Infiniti2000
First Post
Question said:
This statements are conflicting. You can't desire common sense or to fix the "half price" phenomenon if you just have loot disappear.Question said:
Why do DMs have a rule regarding how much can be spent on one item?
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Question
First Post
Which part is conflicting, the idea that common sense would (eventually at least) stop people from making impossible to survive PCs who have excessive amount of their wealth invested in a single item with the idea that the PCs not get extra wealth that might screw wealth levels over and encourage people to make other PCs rather than try to get raised?
Infiniti2000
First Post
The part that is conflicting is for you to desire common sense and then just inexplicably disallow looting of a body, as common sense would otherwise dictate. Either you want common sense or you don't. There are other suggestions for handling such loot, but those people also use common sense for starting items. So, you want to throw away common sense for starting items, throw away common sense for dead PC's, and create common sense for D&D economics (of which I agree there is none), and yet attempt to retain some sort of common sense for balanced PC wealth/power.
Something in that mix doesn't jive.
Anyway, I'm not trying to get on your case about this. Not everything in D&D has to make sense, but you should realize when something does or doesn't and then not get bent out of shape when others choose an option differently than yours.
Something in that mix doesn't jive.
Anyway, I'm not trying to get on your case about this. Not everything in D&D has to make sense, but you should realize when something does or doesn't and then not get bent out of shape when others choose an option differently than yours.
RigaMortus2
First Post
Infiniti2000 said:
Exactly... If you have 33K after reselling, you are not at your "proper" character wealth, so the character would have to have either saved up the other 33k or the DM would have to make preparations to help the character get the extra 33k (again, if you are following the character wealth guidelines).
Another way to do it would be to trade the items straight up for full market value. The half GP thing is only for reselling, not trading.
This is all dependent on the campaign and the players.
First, the half sell price limitation can easily be avoided. I do not know of any games where every 11th level PC has exactly 66K and every 12th level PC has exactly 88K, etc. PCs have a variety of items, some bought, some made, some found. Since this varies greatly from campaign to campaign, it should also vary from PC to PC.
In fact, a DM forcing all PCs to have nearly the exact same wealth would result in a pretty skewed situation. This can only be enforced by a combination of the DM and the players. Recently, I added up the wealth of the PCs in our group and one PC had more than twice what anyone else had. The players in my group do not know it and most of them did not care: although we did start a new system for those who did care of the DM keeping track of wealth in certain categories and the PC who is lowest on the totem pole gets to pick first for newly found items. But before this change, their idea was to give items to whomever could use them the most effectively. Other players (or PCs) in a different game might be very detailed and party wealth balanced oriented.
As to the original question, really, who cares? If an 11th level PC wants a +5 Greatsword and has very few other items, what's the problem. He is a very offensive combatant type who can only last a few rounds. Err, so?
As a DM, I do not impose an artificial rule that a PC cannot have an item worth more than xyz, instead, I just place items based on current challenges. Sometimes, that means a very expensive item if the challenge is very great and it makes sense for the NPC to have the item. If they overcome the challenge, the players then decide whether they want one PC to have that item, or whether they want to sell it so that all of the PCs can benefit from it.
Course, we start campaigns from level one, so I could see if a DM started the campaign out at much higher level, he would have such a house rule.
First, the half sell price limitation can easily be avoided. I do not know of any games where every 11th level PC has exactly 66K and every 12th level PC has exactly 88K, etc. PCs have a variety of items, some bought, some made, some found. Since this varies greatly from campaign to campaign, it should also vary from PC to PC.
In fact, a DM forcing all PCs to have nearly the exact same wealth would result in a pretty skewed situation. This can only be enforced by a combination of the DM and the players. Recently, I added up the wealth of the PCs in our group and one PC had more than twice what anyone else had. The players in my group do not know it and most of them did not care: although we did start a new system for those who did care of the DM keeping track of wealth in certain categories and the PC who is lowest on the totem pole gets to pick first for newly found items. But before this change, their idea was to give items to whomever could use them the most effectively. Other players (or PCs) in a different game might be very detailed and party wealth balanced oriented.
As to the original question, really, who cares? If an 11th level PC wants a +5 Greatsword and has very few other items, what's the problem. He is a very offensive combatant type who can only last a few rounds. Err, so?
As a DM, I do not impose an artificial rule that a PC cannot have an item worth more than xyz, instead, I just place items based on current challenges. Sometimes, that means a very expensive item if the challenge is very great and it makes sense for the NPC to have the item. If they overcome the challenge, the players then decide whether they want one PC to have that item, or whether they want to sell it so that all of the PCs can benefit from it.
Course, we start campaigns from level one, so I could see if a DM started the campaign out at much higher level, he would have such a house rule.
shilsen
Adventurer
Question said:
Some DMs, myself included, don't believe in the philosophy of proving our point by letting PCs die off. It's a waste of time for me, the campaign, the other players, and most likely, the player involved. I'd rather just say why I don't want that sort of lopsided spending done and make it so. I don't need a "I told you so" moment.
The interesting thing with common sense is that it's not really common and often not very sensible.
Infiniti2000
First Post
We're talking about campaigns starting out at a high level, else the character would just have xGP to spend. At least, that's my perspective of the conversation.KarinsDad said:
Ah, I see. Is that what you do, then? If an 11th level PC sells all of his stuff, he gets half value and then turns the corner and finds a treasure chest with 33,000 gold pieces? Good luck with that.RigaMortus2 said:
Nac_Mac_Feegle
First Post
When you sell an item, you sell to a merchant. Now thta merchant is going to want to resell it at full price, he has overheads and profit to make, so he only buys at half value. You can sell it to him, or not, thats your call, but he is only giving you half value. Take it or leave it.
As for max item price, its not arbritary, wealth by town/city etc have guidlines on how expensive a single item can be. There simply isnt enough wealth in the city to make items over a certain amount, so you need to travel to bigger cities.
Our campaigns tend to be in forgotten realms, and our GM has basically said if we want items worth more than 45k we need to trravel to waterdeep to find someone of the required ability/skill to make it in a city that can support that wealth level.
Funnily enough, something always comes up that stops us going to waterdeep, so we then spend our money on lower magic items, that conversely up our adaptability.
Feegle Out
As for max item price, its not arbritary, wealth by town/city etc have guidlines on how expensive a single item can be. There simply isnt enough wealth in the city to make items over a certain amount, so you need to travel to bigger cities.
Our campaigns tend to be in forgotten realms, and our GM has basically said if we want items worth more than 45k we need to trravel to waterdeep to find someone of the required ability/skill to make it in a city that can support that wealth level.
Funnily enough, something always comes up that stops us going to waterdeep, so we then spend our money on lower magic items, that conversely up our adaptability.
Feegle Out
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