D&D 5E [+] Design & Development: Magic Item Pricing

[Quickleaf]

I've perused 2 fan-made systems:

Sane Magical Item Prices by Saidoro, which focuses on identifying which items can be priced and which cannot, and establishing relative value between magic items. He seems to start from assumptions – some of which make sense like consumables being cheaper than permanent items, but others like a weapon +1 is worth 1,000 gp....not clear on how he reached that.

and

A Guide to Non-Random Loot by Waffle2121, which reverse engineers a more "accurate" magic item for PCs of higher starting levels table, based upon the random treasure tables in the DMG.

 

[Oofta]

I believe the intent behind this thread is to assume that adventurers are the only people in the setting who buy magic items.
Furthermore, that even the cost of enchanting an item is directly based upon how useful that item will be to adventurers. (To the point where applying the same enchantment to different weapons or armour may vary the cost of that enchantment by a factor of ten, or even a hundred or more.)

However, I'm not sure how specific we're being about what "adventurers" consist of. Are we assuming 'worst/most potentially OP case scenarios when deciding on prices?

I don't think the OP request is reasonable but I don't want to derail the conversation any more than I have.

I simply think that if magic is ubiquitous enough to have magic shops (not an unreasonable assumption) you have to take the overall economy into account. Assuming magic items can be manufactured, then it's illogical to assume that only items worthwhile to adventurers will be manufactured.

But it all goes back to the heart of the problem. Why is sovereign glue legendary rarity and therefor cost so much based on most rules? After all it's not particularly useful. Magic super glue. Ooh boy. But ... it does require powerful magic to counter it's effects. So from a meta-game standpoint it kind of makes sense, in the right situation it's incredibly powerful in the right situation.

But in-world reason for it's rarity? Who knows. Maybe it has legendary rarity because you have to brew it from the tears of a Tarrasque. Maybe it's difficult to craft. Maybe more can't be made because someone glued the recipe book closed. Maybe there's a cartel controlling the supply like the diamond industry.

Ultimately there is virtually nothing to base it's value on that doesn't rely on it's rarity which is based on "it's legendary because it takes a wish to undo it's effects". There are all sorts of things that people are willing to pay an exorbitant amount for simply because of their rarity (a 1943-D Lincoln Bronze Cent sold for $1,700,000 in 2010). Sometimes there is no good reason behind an item's cost.

Unless there's a way around that logic, I don't see a better way to price items than rarity.

 

[Jester David]

I did a semi-random spreadsheet a while back for magic item prices:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1hy0fwrg-v7samzZwde_eWT38BVs97fTCfH7cnj-6LOA/edit?usp=sharing

Basically, I took the table the magic item appeared on (A to I or so...) and assigned that a numerical value. Then I divided that by the amount of percentile rolls that could generate that item. So if a roll of 51 through 55 would get you an item it would be "5".

Then I just threw random numbers into the equation. So that the most common item from the lowest table would have a value close to the low end of the price range for that rarity and least common item on the highest table would have a value close to the high end of the price range.

It's as good a foundation as anything...

 

[Charlaquin]

I simply think that if magic is ubiquitous enough to have magic shops (not an unreasonable assumption) you have to take the overall economy into account. Assuming magic items can be manufactured, then it's illogical to assume that only items worthwhile to adventurers will be manufactured.

That’s great, but it doesn’t contribute anything to the thread. The goal here is to create a magic item pricing system based on how useful the items are to the PCs. If such a system wouldn’t be useful to you because you would prefer a magic item pricing system to be more rooted in a simulated fictional economy, that’s fine, but this thread won’t have anything to offer you and you won’t have anything to offer it.

I think a better summary of the intent of a “plus thread” is, if you don’t have anything constructive to add, don’t post anything. If you want to make a different thread about creating a magic item pricing system based on economic factors, feel free.

 

[Lackhand]

... Ultimately there is virtually nothing to base it's value on that doesn't rely on it's rarity which is based on "it's legendary because it takes a wish to undo it's effects". ...

Springing off from this point, because I think there's a thread-relevant way to phrase this: "How canonical should we treat by-the-book item rarity when deriving a price for it".
I think that we should basically ignore by-the-book rarity -- let that literally be how common or uncommon the item is in treasure hoards, while the price doesn't include that as a concern at all.

That way there are two axes of preciousness, rarity and this new derived cost, and a DM can use both to inform their actions at the table.

For example, I can see why most sovereign glues would be legendary in treasure hoards, for the same reason that Elmer's glue is rare in hoards: it's not something most dragons collect. No, really! But when we derive the price, I see no problem with considering it a reasonably low priced item -- more expensive than a scroll of web, but not by more than 1 order of magnitude. It's quite circumstantial, small target, a little bit dangerous to the operator (hands up if you've glued your fingers together...), and has some workarounds (like: impromptu surgery followed by regeneration, mending, or cure wounds).

This is a "problem" in that it means sane prices will have to disregard item rarities.

But meh, that's the goal here; I assume we're ready to crunch some numbers and challenge some by-the-book assumptions

 

[Oofta]

That’s great, but it doesn’t contribute anything to the thread. The goal here is to create a magic item pricing system based on how useful the items are to the PCs. If such a system wouldn’t be useful to you because you would prefer a magic item pricing system to be more rooted in a simulated fictional economy, that’s fine, but this thread won’t have anything to offer you and you won’t have anything to offer it.

I think a better summary of the intent of a “plus thread” is, if you don’t have anything constructive to add, don’t post anything. If you want to make a different thread about creating a magic item pricing system based on economic factors, feel free.

It's difficult to have any constructive conversation that starts with "you must agree with me". In addition I haven't seen any concrete answers here which don't basically boil down to variations of "base cost on it's rarity".

If we had a "recipe" for every item that could be a start, but we don't. But even if we had a recipe that said in order to craft x, you need to have y materials and a caster of level z it doesn't buy us much because we don't know how rare y and z are.

Real world prices aren't always based on utility. No penny has an intrinsic value of 1.7 million dollars, a rolex doesn't tell time any better than a timex (or my phone for that matter).

But you're right, none of that contributes, so I'll flip the question around to what I think really needs to be asked. What does the DM want the PCs to have? What trade-offs does the DM want to impose on his players? Do you want them deciding whether to build a castle or buy that +3 armor? Will any of the DM's players even want to build a castle? It's a meta-game answer, but it's the only one that really matters.

Figure out what you want PCs to purchase and set prices and monetary rewards accordingly. Trying to figure out what magic item prices "should be" is about as futile as trying to figure out what the value of crystallized carbon "should be".

 

[Fanaelialae]

If you want players to be able to easily buy and sell magic items in a balanced way, then you need to establish wealth by level guidelines. (Individual DMs can obviously stray from these guidelines, but i think it's important to establish your baseline since otherwise your prices only have meaning with respect to each other, rather than the assumed purchasing power of the PCs.)

IMO, you also need to throw out 5e's treasure tables, since they were not created with this in mind.

At this point, you can start to decide how much more a +2 item is than a +1 (should it be double, in strict reflection of it's utility, or more than double in order to make it less easily attained).

Consumables should obviously cost less, but how much less than a permanent item with the same effect? You need to account for the idea that such items can be potent in bulk. For example, if I can buy a thousand of the best healing potions for the price of a +3 sword, the former might be the more advantageous choice since it gives me virtually unlimited hp within the scope of the campaign.

Once have a rough idea of how items will be priced relative to each other, as well as the wealth by level guidelines, you can begin to set individual prices. This is, IMO, the least important step, since with clearly established design principles a DM who disagrees with your assessment can easily set their own prices. For example, I might allow flying PC races in my game and therefore consider a broom of flying to be an unexceptional item. You, on the other hand, may have banned the spell fly from your campaign and therefore consider the same item to grant a huge power boost in your campaign. As long as the design is transparent, we can both come up with prices that we will be satisfied with (assuming the system was designed well to begin with of course).

 

[Blue]

[MENTION=12731]CapnZapp[/MENTION], I think a constructive discussion about workarounds for potential pitfalls falls under the concept of the plus thread - if not let me know and I'll remove this.

--

Random inventory or even "everything in the DMG is available for purchase" may seem like a goal, but a curated inventory can both strengthen the concept in filling in gaps plus avoid a common pitfall.

Some items are additive/force multipliers with other items. An easy example is +X armor and a +X shield exceeds bounded accuracy, while Armor of Invulnerability and a Sentinel Shield are both great items but don't really enhance each other.

A flat/calculated pricing structure ill reflects the utility of having items which build on each other.

A solution for this is non-random generation of the inventory. Or if it is randomly generated, a curator pass through to replace problematic choices, specially with an eye to what the party already has.

Items to potentially nix

• +X items (they combine so easily with others, so even the first should be a point to watch) Note that some of these, like the Arrow-Catching Shield, are listed int he body, not the name.
• Items only usable by character with above-party-average number of items.
• Multiple items of the same general type - for example outfitting someone with Resist Fire is useful at times. Outfitting everyone with Resist Fire can trivialize some encounters as well as giving a very high degree of freedom from friendly fire.

If an item is nixed, a replacement item can be determined by whatever method was first used to generate items, but specific picks can instead be used as an additional opportunity by the DM to fill in gaps in the party.

Potential replacements

• Items usable primarily by characters who have below-party-average worth of items.
• Limited use items (consumables, wands, etc) that mimic pillars the party lacks, such as a Wand of Lightning Bolts or a Scroll of Knock.

 

[Matrix Sorcica]

I've perused 2 fan-made systems:

Sane Magical Item Prices by Saidoro, which focuses on identifying which items can be priced and which cannot, and establishing relative value between magic items. He seems to start from assumptions – some of which make sense like consumables being cheaper than permanent items, but others like a weapon +1 is worth 1,000 gp....not clear on how he reached that.

As stated in the OP, by basing it on 3e pricing.

 

[CapnZapp]

(written before I browse the thread)

Two more important design fundamentals:
1. Reduce drops - a larger proportion of items are supposed to be purchased rather than looted
By this I merely mean the obvious - if you keep finding as much loot with magic shoppes as you did without, you are going to end up with more magic items. I will simply assume this to not be the intended result. Instead, whenever a module tells you to place a +1 dagger and an Ioun Stone of Leadership in a cave somewhere, you might want to remove one or both items and instead place perhaps a thousand gold or so.

The characters still end up with magic items, only they find the gold and can then choose for themselves which exact item to get.

If you remove all items and just hand out gold, I believe we all agree that's too harsh. Finding items is after all fun too. Sometimes NPCs are issued signature items that really ought to remain lootable. Sometimes you simply want to let the players get a few rolls on the random treasure lists of the DMG.

If you remove no items, I hope we agree that easily leads to "too many" items. Since you can buy more back in town. In a gold-rich campaign, you'll end up with many times more items.

So to keep it simple I'm assuming/suggesting
1a. Half the lootable items (like every other item) are removed.
1b. This is not an exact science and does not need to be. The gold you place instead does not have to be exact or even close. You can even simply remove items with no gold replacement at all, provided you're either generous elsewhere or like handing out fewer items.