Magic Items and their resale value

[guindone]

Is anyone else a bit put out by the resale value of magic items in 4th edition?
It seems a bit weird that they are only worth 1/5 of their value when resold. I'm guessing this is for "game balance" or some such but it is far from logical. A magical item doesn't become less useful or worn out from someone else's use therefore it shouldn't depreciate too much. Surely other adventurers should be willing to buy the items at a better rate than 1/5.

Thoughts? Comments? Insults?

Eric.

 

[Blackeagle]

Surely other adventurers should be willing to buy the items at a better rate than 1/5.

Well, that assumes that there are a bunch of other adventurers out there. If heroes like the PCs are relatively rare, then there's not exactly going to be a bustling market for used magic arms and armor.

 

[Byronic]

4.0 is mathematics and balance foremost, and common sense/suspense of disbelief secondary at best.

Why they took this approach is up for debate.

 

[Lanefan]

Well, that assumes that there are a bunch of other adventurers out there. If heroes like the PCs are relatively rare, then there's not exactly going to be a bustling market for used magic arms and armor.

If heroes like the PCs are intended to be rare enough for this to make sense, that assumption causes its own annoying set of knock-on headaches in a long campaign...

At low level, who are the higher-level people the party turns to for help if they need a comrade raised, or to cross a long distance in a hurry?

At mid level, who is the party's competition?

At high level, where do the replacement characters (always needed by any long-term party as players and characters come and go) come from?

To avoid all these problems, one has to assume there are other adventurers out there. Given that, those adventurers are naturally going to be selling gear they don't need, and looking to buy what they do need, and will eventually hear about/come in conact with your PC party. Selling will result...and those transactions won't be at 1/5 value either!

Lanefan

 

[samursus]

I agree about the illogic of the 1/5 selling price. Moreso, I can't even see it for game balance. If the Dm is handing out magic Items as parcels appropriately, THEN the party is SUPPOSED to have that for balance. Its only logical to me that a PC could sell that Magic Item for its FULL VALUE, in order to use that gold to purchase a Magic Item they actually WANT. Since the magic item values are supposed to be balanced, the PC COULDN'T upset the balance by selling a Magic Item to get another...

If anyone can explain to me why this isn't so..please do.

 

[Blackeagle]

At low level, who are the higher-level people the party turns to for help if they need a comrade raised, or to cross a long distance in a hurry?

In previous editions, maybe. 4e has rituals for that sort of thing, so raising the dead no longer requires a high level cleric who could probably overcome any challenge suitable for low level characters by himself.

At mid level, who is the party's competition?

Who says they have competition?

At high level, where do the replacement characters (always needed by any long-term party as players and characters come and go) come from?

You don't really need enough new characters during most campaigns to create an efficient magic item market.

To avoid all these problems, one has to assume there are other adventurers out there. Given that, those adventurers are naturally going to be selling gear they don't need, and looking to buy what they do need, and will eventually hear about/come in conact with your PC party. Selling will result...and those transactions won't be at 1/5 value either!

Depends how big your transaction costs are (finding someone who wants to buy what you've got, etc.) Heck, given the ROI of a day of adventuring in most campaigns, you'd loose money if you have to spend even one day finding a buyer for your old magic sword. Your old magic items are probably at least 5 levels old, so one treasure parcel is worth more than the five level old magic item even if you could sell it at full price. One treasure parcel per day is way below average for adventurers, so if it's going to take a day to find someone who will buy it, you're loosing money trying to sell the sword.

Now, a world where adventures are plentiful is a perfectly valid one. Hell, Ptolus is my favorite campaign setting and there adventurers are practically tripping over each other. However, it's far from the only way to play. To me, at least, a points of light setting implies that heroes are few and far between, otherwise there would be a lot more light. This is probably part of why, in addition to game balance, the resale value of magic items was set at 1/5.

IIRC, at one point the designers didn't want to allow the buying and selling of magic items at all (hence the ease of enchanting and disenchanting items).

 

[Blackeagle]

Its only logical to me that a PC could sell that Magic Item for its FULL VALUE, in order to use that gold to purchase a Magic Item they actually WANT. Since the magic item values are supposed to be balanced, the PC COULDN'T upset the balance by selling a Magic Item to get another...

If anyone can explain to me why this isn't so..please do.

If you can select your own magic items without loosing any value from reselling the stuff the DM gave you, you can end up with a much more powerful result, even if the items are individually balanced. For instance, if you've got the power that gives your enemies vulnerability to cold, in your hands a weapon that does cold damage is much more powerful than any other weapon of the same level. That's a simple one, but if the players are allowed to pick and choose all their magic items it becomes possible to take advantage of all sorts of synergies between items, powers, and other items.

 

[nittanytbone]

I think the figure is intentionally lowballed in the core rules to allow for "creep" later on. In 3.5 there are quite a few ways to sell stuff/convert items into higher valued stuff for a higher than 1/2 price -- feats, fast-talking the GM, etc.

With the new 1/5 system, a GM could give a concession -- DOUBLE sale value, even! -- and things will still probably be controllable and "in hand." 4E is designed to be easy to DM. One thing that makes it easier to DM is to have the core rules be a wee bit on the "overly punishing" side so that the DM can hand out the occasional goody without breaking anything.

 

[Starfox]

For me, this is a problem of style. With a 20% resell rate, PCs basically have no control over their magic items. On the other hand, the DMG actually recommends DMs to have players make wish lists, and to make sure every item found is one the players want.

A bit too much of a DM fiat for my taste.

 

[samursus]

Like Starfox said.

Blackeagle: OK, what you say makes sense to a certain degree. I haven't played enough (who has?) to be able to gauge how unbalancing the right combination of magic items would be... and I guess I can even accept that old/useless Magic Items sell values are included in the overall game mechanic for treasure, so that increasing them 5-fold might upset balance. Especially at high levels when they can sell for hundreds of thousands of GP's.

I know in 3.5, the Magic Items were a serious issue, so I will try it with the RAW for now. Thanks for the input.