Shop Inventories

[Awakened]

Back in the days of 2e, I used to love presenting my players with detailed inventories of shops. The presentation of equipment this way was a surefire route of having some control as to the items at the player's fingertips, and the lists encouraged the purchasing of more varied equipment as well as players would read the names of items and wonder as to their functions.
Now, with a thousand 3.x books, I'm about to start a short Christmas campaign. I'm trying to find a way to manage the inventory of shops without resorting to the common, minimal effort of saying that any item of a town's gp limit or lower can be found within an appropriate shop with little or no exceptions.
What I'm wondering is what everyone does to have a more specific inventory lists for shops. Does anyone still write them out in complete, or do you devise a sort of system for determining whether an item's available at a particular town or not? Thanks a lot for the help.

 

[Grymar]

I don't, mainly because I run an Eberron game based in Sharn, which has hundreds of stores. If they want a mundane item, they can find it. If they want to find a specialty shop where they can build a relationship for unusual items, then I will.

 

[LogicsFate]

I don't have a set inventory.
If a player asks for an item, I ask myself "Would this shop have that item and would it be higher or lower than book value"
No place is the same, just as not every area would sell mining picks. Or maybe it is summer and heavy blankets are on sale.
Then I jot down whatever I tell them in case they come back(continuities sake)

 

[DonTadow]

When my players walk into a shop I ask them to compile me a list of what they want. They submit this list and I put it against a percentage that depends on
1. whether the item is mundane, masterwork, minor magical, major magical or epic magical
2. how big the city is

 

[DM_Jeff]

What I'm wondering is what everyone does to have a more specific inventory lists for shops. Does anyone still write them out in complete, or do you devise a sort of system for determining whether an item's available at a particular town or not? Thanks a lot for the help.

I do a couple of things. One, I actually USE the book my wife and I wrote for AEG called "Toolbox" that has lists of stuff (weapons, general store items, clothing, fruits, and gear) in it you can use to peg down a store.

Also, I use a simple d20 roll to determine if something is in a given store/community. I use this more throughly with magic item "shopping" but use it for mundane services too. Roll d20 and add the city's size modifier (1-8). Asign DC's on a basis of simple/cheap - martial/costly - and exotic/expensive and soon you have a quick reference that's fair and based off the city's size to determine eligibility. The 1-8 die roll can also be modified on a DM's whim if the PC had Profession (merchant) or a good Diplomacy skill.

A double sword laced with silver and made of greensteel should go into the exotic/expensive category. I might assign it a DC22. That would mean a thorp wouldn't even ahve a chance of having one while any good sized city has a chance.

I also use the same rules for length of service:

Player: "A DC22? Crap, I rolled a 9 +5 for the city size, that's 14".
ME: "14 eh"? (22-14 = 8). "Well, I don't have one now but I know a guy...I could get it for you in 8 days/weeks (depending on campaign)".

That make sense?

-DM Jeff

 

[Awakened]

Thanks, that's a very interesting method DM Jeff. I'll have to look into Toolbox, I've paged through it before at a nearby Waldens and found it interesting.

 

[Treebore]

Is Toolbox available in pdf? A book like that would be a lot better if it is easy to print out sections of it. Much like Mother of All Encounter Tables and Mother of All Treasure Tables (mundane only) are much easier to utilize when I can just print certain things I want.