D&D 5E No Magic Shops!

[Guest 6801328]

Hah! You know that isn't true. I've never said I don't expect the players not to know about troll fire vulnerability. I've said repeatedly that I expect them to roleplay properly when their PCs don't know.

Which would involve the players acting surprised, right?

;-)

 

[MechaPilot]

Do you expect them to tell you what your NPCs should say? Do you expect them to create your encounters for you? D&D is about the DMs creating within the framework provided. Expecting them to create prices(which 3e showed they do a piss poor job at anyway) for you seems lazy to me. It's not hard to just come up with a number that seems reasonable to you. It takes like 2 seconds, literally.

That's all treasure has ever been. You find it, and then spend it on some money sink or other. Magic items, castle building, training costs and every other cost is nothing but a way to spend(money sink) the coin the party finds.

Money sink implies that money is simply being bled away at no benefit. Magic items, retainers and strongholds are very real benefits to characters. And, if you're going to let characters purchase those benefits it wouldn't hurt to have good pricing for them based on how much benefit is provided by what's being bought.

 

[Guest 6801328]

Right there. That's the part that proves you don't understand what I mean by a magic item being special. It's not just that it does +1d6 to plant creatures (and also to elves and fey). It's that the item has character. The bonus given by the item is evocative of the weapon, its history and its place in the game world. Combine that with a benefit that doesn't just fade into the mathematical background noise of bonuses listed on your character sheet, and you have what makes a magic item special to me.

So...what are you asking for? It sounds like you're either:
a) Asking for much longer lists of magic items
b) Asking for rules to generate random/unique/interesting magic items
c) Neither, and merely commenting on one aspect of 'good' DMing

I can't fathom what any of this has to do with magic shops or buying magic items or price lists, though.

 

[MechaPilot]

I can't fathom what any of this has to do with magic shops or buying magic items or price lists, though.

It was said earlier in the thread that magic item shops violate the "magic items are special" premise of 5e because making them available and less rare diminishes their specialness. My response to that was that the specialness of a magic item is not a matter of rarity, rather of the item having character.

So...what are you asking for? It sounds like you're either:
a) Asking for much longer lists of magic items
b) Asking for rules to generate random/unique/interesting magic items
c) Neither, and merely commenting on one aspect of 'good' DMing

A little bit of all three.

For point a, longer magic item lists, I think it's definitely appropriate for the published adventures (which generally assume the FR setting, at a certain time and and locale, and with a certain history) to give character to all the magic items handed out in them.

For point b, heck yes. I'd have loved to see that in XGtE; certainly more so than SCAG reprints.

For point c, also yes. I try to put a lot of work into giving character to magic items handed out at my table, and modifying the items given in published adventures to have actual character.

 

[Maxperson]

[MENTION=12731]CapnZapp[/MENTION]
I agree with a lot of that, but there are a few things that aren't correct.

# all weapons are assumed to be equally desirable; meaning that - just like in d20 - a +1 dagger and a +1 greataxe is costed the same: 1000 gp. This simply isn't true. Any martial character with Greatweapon Master and Greatweapon Fighting Style is dreaming about a magical greatsword, and will be prepared to pay a fortune to have one, and not to have to use, say, a Longsword or Maul.

This I agree with.

# all armors are assumed to be equally desirable; which is patently absurd. A +3 ring mail costs 24000 gp despite being strictly worse than a regular full plate for 1500 gp!

Magic armor sizes to fit, but regular plate mail does not. that's one advantage that magic armor has over non-magic armor. A 6 strength PC can use +3 ring mail, but cannot use the plate mail. The ring mail weighs 25 pounds less and sometimes that can mean all the difference. +3 ring mail is not strictly worse than regular full plate.

# the magical plus of weapons follow the exact same pricing formula as in 3E, except that +3 weapons are priced as if they were +4 items. That is, the price is the bonus squared times a thousand. This is simply not valid anylonger in 5E, since there is only one level of damage resistance. ALL magic weapons bypass resistance, and so ALL magic weapons need a hefty surcharge. The difference between a +2 sword and a +3 sword might have been significant once (remember 3E featured different schemes for damage resistance in 3.0 and 3.5) but is no longer so. Just "plus one" to your hit is of course nice, but hardly vital, especially in the face of 5E's much lower monster AC over the board. And "plus one" damage is almost inconsequential.

# So a real 5E take of magic weapons might want to set a base price of 10000 gp for ANY weapon that registers as magical (that is, bypasses magic resistance). THEN you can have +1000, +4000 and +9000 for +1, +2 and +3 enchantments, respectively.

In the end, such a scheme would indicate that a +3 weapon is roughly twice as desirable as a +1 weapon, and not sixteen times as Sane would have you believe! But more importantly, that no magic weapon is less desirable than ordinary full plate, or even close to it.

Pricing is not just based on utility, though. It's also based on demand, and +3 items are a lot rarer than +2 items. That rarity makes a +3 weapon command a much higher value than a +2 weapon.

# In a similar vein, magic armor pricing needs to focus on the actual end-result Armor Class you achieve.

Magical +1 leather armor needs to cost... 45 gp, since that's all the utility you'll get out of it. (Unless we add rules for combining enhancements onto items and say you need a magical item as base). Magical +3 ring mail needs to cost... 200 gp or slightly more (since you do get no Strength requirement).

As above, rarity also plays into the pricing. Also, if you don't have a magic weapon, that armor may be the only way you have to get through resistance. Improvising weapons/attacks is a thing, and you may be shoulder bashing the creature. Lastly, you are not looking at this from an in game perspective where people(NPCs) have preferences. Some people prefer leather over studded leather or chain, so +1 leather becomes much more valuable to them and they will drive up prices. Supply and demand again.

I could go on, but you get the point. Achieving a true utility based pricing mechanism and fine-tuning it to the particular sensibilities of 5th edition is hard, and nobody but WotC has the time and know-how to pull it off.

In the meanwhile I'm trying to get by using a demand-driven economy, i.e. the idea is to set prices high and have them gradually lower until a player snaps up the item. In theory this makes for "right" prices.

In practice, however, this ain't a video game where a player might return to town and visit the shoppes every hour and end up with a handful of visits per session. In a pen and paper game we're seeing perhaps one visit every other level if that.

So it's hard, but it's all I have, barring official support.

Your problem is that official support is going to be just as bad. 3e pricing was horrendous. Your analysis shows that you will be better off pricing things on your own anyway.

 

[Maxperson]

But doesn't that go directly against 5e RAW, which says magic items cannot be bought or sold at all? This is the fundamental issue here; not that full-on magic shops can or can't exist but that the RAW don't agree with what would logically happen in the game world, in which the items would be sold or bartered or put up for auction.

No, it doesn't go against 5e RAW at all. 5e RAW is according to page 135 of the DMG, that the rarer magic items are not for sale unless the DM decides otherwise. That makes the option to sell them is a part of that RAW. A campaign with magic mart, a campaign with rare auction sales, and a campaign with no rare item sales at all are all 5e RAW.

As I've said many times, there's a big difference between a "magic mart" where you can buy whatever you want (which isn't necessary) and the concept of trading or buying/selling random unwanted items between adventurers and other wealthy people or groups (which is necessary, as it reflects what would likely happen in most game worlds).

Lanefan

I agree

 

[Guest 6801328]

It was said earlier in the thread that magic item shops violate the "magic items are special" premise of 5e because making them available and less rare diminishes their specialness. My response to that was that the specialness of a magic item is not a matter of rarity, rather of the item having character.

Ah.

I can't speak for others, but for myself what I meant was that finding magic items serendipitously is special/exciting, inversely proportional to their frequency. I still find a +1 weapon in 5e pretty darned exciting because it's a huge boost statistically.

Is it as narratively interesting as something with funky, situational powers? No. But it's still a big moment when a character gets their first +1 weapon because magic items are so rare (relative to previous editions I've played).

Being able to simply buy weapons, not just +1 weapons but really anything in the DMG I want, would definitely reduce the excitement of "loot". It's a mechanic I associate with video games.

A little bit of all three.

For point a, longer magic item lists, I think it's definitely appropriate for the published adventures (which generally assume the FR setting, at a certain time and and locale, and with a certain history) to give character to all the magic items handed out in them.

For point b, heck yes. I'd have loved to see that in XGtE; certainly more so than SCAG reprints.

For point c, also yes. I try to put a lot of work into giving character to magic items handed out at my table, and modifying the items given in published adventures to have actual character.

I do agree with all of the above. Mostly b.

Personally I was disappointed how closely the 5e magic item list adhered to the original AD&D DMG (of which I have fond memories of staying up half the night during 8th grade reading through the magic items).

I also think it's a totally separate issue from magic shops and price lists.

 

[Guest 6801328]

# all weapons are assumed to be equally desirable; meaning that - just like in d20 - a +1 dagger and a +1 greataxe is costed the same: 1000 gp. This simply isn't true. Any martial character with Greatweapon Master and Greatweapon Fighting Style is dreaming about a magical greatsword, and will be prepared to pay a fortune to have one, and not to have to use, say, a Longsword or Maul.

That's actually a great reason to not have magic shops or other forms of "player driven magic item selection". Controlling which magic items are available is a powerful tool DMs have to alleviate powergaming.

 

[Xetheral]

And, as far as utility goes, a +1 weapon, in a bounded accuracy system, is virtually priceless.

Quibble: bounded accuracy means a +1 bonus must be rare, but the utility of a +1 bonus is not increased as a result of bounded accuracy. Mathematically the bonus still represents exactly the same 5 percentage-point increase in the chance of a successful roll that had (and has) an uncertain outcome.

That's all treasure has ever been. You find it, and then spend it on some money sink or other. Magic items, castle building, training costs and every other cost is nothing but a way to spend(money sink) the coin the party finds.

I disagree entirely. Because in a TTRPG the DM has direct control over how much currency is introduced, there is no inherent need for money sinks to control the amount of currency in play. Money sinks are only really necessary in computer games where the developers may not have direct control over how much time the players put into generating currency, and thus require a (non-linear) money sink to control the money supply. Also, the flexibility provided by having a DM in TTRPGs means money doesn't need to just flow uselessly into money sinks, but can instead be used as a valuable resource for overcoming obstacles.

I'm frankly shocked that you consider money sinks a common feature of TTRPG play. If you find yourself needing to rely on them, why not just give the characters less currency in the first place?

 

[Maxperson]

I disagree entirely. Because in a TTRPG the DM has direct control over how much currency is introduced, there is no inherent need for money sinks to control the amount of currency in play. Money sinks are only really necessary in computer games where the developers may not have direct control over how much time the players put into generating currency, and thus require a (non-linear) money sink to control the money supply. Also, the flexibility provided by having a DM in TTRPGs means money doesn't need to just flow uselessly into money sinks, but can instead be used as a valuable resource for overcoming obstacles.

If you hand out money in D&D according to the rules, the PCs end up with a huge surplus and money sinks are necessary. If you house rule the game and provide less money, then they aren't necessary.

I'm frankly shocked that you consider money sinks a common feature of TTRPG play. If you find yourself needing to rely on them, why not just give the characters less currency in the first place?

It's never really been an issue in my games. The players find all kinds of ways to spend the money of their PCs. One decided to build and fund orphanages in a major city for example.