The Magic-Walmart myth

[Raven Crowking]

So if one just abstracted your magical artisans, and said "Okay, in this big city, you can find any vendor who doesn't manufacture wonderous items given a week," wouldn't that be the same thing?

I assume you mean that, if you abstracted my system and said "Okay, in this big city, you can find any vendor capable of manufacturing any wondrous item you want given a week" rather than "doesn't". If that was the case, yes, that would be MagicMarty.

However, that is not the case, IMC at least.

So, wouldn't it be accurate to say that for you, MagicMarts are just when people don't pay attention to the little details of shopping for magic items that can make them memorable? Whenever buying magic is as easy as buying rations, it becomes a MagicMart?

I don't think you have to go so far as to make it as easy as shopping for food before you've hit MagicMart status.

I think that what I'd say is that MagicMarts are any place in which a PC can go to obtain any (or nearly any) magic item for the list price (or near list price) in the DMG.

 

[Rothe]

Whenever someone talks about a preference for, or a setting is, low magic, they always comment, "there are no Magic-Walmarts" (or Magimarts, etc.). This kind of statement makes no sense.

The setting suggested in the core rules has no "Magic-Walmarts". Greyhawk has no Magic-Walmarts. I'm not real familiar with Eberron or Forgotten Realms, but I don't think they have Magic-Walmart-style stores either.

The only times I've ever heard of anything like a Magic-Walmart in a D&D campaign, it was in a 1984 Dragon magazine, and when I played one game session with a new DM around 1991. Both of those were aberrations from the norm.

So, saying your preference/setting is low magic "with no Magic-Walmarts" is like saying your preference/setting is low power -- no god killing PCs. 99% of everyone's preference and setting qualifies as low magic if the definition is "no Magic-Walmarts."

Is "high magic" defined by the existence of Magic-Walmarts? If so, there are very, very few high magic settings. Other than the two strange situations I mention above, I've never seen or heard of any.

So why does this phrase and comparison exist as a measuring stick? If a DM was trying to entice me to his game by saying it was low magic because there are no Magic-Walmarts, I'd have laugh. "So, it's just like Forgotten Realms, then?"

Quasqueton

lol I think the Walmart idea is more just the idea of handwaving how you can come about things, it follows this "old schoolism"

"13) Screw realism, screw ecology, screw explanations, screw economies, screw physics. The explanation is out there for why an ogre is wandering the city without molesting anyone until he sees the party. The explanation isn't what the game's about. Killing an ogre in a cool city brawl is what the game's about. If they ask why, tell them to figure it out. They may try. Their line of inquiriy will give you good ideas."

(emphasis added)

Magic items have to come from somewhere and there is no reason to think for the right price, whatever that is, they couldn't be bought. IMC, which is low magic in even sepll power, magic items are strategic resources so you need to have both a lot of cash, and be in with the right person. The end effect is it's a lot cheaper to adventure for them and custom orders are near impossible, but the stuff everyone wants, (heal potions) is available. End effect, your in good with the King here is a list of what he's willing to part with and for what price. Afterall he needs cash to pay for the troops.

 

[Storyteller01]

It might stem from the villages and cities effectively being the 'magimart'. Per the rules, a given collective will have an item under a given amount based on population. Your DM can say otherwise, but it's declared a reasonable expectation.

At this point, unless you're a heavy roleplayer, a city is a place to go and blow all your cash. It always seems to have everything. Much like Wal-Mart

 

[werk]

Are these real DMs or hypothetical DMs, like those Pun-Pun characters that everyone complains about but no one ever actually sees in a game?

Quasqueton

Real DMs, I've had three since 3.0 almost came out.

"Just pick 2 items from the DMG between $$ and $$$, that's what you find."

 

[AllisterH]

I kind of handwave AND keep it somewhat realistice in the selling and buying of magic items.

Basically, IMC, it takes twice the time it takes to make an item to either sell it or buy it.

That seems to get the best of both worlds....

 

[chriton227]

I think it's funny that people are saying that being able to walk into a store and buy whatever magic item you want is like shopping at a Walmart. IMX, whenever I go into a Walmart looking for something in particular, it is nowhere to be found, but I do find lots of other things to spend my money on.

IMC, minor items relative to the size of the community (say less than 1% of the max item value in a community) are generally available off the shelf. Anything more expensive than that I allow a Gather Info check (DC based on the value of the item relative to the local max) to find someone who has it for sale (extraordinary successes may even find it at a discount from someone who needs the cash *now*), otherwise they can commission the item (if there is a caster of the appropriate level in town).

 

[I'm A Banana]

At this point, unless you're a heavy roleplayer, a city is a place to go and blow all your cash. It always seems to have everything. Much like Wal-Mart

I dunno, I've always had it assumed that you're visiting curio shops, antique shops, the homes of previous adventurers, wizard schools, temples of magic gods, dwarven forgers, etc. in this, just as I'd assume if you popped into town and picked up a longsword you didn't just go to the local Longswords R Us.

Part of the inherent "medievalism" for me has always been this proliferation of specialists, but it's kind of boring to RP through. Usually I say "assume you get what the rules let you get, and if you want to try for something more, you might be able to if you roll well enough...but it's a risk."

It's not really worth going over in detail, but if the PC's find that the temple that they bought potions of Enlargement at has gone out of business because a corrupt landowner is buying up portions of the city to build "adventurer's houses" just for those rich and powerful members of society (to rip a plot from the '80's), that turns into a hook....if I want it to.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Part of the inherent "medievalism" for me has always been this proliferation of specialists, but it's kind of boring to RP through.

Different strokes for different folks.

Usually I say "assume you get what the rules let you get, and if you want to try for something more, you might be able to if you roll well enough...but it's a risk."

What's the risk?

 

[I'm A Banana]

What's the risk?

In general terms, they must make a Gather Info check to point them at someone capable of "bending the rules, just for them." That's a small risk of gp for no reward right there (and the weirder the request, the higher the DC). And once they find such an individual, it tends to be an "in over your head" scenario.

For instance, you might be able to get the item, but it's cursed in some way (a cloak of protection that must be constantly bloodsoaked, a magic weapon that attracts a swarm of butterflies that it cannot hurt, a potion that works but results in gastronomic distress after the effect is over). You may have to find a special item for a specialist to build it. You may acquire the item, but it's hot property, so you've got the town guard (or the lich who originally owned it...) looking for it.

The simplest risk is something like a minor sidequest or a guarded shipment, which then the item becomes the reward for.

One of my favorite scenarios had them sneaking the item from out under the sleeping Terrasque. Asleep, the beast's Listen rolls weren't that great, so the challenge was mostly in their heads, but the thought that getting their hands on that ritual tome could inadvertently trigger an apocalypse kept them very on edge.

Of course, half the time they just decide to jaunt to the nearest metropolis, but sometimes that isn't possible or desirable (metropoli aren't very common IMC, perhaps 2-4 on the entire planet, but I am a fan of urban campaigns). It gives "adventuring in Podunk" a real nice feel of being away from it all when you can't count on the luxuries of high-level spellcasting services at the drop of a bag of glit, and gives the characters a certain respect for the gritty NPC's that endure the harsh conditions.

 

[Slife]

I would say, Yes. The town effectively becomes a gigantic Warehouse of Holding.

So, let's say the party's wizard can cast teleport several times a day.

Is the world now "effectively a giant planet of holding?"