Mules! -- Huh! -- What are they good for?

[Gez]

The encumberance rules are forgiving enough to make mules useless, especially once bags of holding (or rather, handy haversacks) are available.

And given the very abstract nature of the hit point system and the fact that a puny but mid-level elf warlock can survive crushing blows that an awakened magebred warhorse can't (true story, it involved ogres), well, there you go.


Also, to the Wal-Magic accusation some are doing, I assume that you also don't have any spellcaster willing to create a rather cheap MI (as far as MI go) in reward for a service (free adventure hook, DMs!). And that you either forbid spellcasting PCs to take item creation feats, or held the campaign in a perpetual time race to prevent them from using it. Maybe with ninja attacks in the middle in the night in the mage's sanctum so as to ruin the creation attempt, too.

 

[Thunderfoot]

<SNIP>
1) Mage of the Arcane Order, Also called a "guildmage" it's a prestige class. These mages belong to a mage guild.
2) Red Wizards are wizards that run a country. It's another prestige class by the way.
3) Churches. How many churches are led by 1st level clerics in your world?

I don't have those PrCs, and I don't run Frogotten Realms. As for Churches, specific magi is created for the church, yes, but it isn't then turned around a sold.
*Carny Voice* Step right up, step right up, on wave of this wand will cure all that alis you, just submit a sizeable donation and all your worries are gone. *Carny Voice* The sizeable donation part might be a problem for the average person, so if a high income person commisions something, it can be made to order, but then the characters need to collect the components to create it. - SIDETREK, that I go for, walking into a shop where there is no threat of violence, no puzzles and no challenge and saying, "I need three +1 Plate Suits to go", just rubs me the wrong way.

 

[Desdichado]

Am I supposed to say "Absolutely nuthin'; say it again!" now?

 

[Thunderfoot]

So, are you saying nobody makes magic items? People make magic items for themselves to adventure, then the die. Does the magic items in your campaign go poof? Clearly not. And if the PC's can sell magic items, then there is a market for them, which means you can buy magic items? Or is your campaign so lame they can only sell magic items?

And when they adventure, they find them, not buy them.

Question, do you hunt?

Yes, but what does that have to do with travelling through wilderness. Hunting expeditions usually are limited in time and have a place of return for re-supply. When treking into the unknown with no known resupply posts and no known "safe harbors" it makes sence to prepare for anything. As hard as is it for modern folks to understand this, I point to the Arctic, Antarctic and mountian expeditions of the 19th and early 20th c.; these folks took boatloads of crap (sometimes literally boatloads) because they didn't know where theor next meal was coming from. Of course this is hyperbole, but then so are most of the examples being offered in defence, I am sure the truth lies in the middle somewhere.

I've made an enchanter who made money by adventuring and enchanting, what's so dumb about that?

Nothing, and if it works you, that's cool. But you are also constantly adventuring, my point is that the typical "marketing wizard" is pictured as the dottering old fool that has retired and decided that making items is perfereable to using them. *shudder*

Because there are alot of threats. Unless monsters are very rare in your campaign and are badly inbred there is a breeding population, at least for the more normal ones. There are a decent amount of high level characters around.

I can see where you are going with this, however, I don't have the typical hamlet seperated by miles of space in the middle of nowhere with the big flashing neon sign that says, "Monsters, eat here!" I run my world a little closer to 'real' in that when people build, they do so in groups, large ones, for protection. Cities are actually a central metropolis surrounded by tens of farming communities within spitting distance of each other. (Medieval Europe) Sure the odd person build away from everyone elese, and when the monster eat them there is noone left to scream. That's where those ruins come from in the middle of nowhere.

But findable. Other items enchanted by characters like mine, or other adventurers in the past.

Findable, yes, buyable, no.

Or police work (i.e. city guards), or bandit suppression, or war or game management or hunting. What no XP's for these activities in your campaign?

But the amounts therein are insufficient to keep up with the Jones, per se. You mention hunting, okay, lets say a hunter (using magic) captures enough game to garner 3 levels, the XP to level ratio soon peters out and the hunter is no longer gaining XP for hunting, eventually finding a platuea. This was one thing about the city tables in the DMG I was thouroughly digusted by, in order to have a magic item of x level, an appropriate level of NPC support should be there as well (that makes sense) but in order to get those levels, the amount of 'leveled' characters starts to exceed the probable - I like the 0-level commoners from days gone-by, it made more sense.


BTW, at least you are being civil about this, I appreciate it, if nothing else we can come to a point to agree to disagree. I like spirited debate, however some people are not so lucky. Thanks.

 

[Mark CMG]

Am I supposed to say "Absolutely nuthin'; say it again!" now?

That or "cover" will also be accepted.

 

[kigmatzomat]

And when they adventure, they find them, not buy them.

I would find the lack of a magic item market to be far more jarring to my sense of disbelief than the existence of magic items themselves.

If there are things and people, there is a market for the things. it may not be a big market and it might be an expensive market but it exists as long as the sophonts have human-type motivations. Note that I mean "market" to mean "mechanism for supplying materials" rather than "a location where wares are bought and sold." I run a vanilla, magic-items-by-the-DMG game and I don't have Wal-Mage stores. I do, however, have various agents who will put you in touch with someone who is trying to sell the thing you want or is capable of making the thing you want, with the odds skewed towards "make" over "buy."

Even when my party has the weight of the King thrown behind them to help them acquire what they need, they still spend weeks and months awaiting the items' completion. Sometimes they have to quest to find the rare magical components for their specialty items, furthering the game.

Nothing, and if it works you, that's cool. But you are also constantly adventuring, my point is that the typical "marketing wizard" is pictured as the dottering old fool that has retired and decided that making items is perfereable to using them. *shudder*

I'm curious where this stereotype comes from. The only "doddering mages" I know from pop literature is Gandalf, Fizban, Miracle Max and Dumbeldorf. None of which are really fools, though they occasionally cultivate that image.


IMO the high level crafter wizard is the one who knows he's soon to die (at least, likely to die before having a chance to get that "extended life" epic feat) and is burning his XPs to leave a legacy (and possibly buy his way into heaven). The mid-level crafters are either fulfilling obligations to their liege/guild (in line with medieval european tradition) and the low-level crafters have simply decided that the occasional scroll or potion provides enough cash to justify the effort (1 XP = 12.5gp) or brings a much safer (and therefore boring and uninteresting) lifestyle.

Let's face it, a 1st level character will earn about 75XP from a CR1 encounter which translates into 937gp worth of magic item crafting profit. If they have that CR1 encounter once a year (say going to/from a fair or just when the bull escapes from the pasture), they can plan on that 937gp as their annual income. Compare that to Profession, where you earn your skill check x 5sp /week and you have the equivalent of a Profession skill total of 26 (+10 on the die). Why would any non-adrenaline junkie NOT become an item-making mage if they had the choice?

Clerics should be motivated at various times to buckle down and craft items to ensure the survival or spread of the faith. Plus, that 937gp/year is an excellent way to fund the construction of a church.

You mention hunting, okay, lets say a hunter (using magic) captures enough game to garner 3 levels, the XP to level ratio soon peters out and the hunter is no longer gaining XP for hunting, eventually finding a platuea. This was one thing about the city tables in the DMG I was thouroughly digusted by, in order to have a magic item of x level, an appropriate level of NPC support should be there as well (that makes sense) but in order to get those levels, the amount of 'leveled' characters starts to exceed the probable - I like the 0-level commoners from days gone-by, it made more sense.

Plateauing is a problem for those who don't continue to venture farther afield and go for more dangerous game. However, that plateau will be based on the types of game each hunter goes for, e.g. rabbit hunters rarely get past 2nd, wolf hunters can get to 6th, boar hunters make it to 10th and bear hunters to 12th. Same goes for magical craftsmen; are they content to be at the bottom of the magical strata (which is far, far above the peasants or even most craftsmen) or do they swim in the same waters as ambitious nobles, clerics working to further God's Plan, and merchant princes?

I do agree that the population distribution is a bit weird but I was one of the people who hated 0 level commoners. Save 1st level for adolescents now able to do an adult's work and give their parents another level or three of something that gives them virtually no additional combat ability but significantly more skill points to reflect their experience. Leveled peasant and craftsman are fine if you have age penalties rob them of any significant combat ability.

 

[Raven Crowking]

I would much, much rather play in a game where mules were normally used for supply trains than a game with many Handy Haversacks.

RC

 

[Roger]

I see lots of references to mules. Where are the characters getting these handy items? If the DM is giving them out, that's his own fault.

If the characters are buying them, well, let's just say that Wal-Mule doesn't exist in my world.

NPCs aren't going to just sit around all day making mules.

 

[Aeolius]

I see lots of references to mules. Where are the characters getting these handy items? If the DM is giving them out, that's his own fault. If the characters are buying them, well, let's just say that Wal-Mule doesn't exist in my world. NPCs aren't going to just sit around all day making mules.

Oh great... a mules lawyer

 

[Gez]

This is certainly something to mule over.