover is that PC's don't sell magic items that they could reasonably at any point in the future have a use for, because they recognize that such items are essentially irreplacible. You'll also notice that high level characters that can produce high level magic items are rare, and when they do make something its for thier own use or the use of a close ally. How do we know that? Because that's exactly how the PC's operate. Moreover, if you assume a living system, then no one really wants to put magic items on the open market because everyone knows that if you put it on an open market there is a very good chance that that item will come back in the hands of an enemy. Try this excercise. Every time the PC's sell an item on an open market (open meaning that they are selling it to someone who is acting as a distributer), dice for the chance that the item is purchased by one of the sinister organizations that the PC's are up against. Then, if the PC's get unlucky or just stupid, add that item to the enemies wealth above and beyond thier CR. Doesn't take much time for your average PC party to realize that selling the +2 unholy flail to that merchant they met was maybe a bad idea - tidy profit or not. So, my assumption is that all the markets for magic items are basically closed ones, and would only be available to the PC's if they had a close alliance with a major broker of power.

And speaking of, just what do you think PC's in my experience tend to do with thier money?

My character uses a somewhat uncommon weapon. If I ever want to upgrade, say from masterwork to magical because we are starting to encounter those enemies with /magic DR, there are basically six options.
1) The module includes one. It's an uncommon weapon, I'm not holding my breath for this.
2) The DM modifies the module. Possible, especially if the module includes some other weird weapon, he might be kind.
3) I buy the upgrade somewhere.
4) Butter up the artificer/wizard and convince him that I need this upgrade more than the others in the party. Possible too. Banning purchase but leaving easy crafting seems like a little oversight though.
5) Change my character concept. This one is very sad. A central tenet in the character concept is the fighting style, and the fighting style is only feasible with a small group of weapons. If the situation becomes dire, I may switch to the basic longsword or greatsword style, but I would feel like I've wasted a lot and made my character significantly less unique.
6) Accept being less effective than if I had done the most basic of styles.

Fortunately, I did start with a magic weapon so the situation is unlikely to become dire, but I suspect that if our current artificer dies before he can upgrade my weapon then I'll never be upgrading.


The idea of the adversaries acquiring sold items and then adding said items on top of the adversaries' treasure may not be the most effective way to convince the players to stop selling items. By selling items, they get the gold to invest in whatever it is that you let them invest their gold in, and then they get the item back at no cost effectively. (If the increased worth of the adversaries kills the party, then maybe the next set will learn. You'll have to find that very thin line of defeating the party without destroying them while making it clear that it was the items that the party sold that tipped the balance.)

 

[Toras]

As a player in a planescape game, I find that I generally have access to a great deal of magical craftsmenship. While I have picked up the traditional ones, more often than not, there is a tendency to get custom work done.

Cloak of Resistance? How about a Cloak of the Bulwark (Resist, Con bonus or perhaps some energy resist). Boots of Grace (Dex and Evasion)? Make it a bit of a boutique experience, place and order and pick it up when its ready. You want to throw some one, pack an unexpected enchantment in it.

Attunement items are a must for todays adventurer on the planes (I'd like not to die, thank you sir). As is an emergency amulet of the planes (tucked in a trusty bag). Bags of Holding are a must. Masks of Water Breathing are also nice. (Plane of Vacuum or Water anyone.)

Bu my tendency is also to the unusual. Combine the enchantment of a Decanter of Endless water with a Gnomish Pressure container and valve setup and a perm. bless water. Originally it was designed as an anti-fiend field peace for mortal users. (Use them instead of flame throwers or something similar). Guantlets that stored and fired alchemical substances were his item of choice. (God bless gnomish tinkerers) Wands of Exposive Runes, are handy. Beads of force are nice and if in large numbers can be scary.

 

[Nuclear Platypus]

Razz - if you don't allow PCs to buy magic items, what do they do with their money?

Cheers!

I have my players invest their money into a variety of stock options and mutual funds. It's either that or the usual 'hero' stuff: alcohol, women or just hoard the shineys. I'd want to summon an earth elemental composed entirely of coins to follow me around. But the Monk tends to go OCD and sort out his coins in nice even stacks.

Seriously tho, I've hated the obsession with magic items to get anywhere. I doubt I'm the only one that's had a golf bag of magic weapons. "Werewolf? Hand me the #3." Those of the magic six are often fought over in the group, especially anything that bumps up the AC. Another peev is the dependence on heavier armor for protection with the defense bonus as a recent addon rule.

 

[Felon]

There are lucrative markets around the buying selling of F-18's and nuclear weapon technology too, but they aren't exactly the easiest markets to break into if you happen to be well, just about anyone. My assumption has always been that there is essentially infinite demand for magic items, but essentially zero supply because the major brokers of power try to horde magic items for thier exclusive use.

This is just one of those bizarre D&Disms: even fairly low-level characters with a few hundred gold pieces to their names are wealthy by the standards of those living around them. PC's will eventually become as rich as the richest noble (those elite ones that invariably seem to be semi-retired adventurers themselves notwithstanding). If you're a trillionaire, you will find few doors get slammed in your face.

For the model you describe to work, every item-hoarding organization has to exist in a perpetual state of financially solvency. Thsi is where chaos theory steps in and lends the PC's a helping hand. Jihads and adamantine colossi and annihlatrixes cost money. There's going to be somebody out there with cashflow problems and doesn't have the luxury of hoarding. Probably several somebodies. In fact, buying up expensive assets and never liquidating anything to provide captial is a pretty good way to wind up with all your stuff up for auction. We can't all be Michael Jackson.

My character uses a somewhat uncommon weapon. If I ever want to upgrade, say from masterwork to magical because we are starting to encounter those enemies with /magic DR, there are basically six options.
1) The module includes one. It's an uncommon weapon, I'm not holding my breath for this.
2) The DM modifies the module. Possible, especially if the module includes some other weird weapon, he might be kind.
3) I buy the upgrade somewhere.
4) Butter up the artificer/wizard and convince him that I need this upgrade more than the others in the party. Possible too. Banning purchase but leaving easy crafting seems like a little oversight though.
5) Change my character concept. This one is very sad. A central tenet in the character concept is the fighting style, and the fighting style is only feasible with a small group of weapons. If the situation becomes dire, I may switch to the basic longsword or greatsword style, but I would feel like I've wasted a lot and made my character significantly less unique.
6) Accept being less effective than if I had done the most basic of styles.

Fortunately, I did start with a magic weapon so the situation is unlikely to become dire, but I suspect that if our current artificer dies before he can upgrade my weapon then I'll never be upgrading.

Well, looking back to the heydays of a misspent youth, the desire to obtain a cool magic item that you couldn't just go out and commission was the basis of actual adventuring. Rather than plundering mad money from hapless dungeon-dwellers to go on a shopping spree in town, you'd actually sit down with some sage and figure out how to work around the middle-man (as there were no yellow pages of middle-men to work through). Or you'd be rewarded the item of your dreams in exchange for some good deed, like averting the end of the world.

I"m not sure D&D is better off in the end by boiling everything down to a simple formula for convenience's sake. Maybe things are fun when they're not convenient and predictable. There's a downside, that's for sure. But again, when I'm DM'ing, I make the adjustments I need to.

 

[Stalker0]

D&D is definitely balanced to include, not just "correct value of gear," but "correct gear."

In my opinion, there's just no way to balance a helm of comprehend languages, a folding boat, and Murlynd's Spoon against the Big Six-- no matter how much you reduce their value. There are certain kinds of items/abilities for which you could reduce their cost to nearly nothing, lump them all together in the aggregate into a Heward's Handy Haversack, and they still won't be balanced against a +5 sword.

Your right in that some of the big six is always going to be on a character sheet, but that doesn't mean it can't be adjusted.

For example, let's take a cloak of etheralness (55,000) vs a +5 sword (50,000). Now almost any fighter in the world is going to take the +5 sword, I mean he needs a good sword. But how about a +4 sword upgrading to a +5 sword vs a cloak of etheralness. I can spend 18k on that extra +1, or I can save my money and get the cloak. The cloak lets me escape hostile situations, scout, move through walls, go invisible, etc etc. Its very handy. For some people, that extra mobility and scouting might be worth the loss of a +1 enhancement.

However, I think one of the things they can start doing with many items is make them slotless. The problem becomes once you fill up your slots with the big six, your not going to replace those slots with other items. However, if you can get nice slotless items, it might be worth it to branch out and get cool new things instead of upgrading your six pack all the time.

 

[hong]

Well, looking back to the heydays of a misspent youth, the desire to obtain a cool magic item that you couldn't just go out and commission was the basis of actual adventuring. Rather than plundering mad money from hapless dungeon-dwellers to go on a shopping spree in town, you'd actually sit down with some sage and figure out how to work around the middle-man (as there were no yellow pages of middle-men to work through).

I don't really see how, in practical terms, this is so different to adventuring to get vast piles of gold that you can spend to get a cool magic item. It's still killing monsters and taking their stuff, only the "stuff" is now fungible.

I"m not sure D&D is better off in the end by boiling everything down to a simple formula for convenience's sake. Maybe things are fun when they're not convenient and predictable.

Well, things are still not entirely convenient nor predictable when treasure is convertible to gp. You don't know what you're going to find, nor how much you can sell it for. And hey, the DM might still surprise you and give you what you were planning to buy, on top of the dragon's treasure pile....

 

[Agent Oracle]

Frankly, i think i solved this problem a long time ago.

I really roll on the random treasure tables.

Really.

Which is why my characters might end up with one of the six at any given time, but most often have several interesting wondrous items, potions and whatnot.