Do Magic Item "Shops" wreck the spirit of D&D?

[howandwhy99]

In AD&D, if they didn't have enough magic items to function, they'd...

...(a) complain
...(b) leave.

In AD&D, if they were given too many magic items, the serious players would complain or leave.

Monty Haul games are related directly to magic items given out. Killer Dungeons can be related to a lack of magic items.

Cheers!

Complaining or ditching are a dishonorable practice in any edition. Declaring suggested wealth levels are core and treasure loads are to be manipulated by the DM to follow it unless house ruled is not the answer.

When a teacher grades students, it may be true the grading curve is too high. But far more often, it's the students who are performing poorly.

If you're not getting the items you want in game, or not enough treasure in game, it's most likely not the DM's fault. You need to work harder for bigger payouts.

 

[Vocenoctum]

Oh right, because in the world of 3E any DM who isn't an obsequious toady to munchkin powergamers is some kind of weirdo. I forgot about that.

But yes, if the players feel like they can do a better job one of them should step up. It's easy to call the DM's creative decisions a "power play"... but the fact is that if anything goes wrong with the game it is blamed on the DM. The buck stops with the DM, so he is obligated to be more than the players' stepandfetchit boy.

It's a social contract, DM & Player. If the players are all munchkins, and the DM isn't, then the DM should be as happy to leave them as they are to leave him.

The response was not about catering to players, it was about your assertion that a DM should be a jack@ss and insult his players when they ask about such things. Stating that you're the DM and as such the god of "your" game is also not much of a way to keep a game fun. I've had such DM's before, though not for long.

 

[Celebrim]

I believe your point was that magic items should be unique and flavorful.

That was certainly one of my points, but it was not the point. I did not (just) say that gauntlets of dexterity needed a cool, interesting, flavorable backstory in order to be more that 'just' gauntlets of dexterity - although it wouldn't hurt. No, what I said is that they become more than gauntlets of dexterity when they become the player character's gauntlets of dexterity. They become part of the character's story. I found these in a magical wal-mart or in some unimportant scene in a in a nameless shop that we didn't even bother to RP out, is not a story. And gauntlets of dexterity are just gauntlets of dexterity and just another peice of equipment because they can be bought in a nameless store in any small town like any other peice of equipment.

My point is as it always has been that if you treat something like a commodity, then it will just be a commodity, and if you don't then won't be one. So sure, if you start from the assumption that it is a commodity its really easy to prove that it is a commodity and should be treated like one. If you don't start from that assumption, it leads you in a whole different direction.

This is assuming you're using the rules as written, rather than custom rules, and applies to every edition.

This is one of those overbroad usages of the word 'rules' that just annoys the heck out of me.

You can tailor magic items to your campaign, and that will be straying from the RAW...

So if I tailor magic items to my campaign, I'm straying from the rules as written? The rules as written prohibit a DM from having new magic items? That's your take on the game?

<Insert vulgar interjection here>

You have really get a handle on what is an actual rule and what is suggestions, fluff, options, possibilities, guidelines, advice, etc. The DMG is not some sort of straight jacket designed to keep DM's in line filled with lots of rules, restrictions, and regulations. It's designed, I would hope, to inspire the imagination - not limit it.

...but that doesn't really have any bearing on how the common D&D game is played, basically. Nothing wrong with it, but it's a different sort of discussion.

I don't know how common D&D is played, and if I had to guess neither do you. All I know is how D&D has been played in my experience, and all you know is how D&D has been played in your experience. I don't know which is more common, nor do I think it really matters all that much. But, as far as I know, I'm not straying from how D&D is commonly played.

 

[Vocenoctum]

Complaining or ditching are a dishonorable practice in any edition. Declaring suggested wealth levels are core and treasure loads are to be manipulated by the DM to follow it unless house ruled is not the answer.

There's plenty of in between though. If a DM wants a low-equipment game, that's fine by itself, as long as he communicates this with his players. If the players have different expectations and the DM is not receptive to them, then complaining or ditching is to be expected. It's all about expectations.

 

[PallidPatience]

I'm in a game, now, where we all just recently reached 6th level. We all have maybe 1 fiddly magic item (in my case, my backup weapon), and most of our characters have been LOSING money since we first started. We've found almost no magic items, and almost no treasure from adventuring so far (seriously... LOSING money). But, we've levelled up three times over the course of the campaign.

We're in Faerun, and I had to discuss with the DM that we're all THOUSANDS of GP under the wealth by level tables. Our wizard hasn't yet seen enough money to make a second level scroll, even though she's level 6, and she was flat-out told to do so by the DM when she mentioned that she didn't have enough spell slots for some of the situations we've been in (lots of little fights back to back).

If it had been a home-brew setting, I'd not have complained. But, it's Faerun, where the gods walk the land every so often, the Red Wizards of Thay sell magic items in every major city, people like Elminster and Khelben Arunsun live, and ancient empires of magic have risen and fallen.

But a group of 6th level adventurers possess three minor magic weapons, a "call-at-will" spell-book with maybe twenty pages, a magic shield, and maybe twenty platinum each.

My character obviously earned more in his three levels as a mercenary (before the campaign started) than he saw over the three levels as an adventurer. That's pretty sad.

But now the DM understands that we're all pretty discomfited by such a situation, and we're on our way to actually earning money when we kill things.

The campaign I'm running is pretty much by the book, though. Of course, it's Eberron, so magic items are fairly common. The party has a few magical trinkets (+1 armor for one, a +1 ring of protection, and a +1 cloak of resistance, as well as a ton of potions I forgot to have my NPCs use), but they're not overpowered (except that I'm a fairly new DM, and they all have fairly high stats because we like that sort of game, so every once in a while, I judge too low and they trounce what should have been a hard encounter).

Not much of that was relevant, but my point is this: If it's hard to get items, items become MORE important. Not less. The story suffers (IMHO), because the party is focussed on getting the +x sword of y properties instead of worried about facing Galgarm, Destroyer of Small Peoples, or whatever. The BBEG takes the back seat to outfitting the party, and so do the characters. If you just give them the stuff, they get on with the game, and the story continues. BUT, if you want the party to exist in a world where magic is rare, you have to be careful about how you handle spellcaster PCs. You really have a choice there: you can disallow them, entirely, or you can just get rid of Item Creation Feats. After all, if the PCs can take Item Creation Feats and generate the things they need, they'll start to wonder why others couldn't, unless you make them go on a quest to learn that knowledge (which could be cool).

I'm rambling, I know. I think that's really all I have to say about that.

 

[DragonLancer]

Getting back on topic a little here, I like my D&D (and it's how I view D&D anyway) is like Middle Earth. Magic exists and can do wonderful things, but it's not seen by everyday folk. Using LotR as an example, magic items aren't in shops and in people's homes for the most part. They are in the hands of heroes, villains, (for lack of a better term) epic figures and lost in ancient corners of the world. The idea that magic items are made and sold as a commodity like clothing or bread quite frankly horrifies me as far as D&D goes. Where is the mysticism of magic and monsters in a world like that?

The worlds of D&D are by and large faux-medieval so we can take that real world step a little more fantasically but I think my point remains. Everyone's campaigns are different, and thats cool, it's just how I feel about it.

Now I made changes to my game when I started Shackled City. I decided to be a little more open with some options and one of them was to keep the magic shop in the city. Thats the sort of thing I never include because it goes against my (above) D&D sensibilities. Now, as DonRemus pointed out a few pages back, that campaign actually did have something better going for it when the players found that there was a shop that could sell most of what they didn't want and buy a few (random) selections after each chapter/scenario of the campaign.

It has opened up the game a bit more and I'm happy with it for the players, but it really does not fit my view of items. Magic items, even lowly +1 longswords and rings of protection +1, should be priceless and desireable items. If players can buy, sell and craft their own items to match exactly what they want, why are we DM's giving them out in scenarios anyway?

And as for the comment on page 1 about magic stores being raided for their contents, I don't think it would happen. Not more than once anyway. It's adventurers and mercenaries who frequent those stores mainly, and they tend to have the skills and the powers to track down those responsible. Thats assuming the store keep isn't just as powerful. It's not a healthy pursuit to rob a magic store.

Anyway, this has rambled on too long. If I repeated myself too much I apologise, it's 5am as I write this and insomnia doesn't help.

It's an interesting discussion. I look forward to seeing where it goes.

 

[Vocenoctum]

My point is as it always has been that if you treat something like a commodity, then it will just be a commodity, and if you don't then won't be one. So sure, if you start from the assumption that it is a commodity its really easy to prove that it is a commodity and should be treated like one. If you don't start from that assumption, it leads you in a whole different direction.

And my point is that no matter what, these gloves are still just gloves. The player will wear them and forget about them. In no edition has there been some mystique to "gauntlets of ogre power" as anything more than a buff item. It's all well and fine that a player might attach to certain items as "his" and storied, but in any edition there are plenty of items that the player has which are simply items. They are unimportant and inconsequential except in their capacity to increase effectiveness. That does not diminish ALL magic items. You can still have the Gauntlets of Ogre Power that you wrested from the Goblin King and tell folks about them, but not every item will be so unique.

This is one of those overbroad usages of the word 'rules' that just annoys the heck out of me.

I don't see why, the rules as written present certain items and ways of doing things. If you want to invent a system whereby the items gain uniqueness over time, that's fine. It doesn't mean that the Gaunlets were ever anything more than Gauntlets of Ogre Power. It's mostly about older editions though, since 3.5 actually HAS rules for customizing. In earlier editions you basically just made stuff up and guessed.

So if I tailor magic items to my campaign, I'm straying from the rules as written? The rules as written prohibit a DM from having new magic items? That's your take on the game?

<Insert vulgar interjection here>

The rules are a baseline to which the DM adds or subtracts, mutates and mutilates, in order to build a compelling setting and story for himself and the players amusement. As a community, we can't debate the merits of a personal opinion though, we can only discuss what the rules actually are.

So, new magic items are a great part of the game, but they're in no way debatable when we're talking about the nebulous "spirit of the game".

You have really get a handle on what is an actual rule and what is suggestions, fluff, options, possibilities, guidelines, advice, etc. The DMG is not some sort of straight jacket designed to keep DM's in line filled with lots of rules, restrictions, and regulations. It's designed, I would hope, to inspire the imagination - not limit it.

The only real issue is when folks present their opinions as fact and draw conclusions about entire editions based on their personal preferences. 3.5 has made magic items more customizable than any previous edition, yet because that power is also by default accessible to players, it's deemed to be bad by some.

I don't know how common D&D is played, and if I had to guess neither do you. All I know is how D&D has been played in my experience, and all you know is how D&D has been played in your experience. I don't know which is more common, nor do I think it really matters all that much. But, as far as I know, I'm not straying from how D&D is commonly played.

I didn't say I had any great insight into how common D&D is played. You do mention customizing your games in different ways, so obviously you're not using just the D&D rules. It doesn't matter at all really, except in the sense that we're discussing various editions of D&D and how magic items were portrayed. Obviously the further strayed from the baseline, the less valid the information is when discussing that Baseline.

 

[MerricB]

Getting back on topic a little here, I like my D&D (and it's how I view D&D anyway) is like Middle Earth. Magic exists and can do wonderful things, but it's not seen by everyday folk. Using LotR as an example, magic items aren't in shops and in people's homes for the most part. They are in the hands of heroes, villains, (for lack of a better term) epic figures and lost in ancient corners of the world. The idea that magic items are made and sold as a commodity like clothing or bread quite frankly horrifies me as far as D&D goes. Where is the mysticism of magic and monsters in a world like that?

The trouble with the LotR setting - as applied to D&D - is that Middle Earth during the Third Age doesn't have the number of active magic users that D&D has. If you chose the right period of Middle Earth - say, the First Age - then amongst the elves you'd find a *lot* of magical items. And yes, they'd be trading them. I find the First Age (as described in the Silmarillion) a really magical age; and it's with a lot of magic about.

In fact, LotR really presents magic items as we have it in D&D today in some ways - so that those who have it don't even think about it. For the hobbits, the elven cloaks are miraculous (and Galadriel's rope), but all the elves are clad like that and they're not going around saying "wow, look at my fancy cloak!" They've moved past that. The really special things are the artefacts, such as Galadriel's Mirror.

Cheers!

 

[Celebrim]

Perhaps you missed the absolute pronouncements of rightness from the other side a few pages back? C gives a number of backing arguments for each assertion.

Really, the whole 'that's just an opinion' meme is lame, because it seems like nine times in ten when someone trots it out, it isn't over something that is merely subjective or even normative in nature. Instead, its trotted out in response to any sort of firm statement, as if there was something inherently wrong with making a firm statement like - "A is equal to itself."

What I find interesting about that sort of behavior is its irony. Kamikazi would have you believe that it is absolutely true that the three statements I made is are subjective statements rather than objective facts. No effort is actually expended to show this must be true. No proof is offered. He simply assumes that it is absolutely true that pronouncements like that can't be absolutely true, even when for example there is nothing more difficult than a proof by definition in the case of #2.

The further irony of that is that he then, after asserting that the three statements are subjective statements, goes on to state that it must be the case that I'm absolutely wrong about statements which - in order for his first proposition to be correct - must be the sort of statements about which one cannot be either absolutely wrong or absolutely right.

Anyway, here's a heads up on a counter-argument Kamikazi:

For number #1 to be wrong, you must show that the things I listed that disappeared from the game have been replaced by things that make the 3.X game less predictable and less transparent to the players and give them a lesser degree of control over the game. That's going to be amusing, since I suspect based on your reaction you to be in the camp that argues that the fact that the 3.X game has become more predictable for the PC's and gives them a greater degree of control over the game makes for a better game.

For number #2 to be wrong, you must show that a thing can be both completely known and completely unknown to the same person at the same time. (Hint: the word mysterious is a synonym of the word unknown, and the word control is a synonym of known, for example a scientific control)

For number #3 to be wrong, you have to show that there is no more to a role playing game than the rules. That is to say, you have to show that the game is only crunch and never fluff and that fluff cannot alter play.

 

[MerricB]

1) Magic was more mysterious in earlier editions than it is now.

Just looking at your examples, I think we need to distinguish between:
* Magic was more mysterious, and
* Magic was more random.

Random doesn't mean mysterious. Casting prismatic spray was random, not mysterious. I tend to feel the same about the potion miscibility tables. When they could be mysterious was when the players didn't know about them.

The play-style where players don't have access to the DMG does promote the mysteriousness of magic items; it is encouraged more in 1e than 3e, but, as demonstrated by many people over the years, a lot of players read the DMG (for one reason or another). D&D Magic is at its most mysterious - along with the rest of the game - in your first few sessions. Eventually, how secret you keep magic (and thus the mystery of it) is far more group playstyle matter.

"The fact that spells like identify worked less effectively in earlier editions"... actually, it worked pretty well in 1e. It was least effective in 3e, strangely enough!

2) Magic can never be completely mysterious in any game where the players contol it.

Yeah, knowing all the rules - and the items created by those rules - does rule out a lot of mystery. Like reading the adventure before you play it. As above, playstyle decisions.

This is mitigated by the DM creating their own items, of course.

There were plenty of 'touch this and suffer some horrible fate with no saving throw' effects in earlier editions of the game. You can argue with a degree of persuasiveness that such gross effects aren't necessarily fun in play, but you can't argue the superiority of 3rd edition in that regard and then at the same time argue that magic in D&D has always been nothing more than a mere predictable commodity. Well you can, but it won't make any sense.

I don't see what that has to do with your argument. "Put on a cloak of poisonousness and die" is hardly mysterious. Indeed, likely, given a few Killer DMs...

3) The rules of a game contribute to magic's flavor in the setting, but they don't define it.

Pretty much. Well, they can define its limitations.

Cheers!