Mummy's Mask Marble table

[Raigeki]

So I am running a mummy's mask campaign and we are on the first book and the group is in the second house for the adventure and they have come across the adamantine flail and when they come across the marble table with the skulls on it in the description it states it was a marble table and they bit off on that and they want to smash the table for all it's marble and sell it for a lot of money the table is a 20 by 5 foot table which would make a lot of marble to sell and that's way too much money for them at level 2. What do I do?

[Ataraxias]

Is marble even that valuable? I don't see a cost for it anywhere.

[Louise Bishop]

Broken Marble pieces...Maybe they should recover it fully instead of smashing it to bits....

[nicholas storm]

you could give them 1000cp for it.

[nicholas storm]

Table 6-3 has some prices for trade goods. 1 lb of iron is 1sp. 1 lb of wheat is 1cp. I can't imagine broken marble to be worth much, so maybe 1cp per pound (Or 20gp per ton). If they want to spend their time hauling marble to and back, let them.

[Raigeki]

If you look further down on the trade goods chart it shows that 1 pound of marble is 5 gold and you can get plenty of marble off this huge table maybe different 1 lb pieces

[nicholas storm]

You are free to set the price on it - you don't have to follow a table. In my mind broken up marble isn't worth much. You can't make a marble table out of broken pieces of marble.

[Raigeki]

I also have someone who has mending that can mend the pieces together

[nicholas storm]

Mending has a weight limit of 1lb per level and takes 10 minutes to cast.

It's your game, you can set whatever price you want. You can always justify it by saying the marble was low quality and no one wanted it.

[Louise Bishop]

They are assuming a block of marble. Not broken crumbs you can not reshape.

[Dave Justus]

Let them be happy. Call it 1000 lbs of Marble and give then 5000 gp for it.

Then, to keep the balance right, remove 5000 gp of treasure from the adventure.

[Pizza Lord]

Like the others have said, the trade good price is for trade quality marble, which is likely blocks. Broken pieces are not the same thing.

Dave Justus is correct that if the PCs want to try and make money (not necessarily 5,000 gp, but if it's a significant amount) and that this table is not intended to be used as treasure, then the wealth will have to be redistributed in the rest of the adventure. That's not depriving the PCs of anything. They are still getting their treasure, and actually getting it sooner and more easily (your idea of transporting a marble table or smashing it up and then repairing it piece by piece to do not-withstanding) than having to risk their lives elsewhere for loot, and those letting them actually equip or be better prepared for those later encounters.

Of course, there is also the factor that even if you account for the wealth shift, they still may have far too much gold early on and that would trivialize the encounters and thus skew the adventure. So you will likely have to reasonably explain that maybe there are no parties interested in smashed marble nearby and that if they really need money they can sell that adamantine weapon much more quickly and easily.

[graystone]

Raigeki wrote:

So I am running a mummy's mask campaign and we are on the first book and the group is in the second house for the adventure and they have come across the adamantine flail and when they come across the marble table with the skulls on it in the description it states it was a marble table and they bit off on that and they want to smash the table for all it's marble and sell it for a lot of money the table is a 20 by 5 foot table which would make a lot of marble to sell and that's way too much money for them at level 2. What do I do?

A marble countertop is around $125-$250 a square foot [13 lbs]. A 50 lb bag of marble chips is $4.88. Condition matters so to get that 5gp/lb price, they'd need to bring it back in usable pieces. Using 'hulk smash' is going to result in the gravel option.

Using the prices above, marble chips would be worth 1cp/38 lbs...

[avr]

Casting Mending a thousand times or so is a few weeks' work. Maybe more if you're trying to piece together a jigsaw. I don't know this adventure - do they have a few weeks to spare?

[graystone]

avr wrote:

Casting Mending a thousand times or so is a few weeks' work. Maybe more if you're trying to piece together a jigsaw. I don't know this adventure - do they have a few weeks to spare?

It might be viable if everyone in the party can use the cantrip and they do so continuously until finished. However, you run into the fact that at the end of that you have a pile of 1 lb marble pieces as the spell stops working after the object weighs over 1 lb. It wouldn't get you full price but maybe somewhere between slab prices and chips. With some extra work [craft/profession is stoneworking], making it into marble tile would get the best price but THAT'S even more time.

You'd make money faster mugging random goblins for their lunch money...

[Raigeki]

Thanks guys I will use that information you guys give and use that

[Black_Cat]

Final alternative - as they start to break it up it could be a marble veneer or maybe just really well painted stone, so it looks like marble. If you don't want to give them the money for it that is...

[archmagi1]

This is precisely why the auction is there in book 2. Keep them from *being able* to sell the table until then. Have them schmooze, bluff and fluff the price up in the auction and just let them get what they earn for it.

[drsparnum]

I agree with archmagi. Let them learn through a contact that the auction might be a good place to sell the table.

I would let them sell it and make some decent money on it, and not offset it with a decrease in treasure elsewhere. From what I've seen from people's posts in book 2, people feel significantly under-treasured, not over-treasured.

[archmagi1]

Yeah book 2 is basically treasure trickle then about 50k gp at the end dungeon.