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It may be true that AD&D had not formalized the "big six" the way it is in PF and was in 3.5 but the basic concept was in place and the fundamental mechanic was well established.
I still remember having to decide between replacing my +2 RoP with a +3 RoP or getting a tome that boosted my wizard's int by +2. Eventually I went with the tome but ended up replacing the ring a short time later anyway.
Yeah it was all about the Ring of Protection back then! So maybe not the Big Six but the Big Two or Three (sub armor for Bracers of Defense I suppose).
I'd like to be nostalgic and say magic in my games had more meaning back then, but there was that point where the +1 swords and +1 RoP's got thrown into the treasure bin or handed off to NPC followers. The notion of "upgrading" from +1 to +2 hasn't changed since the beginning - getting a special or intelligent weapon was almost a nice release from the upgrade.
One thing I very much like in PF - and presumably a service the 'Magic Shoppe' could provide - is the ability to enhance existing weapons and armor, so that (besides DM fiat) you have a way to keep your cool named sword and have it grow with you.
Actually 2E had Stat Boosters... Though they came in a later Book.
In fact the original 3.0/3.5 edition Stat Boosters were carried over from that 2E book.
So you had:
Gloves for DEX
Belts for CON
_____ for STR(can't remember what these were...)
Cloaks for CHA
Headbands for INT
____ for WIS(same as STR)
Depends on if that was changed from 3.5 or not. As 3.5 that was not the Expectation.
But then again 3.5 had odd ways of handling CR...
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I think that shallowsol is trying to say that those numerical items existed in AD&D but it was not computed in the CR of monster.
I mean, I PF there is the expectation that Pc will have a stat/SAves booster item by mid levels, the monster are designed with that expectation in mind. So those items are not really giving you and advantage they are just keeping you at the expected power level.
Particularly I wil like to try another kind of cloaks but at high levels most classes out there will be hopeless without that boost to the saves from the cloak of resistance.
Is that was he was trying to say after all of that? LOL! Well in 2nd Ed. terms of the power of the higher monsters requiring particular magic items from the characters as 'expected and necessary' I would agree with that for the most part, other than the 'basics' of better AC (armor +'s or bracers+protection item combo), bettering your chances to hit (weapon +'s) and bettering saves (protection item). Ability stats could be static across the entire life of your character (except maybe exceptional STR for warriors) and you'd be fine. No way to translate to this system though...wouldn't be an advocate of it either.
On your cloak issue, my mind takes me to the unavoidable conclusion that you gotta have the Resistance +whatever in PF, but make it able to be empowered with another cloak ability down the road of the player's life. Cloak +1 (resistance) of Lesser Displacement as an example?
@thejeff: The Items I referenced (IIRC) were in one of the last 3 or 4 books released for 2E.
Also the only expected Items in 3.5 were the Armour & Weapon +X Bonuses...
Because some people find hitting better a bit boring, especially when you are beating the AC by 8 or more points, some only a nat 1 will cause you to miss.
Some players aren't all about the math.
Some player's would rather have a +1 mageslayer blade that casts dispel magic on a natural 20 and can cast Silence 3/day.
That sword is too Metagamy for me. What defines a "mage?" The ability to cast Arcane spells? That includes Bards, Summoners, Witches, and Magus. How about a Rogue with the Minor and Major Magic Rogue Tricks, do they count? Or is a "Mage" any one that can cast spells, which adds Rangers, Paladins, Clerics, etc.
That sword actually existed in 1E, and one was specifically carried by Caramon Majere, by the name of Mantooth.
what if, and i may be crazy in suggesting this
the numerical bonus placed on particlar items wasnt their 'magical enhancement'?
in 3.5 there was a variant on crafting called dwarvencraft, which was considered a craft grade so well done, that it was like it had magical quality
what if the +X sword didnt obtain the +X from magic but rather from how well the blade was masterworked
all of a sudden mundane crafting has a more useful application, and whiners about wanting less magic have less magic and the mechanics of the game are more or less unchanged
By the way, in case anyone is wondering why I would opt for a +2 int-boosting tome over replacing a +2 RoP with a +3 one...
Back then when your intelligence went up, you got another chance to relearn spells you had failed to learn the first time.
And I really wanted some of those spells that my wizard had rolled poorly on, like Magic Missile for example...
Magic shops don't make sense to me. The expense of magic items is 10 to 1000 more expensive the mundane items. Now who buys this stuff to make it a vialble business with adventurers dumping loot for gold, someone must be buying all those +1 swords at 2000 GP a pop. Realistically the more +1 sword sold the lower the prices really a +1 sword should be prices a little higher than a masterwork sword. But then masterworks swords also should be cheaper. With adventurers dumping good in small economies the law of supply and demand should kick. Low deman with large supply means PC earn less off loot from magic items but can buy magic items for less. Of course the game doesn't work this way so it make magic shops an oddity that you just have to ignore and accept that it works.
To fix this you need to make magic scarce. If a +1 sword is dime a dozen which seems to be the case in most published games then magic is not scarce. In my next game I'm going to say you need magic to create magic items. This can't be pulled from thin air, it must come from some where. You can use lesser items, draining them of magic and pooling it to make more power items. As well magical creature have magic and it can be taken from them. Magic items that are not artifacts break down over time, not in PCs life time though unless they become immortal. The magic will leak out and collesque in areas of the world resulting in magic beasts. So a +5 sword over time will drop down slowly to +1 and eventually turn into a mundane masterwork weapon. So in this case a +1 sword may just be old weapon on it's last bit of magic before turning mundane. It might take decade for this to happen so not big deal to a PC but eventually the item will turn non magical.
I've also though that caster could sacrifice their spell casting ability to put their magic into an item. A caster level would be equivalent to a +1 bonus. This could be forced out of arcane caster but not divine caster and the deity would have to petitioned to allow it.
I'm going to try this in my next game.
Now who buys this stuff to make it a vialble business with adventurers dumping loot for gold, someone must be buying all those +1 swords at 2000 GP a pop.
Consider that a "wealthy" lifestyle costs 100gp per month (or 1,200gp per year); I think anyone in the wealthy lifestyle category could probably afford most magical items. If you can afford to blow 100gp a month just on living, you could easily afford a measly 2000gp magic item.
And wealthy isn't even the highest lifestyle category. Extravagant costs 1,000gp/month (or 12,000gp/year). Those individuals could easily afford these magic items. The GMG even says that this is the lifestyle of most aristocrats, and there are a lot of aristocrats out there. In Magnimar alone, there are at least 15 aristocratic families (possibly up to 120), with each individual living a wealthy or aristocratic lifestyle. That's just in one city (not even a metropolis) in one country of the Inner Seas.
People are a lot richer in Pathfinder than in previous versions of the game. I know that back in 2nd ed, we used to claim that the average person would be lucky to see a handful of gold pieces in their lifetime, and most people could easily retire and live comfortably off of a few platinum pieces. In Pathfinder, it costs 3gp per month just to live a poor lifestyle. Poor people are going through a few platinum pieces per year.
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There's a lot of wealth assumed in the core rulebook concept of PF society. This constantly expressed notion that nobody could afford magic items but the PCs is just plain wrong. There is an entire tier of society at the level of "aristocrat" and higher.
The thing in my world is that while those people do buy a lot of magic ITEMS, it's usually mercenaries and officers in the military who are buying magic arms and armor. And there's quite a large population of those dudes in my worlds too.
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Just as a point of reference, I was watching a show on TV the other day, I think it was the Antiques Road Show but it might have been Pawn Stars or even Storage Wars where a couple of Civil War items were being appraised.
The items were a rifle (carbine actually) and a sword.
The rifle had a custom stock, extensive engraving, silver, gold and jeweled inlays and other enhancements. The sword was gilded, jeweled and was hand-made, not military issue.
The appraiser said it was not uncommon in the Civil War for officers on both sides of the conflict to have custom guns, swords and other items. In fact it was a source of pride for many of them to have special weapons. Many of the officers came from established families with large fortunes and their gear could be quite lavish, including lots of gold and gems. Even things like canteens or ledgers could be very expensive.
There were entire companies who spent their own money to upgrade their weapons, especially as repeating rifles began to demonstrate their extreme lethality compared to the more common muskets or single-shot rifles.
So, yeah, when your life depends on it, you'll spend a lot of money on it.
Yeah. That's what people have said about 4E gear. It all* has a flat bonus and some other power. There's no such thing as +1 Armor. It's all bonus and something else. Which tends to be an encounter or daily power, because that's how 4e rolls. (*All may be strong. There may be exceptions, but it's pretty much the standard.)
well, you're wrong (or overstated if you prefer), the PHB had weapons with "Just +xs" in it
Because the Items are split up into levels....
Level 1 - +1 Magic Weapon/Armor
Level 6 - +2 Magic Weapon/Armor
Level 11 - +3 Magic Weapon/Armor......
Level 2-5 were all +1 Magic Weapons with a special "Quality", but you could have a "+1 Longsword" with nothing attached as a level 1 item.
Now, the way 4e was set up, were these as "appeasing" as something With a encounter/daily power? Of course not. But that doesn't mean they weren't there.
4e also tried to limit the "overflowing bag of excess magical items" (like a bag of 20 wands) and limited how many times per day you could use the Daily abilities on magical items, which actually blends more "realistically" to a lower magical campaign
And the way I do Magical Rewards (in 4e, but sometimes in 3e), if the players like their equipment, it will raise in power. So if they have a Level 3 item, and they're up for a level 8 reward, they will discover it has more power, as opposed to replacing it. I would make sure the party got a reward to make up for it (so in this example, another level 3 magical item/treasure packet).
In the early firearms days, almost all guns were custom (very few made for mass production, some exceptions would have been Tower of London Arms like the Brown Bess)
Even as Late as the 1860s-1870s guns were hand crafted by colt for their customers (this gives testament to how few customers there really were)
Ned Buntline, Bat Masterson, Buffalo Bill, Hicock and Wyatt Earp were just a few of the customers from colt, who with a mere letter asking something specific from colt, got it.
Can you imagine writing ford motor company today and saying "enclosed is a check for my new F150, I would like it eggplant purple with orange and yellow flames, I prefer the 6.4 diesel twin turbo motor and 20" wheels with the firestone MT tires, the gear ratio should be 4:10"
This is literally what these men did, without colt or anyone in the company ever having known or met them.
Freaky huh? It should be known that of those men, only buntline and Hicock paid more than standard price for their pistols (Buntline wanted a 10" barrel as opposed to the 5 1/2" standard barrel at the time and Hicock wanted special grips.)
The interior specs and tolerances and front sight were completely non stock on mastersons pistol and he paid standard price for it.
It should be noted the standard colt peacemaker was 2 months salary for a 'regular working man' at the time.
At a price of $16.00.
Two months salary today is somewhere around $4000 give or take. So the comparative price for most handguns have come down quite a bit.
Handguns are common today, where as they were relatively rare and to up and coming at the time.
Comparing the prices to firearms rules in PF. You might want to skew your magic prices a tad depending on how common you want them to be.
You can get a decent handgun for around 800-1200$ today
So say 1/5 of the comparative cost in 1873.
Using that analogy, in a common magic world, a +1 sword would cost 400gp.
What would that do the the price of a common sword?
What would happen to the cost of say... farming tools?
Would you have a world where no one could make a decent wage unless they were buying/selling/trading magic?
Perhaps?
think about a wand of create/food water.
In a common magic world, would things like this put farmers out of business?
People in cities wandering about popping food like George Jetson, instead of buying it at market?
Just as a point of reference, I was watching a show on TV the other day, I think it was the Antiques Road Show but it might have been Pawn Stars or even Storage Wars where a couple of Civil War items were being appraised.
The items were a rifle (carbine actually) and a sword.
The rifle had a custom stock, extensive engraving, silver, gold and jeweled inlays and other enhancements. The sword was gilded, jeweled and was hand-made, not military issue.
The appraiser said it was not uncommon in the Civil War for officers on both sides of the conflict to have custom guns, swords and other items. In fact it was a source of pride for many of them to have special weapons. Many of the officers came from established families with large fortunes and their gear could be quite lavish, including lots of gold and gems. Even things like canteens or ledgers could be very expensive.
There were entire companies who spent their own money to upgrade their weapons, especially as repeating rifles began to demonstrate their extreme lethality compared to the more common muskets or single-shot rifles.
So, yeah, when your life depends on it, you'll spend a lot of money on it.
This. So much this.
Just as a point of reference, I was watching a show on TV the other day, I think it was the Antiques Road Show but it might have been Pawn Stars or even Storage Wars where a couple of Civil War items were being appraised.
The items were a rifle (carbine actually) and a sword.
The rifle had a custom stock, extensive engraving, silver, gold and jeweled inlays and other enhancements. The sword was gilded, jeweled and was hand-made, not military issue.
There were entire companies who spent their own money to upgrade their weapons, especially as repeating rifles began to demonstrate their extreme lethality compared to the more common muskets or single-shot rifles.
So, yeah, when your life depends on it, you'll spend a lot of money on it.
Also interesting to note on this is in the 150 years since it's design, and introduction. only 14,000 of these rifles in question were ever made.
that's less than 100 rifles a year on average. Not everyone was spending a lot of money on them.
While specialized units did use them, they were solely volunteer units (essentially mercenaries) as the standard army issue did not receive them on either side of the conflict.
The cost of production of the weapon was so high and the sales so low in comparison to what was expected (they thought they would get the government fire arms contract) that following the war, in order to avoid going utterly bankrupt, they sold the rifles to the indians because the US government simply wouldnt buy them and the average US citizen couldnt afford one. (where the indians got the money I dunno... however seeing as they spent no money on food or rent, I think thats the explanation)
The indian purchase of these weapons could be directly tracked to the battle of the little big horn, where MOST of the repeating rifles were owned by the indians.
However, I could barely compare a repeating rifle to a +1 sword, when comparing it to a trapdoor springfield, as a +1 sword is a marginal gain. Perhaps more along the lines of +5 flaming sword.
When you it in THAT perspective, look at the price of a +6 weapon Vs. a regular one. The cost of magic is out of whack compared to the accquisition of the henry rifle?
Why?
The New Haven Repeating Arms company had a bunch to get rid of, and had to move them.
There for the law of supply and demand drive down the price.
Much as there would be in a case with an over abundance of +1 Swords
I dont see how the insane prices on magic make anything more "balanced"
I think it was more based on the idea of the PCs finding that hoarde of gold in piles and piles and pricing things so that the PCs could just go buy a holy avenger at level 5.
Therefor maybe balancing the 'concept' of how much dough the PCs find laying around against what they should have access to at what level, but not in balance with the world in which they operate/live.
Not to mention the fact that in most cases I have seen in recent gaming you dont find the mounds of coin you used to, so buying/selling magic items is more based on Pawn/Trade.
Which means the only real way of acquiring magic through purchase is to find other magic, which means, you could actually drop the price of magic items quite a bit (especially in a high magic campaign), since, finding a pile of coins is no longer status quo .
Arbitrary magic item prices are arbitrary. They are the only things that have any actual meaning in terms of an "economy" once you get past level 4 or so. At that point anything mundane is "hand waved" in virtually every game because the prices of mundane items are insignificant compared to magic item prices.
Magic item prices could be drastically reduced with no game impact whatsoever because all you would have to do is reduce WBL to match.
No youre not EXPECTED to buy one at level 5, but for example in older version of the game some of the coin that was found was stupendous! So much so, when we write down loot these days and the DM reads the coin amount I'm still holding my pencil with an "And??" look on my face...
Pendagast, I have a similar look sometimes as well.
Most priceless time was when we literally got 20 Masterwork Longswords at level 2. In a party of 6.
Instead of "Dungeon Crawl Classics" they should have called it "Dude where's my coin?"
That actually was what my group said when she gave us the 20 Swords. Only we subbed in Dudette for Dude.
too bad you didn't have a 'Casey Jones' ...a guy with a golf bag full of weapons and the throw anything feat, he could have carried them ALL on his back and freaked people out when he started hucking them!
Actually that is what I ended up doing...
when we played LoF we kept finding random bane weapons, for odd things, like giant bane, and orc bane etc. We had a "Casey Jones" that carried a golf bag of random bane weapons.... he would start out encounters with "what are you?"
"I am the Guardian of the cavern!"
No i mean what type of creature are you?
"Errr I'm a Salamander!"
GREAT I've got your beat stick RIGHT here!
Priceless! My guy was happy we got Gloves that worked similar to a Belt of Mighty Hurling. I literally could break a standard Door on a roll of 5+ on a STR Check.
Actually... He was based on This Sportsmaster...
Yes it was just after he appeared in the show that I needed a new character so then I made this character.
He ended up getting a Mask that allowed him to disguise himself and added an Intimidate Bonus when he wasn't Disguised. Thank God we were using my houserule of higher Base Skill Ranks do to expanded knowledge in the setting.
Bonus points if he had a Hockey Goalie mask
No but the same player ended up with the "Kabookie War Mask" we found in Delehaven... two different characters , two different APS, but plenty of "Booga Booga" intimidation attempts made it ALL worth it!
I don't know why, but the thought of a commoner taking a loan out to buy a +1 longsword makes me chuckle a bit.
What would he use as collateral? What would a commoner have that could be put up against a 2000 gpv magic sword? Or, I suppose the bank could just repossess the sword, so it could be it's own secured collateral?
What would he use as collateral? What would a commoner have that could be put up against a 2000 gpv magic sword? Or, I suppose the bank could just repossess the sword, so it could be it's own secured collateral?
Land, my boy! Land! You can print money, manufacture diamonds, and people are a dime a dozen, but they'll always need land. It's the one thing they're not making any more of.
There is a huge discrepancy in the core rulebooks about what a "commoner" is supposed to earn on average, and what a level 1 commoner with a farm, or a stockyard or any of dozens of actual commoner style vocations can actually earn using the skill or profession rules.
It's not hard to come up with ways for commoners to have enough collateral to borrow money to get a sword. All those cheesy wealth making schemes that people come up with all the time would work for commoners as well as PCs. So every now and then one of them figures it out.
itt Pathfinder teaches me the meaning of equity
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yea, it wouldnt be common, for a commoner to own land.
But to put it into perspective, for PCs, do I buy celestial armor...or Buy Brevoy.... Celestial armor? or Brevoy? ugh! I cant decide! Think I'll Settle on +2 mithral and buy sargava instead.... drags, the wife is going to hate vacationing there, but oh well!
Now who buys this stuff to make it a vialble business with adventurers dumping loot for gold, someone must be buying all those +1 swords at 2000 GP a pop.Consider that a "wealthy" lifestyle costs 100gp per month (or 1,200gp per year); I think anyone in the wealthy lifestyle category could probably afford most magical items. If you can afford to blow 100gp a month just on living, you could easily afford a measly 2000gp magic item.
And wealthy isn't even the highest lifestyle category. Extravagant costs 1,000gp/month (or 12,000gp/year). Those individuals could easily afford these magic items. The GMG even says that this is the lifestyle of most aristocrats, and there are a lot of aristocrats out there. In Magnimar alone, there are at least 15 aristocratic families (possibly up to 120), with each individual living a wealthy or aristocratic lifestyle. That's just in one city (not even a metropolis) in one country of the Inner Seas.
People are a lot richer in Pathfinder than in previous versions of the game. I know that back in 2nd ed, we used to claim that the average person would be lucky to see a handful of gold pieces in their lifetime, and most people could easily retire and live comfortably off of a few platinum pieces. In Pathfinder, it costs 3gp per month just to live a poor lifestyle. Poor people are going through a few platinum pieces per year.
A wealthy life style allows own nice home, obtain any 5 gp non magical item or less, not pay taxes and not have to track spending of 10 GP or less. You can't buy a 2000 GP sword with that. You need extra income.
Extravagant is a castle with 25 gp or less non magical items, no taxes and you don't have to track spending under 100 gp. Again you need to have extra income to get +1 sword.
Now I'm not saying no one make extra gold per month just those that do would be small subsection of those in those life styles. Then of those that do make extra a minority of them would make enough to buy magic weapons. I just don't see that supporting magic shops unless you had cities in the millions for population.
Well your average untrained laborer can afford the normal 10 gp/month lifestyle with another 8-10 gold left over each month above and beyond his or her cost of living.
If the same applies to other lifestyles, that means that your average wealthy individual banks about 100+ gp / month, which means you could indeed purchase a minor but permanent magic item every couple of years; which seems pretty reasonable to me since these are permanent magic items.
An extravagant lifestyle would imply greater 1,000+ gp banked each month. Such a wealthy individual could purchase permanent magic items frequently (probably more frequently than your average adventurer). These are major purchases in comparison to the trivial costs of his lifestyle (trivial being the ones he is allowed to ignore or find around the house) but in keeping with someone who had enough wealth to do things like collect fancy cars (I had an uncle who did this). Such an individual could easily stockpile some cash over the year and purchase things up to the usual GP limit in a metropolis (16,000 gp).
Well your average untrained laborer can afford the normal 10 gp/month lifestyle with another 8-10 gold left over each month above and beyond his or her cost of living.
If the same applies to other lifestyles, that means that your average wealthy individual banks about 100+ gp / month, which means you could indeed purchase a minor but permanent magic item every couple of years; which seems pretty reasonable to me since these are permanent magic items.
An extravagant lifestyle would imply greater 1,000+ gp banked each month. Such a wealthy individual could purchase permanent magic items frequently (probably more frequently than your average adventurer). These are major purchases in comparison to the trivial costs of his lifestyle (trivial being the ones he is allowed to ignore or find around the house) but in keeping with someone who had enough wealth to do things like collect fancy cars (I had an uncle who did this). Such an individual could easily stockpile some cash over the year and purchase things up to the usual GP limit in a metropolis (16,000 gp).
Assuming a person saved for 10 years why would they blow it on +1 sword? What other permanent magic item would they want? Now assuming there is mundane permanent magic items wouldn't the medieval setting turn into a society much like we have today except instead of technology it's done by magic. I mean that type of scenario would lead to magic iphones everywhere.
This isn't a big problem or anything, just an observation. I just tend to igonre economics in my games. The only game this really game up was King Maker, my players and I were trying justify why magic economy worked at all.