How're we supposed to divvy the loot?

[baberg]

The whole idea of "the DM's responsibility to make sure encounters are of appropriate level" was never explicitly stated in 3E, and I have yet to see such a quote in 4E. Some people take the EL guidelines as some sort of mandate about design, but I see no evidence for or against that. In fact the 3E DMG describes the range of ELs that will kill the PCs, evidence that such a thing is possible.

Sorry, I thought it was assumed that the DM's purpose was to facilitate fun and interesting gameplay. Throwing encounters specifically designed to do nothing more than kill the PCs runs contrary to that. I guess if you're going 100% by the letter of the books, no, there's nothing preventing a DM from throwing a cadre of Titans at level 1 characters in any D&D edition. But that doesn't sound like much fun unless there's a feasible way for the PCs to survive the encounter.

I wouldn't think a point system would be significantly different from a system where the players know that the DM is arbitrarily stocking the vaults anyway.

The trick is that you stock the vaults without making it look like you're stocking the vaults. The necromancer that the PCs just killed should have items a spellcaster would want. Giving him a +5 Plate Breastplate might make sense since the Fighter hasn't had an upgrade recently, but any DM worth their salt wouldn't do such a thing without a good reason. So, since you know the Fighter is falling behind you arrange for the next adventure to raid a castle vault where they would need Fighter-y items.

I see nothing wrong with doing this because it makes the game more fun. Having to throw away a magic item because you already have something better is no fun. Never getting a magic item is no fun. Seeing your friends get all of the +4 level items and you only getting +1 is no fun. Thus, the DM must fudge the numbers a bit in order to facilitate fun.

 

[Terwox]

Here's fair:

It's a roleplaying decision how loot gets divvied up. Leave it your players, and even better, leave it to their characters.

If that doesn't work (and, yes, I've seen it not work!) the characters will probably figure it out.

A game that did DKP for D&D loot would pretty much drive me nuts, even if it was in-character though...

 

[Engilbrand]

We usually just make sure that there's obviously something for everyone and go from there. That will probably need to be different for the new edition. I'll figure it out as time goes on.
There's only really been one time where I voiced- in character- opposition to someone getting their share of the loot. We had a large group of low-level characters and fought some dragons. A brand new character- a Barbarian- drank a potion of Levitate and did nothing during the entire fight. I called shenanigans on him getting anything. He was there, but he didn't do anything. Grrr...
Items are pretty straightforward for my typical group. With money, we usually just split it evenly with an extra party fund "member". 4 players, split the gold 5 ways. It usually works pretty well.

 

[ProfessorCirno]

Eh, the DM supplies the items, the party decides where and who they go to.

Groups I've DM'd for and been in often sell non-upgrades but keep REALLY esoteric stuff like belts of climbing for "just in case."

And then there was the artificer and his small mountain of unenchanted rings...

 

[Voss]

Eh. So someone has an extra +1 for all of a level. Or less. It isn't really a big deal.

 

[Lurker37]

By old system I mean this:
1) Sell magic items no one wants.
2) Divvy all the gold evenly.
3) Anyone who wants a magic item pays the group however much it could be sold for. If multiple people want it, it goes to the highest bidder.
4) Divvy the gold paid to the group in step 3 among all members of the party, including to the people who bought the item(s).

Under that system, we get something like this for a party that just finished the adventure taking them from 1st to 2nd level:
Member A has a 5th level magic item and 65.6 GP.
Member B has a 4th level magic item and 97.6 GP.
Member C has a 3rd level magic item and 129.6 GP.
Member D has a 2nd level magic item and 161.6 GP.
Member E has 265.6 GP.

Are you kidding me?

People actually used that system?

*Boggle*

My experience has always been that magical loot is sorted it out in character, with most items being a no-brainer. Wizard gets spell staff, cleric and paladin discuss holy item, items may even change hands if something drops that's more appropriate for someone who recently got an item that could also be used by another party member.

Monetary treasure was a completely separate issue.

Sure there was some haggling occassionally, but it generally got sorted out pretty quickly.

I had no idea that was unusual.

 

[Xethreau]

My group has always done the "Lets decide as a group who gets what, and sell the rest." People would take turns picking choice items, and things that "obviously" go to whatever character do. Gold is distributed equally. In my group, that usually works out well, even in 3.5.

 

[Saeviomagy]

In all the campaigns I've played, only one has tried to formalise loot distribution, and it failed pretty miserably.

That is, it failed to formalise stuff - the campaign went on regardless. The players just divvied stuff up on a "whoever needs it gets it, and if you've been missing out for a while, complain" system, and if we felt someone had missed out and there was nothing appropriate to give them, we'd give them an extra chunk of cash.

After all, we're all friends. Why would you play if you were playing with selfish jerks for whom such a system was actually needed?

The disenchanting system actually helps you distribute loot. If player 1 2 and 3 have their magic items and 4 has missed out, you can disenchant hand-me-downs and useless loot and just make some for him.

 

[Holy Bovine]

My group has always done the "Lets decide as a group who gets what, and sell the rest." People would take turns picking choice items, and things that "obviously" go to whatever character do. Gold is distributed equally. In my group, that usually works out well, even in 3.5.

Pretty much my experience as well. Although I did have some problems years ago with some players trying to 'hog' the best items. They were quickly dealt with (one was booted from the group).

 

[scrubkai]

Long ago we used to just give the magic items to the character who needed it most.
Then we had a couple characters who could make magic items.

Ever since that campaign, Every item found goes into a spread sheet with it's value caluculated and we follow the method outlined by im_robertb

Of course that may have something to do with one of the main DMs for our group loving to roll treasure up on the random tables, so 90% of the items are stuff you have no use for.

As a side note:
Let me say, we had some power creap in previous campaigns, but never like we did once the players started crafting their own magic items in 3.x. And don't even get me started on what happened once an Artificer joined in the campaign.

Lets just say I'll be very happy if crafting/ye old magic shop is hard to find in the 4E. I long for the days when you picked up a funky magic item and you actually used it for four levels before you could find something even better.