D&D 5E Why are potions of healing so expensive?

[Oofta]

I tend to have slightly less of a problem with common potions (though I do think they are a little expensive for the amount of healing) but once you get into the more expensive stuff?

A Superior Potion is potential 2,000 gold for 28 hp? By the time you can afford that, most characters would need to drink multiples of these potions to be fully healed. Supreme? Potentially upward of 20,000 gold for 70 hp.

Or, buy four thousand basic healing potions (yes, supply and demand, but talking value for healing) and get 8,000d4+8,000 potential healing. Sure, going to take multiple actions, but that's just showing the same money spent. 10 basic potions for 500 gold is equivalent healing for a fraction of a fraction of the cost. And for the level where you might have supremes.... it isn't always great healing either. 70 is the average, but you could just as easily end up healing 55. And since it is hard to justify the action either way, it makes them really hard to justify ever buying.

That's why you need one of these:

 

[Ancalagon]

That all assumes a strictly medieval setting. D&D is not strictly medieval - it has wizards, clerics, and all kinds of magic creatures and things.

When I started this thread, I was just thinking about how 50 GP is a lot, especially for a 1st level character and given the relatively little healing involved. A goblin hits you with an axe and it takes a 50 GP item to heal it?

But then after a few posts and thinking about it some more, I realized--or remembered--that every setting is (potentially) different, and it really depends upon what the DM (as world-builder) is going for. As I said above, I imagine my own setting as being more akin to a magic-infused, animistic world akin to the way that ancient peoples saw the world, not the orthodox historical view of the medieval with some magic slapped on that that default D&D assumes. My issue with that is along the lines of what @BlivetWidget said above, that magic is assumed to be rare but presented as common.

There's no right or true way to do it, except I think it erroneous to assume that all worlds must follow the same template and the same assumptions or go along with the default view. We can play with this and follow through with some kind of thought out internal consistency (aka, the infamous verisimilitude).

So in my world, in the village that you describe, there is an herbalist who lives on the edge of town, who is deeply connected with the living (and magical) world and creates herbal concoctions that are available to villagers, in the same way that there's a smithy or a tavern or a shrine. Druids and rangers know the intrinsic properties of the living things of their region, and can find plants or springs that can heal or provide visions. Priests can bless water to offer for true believers. And so on.

Why do you think medieval? Because I said "peasants"? There were peasants in the renaissance, and there were peasants in the roman era too.

All I did was use the prices from the PHB, which I assume are "correct", to show that a healing potion is quite affordable at a community level, even if the community is very modest in size. When the OP noted that potions were "so expensive", they were using the PHB prices as a baseline I assume (otherwise the complaint doesn't make a lot of sense). I was merely pointing out that they aren't that expensive.

who provides the potion? I don't know, but it could be that herbalist.

Lastly, you don't need a potion to heal you if a goblin hits you with an axe, you need a long rest

 

[tetrasodium]

I tend to have slightly less of a problem with common potions (though I do think they are a little expensive for the amount of healing) but once you get into the more expensive stuff?

A Superior Potion is potential 2,000 gold for 28 hp? By the time you can afford that, most characters would need to drink multiples of these potions to be fully healed. Supreme? Potentially upward of 20,000 gold for 70 hp.

Or, buy four thousand basic healing potions (yes, supply and demand, but talking value for healing) and get 8,000d4+8,000 potential healing. Sure, going to take multiple actions, but that's just showing the same money spent. 10 basic potions for 500 gold is equivalent healing for a fraction of a fraction of the cost. And for the level where you might have supremes.... it isn't always great healing either. 70 is the average, but you could just as easily end up healing 55. And since it is hard to justify the action either way, it makes them really hard to justify ever buying.

Not disagreeing with you, but It's because despite removing the magic item budget they are still using the old pricing or randomly picking numbers similar for the items in a given rarity[/spoiler]

[/spoiler]
For what it's worth a potion of cure serious wounds would have cost 750gp as a steep but reasonably affordable safety net for when things go sideways while the healing was still significant & because that was when attacks missed more often than hit compared to 5e's 60%++ hitrates that healing covered a lot more attacks even at higher levels

@Ancalagon except with the way 5e works that's not even a significant amount of healing or even all that efficient as you note. Because damage beyond zero goes away the 50gp ones are dramatically more efficient in making sure bob can make it to the next smoke break known as a short rest in order to have a high probability of recovering all of his hp.

 

[el-remmen]

Huh. I thought the DMG said they cost 100 gps (that's what I've been charging - sometimes more - since there are limited amounts available at any given time).

 

[SkidAce]

I tend to have slightly less of a problem with common potions (though I do think they are a little expensive for the amount of healing) but once you get into the more expensive stuff?

A Superior Potion is potential 2,000 gold for 28 hp? By the time you can afford that, most characters would need to drink multiples of these potions to be fully healed. Supreme? Potentially upward of 20,000 gold for 70 hp.

Or, buy four thousand basic healing potions (yes, supply and demand, but talking value for healing) and get 8,000d4+8,000 potential healing. Sure, going to take multiple actions, but that's just showing the same money spent. 10 basic potions for 500 gold is equivalent healing for a fraction of a fraction of the cost. And for the level where you might have supremes.... it isn't always great healing either. 70 is the average, but you could just as easily end up healing 55. And since it is hard to justify the action either way, it makes them really hard to justify ever buying.

I tend to award potions one rarity higher than the characters are "expected" to have, so they stay "miraculously effective".

 

[Iry]

I don't mind healing potions existing in the world, but I've got much better things to spend 50 gold on.

It would be more enticing if NPCs offered some use it or lose it discretionary funds in their missions, provided they are organized enough to do so.

 

[Rob Kuntz]

'Because life isn't cheap?

 

[Eyes of Nine]

This is 5E, what else are you going to spend your money on?

This is EXACTLY what I was thinking 100%

 

[UngeheuerLich]

HP don't stand for HP that need to be healed by magic.
You can heal more by just take 1h rest usually. Or have a good night's sleep.

A potion takes away you tiredness.
So it is more like a shot of coffeine or a cocaine which might be equally expensive in real world. (The former is cheaper, the latter probably more expensive).

 

[QuentinGeorge]

HP don't stand for HP that need to be healed by magic.
You can heal more by just take 1h rest usually. Or have a good night's sleep.

A potion takes away you tiredness.
So it is more like a shot of coffeine or a cocaine which might be equally expensive in real world. (The former is cheaper, the latter probably more expensive).

Nah, methamphetimine. All you potion drinkers are basically huffing ice.