DM's: Gems, Jewelry, Artwork & Copper pieces..do you actually describe them?

[Emirikol]

Do any of you bother to roll up gems and jewelry (aka artwork)anymore? Or, do you just tell your players "yea, you find 500gp worth of gems & jewelry & stuff."

Is there any purpose anymore to rolling that stuff up? It seems akin to handing out copper and silver as treasure. Why not just say 10gp worth of coins?

jh

 

[D'nemy]

Two words.

Spell components.

Some spells require the expenditure of specific gems or the focus of expensive mirrors. I always roll up each and every gems, jewelry and artwork. Also, some of the PC's in the game I'm currently running are divas and love the accessories!

 

[ThirdWizard]

I never randomly determine treasure.

 

[Emirikol]

I never randomly determine treasure.

Not that. I mean do you bother to describe what gems and jewelry they find? Is there any possible 'advantage' to describing all of them in your games?

jh

 

[smootrk]

I try to define what they find, even down to decor & histories on relatively mundane magical items.

Recently my group has found a Silver Ring enameled with fish designs (ring of swimming), a Belt Buckle with Jade inlays, and a 'Hand of the Mage' (does Mage Hand spell) with an extensive history and slightly altered appearance (leprecahn hand).

Sometimes the group sells off these items with total disregard, and sometimes they fancy the items (even mundane stuff) and want the items on their sheet. Dropping all description of items to either gp value or to 'whatever bonus it is' only further moves the game (in my own humble opinion) from the role-play focus, and moves it closer to the 'video-gamy' mode. It all depends on what your particular group enjoys more. We prefer a rather balanced game (video-gamy vs role-play) but leaning closer to the role-play side.

I do my part to move things to the role-play side of things.

 

[Chimera]

I tell them what they found, but never the "value". Such things are often variable, depending on where and how you sell them. This applies to artwork, items, jewelry and gems.

I have three different monetary systems in use in the same area, so I always give them the number of each kind of coin. They can figure it out from there or I'll whip out the calculator and convert it all into a basic figure in the common currency.

 

[the Jester]

Do any of you bother to roll up gems and jewelry (aka artwork)anymore? Or, do you just tell your players "yea, you find 500gp worth of gems & jewelry & stuff."

Is there any purpose anymore to rolling that stuff up? It seems akin to handing out copper and silver as treasure. Why not just say 10gp worth of coins?

jh

Yes, I describe jewelry, art pieces, valuable scroll tubes, gems, makeup kits worth 10 gp, piles of copper, etc. In fact, it's very rare that they are worth the same amount as an equal-weight pile of gold pieces.

I'm betting you don't track encumberance?

Edit: Not to mention that you will prolly have a hard time selling that 100 gp value statue of the elven king for 100gp... unless you find the right buyer.

 

[ThirdWizard]

Not that. I mean do you bother to describe what gems and jewelry they find? Is there any possible 'advantage' to describing all of them in your games?

Ahhh, I gotcha! Yes. I describe every piece of jewelry, art piece, tapestry, statuette. Sometimes they like them and keep them. Other times they use them for spell components. Other times they throw them into a bag and forget they exist (that happens a lot...).

For example, they recently went through the remains of an illithid city in which all the inhabitants had died. Eventually they happened upon what was an illithid's trophy rack. It was just great! There were all mannar of things, statuettes of elven children, a holy symbol to a good god, a gold brain, a spell component pouch, and some various other odds and ends that were just creepy being found in that place. It definately helped the mood and made for some good treasure!

So, I'm definately on the side of spelling everything out.

 

[Contrarian]

Two words.

Spell components.

Some spells require the expenditure of specific gems or the focus of expensive mirrors. I always roll up each and every gems, jewelry and artwork. Also, some of the PC's in the game I'm currently running are divas and love the accessories!

D'nemy said almost everything I was going to say. I even agree with the "divas" bit -- I've had players who thought giving their PCs a favorite gem was an important roleplaying detail! (Then again, the 1E DMG thought it was important to note that dwarves dislike pearls, so maybe I shouldn't mock them so much.) And since I always use the spell component rules in AD&D, players with spellcasters always ask for details about gems found in treasure.

Weird gem fetishes can affect interactions with NPCs, too. If the PCs find out that Bob the Alchemist has a thing for emeralds, maybe they can get a discount on healing potions by paying him with emeralds.

Depending on how much detail the DM wants to put into the campaign setting, the gems found on NPCs can be a hint about bigger things, like what parts of the world the NPC came from (or, more likely in a D&D game, what part of the world the person the NPC robbed came from).

 

[Vanye]

I came across a program some time back that generates things like jewelry, etc. It's very simple, with no customization, but it's pretty nifty.