D&D 5E Sinister Secret of Saltmarsh - worthless gold?
- Thread starter uzirath
- Start date
billd91
Not your screen monkey (he/him) 🇺🇦🇵🇸🏳️⚧️
No, not really. The treasure expectations have changed between 1e and 5e. The value of treasure given out should go down. It's the descriptions that are problematic. A solid gold apple shouldn't be worth 5 gp unless it's very small and has about 5 gp worth of gold in it. The description of the treasure item should have changed with its value - instead of being solid gold, it should be something else.
I agree that the descriptions are at issue here. As a GM I'd rather give out too much treasure (which is relatively easy to deal with) than have descriptions that are even more absurd than the baseline absurdity of the genre. My players are fine with economic handwaving but will balk at solid gold objects being hardly notable. An apple made from 5 gp would have a diameter of roughly 2/3 of an inch. This might work if the alchemist's process also shrunk the object down (which could make some handwavey sense... gold is more "essential" so it requires more of a baser material to convert).
Another option would be to change the philosopher's stone idea into something different. Perhaps he was converting things to silver or copper or bronze. It doesn't have the same ring to it.
I think I'll boost the values of the objects. I'm running this as part of a GURPS/DFRPG campaign anyway, so the PCs are more like the equivalent of level 5+ D&D characters. I've been upgrading the opposition and treasure accordingly. The solid gold apple leapt out, though, as especially goofy.
MarkB
Legend
Sounds like it was just lazy writing, then. Nothing wrong with de-valuing the treasure in a module to reflect a new edition, but they could at least have changed the descriptions of the items to match.
Salthorae
Imperial Mountain Dew Taster
Well, since we don't need the treasure value to gain XP to level, it doesn't really seem all that silly to decrease their values.
I'm sure it's just an editing/not thinking issue about a "pure gold apple" that is only 5 gp. One of those should be changed. Either it's a pure gold sized apple and VERY much more valuable or its a very small pure gold apple. Like a crab apple or something and it's worth 5 gp.
Celebrim
Legend
What does it break to keep them with their original values? Is gold more valuable in the 5e context than it was in the 1e context?
Salthorae
Imperial Mountain Dew Taster
I didn't say it breaks anything.
Honestly, it doesn't really matter what the value of these things are once you decouple gp and XP.
I'm sure it was an overall value total for a series of encounters that they were trying to hit, and they just divided that total value up among the various items without TOO much thought as to what the value of items should have been "realistically".
Celebrim
Legend
Still seems silly then.
Len
Prodigal Member
It makes sense that it could be made of gilded bronze or something like that, even though it wasn't written that way.
Fanaelialae
Legend
It's just inflation. Think about it. Dwarves have been mining constantly since 1e, flooding the economy with gold and devaluing the market. These prices just reflect that. 
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