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d20 Modern Wealth problem?
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<blockquote data-quote="Terath Ninir" data-source="post: 512354" data-attributes="member: 47"><p>The Wealth system was, I think an honest attempt to make a moneyless system that could be applied to many eras and many scenarios. It fails totally, but it is not due to maliciousness of the designers.</p><p></p><p>The DCs of items are eccentric at best. Chainsaw 9, 8-person tent 13, .22 pistol 14, machine pistol 15. Nope, sorry. Not even close, in any time or era; the .22 pistol is cheaper than any of them, and usually by a lot. I especially am amused at the thought of a machine pistol only being a little more expensive than a bottom of the line pistol.</p><p></p><p>Then you have the problem of the basic concept. The DCs still represent money and, fundamentally, there is a direct correspondance between the DC of an item and its real price. (Theoretically. They obviously got some of them wrong.) And you have to pick a specific time and place to base the DCs on the prices of real items. In this case, 2002 USA -- so any other time or place cannot use the DCs as-is.</p><p></p><p>A related problem are the licences. In general, they are a good game tool. But they come already applied to items, making that part of the item stats again useful only for 2002 USA. Again, take the .22 pistol, which is listed as needed a simple licence to own one. That wasn't true when I was born just 30 years ago. Hell, I don't think that even the machine pistol needed a licence in 1972 USA, though I could be wrong on that one.</p><p></p><p>Or travel to the UK. (I'm sure Morrus wouldn't mind having you crash on his couch. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f61b.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":p" title="Stick out tongue :p" data-smilie="7"data-shortname=":p" />) There, the .22 pistol requires a military licence, not just a simple licence. Again, the rules don't work. You have to have a list of equipment and licences necessary for any area the characters travel to, if you want to use licences at all.</p><p></p><p>The wealth reduction and increase rules are so... weird I don't even know what to make of them. I don't think they'd work well in practice, especially if a power gamer (me) came along. You could do a lot of damage to a game just by the order you "bought" items in.</p><p></p><p>In conclusion, I'd say that the Wealth system, at least without heavy revision, is not usable at all. If you're doing a 2002 based game, this is not a problem at all, though. I *know* you have access to the internet if you're reading this. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink ;)" data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" /> So just use Google and look up the price for whatever you need. And use real money! Cash is much more fun than wealth points.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Terath Ninir, post: 512354, member: 47"] The Wealth system was, I think an honest attempt to make a moneyless system that could be applied to many eras and many scenarios. It fails totally, but it is not due to maliciousness of the designers. The DCs of items are eccentric at best. Chainsaw 9, 8-person tent 13, .22 pistol 14, machine pistol 15. Nope, sorry. Not even close, in any time or era; the .22 pistol is cheaper than any of them, and usually by a lot. I especially am amused at the thought of a machine pistol only being a little more expensive than a bottom of the line pistol. Then you have the problem of the basic concept. The DCs still represent money and, fundamentally, there is a direct correspondance between the DC of an item and its real price. (Theoretically. They obviously got some of them wrong.) And you have to pick a specific time and place to base the DCs on the prices of real items. In this case, 2002 USA -- so any other time or place cannot use the DCs as-is. A related problem are the licences. In general, they are a good game tool. But they come already applied to items, making that part of the item stats again useful only for 2002 USA. Again, take the .22 pistol, which is listed as needed a simple licence to own one. That wasn't true when I was born just 30 years ago. Hell, I don't think that even the machine pistol needed a licence in 1972 USA, though I could be wrong on that one. Or travel to the UK. (I'm sure Morrus wouldn't mind having you crash on his couch. :p) There, the .22 pistol requires a military licence, not just a simple licence. Again, the rules don't work. You have to have a list of equipment and licences necessary for any area the characters travel to, if you want to use licences at all. The wealth reduction and increase rules are so... weird I don't even know what to make of them. I don't think they'd work well in practice, especially if a power gamer (me) came along. You could do a lot of damage to a game just by the order you "bought" items in. In conclusion, I'd say that the Wealth system, at least without heavy revision, is not usable at all. If you're doing a 2002 based game, this is not a problem at all, though. I *know* you have access to the internet if you're reading this. ;) So just use Google and look up the price for whatever you need. And use real money! Cash is much more fun than wealth points. [/QUOTE]
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