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Tell them not to go through the treasure section. Allow the players to earn their items through dungeon crawls and doing cool stuff instead of crafting and spending gold. One way you could do it is reduce the amount of gold they acquire but ensure that 50% of items are usable by the party. The remaining 50%, you could chalk it up to random treasure rolls.
I've seen dms try to put 90% of items found, be determined by random treasure tables and the result was disastrous. Everyone was way below wbl and underpowered for their level since 3/4 of the loot found was unusable by the party. If you want to allow crafting and purchase of magic items, be careful of how much you allow. Depends on the group but it can severely break the game depending on the players.
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I play a low-power, low-level bronze age campaign. Magic items are taken from the cold dead hands of leading villains, or as assistance from quest-givers. There are no stores, except for potions.
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I think I am in love.
Here's the thing, I know that one method of deciding items that exist in cities and towns is to use the generation method presented in the core rulebook and the gamemastery guide, but supposing players want SPECIFIC weapons, should I make locales available where they can get their hands on them or should I tell my players not to go through the treasure section of the book?
How do you guys decide what's available for the players to get? I'm more curious to get your opinions and methods rather than ask for advice since admittedly this is more of a 'discuss it with your players' thing.
As well known as pearls of power are, neither myself nor my group know what they are for example and personally I feel that it adds a certain mystique and excitement when you discover something amazing that is still new for you. I'd like for them to get their hands on strange and wondrous items without it being 'oh, it's the item on page 56 of the ultimate equipment guide'.
I remember back in 3e/3.5, I never took feats like weapon specialization or weapon focus because I knew that there was no telling what weapons a person might find on the field (we never bought items ourselves because the DM rarely gave us gold and because we didn't know what magical items cost or what was available anyway).
I'd personally rather magical weapons were something that had a purpose/story behind them, for example: that powerful knife you wrenched out of the mindflayer lord's hands was his special Foe of the chosen, an ancient weapon belonging to an ancient enemy of the mindflayers which is incidentally a +1 aberration bane dagger. It isn't perfectly useful to the character, but it has roots in either the story or in the world itself.
I'm curious to hear how you guys go about this matter.
I agree, makes sense to me.
I struggle with this same question alot in my games. I prefer as a player and a DM to earn/reward my magic in game, similar to Yora's method above.
Everytime a player develops a new PC it begins with the visualization of what the PC will grow up to be and this includes the magic items he or she will posses. As a DM I think we should work at meeting that players visualization, after all that is part of the fun of developing and playing a PF character. As a DM you have a lot of expectations to meet. A player who is excited about his axe swinging, shield bashing Viking with all the feats in place to bash Saxon skulls is going become very disinterested if the campaign doesn't give him the opportunity to obtain the uber-arms he drooled about when he developed his Viking.
I think everyone agrees that after a memorable encounter, having a hero pluck a magic weapon from your slain foes hand, is more satisfying than going to magic-mart and plopping a small sack of gold on the counter.
Just as memorable from my standpoint is the crafting of magic. The visual of the party wizard proudly presenting an enchanted blade to his companion after a week of nail-bitting crafting is just as strong.
However, magic-mart style does have a place in the game. It allows for direct interaction with otherwise ignored NPC's. DM's spend hours developing a living breathing community for their players to experience and the magic-mart gives these hapless NPC's a chance to shine. It also moves the pace of the game forward focusing on the action and plot more so than the mundane.
I have noticed I tend to use magic-mart early in my camapaign to establish relationships with NPC's to help immerse the players in my world and set the mood. As the campaign progresses the other two methods of availabiltiy become more common.
I don't think every item should have a story behind it, but certainly some should, especially if they are a focus of the campaign (Serithial in CocT for example). That said, the only story of the item that really matters is the one your player writes while using it!
Ulitmately, its a balance of all these and more that is probably best.
Dismounts soap box!
There are many different approaches possible, all equally valid, ranging from: "everything is available, don't bother to roll" to "ignore the lists; talk to the guy if you want to know what he's selling, and it's all unique" to not having any good magical stuff for sale at all.
I notice a lot of people in my area leaning towards the former, but personally I really prefer the unique items with a story. But that's generally a lot of work.
The ultimate "every item is unique and has a story" RPG is Earthdawn, by the way. And you need to learn its story in order to make full use of an item.
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It seems to me that it must be an exceedingly odd campaign world where all magic items are in the hands of evil villains. Somebody had to create the magic items in the first place, why would this ability/technology suddenly disappear? How come nobody can make or sell it now? Moreover, why do only BBEG have them? Is it a prerequisite that you have to be evil to create magic items? And, if all the magic items are in the hands of BBEG, then what stops them from simply destroying all good/civilization/whatever they want? I mean a few underpowered heroes certainly wouldn’t be able to stem the tide if all the bad guys have magic items and nobody else does. Just seems strange to me.
Besides being strange/odd, it is unbalancing. I mean good tactics and well made characters can compensate a lot, but after a few levels they get underpowered. If this is what the GM is intending and is knowledgeable/capable enough to balance that, than it can be ok. Or, maybe it is just a “Brutal” type game with lots of PC death, but the players should know/accept that upfront. Moreover, this can be seriously limiting for players that create characters with an end goal in mind. Don’t ever take weapon focus or exotic proficiency cause who the heck knows what will drop. Forget the critical focus chain because you likely won’t find a weapon with a high crit range. Think long and hard about playing a wizard because you will have to rely on getting lucky as far as spells outside of your two when you level. This could seriously limit your utility.
In my current campaign the DM is of a similar mind to those posting above. I made the mistake of choosing to use an archetype to build a polearm user. So now I am running around and whacking things with a quarterstaff because apparently nobody makes polearms, you can’t buy a polearm, you can’t trade for a polearm, I certainly can’t craft a polearm, and no BBEG has deemed it worthwhile weapon to use a polearm. Ohh and my starting polearm got magically warped. How does this make any sense? Is it really more fun this way? More fun for whom?
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The game, as written, assumes availability of magic items, arms and weapons. If you restrict them you are reducing the expected power of your players' characters, and should adjust encounters appropriately.
I personally like to have my players quest to find an npc who can craft the magic items they seek, save for novelty items they could find in pawn shops, the mysticism us in finding a super powerful crater who can actually make what they want, I also have strict restriction on the lengths to which items can be crafted
I.e. no adding 5 to the dc for lacking a component, you have to find a way to provide everything, and if you don't wanna take the feats yourself, you pay full price
Last rule, no npc can craft items with a higher CL than their own
no matter how many times I've created or otherwise provided specific items for specific characters, they've always ended up selling them off and buying or crafting what they want anyway, so just knowing that's my groups play style that's how I handle it
Magical craters should be just as rare and special as the magical items that people want, so I balance the magic shop vs magic loot argument for my group
I cover this on many levels:
1- Ask the PLAYER the item types they see the CHARACTER getting and a bit of the why so you can adapt treasures to include items that will be enjoyed and even adapted to some unknown situation further along the adventure.
2-I usually have places where you can find town scale appropriate items but not magic shops. These places always have conditions or limits to meet or be met.
Ex.: Lately in Riddleport they got the information they got for potions were special brews from the Publican House but since it’s a CG temple they make you swear you’ll use them to do good or fight evil. The priests won’t spy the buyers but if the words come back that they did wrong then they will be registered in the black book and the names spread as “bad folk”.
Also in Riddleport They went to Cypherlodge to get scrolls where they got access to most proper-level spells but the buyer were registered (name, origin, description and quick face drawing) and signed a half-legal agreement to offer a copy of any new spell discovery for which they would be significantly rewarded.
Those don’t cost anything but they are not worthless.
3- Magic Crafting material isn’t gold (it does have a gp cost and a value) so it’s availability has to be considered with the scale of the area. Binding the Frost to your Enchanted Mithral Kukri From the Small Dragon’s Lair (weapon +1) would require 3000gp WORTH of specific material so either in a small city or with knowing what and where to get it…
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Slime, I understand your approach, and here are my thoughts/reactions to them:
1. This leads towards the situation where the world somehow just happens to accommodate the PC in such a way that it can damage verisimilitude far more thoroughly than just allowing magic items to be purchased at the right place for the right amount of gold. "Hey guys, look at this! I've been hoping to find a +2 furious, courageous falchion and wouldn't you know it, the ogre had one locked in this chest!"
2. Having magic items available but only through some role play or special consideration runs the risk of turning every significant search for a particular item into its own side quest. That can be fine, but if the main campaign is time-dependent and critically important to the world's future, then you have the scenario where the adventuring party is dawdling around some minor lord's house bargaining with him for some trinket while the fate of the world hangs in the balance. Oh, and this doesn't change the whole "and how is it that Lord Baldynose just happens to have the monk's desired amulet of mighty fists enchanted with shocking?"
3. Requiring specific rare material components to allow a magic item to be crafted again just duplicates the side-quest effects of #2 above.
I know you and many others who desire the "flavor" of rare and hard-to-obtain magic items love to create this sort of world, but frankly I've been there, done that, got the T-shirt (it was a side quest, btw) and really, really don't see the point of all that rigmarole just to keep the GM's personal taste satisfied.
If your whole group loves it, fine. But usually what I see is the GM mandating these sorts of the things "because it's better that way" while the players mostly grin and bear it.
... the world somehow just happens to accommodate the PC in such a way that it can damage verisimilitude far more thoroughly than just allowing magic items to be purchased ...
I see what you mean, but I don't do it as a Master of the World DM but as a member of the group of players. That's why I specified talking to the Player about an item Type. That is what we like to have. Not an exact magic item description that will optimize the Character.
I mentionned to my DM (that is a player in my game) that I would be interested in trying sling-bullet/stone version of alchemical flask (no specs mentionned) since we have met a NPC Brewer we established good exchanges with (not yet sure of his type of character).
As for dealing with roleplaying exchanges or side quests we usualy don't have to go deep about it but including NPCs or Factions in the storyline and just using those already in the adventure path usually make things more interesting and remembered.
To each his own spin on things.
Slime, I understand your approach, and here are my thoughts/reactions to them:
1. This leads towards the situation where the world somehow just happens to accommodate the PC in such a way that it can damage verisimilitude far more thoroughly than just allowing magic items to be purchased at the right place for the right amount of gold. "Hey guys, look at this! I've been hoping to find a +2 furious, courageous falchion and wouldn't you know it, the ogre had one locked in this chest!"
2. Having magic items available but only through some role play or special consideration runs the risk of turning every significant search for a particular item into its own side quest. That can be fine, but if the main campaign is time-dependent and critically important to the world's future, then you have the scenario where the adventuring party is dawdling around some minor lord's house bargaining with him for some trinket while the fate of the world hangs in the balance. Oh, and this doesn't change the whole "and how is it that Lord Baldynose just happens to have the monk's desired amulet of mighty fists enchanted with shocking?"
3. Requiring specific rare material components to allow a magic item to be crafted again just duplicates the side-quest effects of #2 above.
I know you and many others who desire the "flavor" of rare and hard-to-obtain magic items love to create this sort of world, but frankly I've been there, done that, got the T-shirt (it was a side quest, btw) and really, really don't see the point of all that rigmarole just to keep the GM's personal taste satisfied.
If your whole group loves it, fine. But usually what I see is the GM mandating these sorts of the things "because it's better that way" while the players mostly grin and bear it.
for my campaign that im creating ive decided im allowing myself to assume one thing: my players will want things
for that reason, im making it part of the main quest that they have to find someone who can craft magic weapons, and i also plan on having all NPCs that arent bosses scale with my PCs, since they are lvl 3, they have to find someone who can craft magic weapons at lvl 3, the only one who can do it is a forgemaster dwarf, which leads them to the dwarven cityyou want me to craft you magic weapons? i can do it, sure, but first i need something... quest ensues
A mighty quest, to hold the crafting chronicles at bay.
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People familiar with my admittedly oddball houserules are aware that I've cut out the middleman and simply insitituted a system by which the players themselves can accept responsibility for figuring out exactly what the sword they just found actually does, within level-based restrictions -- and they can "learn" its other abilities (i.e., add them) as they level up. Once at their personal limit, they can find/craft a limited amount of other stuff.
Then they can spend most of their money on hookers and blow and castles instead, and I don't need to put a Magick Item Shoppe on every corner.
Had a dodgy rogue skirmisher character a few games back, spent the entire haul of a dungeon on hookers and blow. The others slightly upgraded their magic items. Whoopty-do, the down time of my character was a lot more interesting, he even came back from his holidays exhausted, wane and smelling very fruity indeed.
He may have been a little out of it for a few days, lol.
My rule is, basically, if they're in a city they can buy whatever they can afford. It saves time.
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Heh, I'll get slammed for this, but what the heck.
Virtually every thread on this subject is filled with indignant GMs complaining about how magic item shops ruin their sense of "rare and wondrous magic items" and so they institute a variety of means to thwart the players' desire to acquire magical stuff that suits their characters.
There's only one real major problem with this.
In Pathfinder magic items are neither rare nor wondrous.
It's just not part of the game. Magic items are not only not rare, they are baked into the power curve expectations of the game. +X armor, swords, amulets, rings, etc. are expected by the game designers to be readily available if the character has the cash and/or time to buy/make them.
The bottom line is that if you are playing a game where +1 swords make the characters swoon with joy....
You really aren't playing Pathfinder. You're playing "Lord of the Rings" or "Conan the Barbarian" or "Xena: Warrior Princess" or something.
As a player, I sort of want to play Pathfinder. So as a GM I run Pathfinder games for my players.
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BA, when I want to have something "rare and wondrous" I make something up that is truly rare and wondrous. I favor magic items that have powers that are keyed to the owner's power level, with new capabilities becoming available when the PC reaches milestones.
But a +2 flaming sword? Pfahgh. If you want one, you just find one and buy it, make it yourself or pay someone to do it. I've got more interesting and (hopefully) fun things to do as a GM than micro manage your inventory.
Heh, I'll get slammed for this, but what the heck.
Virtually every thread on this subject is filled with indignant GMs complaining about how magic item shops ruin their sense of "rare and wondrous magic items" and so they institute a variety of means to thwart the players' desire to acquire magical stuff that suits their characters.
There's only one real major problem with this.
In Pathfinder magic items are neither rare nor wondrous.
It's just not part of the game. Magic items are not only not rare, they are baked into the power curve expectations of the game. +X armor, swords, amulets, rings, etc. are expected by the game designers to be readily available if the character has the cash and/or time to buy/make them.
The bottom line is that if you are playing a game where +1 swords make the characters swoon with joy....
You really aren't playing Pathfinder. You're playing "Lord of the Rings" or "Conan the Barbarian" or "Xena: Warrior Princess" or something.
As a player, I sort of want to play Pathfinder. So as a GM I run Pathfinder games for my players.
AD, do you allow any magic items players want to be purchased?
My only issue with magic item availability is that if the players have the run of it, there is always a best choice. That pretty much elimnates 90 percent of magic items that have been designed. How do you adjudicate that?
AD, do you allow any magic items players want to be purchased?My only issue with magic item availability is that if the players have the run of it, there is always a best choice. That pretty much elimnates 90 percent of magic items that have been designed. How do you adjudicate that?
Riggler, I think the actual CRB and GM's Guide guidelines are not a bad place to start for determining availability.
Most of my group's games occur at levels 1 - 12 or so. Every now and then we'll have a higher level game, but that's pretty rare. In general the players I have do not cheese up builds around some strange and unusual magic item. But they do look for specific enchantments primarily on weapons or armor.
For the most part in my games (and the games our group's other GMs run) magic items are more or less commodities. There is a magic item economy in my own campaign world with a world-spanning distribution system so that if you have the gold, and you know where to go, you can either buy something or find someone who can make it. The world-ruling wizard's guild maintains a network of magical crafters who interact with special magical teleportation boxes which allow them to teleport magical items to and from a central repository which is maintained by the wizard's guild in a special extra-planar location that is one of the most closely guarded secrets in the entire multi-world "universe".
But that usually only comes into play when someone wants something particularly powerful or unusual. Your standard +2 flaming sword is something that could be located in several cities or commissioned from one of dozens of magical weapon makers. Or, if the player wants to invest in crafting feats, they can make them themselves.
I am strongly considering allowing a 4e style of moving enchantments from one compatible item to another. I just don't see why such a capability wouldn't exist in a magical world filled with cosmic-reality altering magic users.
Again, I know it puts me in a minority, but I like to cede a limited amount of narrative control to the players and see where they go with it. If the player decides it would be really cool if an iron nail found in the dungeon is actually an ancient artifact, I like for there to be mechanics allowing him/her to develop that idea within appropriate level-based guidelines, instead of telling him "NO! That's just an iron nail! You either accept the magic items I give you, or else go BUY them somewhere!"
What's King Arthur's legend without Excalibur? Yeah, maybe the GM just handed the thing to him, or maybe he tossed 200,000 gp into the Vend-O-Lake for it, but I personally think it's even cooler if Arthur's player is the one who came up with that whole idea for his PC. And meanwhile Wayland's player, also wanting a cool sword for his PC but not wanting to use the same gimmick, points to his max ranks in Craft (Weaponmaking) and says "THAT'S where my sword is coming from!"
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I've made this point before, but the same old cliches and straw men get rolled out every time this subject comes up, so I'll make it again.
There is a fundamental difference between the concept of a special and unique item, and the concept of magic items as implemented in Pathfinder by RAW. That difference is expected to be covered in Pathfinder not with "magic items" but instead with "artifacts."
Swords like Excalibur or Stormbringer or other famous magical weapons or armor from literature would translate into a PF environment as an artifact, not a magic weapon.
Artifacts exist entirely to allow for the perpetuation of that mythical, unique, legendary item that can drive a campaign, alter the balance of power or allow for legendary feats of prowess.
Magical items themselves are just tools. Replaceable, fungible, re-usable tools. Tools that are necessary for PCs to have access to for them to remain balanced according to the standard rules of the game.
One problem with the current system is that the higher end of magic items blurs the line between magic items and artifacts since you can create extremely powerful magic items using the standard item creation rules.
This is just one of the things that I think demonstrates how completely and utterly broken the magic item system is in Pathfinder.
If I had the energy I had as a young 20 year old, I'd rewrite the magic item system into a multi-tiered system which allowed for a reasonable magic item economy without leading to complaints about "PCs can just buy anything they want".
Just off the top of my head I would have the following tiers:
1. Non-magical enhanced items. These would be items of superior craftsmanship, or items using rare materials to achieve specific mechanical enhancements. Think of an extended "masterwork" model, including non-magical potions, elixirs and drugs which would duplicate some low-level magical effects. These would all be commodities available wherever the market supported their creation and purchase.
2. Minor magical items. These would be simple magically enhanced items that gave specific benefits, mostly charms or trinkets. These would be things like healing or buffing potions, amulets of warding or good luck, minor attribute enhancers (belt of str, headband of wisdom, etc) but with limited benefits, topping out mostly at what is now the +2 range. These would still be commodities and more or less freely available as the market allows.
3. Major magical items. These would be items created only by the most powerful of magical craftsmen, and as such would be rare and costly. You wouldn't be able to find these in any but the most expensive shop, and they would only be usable by characters who met specific requirements. Mostly these would be the result of some quest or accomplishment.
4. Legendary magical items. These would be items that had to be created for a single creature and would not work for another creature without some powerful magic or ritual. They simply could not be sold because they would not be usable for anyone but their owner.
5. Artifacts. Much like the current idea of artifacts, except there would be only a few of these, not entire splat books full of them.
Also I would allow magical items to be disenchanted to recover and re-use their magical powers for the creation of other magic items.
Handle it as it fits your playstyle. Find items in dungeon, give them as treasure. If one of you player got a item crafter, find a cool way to let him craft items. Eberron style? Dragonlance style? It's all about settings, all rules about magic are optional and should fit your campaign.
There is a fundamental difference between the concept of a special and unique item, and the concept of magic items as implemented in Pathfinder by RAW. That difference is expected to be covered in Pathfinder not with "magic items" but instead with "artifacts."
Take all the expected minor magic items the RAW expect you to have: a magic sword, a belt of physical might, a cloak of resistance. What's the difference if they're acquired piecemeal, purchased/found as separate items, or if the PC "discovers" that the sword he found does all of those things (more as he levels up), and then he names it?
Mechanically, we're representing the exact same things: +X to attacks and damage, +Y to physical stats, +Z to saving throws. There is no difference there. The only difference is in the fluff: character "A" might have a sword, a belt, and a cloak; character "B" might have some named sword he recovered from gods-know-where. The story is all that changes, not the crunchy stuff.
There is a fundamental difference between the concept of a special and unique item, and the concept of magic items as implemented in Pathfinder by RAW. That difference is expected to be covered in Pathfinder not with "magic items" but instead with "artifacts."Take all the expected minor magic items the RAW expect you to have: a magic sword, a belt of physical might, a cloak of resistance. What's the difference if they're acquired piecemeal, purchased/found as separate items, or if the PC "discovers" that the sword he found does all of those things (more as he levels up), and then he names it?
Mechanically, we're representing the exact same things: +X to attacks and damage, +Y to physical stats, +Z to saving throws. There is no difference there. The only difference is in the fluff: character "A" might have a sword, a belt, and a cloak; character "B" might have some named sword he recovered from gods-know-where. The story is all that changes, not the crunchy stuff.
Kirth, the difference is that if your character is going to continue to improve and grow (and level up) then those items that character "B" received as a named item from "god knows where" will end up being either tossed into a trunk when character "B" finds a shinier magic item (needed to maintain his power balance) or sold with a teary eye, or else the GM will have to figure out how his named sword somehow gained additional powers.
That's how magic items work in Pathfinder. It hasn't taken most players long to decide that getting all gaga-eyed over some +2 sword and lovingly detailing its history, name and legend was not worth the trouble when they end up just dumping old "Excalifragilistic" for some unnamed sword they looted from a dead ogre's pile of junk.
If you just make the same sword more and more powerful as the character levels up (and presumably do the same with his armor, amulets, belts, etc.) then you have a problem with what he will do with all his unnecessary wealth.
That's how magic items work in Pathfinder.
Forgive me; I'd thought I was abundantly clear that it's NOT how they work in Kirthfinder. The title of the thread is "How do YOU handle..." rather than "how is X handled RAW," and my very first post pointed out that I use "admittedly idiosyncratic houserules." I don't know how to be any more clear about that.
Kirth, the difference is that if your character is going to continue to improve and grow (and level up) then those items that character "B" received as a named item from "god knows where" will end up being either tossed into a trunk when character "B" finds a shinier magic item (needed to maintain his power balance) or sold with a teary eye, or else the GM will have to figure out how his named sword somehow gained additional powers.
With respect, the way I handle it is none of the above. Within the pre-set limits on total WBL, the player him/herself gets to decide where those new properties are coming from. Maybe PC #1 does toss the old sword in a trunk and inherit a monster's that has all the shiny new bonuses he needs to compete. Maybe PC #2 continues training with the sword he already has and realizes that, used correctly, he can also use it to deflect rays like a lightsaber (read: deflection bonus to AC). And maybe PC #3 simply buys a ring of protection. That's up to the player to decide, unless he/she asks for help.
That's how magic items work in Pathfinder.Forgive me; I'd thought I was abundantly clear that it's NOT how they work in Kirthfinder. The title of the thread is "How do YOU handle..." rather than "how is X handled RAW," and my very first post pointed out that I use "admittedly idiosyncratic houserules." I don't know how to be any more clear about that.
Hmm.. I'm not sure how you thought my initial comments were directed at you then Kirth. I was responding to your comments on my original post which were directed at general PF players.
If you've solved it for your group, good for you. Your approach is similar to my own as far as I can tell.
Got a new game in the works and I have come up with a cunning ruse in relation to items. There are quite a lot of magic weapons of the plain variety, standard swords, clubs, axes, spears. These weapons are old, so the magic support for them is high. Exotic and excellent weapons, not many of those are magic.
Going to add plenty of low use wondrous items, crystals with charges, healing crystals (use reiki, lol).
Almost no stat boosting stuff.
I recommend that you do away with magic stores, and have component gathering for crafting an adventure in itself. My personal opinion is when a list of magical items become part of a build, your probably making it to easy. And you will most likely be forced to retire the characters earlier because. when they have access to that much power you start having to get a little ridiculous to keep them challenged.
Besides powerful magical items are kind of the coolest things to get in an rpg, if you let the players run wild, what are going to reward them with for doing awesome, that they can't get themselves with all the magical items they just bought.
Balance in all things.
In my campaigns, most magic shops sell a wide selection of potions and scrolls, so you are fairly guaranteed to find your potion of cure light wounds if you need it, but only a small selection of random permanent magic items. There are some exceptions, but powerful magical items are never considered automatically available. Instead they must be obtained via RP or crafting.
I'm unashamedly old school, so crafting necessitates a degree of questing to obtain rare and obscure magical components (although I offset this requirement by reducing gp costs).
I'm a big fan of randomly rolling for and creating magical items in hoards. I probably provide a bit more than standard in acknowledgement that not all the goodies are useful to PCs. However it's fun to see some of the PCs adapting their builds to respond to cool items they've found in treasure hauls rather than resolutely sticking to their planned builds.
My PCs often are below WBL or less than optimal in some areas - I just take this into account when building encounters.
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Players choose how their WBL is spent, as that's what the system is balanced on.
Have to agree there. Otherwise, it's way too easy for players to have gear equal to their WBL without it being all that useful to their characters. Sure, a level 8 fighter whose only magic item is a +6 headband of Charisma is actually a bit above the expected WBL, but he's not really getting the full value of his WBL.
Unless the GM and the player work pretty closely on loot drops, it's easy to run into problems here if your WBL mainly comes from drops. Even if the GM is trying to be helpful, there will be times when what the GM thinks would be cool/helpful might be off base.
It's the same issue as giving your players gold, but then not allowing them actually buy anything with it. Your WBL only counts if you can actually use it.
Honestly, I rather like Kirth's system of just abstracting WBL and saying it's up to the players to say how they're getting those bonuses. It gets the WBL issue dealt with nice and quickly.
The big problem I've tended to see in games where you need to do crafting component hunts or spend time hunting around and talking to bunches of NPCs to find items is that all of this eats up game time. So, if the party needs to devote a significant chunk of time to shopping trips, make sure those trips are at least as entertaining as whatever else they could be doing with their time. I've definitely had a few 3.5 games where I wanted to stop playing "Shops and Storekeepers" and get back to "Dungeons and Dragons."
All I can say is that my players and I have been ignoring WBL for years, and we've never really run into any problems.
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Only the very basic can be found never more than six cl items. If they want more I tell them they have to make it themselves. I don't believe casters turn out magor items just to sell to a fighter or rogue just so they can kill them with stuff they make. They would never be sold life insurance if they did.
when you calculate WBL do you count all loot at full value or half? It seems rather important because not all players are going to keep and cherish every item they find, in fact, most stuff we find gets sold off, cutting WBL in half if we don't find twice as much stuff.
Infuse life into the process.
Alright, so a player wants to purchase a specific magical item.
Who would make said magical item? What is the setting in which they make said item? Does the authority of their community dictate what they can make or who they can sell it two?
I'd answer those questions first, and go from there. That third one is probably the avenue to a lot of adventures.
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This really depends on the setting. How high magic is your setting, and what is the availability of magic items. The two are connected. If you can go to a store and buy a specific item, you're dealing with a high magic setting and all that comes with it.
You need to decide how much you want magic to be a part of your setting. This decision will have ramifications in a lot of areas. Is magic something rare and mysterious that the average person has no experience with, or are magic users and items common, where even a commoner might have a magic broom to sweep the floor?
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It seems to me that it must be an exceedingly odd campaign world where all magic items are in the hands of evil villains. Somebody had to create the magic items in the first place, why would this ability/technology suddenly disappear?
Power corrupts. Those people with the most magic items have the most power, and are therefore the most evil. This makes perfect sense!