D&D 5E Looting Monsters?

[John R Davis]

Orcs are no longer foul twisted wretches so their weapons will be as diverse and upstanding as they are. The main issue will be carting stuff around and then finding a seller who would buy 10 suits of hide and 10 greataxes for example.
I did remember reading that selling monster parts for their equivalent Individual-Treasure-Challenge gets past the carting of endless bits metal and trying to completely empty the dungeon of every bit of fixture and fitting to earn money.

 

[Bupp]

My World of Eska is post-apocalyptic fantasy, and I'm stingy with treasure in general, so scavenging loot is a viable option for characters to get ahead.

They can sell for 1/2. Encumbrance is...somewhere between tracked and handwaved. I don't like to get into the minutia, but if things seem to be piling up, I'll bring it up. No bags of holding or portable holes, either.

I also describe some items and equipment as "unlootable". Stinky goblin armor, rusted weapons, ect. as the story supports.

I don't roleplay out the buying and selling of mundane gear. That get covered off camera, between sessions.

I have a Discord channel for my group, and that's where the looting generally happens. Our limited play time means we try to play efficiently. A lot of the social and exploration stuff happens on Discord, and our sessions usually open at the "front door" and end after the "boss fight". XP and loot are given out there between sessions (when someone specifically looks for loot).

The group also has a shared Google Drive doc that they use as their loot list. I'll make notations of value, or where to sell specific loot there.

@SovietDM you mentioned it being too much money. What are you giving them to spend their money on?

 

[Tonguez]

Orcs are no longer foul twisted wretches so their weapons will be as diverse and upstanding as they are. The main issue will be carting stuff around and then finding a seller who would buy 10 suits of hide and 10 greataxes for example.
I did remember reading that selling monster parts for their equivalent Individual-Treasure-Challenge gets past the carting of endless bits metal and trying to completely empty the dungeon of every bit of fixture and fitting to earn money.

Not necessarily - in my version of orcs they are as intelligent as humans but have thicker skins - they thick skin means they are much much tougher but also have less tactile sensitivity, This lack of tactile sensitivity means that they have trouble with fine precision work - so their weapons aren't honed to as sharp an edge and Orc armour lacks the close riveting or articulated joints that human armour employs.

 

[dave2008]

Yeah, when I have a player like that I try to include really interesting stuff among the monster's belongings. The armor may or may not be salvageable, the weapons may or may not be worth much, but I like to include weird stuff. Lady Tiefling on Instagram has some great "I Loot The...." tables that I highly recommend.

Cool tables - thank you for the link!

 

[jgsugden]

D&D is an RPG. A role playing game. Characters play a role in a story. I want the stories to make sense.

If an orc has a greataxe that works like a greataxe, it has value as a (used) greataxe. If the PCs can get it it someplace where people want greataxes, it can be sold for value. Yes, a 'typical orc' as written in the PHB has about 40 gp worth of equipment. So, when the PCs encounter 8 orcs, if you equip them per the PHB, they have 320 GP in equipment that can be sold - if there is a market. They may have to travel to find the place to sell it, or sell it to someone that wants to take it elsewhere and sell it for more, but they generally can find ways not to sell it for coppers on the gp.

I am absolutely not worried about the PCs getting this much gold, or 10 times that much gold, at low levels. It allows them to do things in the game that are fun. They do need to figure out how to move it (bag of holding, tenser's floating disks, etc...), but that generally is not a problem by the time they hit 3rd level.

 

[dave2008]

I did one adventure, as a beginner DM, where I let my players loot monsters that they kill of their weapons and armor, but they can only sell it for 1/4 of the original price. They still ended up getting too much money, so I stopped doing that, but I want know how other people do looting monsters, or if you do at all?

I allow it, but it rarely happens because it is not worth the effort generally. I will say we use a silver standard, but I don't that matters.

Take the example of your rouge who likes to loot. What are they looting? If it is armor or weapons, that quickly becomes an encumbrance and likely noisy, hindering their ability to do roguish things. There are rules for some of this, but I suggest just thinking about it logically. Allow them to carry an amount that makes sense, but after that you are going to have a speed penalty, have disadvantage, etc. for trying to carry to much heavy, encumbering, noisy junk.

Plus, used weapons and armor would probably go for 1/10th the cost of new (particularly armor). So that might help with the gold issue.

 

[Blue Orange]

Ironically I used to play a lot of the really old 1e D&D computer games back in the day, and picking up the 10 short swords and taking them back to town to sell for small change was a way the party made money before they hit the big time. Is this an edition thing, or a tabletop-vs-computer thing (as previously suggested)?

 

[MarkB]

Ironically I used to play a lot of the really old 1e D&D computer games back in the day, and picking up the 10 short swords and taking them back to town to sell for small change was a way the party made money before they hit the big time. Is this an edition thing, or a tabletop-vs-computer thing (as previously suggested)?

I think it is a videogames-vs-tabletop thing, because it's certainly not limited to really old games. In Skyrim, looting is such an established part of the experience that players came up with the "ten-to-one rule": If an object's listed value is at least ten times its weight, it's worth hauling back to town (at least, in the early game).

 

[Puddles]

I put all kinds of loot on my monsters. Coins, gemstone, copper rings, silver necklaces, arrows, bolts, vials of poison, armour, brooches, wooden toys, bone fetishes, potions, spell scrolls - you name it. Not that every goblin has a bag of diamonds, but there is a bit of loot on almost every monster they defeat and it comes in all shapes and sizes. Some that’s valuable, some that is there to add flavor and encourage roleplaying, (the Druid collects trinkets for her Peyote rituals).

Usually the haul after a battle is one of the funnest parts for my players, and as one of the major NPCs is a jeweler, they have someone to sell it to. Actually, after acquiring a particularly valuable crown they bypassed that NPC and sold it straight to a collector (a wealthy merchant prince), a turn of events I didn’t expect and that collector is now tasked them with other treasure he wishes to receive.

When it comes to weapons and armour, I have custom encumbrance rules that would mean a player would come immediately encumbered if they looted a suit or armour or a few weapons. Still, they often have a pack donkey or a sled, so if they want to start looting that stuff more often I’m keen to let them do so.

 

[Faolyn]

Have merchants buy the swords (assuming low-quality monster-made swords, or better-made swords that have been beat up or rusted from lack of care) for the value of the metal. That'll be a couple of silver per pound.