The Myth of the Necessity of Magic Items

[green slime]

Wear it, fine. So what? Make them quest to learn the feat instead if it bothers you. That's half or less. Wolves and animals don't carry much cash.

Again, why take it away from the PC's?

No I wasn't suggesting that at all....

It was in response to your assertation that it was a low-magic campaign with rules by the book. My response was.... even with initially half wealth levels, but with Item Creation feats, you are going end up with something approaching standard wealth levels (assuming, of course, the players take this route, which is hardly guaranteed), and at the least, no dirge of vital equipment to face the DR/magic monsters. Which is the real issue in a campaign with low-magic. Less so in 3.5 than 3.0. due to the lower DR numbers and higher 2hd PA.

 

[Emirikol]

One of the issues with lower magic item campaigns is what to do with all of your cash. I typically allow it to be wasted as part of RP x.p. gain (wenching, gambling,etc.)

I've also thought about normal item wear and tear without having to deal with weapon breakage and crap like that. I've toyed with the idea of requiring new standard gear each level unless masterwork. Haven't run the numbers yet, but it helps drive down CR escalation.

The demons/devils/etc of higher CR/EL's are probably part of the problem for many DM's who don't take the time to have more higher level HUMAN or advanced natural monster encounters. There's no rule against why everyone in any given town can't be 10th level commoners.

jh

 

[molonel]

Yeah..fun and challenging for casters. I've played in a game that was "low magic"..basically casters work as normal, and monsters are unchanged, but there are no magic items. After being completely ineffective for a few fights I was frustrated enough to ask the dm to change some things. Nothing says fun like ineffectively swinging your weapon at a monster while the casters do everything.

Ah yes. The "Crawl through the Lovely Filth" campaign setting. I believe a couple of my DMs obtained a boxed set off of Ebay.

Usually, the people I see rhapsodizing about low- and no-magic campaigns are DMs. I do not include Conan RPG, Midnight and Iron Heroes under this rubric, however.

I like lower magic rules. For example, one where there are no permanent stat bump items (inherent or enhancement), and wealth is reduced anywhere from 75% of standard to 50%. But generally, in those campaigns, you also get a stat bump at every even level, and a feat at every odd level.

In order to work, the modified rules must, in my opinion, offer something for what they take away.

Simply taking stuff away does not improve the game.

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

We've been running a low magic campaign using 3.0/3.5 for about 5 years now. We've found that there is some kind of "myth" surrounding people's belief that magic items are necessary for the game.

I think we have an episode for next season's Mythbusters!

Of course in actuality, if someone would not enjoy a game without magic items, then they are in fact necessary for them.

The only real myth is that one person's way of playing is a better way to play the game than someone else's.

 

[Kahuna Burger]

And so when discussing low-magic-level campaigns, this is relevant because....

I'm really trying to understand this. If there are no house rules, then it can hardly be low magic, given the default assumption of the DMG, regading the availability of Item Creation feats, assumptions regarding magic item cost and their availability?

I've probably simply lost the flow of the conversation, but when the topic of the thread is "The myth of the neccessity of magic items" and the OP is initially claiming not to need heavy house rules to make a sparsely equipped party viable at high levels, this post seems odd.

 

[Mortellan]

I'm not sure magic items are necessary, but I have a house rule that it's not the DM's responsibility to remember all the protections/ effects on a PC as the load of items becomes a logistic nightmare sometimes at high level. For me I despise magic item creation and commerce in 3x. Items should not have a quantifiable price tag and a spellcaster PC should not be able to outfit the entire party with boosting items. It trivializes treasure allocation and makes me want to dole out less magic treasure.

 

[DungeonMaester]

In my honest opinion I think the 'tons of magic items' myth comes from the same powergamers that brought you the 'you need to have 5 or 6 class levels at 20th level' myth.

Its because D&D players mostly are power gamers. If you ask them to describe there character the response that is most common is "My character can do 40 damage by 3rd level using this and this and this."

Case in point, a local Dm ran a one shot where a group of 12 level fought a G. Black dragon. Every one bought every magic item and cross classed as much as possible for this fight while I played a warlock by the book with no magic items dumping all my money in the bottom of a lake. The only feat worth mentioning that I took was maximize spell like ability.

Using Flee the scene as a redy action to dodge attacks and eldric spear to long range a 2 touch attack (Size sucks don't it?) from out of attack range. Out of the party I:

Inflicked the most overall damage
Was the only survivor
Killed the dragon

Insane cross classing and tons of magic items shoud not replace good role playing skills.

(Didn't Monte Cook say something like that?)

---Rusty

 

[sukael]

Case in point, a local Dm ran a one shot where a group of 12 level fought a G. Black dragon. Every one bought every magic item and cross classed as much as possible for this fight while I played a warlock by the book with no magic items dumping all my money in the bottom of a lake. The only feat worth mentioning that I took was maximize spell like ability.

...except that the warlock, by way of having assorted at-will abilities and a primary attack that pretty much doesn't rely on equipment at all (aside from maybe a Dex-boost item), is actually one of the best character classes you could come up with for something like that.

 

[sukael]

Items should not have a quantifiable price tag...

I'll disagree on that one... though less in the sense that the DM should have an easy way to keep track of who has how much, rather than that the players should always be able to sell X item for Y.

 

[Crothian]

No thanks, my group considers that cheating.

DM's are allowed to cheat, it's in the rules