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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Bacon Bits" data-source="post: 9332407" data-attributes="member: 6777737">The 2e AD&D DMG explicitly lists Training as an optional rule in Chapter 8. B/X has no rules at all for training, let alone training costs, and BECMI's "Training" refers to it's own Weapon Mastery system. Similarly OD&D had no training costs; the only limitation that I can recall was that you had to level up between adventures.There are training costs in the 1e AD&D DMG! However, in 1e AD&D everything was an optional rule. After all, weapon speed, weapon vs armor type, and multi-attack's effect on initiative segments weren't presented as optional rules, either, but I never saw anybody use them longer than one or two sessions. <a href="https://index.rpg.net/display-entry.phtml?mainid=13318" target="_blank">A.D.D.I.C.T.</a> is quite deservedly a joke to most people.My experience with 1e AD&D training was that it worked exactly like demihuman level limits. At the start of the campaign, the DM would staunchly insist the training rules would be enforced. Then, as soon as they actually came up in play, they would be relaxed. The DM would know you were several sessions from getting back to town and the PCs had nowhere near the somewhat absurd 1,500 gp per level required of each PC. They know they don't have 6,000-10,000 gp in the entire module for the 1st-level PCs to reach 2nd level alone (several of whom are multiclass and need to train twice). Then the DM knows that the module is supposed to take the PCs to 3rd or 4th level... and their napkin math says they're now somewhere around 35,000 gp short for a party of 4-5. Suddenly "training costs" end up not being very important at all, and you can just level up between sessions.I don't think buying magic items subverts the setting. I think it subverts the game itself, but not because of loss of wonder.When the players or PCs want to accomplish something, the answer should essentially always be, "go on an adventure." That's the core game loop of D&D. Go on an adventure, find dungeons, kill or bypass the monsters and traps, and take the treasures you find as reward. As much as possible, the mechanics and elements of the game should funnel the players back into that core game loop. And, yes the goals of the adventure should sometimes or even often reflect the goals that the players want to achieve.Critically, this is what the DMG should be telling new DMs.Buying a magic item should only be possible when the alternatives to going out and finding it through adventure are worse than the adventure that is being blocked by not having the item.</blockquote>

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