I dont think any DM's track treasure down to the last gold piece, but I try to keep it close.
How much money does each goblin have on him?
That depends on the CR of the goblin. It also depends on the whether you are using the slow medium or fast XP progression.
The NPC wealth chart is on page 454
Say you have a level 4 party, and you are using the fast XP chart. A standard level 4 encounter hands out about 1700 gp. If the enounter consist of a monster that would reasonably treasure then it should have 1700 gp or if its two identical monsters give them set them up so that after the encounter they should have about 850 a peice. Now if they end up being slightly over or under the mark dont worry about it.
Another example is an encounter with a CR 4 animal. Animals dont carry treasure, normally anyway, so they dont get treasure, but what you can do is put a treasure chest(s) in the dungeon equal to the amount of gold they would have had, or you can let them fall behind the wealth chart a little, but give them extra gold later so they are back on track.
What decides if he drops a shortspear or not?
If you give the monster and item and the players kill the monster they get the item as part of the treasure. if you are asking what weapon you should give the monster, that is up to you.
How do I decide if that bugbear had a potion?
A monster can have whatever treasure you decide to give it. If the players are low level, potions are good since it makes the clerics job easier and increases the chance for survival. Potions are also good to make a monster better if its a buffing potion such as bull's strength. If I give these potions to minions I normally do it so the PC's can get them. If I give them to a boss character it depends on whether or not the PC's can get to him undetected. If he knows they are coming he will drink the potion. If he does not get to use them, then it is their reward for taking a non-direct approach and succeeding at it.
Do all similar monsters have the same amount of treasure value on them?
Most of the time I give similar monsters all the exact same treasure to make book keeping easier even though I know its not realistic for all the bugbears to have the exact same amount of gold/arrows/potions/etc.
In regards to cash and valuables, Pathfinder seems to assume that I'm familiar with 3.5, which from a DM perspective, I'm not. The way that treasure is awarded is vague and incomplete. Apparently, and I'm still trying to figure out CR rules although I think I've got those down, every CR encounter has X gold on it somewhere. Or, you can like, spend that gold to buy EQ for the monster to have on it, like goblins having spears and such. How does all that work exactly? How much money does each goblin have on him? What decides if he drops a shortspear or not? How do I decide if that bugbear had a potion? Do all similar monsters have the same amount of treasure value on them? Or do none of them have anything they aren't holding, and all the treasure comes in a chest at the bottom of the dungeon?
This is one of my pet peeves honestly, I really did like the old treasure tables, and they were OGC, so their vanishing is annoying. However, it's still not all that hard. I'll do my best to help.
First off, that treasure listing is an average thing. That is, the average CR 10 (Medium) encounter is 5450gp. If you have 10 CR 10 encounters, you should have about 55000gp handed out over all 10 encounters. Some encounters may have none (skeletons for example usually have no treasure, same with animals), while other's might have as much as 15,000gp (A CR 10 dragon for example has a x3 treasure multiplier). As a GM, you want to try to balance out that treasure over those 10 encounters.
Without the tables, it's up to you to decide what makes sense for the encounter. So, let's take a bandit band that's CR 10. We can arm them all with MW weapons, so if there are 4 of them, that's about 1200gp worth right there (I usually ignore weapon cost, just charge MW cost). We can arm them with MW Leather armor too, another 600gp. That's 1800gp out of our 5450gp. Next, I usually roll percentile dice (2d10 ordered). I then take that percentage as the percentage in money. So let's say I rolled 50% (for simplicity). 5450-1800 = 3650, so half that is 1825, so 1825gp in various coinage. I would break that up as say a 50 25gp rubies (1250gp), 10 platinum (100gp), 500 copper (5gp), 200 silver (20gp), and 250gp in gold coins, and then I'd throw in 10 25gp gold bars. There's my 1825gp in coins. Then I'd grab one or two magic items worth less than 1825. Let's say 600gp worth of cure light on a wand (45ish charges, minus whatever the bandits use in the fight), and then I might roll a (1d20 + 1d4) - 1 on the minor wondrous items chart (1100 or less). If I rolled an 18, I'd toss in a Hand of the Mage (800gp), that's 1500gp so far, and then I'd just pick something to use up the rest, like a vial of silversheen (250gp).
There, the bandits are outfitted, with a couple of items.
The missing treasure tables are one of my pet peeves too. We're hoping to address that failing in the upcoming Gamemastery Guide.
WOO HOO!!!!
And yes, it does make sense for it to be in that book, if it's not in core. Thanks!
Hopefully they will be a little more fleshed out than the old ones. I really *REALLY* like the tables in the Magic Item Compendium.
Actually, on that topic, I hope Paizo will put those tables up on the PRD and then update them whenever they release new equipment in future books? It's always so annoying to have new books and equipment but not have them on random tables. And, again on a related note, I'm hoping that eventually (AFTER Monstrous PCs) Paizo releases an equipment compendium (not just magic items, more like the GURPS High Tech, Ultra High Tech, Low Tech, etc books. A good mix of weapons, armor, mundane equipment, and magical items).
Frankly, I miss the orc standing guard over a chest in 10' by 10' room.
Wonder if he ever got coffee breaks...
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The weirdest game I ever played used strict wealth by level. Didn't matter what you got as loot, take as much or as little as you want, when you level up, all your stuff vanishes and turns into the gold piece equivalent you should have for the new level.
Buy it back, better, if you want, or replace it entirely, the DM didn't care, as long as it came from the PHB or DMG, or was personally approved by him.
On the one hand, you never lost money selling off old gear for new gear.
On the other hand, you never got to keep anything you'd found that was 'too good' for you to afford after leveling up.
Freakish. It was like the most suspension-of-disbelief breaking thing ever, but also kinda fun, in a beer-and-pretzels 'oh, what the hell, it's just a game' sense.
Frankly, I miss the orc standing guard over a chest in 10' by 10' room.
Wonder if he ever got coffee breaks...
One reason why I rarely use them. :) Stupid orcs and their coffee breaks. You never hear an Advanced Flaming Bleeding Orc Skeleton whining about sick time, coffee breaks, having a wife and litter, or anything else. Tell him to stand on the chest and kill anyone who isn't me that enters and done.
Whereas something clear and simple would be really nice, some nice tables, etc, I'll have to wait for the DM guide to get it, it seems :) What's there now will do the trick, now that I get a clearer picture of how it works, but the way it's presented in the player's guide makes me do a lot of flipping through the book in ways that are confusing to a newb. Also makes it hard to toss gear on an NPC that you had to create on the spot because your players asked an obvious question that you never thought about before.
One thing you might want to think of doing ahead of time is just make up some generic 'outfits' of equipment, maybe 3 per class appropriate for your character's level (one two levels below, one two levels above, and the third the same level as your players characters). Put the GP cost of the equipment down on the list (I'd suggest a little 3x5 card, you can keep them in a box). Then when they ask what he's wearing, just pick a card and read it off. Subtract his equipment from the treasure. :) Ta da, easy. Gives you something to do when you are bored (making the little cards). By the same token, you can write out some 'treasure cards' ahead of time in gp increments. So, 500gp, 250gp, 1000gp. Keep them in the same box. Then when you need a treasure trove on the fly, pull out however many cards you need. If you need 5450 in gp, and you gave the bad guys 1200gp in equipment, pull out a 2500gp, a 1000gp, a 500gp, and a 200gp card and you're done. Just as much setup work up front, but saves you time in the long run.
That's actually a really good idea. I'm totally using that. Might also do it for goblinoids, etc, so groups of things can have random loot that I only have to figure out once.
Yep, I used to do that back when I first started GMing (granted, that was in Shadowrun), but it saved me a ton of time.
I've never been a fan of the wealth by level concept. Long live the old 2nd edition treasure tables!
Zo
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what about treasure beyond 20th level? table 12-5 in the core rule book lists the amounts per level of encounter gained.
the third paragraph of page 400 of the core rule book discusses how to adjust those amounts for the difficulty of the encounter, should the party face a challenge higher (or lower) than the APL.
this could potentially shift a treasure above the 20th level, yet i can find no rules for how to handle that.
what about treasure beyond 20th level? table 12-5 in the core rule book lists the amounts per level of encounter gained.
the third paragraph of page 400 of the core rule book discusses how to adjust those amounts for the difficulty of the encounter, should the party face a challenge higher (or lower) than the APL.
this could potentially shift a treasure above the 20th level, yet i can find no rules for how to handle that.
If it helps you, I never use table 12-5 and I never give treasure after each encounter.
I use table 12-4. Wealth for level X - wealth for level X-1 = (aprox.) treasure for this level for 1 character. Then I place the treasure where and when I want to.
I use semi-random treasures, the counsels in page 401 are short but useful: "Random magic item placement should always be tempered with good common sense by the GM."
The missing treasure tables are one of my pet peeves too. We're hoping to address that failing in the upcoming Gamemastery Guide.
They were missing? One of my peeves about the GameMastery Guide was that there were redundant treasure tables taking up so much space. I thought "why is this needed when they are already in the core book?"
The only thing that looked different about them than the ones I saw in the magic item chapter of the core book was that they expanded the potion, scroll, and wand sections.
What am I missing?
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The missing treasure tables are one of my pet peeves too. We're hoping to address that failing in the upcoming Gamemastery Guide.They were missing? One of my peeves about the GameMastery Guide was that there were redundant treasure tables taking up so much space. I thought "why is this needed when they are already in the core book?"
The only thing that looked different about them than the ones I saw in the magic item chapter of the core book was that they expanded the potion, scroll, and wand sections.
What am I missing?
I found those tables bloody frustrating because not two months later came the APG with substantial list of magic items and spells that were not mentioned in the random tables.