PC's trading in items

[Mystery Man]

I'm also trying to encourage people to stop using charisma as a dump stat without realizing that there are consequences.

Depending on if they're actually in a town that can afford what the have to sell but assuming so...

Gather Information (cha) to find the best merchant for what they have to sell.

Start them off at 40 to 45% of the Market value and depending on their appraise (int), bluff (cha) and diplomacy (cha) skills they can get as high as 55% of the market value.

This is how I do it anyway.

 

[jerichothebard]

I treat gems as cash - but, in the event they are selling goods, I give them a flat 60% baseline; if they really take time or sell to someone in the market for what they've got they can even raise that higher. That's above the 50% I would normally give them, because they have some serious diplomacy monsters and a merchant in their party.

jtb

 

[Anax]

The real reason to treat gems as cash is that, well, gold begins to weigh a whole hell of a lot after a while. Not even a very long while. Having to lose value *every time* you need to buy something or make change is a bit painful.

(Of course, if the adventure is in a society where effective banking is possible, this is less of an issue.)

 

[Voadam]

50 gp. Done and the party moves on to the plot and adventure.

 

[Grand_Director]

I give my players full value for gems and jewelry. Otherwise there would be way too much bookkeeping on my part and it would descend into the “not fun” category.

However, when the gems are found an appraise roll is made. Depending on the result of the roll I will give either the proper value or lower. That is how much they will get for the gems when they are turned in. The idea being that they don’t know to ask for more because they may think something is junk. A spectacular success will increase the value slightly because they have a fine eye and pick up on subtleties that would be overlooked by a lesser appraiser. An appraiser who knows his stuff may not be the most convincing guy in the world…unless he is talking about fine art.

I feel that this method adds value to an oft over looked skill. I also feel that it helps explain why a pricless work of art may be left in a dungeon (It’s garbage, we would get 200 gold for it if we were lucky).

 

[KB9JMQ]

50 % flat rate unless they specifically want to haggle.
If so we do some bluff/diplomacy checks and they get what they get

 

[Teflon Billy]

We'd save that pearl for an Identify component I think

 

[MavrickWeirdo]

To a former DM of mine, it was a question of if they were "selling" (for cash), or "trading" for other merchandice.

So lets say that the party cleric needs to stock up on diamond dust for a Restoration spell. The merchant could give them full value for the pearl.

On the other hand if they want cash, well the merchant needs to make a living.

(Also works for weapons, if they wanted to trade in a light crossbow 35gp, for 2 longswords 15gp each, no problem. If they want cash they get 17gp unless they can haggle.)

 

[Henry]

I've handled it differently from campaign to campaign. In my current campaign, a jeweller or moneylender will exchange it for cash with a 10% comission fee. In other games, I've just offered book value and was done with it. In still others I based it on a diplomacy check. The big thing to keep in mind is to keep art objects and jewelry not too complicated to exchange, because if it is, it may discourage the PCs from using it.

 

[WayneLigon]

I start with a base of 50% and make a Diplomacy roll or Appraise for the seller, then the player makes one for his PC, and I eyeball the comparison. If the merchant fares poorly and the PC does well, it goes up; in case of a really spectacular disparity, they might get full book for it. It goes the other way too, especially if the merchant is crooked.

Past dealings usually affect present dealings: if they've dealt fairly with this armorer, he'll deal fairly with them. If they've made a friend in him, he either lowers prices or does some minor work for free. If they've done him a major service, he'll do them some until there's some kind of equality reached. In both the latter cases, the biggest favor he usually can do for them is to bump their project ahead in the queue.