D&D (2024) Gold & Other Treasure (Can we get off the treadmill?)

[Clint_L]

I just try to have enough money in the story so that characters can get around, while saving up for a coveted item, perhaps. My current home campaign is level 7, and free room and board at the inn (drinks not included) is still a legitimate incentive for them.

I can't think of many good adventure stories where the protagonists are all Richie Rich. Some superhero stories, I guess...one of the reasons I prefer characters like Spiderman. He's broke. The mounds of treasure fantasy just isn't my bag.

 

[RuinousPowers]

How much is a stronghold in 5th edition?

Here you go.

Mod Edit: link removed

 

[MGibster]

I just try to have enough money in the story so that characters can get around, while saving up for a coveted item, perhaps. My current home campaign is level 7, and free room and board at the inn (drinks not included) is still a legitimate incentive for them.

I can't think of many good adventure stories where the protagonists are all Richie Rich. Some superhero stories, I guess...one of the reasons I prefer characters like Spiderman. He's broke. The mounds of treasure fantasy just isn't my bag.

There are plenty of good fantasy stories involving wealthy nobles. I'm not opposed to characters acquiring treasure, even a massive amount of treasure, but I'd like more options for what they can do with it. Or failing that, just do away with keeping track of gold and go with an abstract system. Something.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Why did you substitute the word "players" in place of "authors"? If an author wants to engage in that sort of director level control over a they might want to do that someplace like Lets become a novelist! or an english equivalent like Royal Road where readers of "their" story aren't simply misguided extras who thought they were fellow players & a GM. gamelit & RPGlit are quite popular on both sites.

Because other people don't think like you do and I wrote my statement for them. People who know you can have part authorship of a story while still playing a game.

Just because you apparently don't see how that's possible doesn't mean everyone else doesn't either.

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

Our group requires spending gold on training during downtime to level up. Solves most of the problem really

 

[tetrasodium]

Because other people don't think like you do and I wrote my statement for them. People who know you can have part authorship of a story while still playing a game.

Just because you apparently don't see how that's possible doesn't mean everyone else doesn't either.

No it's not simply a matter of interpretation or pedantry over the terms. The idea that players are authors who get to decide how their story develops is an incredibly toxic influence on new players because the way d&d is structured follows a loop of 1: GM describes the situation ->2: players react -> 3: GM describes the outcome. Anything that encourages players to feel like steps one & three are theirs to decide like "your story" or "Their story" when specifically referring to a player encourages that toxicity.

Nobody at the table is there to tell a story or even decide what the story is. Nobody has that role because no one side of the GM screen is responsible for the entire 3 step chain. The story is something that develops based on the results of dice plus both sides of the screen rather than a thing someone decides or tells. wotc needs to do a much better job of expressing that in the 2024 books.

 

[CleverNickName]

One of my friends runs a D&D campaign where there is no gold or treasure. It's all hand-waved, and the players have free reign to outfit their characters with whatever gear they want. Except for the occasional McGuffin, monster lairs are usually just filled with bones and other trash.

Instead of gold or treasure, the characters have a "purchasing power" stat, which is tied to their level and Lifestyle. (There's a chart for it in her house rules.) This means that all characters of a certain level are assumed to own a certain total value of equipment. Whenever they level-up, their purchasing power increases so they all run to the market to sell off old gear and buy new stuff.

Same for day-to-day stuff, also. Lifestyle improves with level, and if a character lives a Comfortable lifestyle, they are assumed to have enough cash on hand to pay for a meal...while an Aristocratic lifestyle means they can probably bribe a guard.

It's not something I want in my game, but they seem to like it.

 

[Tonguez]

• dont give out gold - just fine items, art and books which all have adventure hooks or need to be traded via RP
• require Clerics and Paladins to pay Tithes
• impose Gate duties and Adventurer Taxes enforced by dragons
• build strongholds
• use an abstract wealth system

 

[Shiroiken]

running a campaign without magic items is booring.

What, you have same naughty word sword you got from boot camp?

Only as a heavy armor user can you hope for some advancement in form of full plate or if you manage to macgyver some cool things for your weapons(if allowed) as poison dispensers or similar.

Even the most basic, boring, inimaginitive +1 weapon is still advancement, you got something better, even if plain, bare minimum.

Uh... I said "non-magical treasure," i.e. gold/gems/jewelry. I mean, you can run a game without magic items, but that's not the topic of the thread.

 

[WanderingMystic]

It's been oft lamented that treasure becomes essentially meaningless very quickly in 5th edition D&D. At least it's oft lamented by me. I ran my first 5th edition campaign in 2014 or 2015, and just accumulating treasure off of monsters and foes, even at lower levels, kept the party hip deep in more gold than they really knew what to do with. There were no magic shops, they weren't spending gold to advance in level, they were itinerant adventurers so real estate wasn't an option, and we were really more focused on old school style adventuring. Even when I ran Acquisitions Inc., a few years later, gold was essentially meaningless as it was trivially easy to make enough of it to keep the business afloat and to make improvements.

How important is treasure in a campaign really? Don't get me wrong, I might have characters who are highly motivated by treasure, but as a player, I don't really care about treasure. It doesn't matter to me if I find five gems with 50 gp each or a statuette made out of electrum. In Honor Among Thieves, the obsession with the acquisition of wealth wasn't the motivation for our heroes (I'm not going to spoil the plot for anyone who hasn't seen it yet), and it's not necessarily the motivation of many protagonist from various fantasy movies and novels.

Is the revision of 5th edition (I threw up a little calling it a revision) going to feature less treasure or provide DMs and players with more options on how to use treasure?

They talked about how the new dmg will have magical items prices and plans for things like keeps rules for building organizations so that players have something to do with their gold.