Hi!
I need advice on how you handle purchasing magic items. If I am reading the rules correctly, in a metropolis, the highest value of purchasable item is 16000g. This seems reasonable for lower levels, however it seems to pose difficulties in keeping up with things like DR etc. higher levels.
For instance, I am playing in one game, where we are fighting a lot of evil outsiders, many of which have DR/good. Not having a paladin, we are struggling to get through these encounters. A +1 holy weapon being an equivalent +3 is beyond what can be purchased and therefore unavailable so how does one deal with that?
Same goes for any amulet of mighty fists beyond +1.
In other campaigns whether I play or run it, it seems that crafting becomes mandatory to allow for better magic items. Is that the only way?
Has anyone tried or had success with scalable magic purchase limits. for instance doubling the values when PCs attain level 10?
Thanks for any help!
A Paladin could be issued a Holy weapon by their church, to aid in the good fight. Just deduct its value from the loot the party will get, and call it a day.
Also, a wizard might be commissioned to craft something special, and demand to be paid with a favour as well as gold: instant side quest & affordable gear.
A Paladin could be issued a Holy weapon by their church, to aid in the good fight. Just deduct its value from the loot the party will get, and call it a day.
Also, a wizard might be commissioned to craft something special, and demand to be paid with a favour as well as gold: instant side quest & affordable gear.
I think of it more as a limit on what you could find in a shop.
"oh you want this item that is a kagillion gp? Well i dont sell anything that powerful, but if you go see this powerful wizard he might be able to help""yeah i can make that for you but you will have to bring me X, Y, Z, pay me N gold. Walk my dog, fix my roof, find me a virgin, deliver this letter, and participate in a summoning"
It's basically cap so that players shouldn't be able to buy whatever they want anywhere. That doesn't mean the items cannot be availble through other means, though. Consider Extraordi-Nerd's quest idea, for example.
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For a metropolis, 16,000 gp is the Base Value for magic items that are generally available. If you want to buy something 16,000 gp or less, there's a 75% chance that you find it for sale with "little effort" that week.
There's a second table that lists the number, minor/medium/major magic items also for sale that are valued above the Base Value. For a metropolis, generally any minor magic item can be found (again with the same 75% chance as mentioned above), 4d4 medium magic items, and 3d4 major magic items.
If, in the course of rolling those items if you choose to do so randomly, you end up with a magic item that is less than the Base Value, you discard it and roll another. It's up to the GM to decide when to add additional magic items over time (once a week, once a month, etc.) and when to expunge old items (to represent other people buying those magic items).
That can get rather tedious, so someone wrote an application to do that for you:
It's your world. You decide what is available or not.
I only resort to the dice rolling when I have no real concern or interest in whether something is available or not. Otherwise I decide what is available based on what will advance the goals of the campaign and the goals of the individual players.
Thanks for the advice, I wasn't sure whether our group missed something.
Also Big thanks Ansel for that link, the generator is a HUGE time saver!