A solution another person has posted about that I kind of like is to separate gold from magic completely in terms of the party. Gold is used for day to day living and can be scaled however you like. Magic item value is handed out just like gold, but can be only used for a PC to obtain magic items. These are awarded however fits your playstyle. The PC's spend the MIV on what they like and the DM uses that to fill the next encounter or three's loot coffers or they get bequests from nobles who like the cut of their jib in the form of magic gifts or whatever. This keeps the gold standard in check such that you don't have to figure out just exactly who has 500,000 gold pieces, how do you deliver that much gold, etc and your high level heroics can't just buy and sell wholesale villages and small towns.
Decoupling wealth from magic items, help wanted
- Thread starter Blackbrrd
- Start date
AbdulAlhazred
Legend
This topic has been discussed at great length (there is a currently active thread) on the WotC forums.
Keterys is right, if something has value (and residuum certainly does) then it WILL have some exchange for other things of value. That's just part of the logic of value itself and you can't really get rid of it. Its quite true residuum might not be a very useful currency any more than gold is in modern society, but somewhere someone will buy it or sell it for the right price. That price establishes the gold <=> magic conversion ratio. You can set that at anything you want, but what's the point of making it different from RAW?
The "high level PCs can buy a village" issue is THE issue. One good solution is simply to make such things non-fungible. In other words in theory you might be able to assign a GP value to a village, castle, etc. but in a feudal type society these items simply cannot be purchased. The village is part of feud granted by a king or higher level lord. He doesn't grant those things to anyone he doesn't want to and his criteria aren't really monetary. He can't take them away from their current "owners" and those owners won't sell because their social status is dependent on occupation of the land plus they don't have the right to do so without permission.
Now, that doesn't mean its IMPOSSIBLE to buy and sell any kind of property, but having a quantity of money (gold) is not the one and only necessity. It might be possible to drop a bunch of coin in the lap of a lord to have him somehow get you title to something, but there will be a lot more to it than that, like having a patent of nobility at the very least or being of such service to the lord that he might grant one (and note that kings normally are the only ones who can do so).
In other words, its not necessary to split magic from other stuff in order to solve the underlying issue and any way you do that is simply a DM fiat that contravenes logic.
Keterys is right, if something has value (and residuum certainly does) then it WILL have some exchange for other things of value. That's just part of the logic of value itself and you can't really get rid of it. Its quite true residuum might not be a very useful currency any more than gold is in modern society, but somewhere someone will buy it or sell it for the right price. That price establishes the gold <=> magic conversion ratio. You can set that at anything you want, but what's the point of making it different from RAW?
The "high level PCs can buy a village" issue is THE issue. One good solution is simply to make such things non-fungible. In other words in theory you might be able to assign a GP value to a village, castle, etc. but in a feudal type society these items simply cannot be purchased. The village is part of feud granted by a king or higher level lord. He doesn't grant those things to anyone he doesn't want to and his criteria aren't really monetary. He can't take them away from their current "owners" and those owners won't sell because their social status is dependent on occupation of the land plus they don't have the right to do so without permission.
Now, that doesn't mean its IMPOSSIBLE to buy and sell any kind of property, but having a quantity of money (gold) is not the one and only necessity. It might be possible to drop a bunch of coin in the lap of a lord to have him somehow get you title to something, but there will be a lot more to it than that, like having a patent of nobility at the very least or being of such service to the lord that he might grant one (and note that kings normally are the only ones who can do so).
In other words, its not necessary to split magic from other stuff in order to solve the underlying issue and any way you do that is simply a DM fiat that contravenes logic.
The gold <=> magic conversion ratio when it isn't traded much will be very variable. In other words, it will probably be hard to sell in any quantity and hard to buy in any quantity. Which is part of the goal.
A trader might be willing to trade a +5 magic item for just a few thousands of gold, but in my campaign he won't have the +5 magic item, and if he had stumbled upon it, he would probably have been robbed blind before he got any use out of it.
Eric Finley
First Post
This is something I went into at length a while ago, calling it IXP. Still using it, still loving it. Check it out.
(Amusingly, since I'm not a Community Supporter here, I can't "see all posts" even by myself, so ended up Googling for the darn thing. And wouldn't you know it, but it got a link on Key Our Cars, for which I'm flattered. Thanks, Dennis.)
(Amusingly, since I'm not a Community Supporter here, I can't "see all posts" even by myself, so ended up Googling for the darn thing. And wouldn't you know it, but it got a link on Key Our Cars, for which I'm flattered. Thanks, Dennis.)
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