KotS Healing Potions

[Baron Opal]

Hrm. I don't think I like that the magic item uses character resources. The benefit also drops markedly when the character's HP climb above 40, which is fairly soon now.

Well, I'll still reserve final judgement until after I've read the books.

 

[Vempyre]

Search as I mighty I can't seem to find my no magic shops reference. Maybe I imagined it, happens to me at times. Re-reading past articles shows that 4E items will indeed have prices and some developer articles talk about "buying a lvl 7 sword cause it's more affordable than the 12th lvl one".

The PoL setting does suggest that such "shops" will be very rare, maybe existing only in larger cities or very unusual places, though, therefore still limiting magic items availability unless a particular DM actually wants to have lots of magic shops with lots of inventory in them.

But I dunno, having magic Wal-Marts .... beh. Can be fun as long as they are "rare and wonderful" but not if they are at every street corner.

 

[ForbidenMaster]

There is no magic shops in 4E, so they should remain in limited quantity even at high lvl since you can't just go around the corner and buy a bunch simply because nobody usually sells them in typical 4E DnD.

Well for one there is a diffirence between a magic shop and a potion shop. Suposedly alchemy is getting an overhaul and should be more prevelant, and it would make a lot more sense to see a potion shop in smaller towns then it would to see a "wondorus items" shop in smaller towns.

 

[Saeviomagy]

Search as I mighty I can't seem to find my no magic shops reference. Maybe I imagined it, happens to me at times. Re-reading past articles shows that 4E items will indeed have prices and some developer articles talk about "buying a lvl 7 sword cause it's more affordable than the 12th lvl one".

The PoL setting does suggest that such "shops" will be very rare, maybe existing only in larger cities or very unusual places, though, therefore still limiting magic items availability unless a particular DM actually wants to have lots of magic shops with lots of inventory in them.

But I dunno, having magic Wal-Marts .... beh. Can be fun as long as they are "rare and wonderful" but not if they are at every street corner.

Mind you, the same thing goes for having most other shops everywhere. I've an interesting document somewhere that gives the distributions of businesses by population in medieval france, and if you apply those numbers, you end up being hard pressed to find any weaponsmiths in most towns, for instance.

 

[Colmarr]

I've an interesting document somewhere that gives the distributions of businesses by population in medieval france, and if you apply those numbers, you end up being hard pressed to find any weaponsmiths in most towns, for instance.

I think you mean this. It's a great read, but I'm not sure how useful it is for D&D world-building.

 

[Primal]

So, Keep on the Shadowfell has a couple of Healing Potions appearing.

One of them says it's a minor action to use, the other says it's a standard action. (Yes, yet another editing snafu.)

They both do:

[sblock] Expend a Healing Surge, instead of receiving your normal healing amount gain 10HP instead.

Comment: So they get weaker as you go up in level? I wonder why they didn't just say "Heal a surge +4" or something?[/sblock]

I wonder which it is. Minor or Standard. Personally I think it should be TWO minors (one to get it out, and one to drink it, not to mention require a free hand, so you may need to spend another one to put something away....)

Any thoughts?

Fitz

So if you're out of surges, you don't heal *at all*? :O

 

[FitzTheRuke]

So if you're out of surges, you don't heal *at all*? :O

Yup. At that point, it's just a tasty beverage that wets your lips.

Fitz

 

[drjones]

Mind you, the same thing goes for having most other shops everywhere. I've an interesting document somewhere that gives the distributions of businesses by population in medieval france, and if you apply those numbers, you end up being hard pressed to find any weaponsmiths in most towns, for instance.

Well if you go to the Iron Age in general possessing a moderately well crafted sword was like owning a sports car now, not something every joe-blow let alone every bandit would have casual access to.

For a game like this any sense of historically realistic economy is pretty much out the window and always has been. So why worry?

 

[Sojorn]

Well if you go to the Iron Age in general possessing a moderately well crafted sword was like owning a sports car now, not something every joe-blow let alone every bandit would have casual access to.

For a game like this any sense of historically realistic economy is pretty much out the window and always has been. So why worry?

Well, economy is tonight in the excerpts.

Which is going to either be very short and boring, very long and boring, or impressive as hell in that they managed to come up with some unique angle to share.

 

[Stalker0]

Hrm. I don't think I like that the magic item uses character resources. The benefit also drops markedly when the character's HP climb above 40, which is fairly soon now.

Its not that steep of a drop.

You lose one pt of healing off of a surge for every 4 hitpoints above 40. So at 60 hp, you lose out on 50% of the healing of a healing surge. But...you gain the ability to use more healing surges in combat. Seems like a reasonable tradeoff. When you have 80, you get double the benefit out of combat. I might use the potion if I really needed it, but otherwise I'd probably save it.