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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dausuul" data-source="post: 4004593" data-attributes="member: 58197">The problem is that for there to be a real trade in magic items, there needs to be both sufficient magic items to sustain the trade, and sufficient buyers.  That works in a cosmopolitan setting such as Planescape or the Forgotten Realms.  In a points-of-light setting... not so much.Now, PCs should certainly be able to sell magic loot.  But in most cases, they should not be able to get anywhere near the purchase price of a new-made magic item.  If you're trying to sell a +2 pick, the odds are terribly against your finding somebody who actually wants such a weapon enough to shell out full price.  Much more likely, you'll sell it to a low-level warrior type who's happy with any magic weapon, or to a travelling trader who'll take it in hopes of someday offloading it on some other sap.  Either way, you'll get rooked on the price.  The warrior can't afford to pay much, and the trader is too savvy to do so.IMO, when you go to sell a magic item, the sale price should depend on a) the size of the market (small town, large town, small city, et cetera) and b) the demand for the item.  A +2 greatsword is something that lots of people would want, so it should bring a solid selling price; a wand of sepia snake sigil, on the other hand, is a very specialized item which not many people would have any interest in buying.Conversely, when going to buy a magic item, you shouldn't have your pick of the list.  Instead, there should be a table one rolls on to see what items happen to be available just now (probably just the regular treasure table).  If you want a specific item, you'll usually need to commission it custom-made from a suitably powerful wizard.Modern players aren't interested in counting the output of flour mills, sure, but that doesn't mean they have no interest in things like castles and armies.  They just want an NPC vizier to take care of all the fiddly details.  D&D could quite easily support spending money on such things, so long as a) players don't have to sweat the details, and b) there's something interesting to do with castles and armies once you've got them.</blockquote>

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