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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 716017" data-attributes="member: 4937">Those responding to me have gone down a remarkably large number of paths and tangeants.  I don't think I could possibly fully respond to them all.Concerning PC's finding treasure that they 'can't use', like a +2 mace when you have weapon specialization longsword.   Well, them are the breaks.  Maybe for a while the fighter is going to have to do some thinking about which weapon he wants to use in which situations.  Nothing says that just because you've decided to use X weapon that the world owes you a good one.  And while +2 maces may not be commonly on the market, that is not evidence that someone can't be found who will be willing to buy a valuable object like a +2 mace.  Simply find someone who has a use for one.   Moreover, as a DM you simply can't complain about what treasures are placed and found in your adventures.  If you don't want to give the PC's suboptimal treasure, no one is forcing you.  If a PC wants a magic longsword, well just place an appropriate longsword in his path if you feel he is owed one.Concerning traveling or other merchants turning up with the occassional magic item.  Well, it is bound to happen occassionally perhaps even with the merchant not even realizing what they have.  But it would hardly be a common occurance.  It would be the equivalent of a suit of plate mail or a necklace of fine jewels circulating around looking for a buyer.  Mostly such works are commissioned for some wealthy person, and when they are sold or stolen or plundered from the original owner they generally move from where they are to who wants them fairly fast.  If the merchant does not know of a buyer he is going to be very hesitant to tie up so much of his ready wealth in an object that he doesn't know how long he is going to have to hang on to and which can itself be stolen from him.If you just want to go back to the killing field, stop playing D20.  It offers no advantage.  Computer games are a whole lot better choice - and in this day and age they can even be played socially.LokiDR: I find your fourth and fifth points to be at odds with each other.  First you claim that is 'narrow-minded' (your word) to imagine that there would be significant subcultural pressure to not make magic weapons, and then you turn right around and offer up the point that without magic weapons fighter types will lag severely behind spell casters.   Err... Can't you possibly imagine wizards wanting to keep thier secrets to themselves?  Isn't that a common theme of fantasy?  Can't you imagine possibly that each spell caster admonishes each of his apprentices not to friviously give away the objects of his craft?  Will there be incidents in which a spell caster gives a gift of a might weapon out of respect or gratitude or obligation to some warrior type and thus bequeths to history a heirloom of great power?  Sure, but that doesn't mean that it is all that likely that there are spell casters anywhere offering magic arms wholesale.Piratecat:  No need.   The heretics seem properly chastised.   But, if I just might add, Frodo wasn't defined by the Ring and perhaps as a character not even Sauron was, but if we wanted to we could certainly cite examples of characters who were very much defined by the objects they owned.  The most obvious would be (my single favorite character) Turin Turambar, who is ac much defined by Anglachel as Elric is by Stormbringer.Concerning the placement of magic items in published modules.   Yeah, it has frequently been gratuitous, but 1 ed. was never the worst offender.  I tend to elimenate 50% or more of the generic magic items lying around in any TSR module (the three +3 maces in I6 come to mind), but I remember picking up a 2nd edition module for 1st-3rd level characters that offered a +4 weapon among other similar treasure.Nothing I have said means that NPC's should be treated differently than PC's.  Why does this come up in every discussion?  Given the fact that this seems to be a hot button issue for so many people, I really wonder how many DM's out there are just ego gamers in disguise?  Sheesh.  I certainly DONT feel that 1st edition modules were filled with inappropriately stated NPCs, and certainly not in comparison to FR NPC's.Here is a sample list from a module I just grabbed off the shelf (given in 1st edition order):13 16 14 18 15 14  (14th level character)18(56) 11 12 17 14 12 (7th level character)18(88) 11 9 15 15 10 (7th level character)18(22) 14 10 12 16 14 (7th level character)14 12 15 13 14 10 (5th level character)16 14 9 15 11 9 (5th level character)Other than the abundance of 18's among the fighters, I don't have a particular problem with that.  And in any event it is not particularly germane to the topic at hand and was recently discussed at great length in another thread.The existance of feats giving the PC abundant magic items is an entirely different thing than a magic shop with a list of items readily available for general consumption.  If the PC's got the feats and paid the XP, cost of materials, and found the time to equip themselves then more power to them.There is any number of other individual points I'd like to respond to but this is already to much of a hodge podge of ideas.</blockquote>

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