nnms
First Post
With changes coming to magic item distribution, I thought it would be a good time to look at the underpinnings of magic item prices and the 4E economy.
How the costs progress
Every 5 additional levels (the levels the enhancement bonus increases) an item costs 5 times the amount.
This is not spread linearly from level to level. Instead, the difference between the cost of a high level item of the same enhancement bonus is 11.11% (one ninth, actually) more of the difference between the lowest enchancement bonus item and the next higher enchancement bonus item. This probably needs an example.
A level 1 item is 360. A level 6 item (the enhancement bonus is now +2) is 5 times that amount at 1800. A level 2 item costs the same as a level 1 item + one ninth of the difference between 1800 and 360. So it costs 520.
At level 6, the math starts again, with 1800 being the new 360.
So it sort of looks like this:
level 1 360
level 2 360+.1111 of difference between level 1 and 6
level 3 360+.2222
level 4 360+.3333
level 5 360+.4444
level 6 1800
What money is spent on
Mundane equipment
Ritual components
Consumables
Rituals & Alchemical formulas
Magic Items
I don't think I'm missing anything.
Mundane equipment becomes proportionately irrelevant pretty quickly. With the treasure parcel system giving increasing treasure at the same rate of magic item costs, tracking the purchasing of mundane equipment quickly becomes as irrelevant as tracking copper pieces.
Ritual components can be broken down into two categories. The first being the cost of casting rituals during the course of an adventuring career. The second being component costs to create magic items. I'm going to talk about money spent on magic items through the use of rituals as part of the magic item category rather than ritual category.
If you look at the cost of rituals, they do no progress at the same rate as magic item costs and treasure coming in. They remain relatively flat and then start spiking dramatically at level 15. They are also proportionately very small expenditures compared to magic items of the same level. The utility of a ritual is not necessarily diminished at higher levels. A +1 magic sword is drastically worse than a +4 sword, but what a ritual accomplishes still has it's full effect. An animal messenger still gets the message sent out. And with skill checks getting higher, often better than it did at lower levels. At higher levels, some ritual component costs are as irrelevant as copper pieces when you're breaking astral diamonds into platinum for change. If during the course of a level, the party is bringing in a few hundred thousand gold worth or treasure, the cost of low level rituals becomes negligible, even though some will be just as useful. Unlike a +1 sword, a ritual generally does not get replaced by an identical version that is +2 but costs 5 times as much.
Consumables are like ritual components in that once they are used, they are gone. They include things like potions, magic whetstones, balms and other things that can be used up. Alchemical creations are examples of consumables. They have a cost progression very similar to magic items. Generally speaking, they hover around 3-4% (with 4% being the most common) of the cost of the same level magic item.
Rituals and alchemical formulas are another thing that some PCs will want to spend some money on. Like consumables, these are inconsistentantly priced, but average around 15-20% of the cost of a magic item. Some vary wildly from this.
Magic items are the largest cost items. And once a character has enough gold that any mundane equipment and even many ritual components become irrelevant, there is nothing to do with the money but to spend it on magic items. Either through purchasing them or through the funding of item creation ritual component costs. Furthermore, the combat system assumes that characters of certain levels will have appropriately leveled gear. At this point, gold effectively becomes a second form of experience points as its only use becomes that of gaining bonuses and abilities similar to those gained by increasing in level.
My next posts will cover the implications of all these things and ideas about how tweaking a variable here or there can help create a certain kind of campaign. For example, my next campaign will have the players starting off as the rulers of a noble house. How will the exponentially growing treasure values need to be changed for such a campaign where players may wish to fund construction, hire soldiers, commission research, buy land and a variety of other tasks they might want to do in the periphery of their heroic adventures.
How the costs progress
Every 5 additional levels (the levels the enhancement bonus increases) an item costs 5 times the amount.
This is not spread linearly from level to level. Instead, the difference between the cost of a high level item of the same enhancement bonus is 11.11% (one ninth, actually) more of the difference between the lowest enchancement bonus item and the next higher enchancement bonus item. This probably needs an example.
A level 1 item is 360. A level 6 item (the enhancement bonus is now +2) is 5 times that amount at 1800. A level 2 item costs the same as a level 1 item + one ninth of the difference between 1800 and 360. So it costs 520.
At level 6, the math starts again, with 1800 being the new 360.
So it sort of looks like this:
level 1 360
level 2 360+.1111 of difference between level 1 and 6
level 3 360+.2222
level 4 360+.3333
level 5 360+.4444
level 6 1800
What money is spent on
Mundane equipment
Ritual components
Consumables
Rituals & Alchemical formulas
Magic Items
I don't think I'm missing anything.
Mundane equipment becomes proportionately irrelevant pretty quickly. With the treasure parcel system giving increasing treasure at the same rate of magic item costs, tracking the purchasing of mundane equipment quickly becomes as irrelevant as tracking copper pieces.
Ritual components can be broken down into two categories. The first being the cost of casting rituals during the course of an adventuring career. The second being component costs to create magic items. I'm going to talk about money spent on magic items through the use of rituals as part of the magic item category rather than ritual category.
If you look at the cost of rituals, they do no progress at the same rate as magic item costs and treasure coming in. They remain relatively flat and then start spiking dramatically at level 15. They are also proportionately very small expenditures compared to magic items of the same level. The utility of a ritual is not necessarily diminished at higher levels. A +1 magic sword is drastically worse than a +4 sword, but what a ritual accomplishes still has it's full effect. An animal messenger still gets the message sent out. And with skill checks getting higher, often better than it did at lower levels. At higher levels, some ritual component costs are as irrelevant as copper pieces when you're breaking astral diamonds into platinum for change. If during the course of a level, the party is bringing in a few hundred thousand gold worth or treasure, the cost of low level rituals becomes negligible, even though some will be just as useful. Unlike a +1 sword, a ritual generally does not get replaced by an identical version that is +2 but costs 5 times as much.
Consumables are like ritual components in that once they are used, they are gone. They include things like potions, magic whetstones, balms and other things that can be used up. Alchemical creations are examples of consumables. They have a cost progression very similar to magic items. Generally speaking, they hover around 3-4% (with 4% being the most common) of the cost of the same level magic item.
Rituals and alchemical formulas are another thing that some PCs will want to spend some money on. Like consumables, these are inconsistentantly priced, but average around 15-20% of the cost of a magic item. Some vary wildly from this.
Magic items are the largest cost items. And once a character has enough gold that any mundane equipment and even many ritual components become irrelevant, there is nothing to do with the money but to spend it on magic items. Either through purchasing them or through the funding of item creation ritual component costs. Furthermore, the combat system assumes that characters of certain levels will have appropriately leveled gear. At this point, gold effectively becomes a second form of experience points as its only use becomes that of gaining bonuses and abilities similar to those gained by increasing in level.
My next posts will cover the implications of all these things and ideas about how tweaking a variable here or there can help create a certain kind of campaign. For example, my next campaign will have the players starting off as the rulers of a noble house. How will the exponentially growing treasure values need to be changed for such a campaign where players may wish to fund construction, hire soldiers, commission research, buy land and a variety of other tasks they might want to do in the periphery of their heroic adventures.
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