D&D 5E Market price for a spell book?

[FireHammer]

Hi guys, long time lurker, first time writer, and so on.

The wizard in the group I'm DMing took the spell book from the body of an enemy wizard,
copied the spells he needed and now would like to sell it.

They are in the world's biggest commercial city so let's assume finding a buyer should not be a problem.

What would be a good formula to compute the market price of a spell book? Is it in the manuals somewhere?

Thanks!

 

[Inchoroi]

Hi guys, long time lurker, first time writer, and so on.

The wizard in the group I'm DMing took the spell book from the body of an enemy wizard,
copied the spells he needed and now would like to sell it.

They are in the world's biggest commercial city so let's assume finding a buyer should not be a problem.

What would be a good formula to compute the market price of a spell book? Is it in the manuals somewhere?

Thanks!

I don't have a slightest idea; I let the group use things like this for bargaining chips rather than straight up Gold.

 

[machineelf]

50 gold, I believe.

Market price for resell is generally half the price of an item's normal market cost, and the cost of a spellbook is 100 gp.

Now, if you are ruling that the book still has spells in it that are useful for other wizards, maybe the price would go up. I guess that's up to the DM. I would probably rule it like it's a magic item, and use the rules for finding a buyer of a magic item in the DM guide.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Hi guys, long time lurker, first time writer, and so on.

The wizard in the group I'm DMing took the spell book from the body of an enemy wizard,
copied the spells he needed and now would like to sell it.

They are in the world's biggest commercial city so let's assume finding a buyer should not be a problem.

What would be a good formula to compute the market price of a spell book? Is it in the manuals somewhere?

Thanks!

That is an interesting question with lots of ramifications. If the value is high, the wizard has incentive to make lots of money by scribing spells and selling the books. If the value is low, the wizard can buy spellbooks for cheap.

If this were my campaign I'd say, "It's worth lots, but is hard to sell because it's worth something only to certain people--kind of like a briefcase full of industrial secrets." If there are any NPC wizards/fighters/rogues who would buy it, I'd introduce them as actual NPCs and have them make an offer based on how much money they have/how badly they want the book. A book with Witch Bolt and Jump in it isn't going to go for much (100 gp); a book with Wish and Simulacrum would go for more (5000 gp); a book with lost spells like Absorb Elements (from the Elemental Evil Adventurer's Handbook) or Bloody Tentacles (from Frog God's Book of Lost Spells--very weird and interesting spell) would probably go for even more (10,000 gp), because it's rarer and easier to use.

In short, I have no formula, I'd wing it. But I'd also set it up so you probably can't sell multiple books in the same market, due to market saturation.

 

[77IM]

I value scrolls at (spell level x spell level x 50) gp. That undervalues high-level scrolls according to the pricing guidelines, but I am not sure I care, as I'd rather have an easy-to-remember formula than stick to the arbitrary pricing guidelines.

So I'd value a spellbook at the same rate. Spells in a book are less useful than scrolls because you can't cast them -- but for the purpose people are buying the spellbook they are more useful than scrolls because they don't vanish after writing, giving the book tremendous resale value. So it's a wash and I'd price it like a bunch of scrolls.

Adding up all those spell levels can be a pain, so a quick-and-dirty approximation is to just look at the highest level of spells and do (spell level x spell level x spell level x 100) gp. So a book with 3rd-level spells in it is worth 2,700 gp, and a book with 9th-level spells is 72,900 gp. This assumes that the book also contains about 4 spells per level at lower levels; if the spell book is sparse, cut the value in half or so.

Of course, I'd use the Selling a Magic Item rules in the DMG to offload the book. I'm of the opinion that trade in magic items should be allowed, but only as a tricky and adventure-prone process.

EDIT: Handy table of pre-calculated values.
Max Spell Level : Spellbook Price
1st : 50 gp per spell (just add them up, if it's only 1st-level spells)
2nd : 800 gp (total; don't count the spells at levels higher than 1st)
3rd : 2,700 gp
4th : 6,400 gp
5th : 12,500 gp
6th : 21,600 gp
7th : 34,300 gp
8th : 51,200 gp
9th : 72,900 gp

 

[Sunseeker]

77IM has a good point. A book of spells is less useful to everyone, but potentially more useful to specific caster-types.

Here's the bigger question: what is your player selling that any two-bit wizard can't get on their own from the local library? What's special about the PC's extra spellbook that makes it valuable? I'm not sure what sort of setting you're playing in because if it's high-magic, a book full of mid-tier adventurer spells is going to be common and have little value. A low-magic setting may raise the value, but the number of buyers is going to be painfully low. Are there restrictions on the availability of magic? What's to stop your player from being arrested for selling magic without a license?

77IM's post also has a major flaw: If a blank spellbook costs 100gp and a book with a variety of up-to 3rd-level spells is worth 2700gp, what's to stop the player from buying books and reselling them over and over again for major money? Especially if you're in a major city where there are potentially lots of buyers? It seems like copying the spells should have some kind of cost, much like making a ritual version of a spell does.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

77IM's post also has a major flaw: If a blank spellbook costs 100gp and a book with a variety of up-to 3rd-level spells is worth 2700gp, what's to stop the player from buying books and reselling them over and over again for major money? Especially if you're in a major city where there are potentially lots of buyers? It seems like copying the spells should have some kind of cost, much like making a ritual version of a spell does.

Hmmm. Apparently Shidaku has me on Ignore.

 

[steeldragons]

Based on the guidelines for spellcasting services which cite 10-50gp as a range for a first level spell, I would go with:

100gp for the empty spellbook + 30gp per spell level contained therein.

So if there are 3 1st level, 3 2nd level and 2 3rd level spells in it, that would be 3 + 6 + 6 = 15 spell levels worth of magic.

15 x 30 = 450
450 + 100 = 550.

They should not take/get less than 550gp total for the book...and other spellcasting NPCs in the game world are going to know that.

If you run "lower/rarer magic" world, use the 50gp per spell level. If magic is ubiquitous (or just cuz it makes the math easier), use the 10gp/level.

If you want to finely grain it and say that magic becomes more rare as it increases in level (as I personally enjoy), then make it:
10gp per spell level X spell level.

That is, a 1st level spell will be 10gp. Big woo. A 2nd level spell will be 20gp X 2 = 40gp ...just for 1 2nd level spell. A 3rd level spell would be worth, just on a scroll by itself, 30gp X 3 = 90gp ...and so on. Obviously, depending on the power level of the spells in the book, this could greatly enhance or diminish the overall cost, versus a single set rate per spell level.

In which case, our hypothetical book above with 3 1st, 3 2nd and 2 3rd would fetch a solid [10 x 3] 30 + [40 x 3] 120 + [90 x 2] 180 = 330 worth of spells/magic + 100 (book cost) or 430 total. [That seems low to me, so I'd probably be inclined to do 10gp @ 1st, (30gp x2) x2 @ 2nd, (50gp x3) x3 @ 3rd, etc... or something like that.]

Of course, then there is the consideration that a spellbook like that, with multiple 1-3rd level spells, could conceivably keep a mage busy for a long time (if not their entire NPC career/lifetime) and/or would supply an apprentice with spells from XP levels 1-5 just in that single volume. In which case the value goes up exponentially, even if the purchasing mage already has a spell or two in there [not that the character would be thinking in such metagame terms, obviously, but the value "in-world" would surely be recognized].

So, as a PC, I would start at at least double the calculation...and let the NPC purchaser haggle me down to no less than what the calculation actually is.

As the DM, I would explain all of this to the player. Give them the calculation you decide to use. Let them tally it up, search out a buyer, and try to get what they want for it.

 

[77IM]

77IM's post also has a major flaw: If a blank spellbook costs 100gp and a book with a variety of up-to 3rd-level spells is worth 2700gp, what's to stop the player from buying books and reselling them over and over again for major money? Especially if you're in a major city where there are potentially lots of buyers? It seems like copying the spells should have some kind of cost, much like making a ritual version of a spell does.

Copying spells DOES have a cost -- 200 gp per spell level, or half that for spells of your arcane tradition's school.

But you are right, that is a linear cost, and my guideline is exponential, so for spells of level 4+, transcribing them becomes super profitable.

One solution is to make the spell book price linear as well. But this seems unsatisfying, since 9th-level spells are some hot , and from a labor market perspective, the few people who can produce them probably have better things to do with their time and the few people who might want to buy them can probably afford to pay a king's ransom to make it worth their while.

Instead I might suggest that the time required to find a buyer is also exponential with the level of the spell. So yeah, you can crank out a book of 5th-level spells that is worth a pretty penny, but it takes so long to sell it that the profit evens out to a reasonable level.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Copying spells DOES have a cost -- 200 gp per spell level, or half that for spells of your arcane tradition's school.

I think you mean "50 gp per spell level, or half..." But that is only the cost the first time you copy (learn) it. Per PHB 114, creating a backup spellbook of spells you already know is 10 gp per level. Definitely not 200 gp, unless your DM has changed it.