Dealing with equipment dependency in D&D

[Aust Diamondew]

In my low magic d&d game the PCs get +1 to all saves every 4 levels and recieve a bonus to AC equal to half their BAB. The have about 1/10th the magic items they should have for their level, everything runs pretty smoothly.

 

[buzzard]

I'm astonished that nobody has jumped in with the Four Color to Fantasy plug. In that system there's provisions for trading wealth for abilities (basically super powers). Instead of receiving X gold, you get a compensatory amout of hero points (or whatever they're called) which can be used to purchase a variety of ablities. Most of the super abilites mold themselves along the lines of spell effects anyway, so it would very easily substitute for magic items.

Of course I've seen FCtF abused mightily in smackdowns and munchkinfests, but you just have to mind the store.

buzzard

 

[Inconsequenti-AL]

StalkingBlue

A very good point about the slots... hadn't really thought about that.

One answer would be to have the innate item occupy the slot it normally would. It's somewhat metagamey but would deal with that problem.

As an in game explanation, I seem to recall certain types of powers were associated with certain body locations, so perhaps the innate powers 'occupy' those locations. If you put something in the same place, then they interfere and neither work?


I quite agree about the flexibility issue. I'd be very leery of allowing this stuff with no supervision, it'd be powergamer heaven (or hell)!

My personal taste would be to sit down with each player and discuss the direction they wanted their character to go in. Then we could agree a path for them together. Probably tweak this as they level up. Supervised choice, as it were.


Am I right in thinking your Midnight game doesn't use the standard paths? How do you handle who gets what powers?

 

[Kalendraf]

My method has been to simply hand out less treasure and items, but reduce the effectiveness of certain foes to compensate.

Saving throws are a valid example - obviously if everyone isn't walking around with a +5 cloak of resistance, they are going to probably miss their saves much more often. Rather than looking for ways to boost the PC's save values, I instead look for ways to nerf the enemies' DC values accordingly.

From the opposite direction, you might think that I then need to nerf the PC's DC's to give the monsters a fair shake. However, my comment about less treasure addresses this as well. With lower treasure, stat boost items aren't very prevalent either, thus party casters don't wind up with uber DC values either.

 

[Aaron2]

I’ve seen a number of threads on these boards ever since they began, complaining about the dependence on equipment in D&D, especially at higher levels.

I prefer to handle this situation on the back end, by adjusting the XP awards. I see nothing inherently wrong with the PC needing to be 7th level to fight a Troll. I even prefer it since it extends the range that the classic monsters (ogres, trolls, manticores, chimeras, etc) are viable threats. My XP bonus is inversely proportional to their equipment. Forex, if they only had 1/2 of the recommended treasure, they would get a +50% XP bonus to compensate for the loser CR of the monsters. This way, if I ever change my mind and decide to give out a few powerful magic items, I don't end up with magic equipment + superpowered PCs.


Aaron

 

[GlassJaw]

I was wondering what the effect less treasure/items has on CR. For example, if you cut the amount of treasure per level (the table in the DMG) in half, by how much would tha average monster's CR increase?

 

[StalkingBlue]

A very good point about the slots... hadn't really thought about that.

One answer would be to have the innate item occupy the slot it normally would. It's somewhat metagamey but would deal with that problem.

As an in game explanation, I seem to recall certain types of powers were associated with certain body locations, so perhaps the innate powers 'occupy' those locations. If you put something in the same place, then they interfere and neither work?

Hm, so once you settle on a certain ability for a certain location you could never change after that? That would be a serious drawback. For example the Witch I played until recently in a high-level game that was half highly challenging and potentially deadly fights, half power-politics carried two cloaks: Resistance for combat days, Charisma for politicking days.

Maybe you could have things overlap but need to attune yourself to the abilitiy you wanted to use at any one time, to have them 'fade in' over a certain period (like, overnight, over the course of a week or whatever seems appropriate)?

I quite agree about the flexibility issue. I'd be very leery of allowing this stuff with no supervision, it'd be powergamer heaven (or hell)!

My personal taste would be to sit down with each player and discuss the direction they wanted their character to go in. Then we could agree a path for them together. Probably tweak this as they level up. Supervised choice, as it were.

Am I right in thinking your Midnight game doesn't use the standard paths? How do you handle who gets what powers?

Yup, working with the player is my preference, too. It can take time to get players to talk though IME, depending on who they've played under in the past. Two of my players seem seriously burnt by past experiences with other DMs and won't yet approach me (nor the other DM in our group) to discuss character concepts or tailoring rules - in fact when I've made suggestions they got that grey, cornered look in their eyes and scurried away. So erm, I'm giving them time and hoping that seeing other players survive negotiations with me will eventually help loosen them up. If not, *shrug* their loss.


In my Midnight game I pretty much use the paths as written for now, although I've started tailoring one particular path to a PC in discussion with the player. It's part group dynamics, part DM pragmatism: As a DM I'm unlikely to create stacks of new rules (or for that matter, world detail) no one will ever use, I prefer to work with the issues at hand. And my Midnight players didn't complain (much) about the lack of viable path choices for our game style when we started play, they simply chose from among the few useful paths. In future negotiations I intend to use published paths as a basis and work from there as and when a need arises.

 

[StalkingBlue]

My method has been to simply hand out less treasure and items, but reduce the effectiveness of certain foes to compensate.

How do you balance non-spellcasting PCs against spellcasting PCs?

My feeling is that spellcasters dominate the game at higher levels even at standard wealth and item levels. If you deny the PCs magic items, doesn't that create an imbalance between nonspellcasters and spellcasters?

 

[StalkingBlue]

I was wondering what the effect less treasure/items has on CR. For example, if you cut the amount of treasure per level (the table in the DMG) in half, by how much would tha average monster's CR increase?

IME CR is a dangerous thing to go by in designing a challenge. What I find is you have to look at is the weak spots in a particular party's / PC's defenses and see whether the particular strength of the foe makes it likely that a PC will be killed in one round (or worse, one hit). That is true whatever the wealth level of the party.
The classic example is the MM ogre, an absolute killer for a low-level party but (assuming no class levels) a wet rag to throw at mid-level PCs.

If a foe has a nasty melee attack, look at who's likely to get bashed/bit/gored by it and how long they'll stay in the fight once that happens. If the foe has nasty area attacks, death touch attacks etc., look at saves, touch AC etc. Think what it'll mean for the outcome of the fight if a PC you have identified as a likely victim actually goes down. Can the others still win? Can they even run away? Is downing that PC going trigger a domino reaction?

 

[S'mon]

I was wondering what the effect less treasure/items has on CR. For example, if you cut the amount of treasure per level (the table in the DMG) in half, by how much would tha average monster's CR increase?

I think it depends a lot on the kind of monster (and not all monster CRs are accurate anyway, in my 3.0 Monster Manual demon CRs are far too high, dragons far too low). For instance: an Ettin (CR 5) is a big strong dumb monster, it's about equal to a 10th level NPC Fighter with no magic gear, to a 7th-8th level NPC Fighter with standard NPC gear, and to a 5th level PC Fighter with standard PC gear & the buffs of his PC spellcaster buddies. So the 'real CR' of that Ettin is somewhere in a 5-10 spread; in a half-standard-magic game I'd say it was roughly CR+2; as I rule of thumb I'd suggest that in half-magic (but regular point-total) games the real CR of big dumb monsters is about 2 over listed, so trolls and ettins > CR 7, hill giants > CR 9. But that's ignoring the spellcaster problem Stalkingblue has discussed - a reduction in wealth weakens some classes (like Fighters) far more than others (like Sorcerers).