Gold. How do you deal with it?

[Temperans]

graystone wrote:

Arcaian wrote:

graystone wrote:

Proven wrote:

Not for discounts unless the party is taking a many month downtime between adventures.

There is NEVER a discount: whatever money you make per day at crafting is the exact same money you could put in your pocket for Earn Income. At no point does the crafter make any ground by making the item vs buying it.

That's not entirely true - it's substantially easier to craft an on-level item in a small hamlet than get an on-level job. If your adventure is in a region where plentiful high-level jobs for a variety of Earn Income skills are available, there's not a difference - but sometimes you're closer to the Realm of the Mammoth Lords than Absalom :)

Settlement levels used for buying items and jobs are "simply guidelines, however, and a GM should make exceptions at their discretion." As such, if a PC can't find jobs as high as the items they are making, that's at the "discretion" of the DM. A DM that's likely to limit jobs to the level of low level settlements is most likely the same DM that's going to limit the patterns you can find for items to make, hence not a lot of profit for one over the other IMO. ;)

Those are also the same GMs who might want to try putting constraints on crafting.

[Perpdepog]

graystone wrote:

Arcaian wrote:

graystone wrote:

Proven wrote:

Not for discounts unless the party is taking a many month downtime between adventures.

There is NEVER a discount: whatever money you make per day at crafting is the exact same money you could put in your pocket for Earn Income. At no point does the crafter make any ground by making the item vs buying it.

That's not entirely true - it's substantially easier to craft an on-level item in a small hamlet than get an on-level job. If your adventure is in a region where plentiful high-level jobs for a variety of Earn Income skills are available, there's not a difference - but sometimes you're closer to the Realm of the Mammoth Lords than Absalom :)

Settlement levels used for buying items and jobs are "simply guidelines, however, and a GM should make exceptions at their discretion." As such, if a PC can't find jobs as high as the items they are making, that's at the "discretion" of the DM. A DM that's likely to limit jobs to the level of low level settlements is most likely the same DM that's going to limit the patterns you can find for items to make, hence not a lot of profit for one over the other IMO. ;)

This feels a bit like a stereotype, and not one I agree with. It's not how I'd be running things, anyway. If there is a crafter in the party then why not give them blueprints for higher-level items? And once they have those blueprints they should be able to produce them anywhere they can find the time and materials to do so.

Conversely, the book does give sample tasks for various proficiency levels of jobs. Take Alcohol Lore, for example. It's a lot easier to find the master proficiency level, "run a large brewery," in a settlement that, you know, has breweries.
This sticks out to me as a specific way to throw crafting characters a bone, by making their equivalent "earn income" type activity more widely applicable at their level, no matter where they are. Not to say that crafting couldn't use some tweaks--I'm all for things like reducing the number of days an item takes to make, or just using the normal earn income rules, if the item is significantly below-level, for example--but it feels like a stretch to assume that all GMs who restrict settlement level would do the same for crafting just because.

[graystone]

Perpdepog wrote:

This feels a bit like a stereotype, and not one I agree with. It's not how I'd be running things, anyway. If there is a crafter in the party then why not give them blueprints for higher-level items? And once they have those blueprints they should be able to produce them anywhere they can find the time and materials to do so.

I don't see it as a "stereotype" and don't really see it the same way. From my point of view, the general progression is from smaller locations to larger, so the natural progression for items bought flows. IF you trip over a high level pattern before you could buy it, sure you can do that but I don't see a reason to have crafters get one before buying items of similar levels: in a similar way, someone could trip over a job much higher than the local they are in too. I mean, it's cool if YOU pass out free stuff for crafters but I don't think that's the general way things go: while I've seen some formula as treasure [usually uncommon+], the VAST amount of them I see PC's get is though cash transactions.

Perpdepog wrote:

This sticks out to me as a specific way to throw crafting characters a bone, by making their equivalent "earn income" type activity more widely applicable at their level, no matter where they are. Not to say that crafting couldn't use some tweaks--I'm all for things like reducing the number of days an item takes to make, or just using the normal earn income rules, if the item is significantly below-level, for example--but it feels like a stretch to assume that all GMs who restrict settlement level would do the same for crafting just because.

I'm not sure why crafters would NEED to be thrown a bone. They have the ability to create items that might not be widely available by making them once they get a formula for it in return for it taking more time: seems balance as is without giving them any extras.

PS: I would agree with some tweaks for sure.

[Proven]

Isn’t there a line in the GMG where they state that settlement levels in Golarion are generally capped around level 10 or 15? What about outleveling a settlement during an adventure that takes 2-4 levels? That right there would be a simple reason before any large GM fiat that players would need to craft over buy. Even something like Fall of Plaguestone chaffed at my players because the settlement level, and then in Age of Ashes where I’m a player myself at the end of Book 2, there’s been issues with Breachill’s settlement level for a few levels now.

But maybe I’m biased because I’m exactly the type of GM who would design adventures with players receiving recipes above settlement level often. If an adventure in a specific area lasts 2-4 levels, the settlement level would likely be set in the lower half of that range. It gives a sense of outgrowing the old town and the new town having new options more relevant to your current and near-future power level.

I can also see options for higher level Earn Income happening in a similar way, but it would definitely be for less used skills and Lore options.

[Luke Styer]

Proven wrote:

Isn’t there a line in the GMG where they state that settlement levels in Golarion are generally capped around level 10 or 15?

I’m really curious to see what level settlement Absalom is going to be. I’m on book four of Agents of Edgewatch, and City of Lost Omens is nowhere to be seen, but even just the settlement stat block would be nice.

[Temperans]

The only guideline I found for city level was that a metropolis was level 8 or higher. With the level of inhabitants having an effect. But it didn't say exactly how.

[Arcaian]

graystone wrote:

Arcaian wrote:

graystone wrote:

Proven wrote:

Not for discounts unless the party is taking a many month downtime between adventures.

There is NEVER a discount: whatever money you make per day at crafting is the exact same money you could put in your pocket for Earn Income. At no point does the crafter make any ground by making the item vs buying it.

That's not entirely true - it's substantially easier to craft an on-level item in a small hamlet than get an on-level job. If your adventure is in a region where plentiful high-level jobs for a variety of Earn Income skills are available, there's not a difference - but sometimes you're closer to the Realm of the Mammoth Lords than Absalom :)

Settlement levels used for buying items and jobs are "simply guidelines, however, and a GM should make exceptions at their discretion." As such, if a PC can't find jobs as high as the items they are making, that's at the "discretion" of the DM. A DM that's likely to limit jobs to the level of low level settlements is most likely the same DM that's going to limit the patterns you can find for items to make, hence not a lot of profit for one over the other IMO. ;)

You only need to visit a city with access to higher-level formulas infrequently to get those formulas - if you have time to pop into a place like Absalom once every ~3 levels, but then spend most of your time in the wilderness/villages/small towns, the crafter will be able to use those formulas for much longer than that work is available to people using Earn Income. This is all very campaign dependent - not only do you have the location of the campaign, but also access to teleportation magic or other ways to get to these sorts of places, and how flexible the GM is with the level of jobs available. I'm currently running content set in Kintargo, which is not a hugely high level city; were I to be running it in PF2, I'd definitely rule that you can't get many Legendary-level jobs (anything outside of opera-related work is probably limited close to the city level), but it's not hard to pop to one of the nearer cities with a days travel and purchase a large set of formulae to work on for the next level or two! :)

[graystone]

Proven wrote:

Isn’t there a line in the GMG where they state that settlement levels in Golarion are generally capped around level 10 or 15?

Not that I know of. It's possible I haven't seen it but a quick search didn't bring it up.

Temperans wrote:

The only guideline I found for city level was that a metropolis was level 8 or higher. With the level of inhabitants having an effect. But it didn't say exactly how.

Yep, that's what I found. The settlement level isn't the whole story though. Settlement Abilities can boost level for buying/jobs too:

"Artists’ Haven: It’s easier to find higher-level tasks involving Performance or art, as well as buyers willing to pay more for art objects."

"City of Artisans: Items of up to 4 levels higher are available from a particular category the settlement."

There is also this in the rules: "If a character’s level is higher than the settlement’s, that character can usually use their own influence and leverage to acquire higher-level items, as they convince shops to place specialty orders or artisans to craft custom goods, though it might take a bit of time for such orders to be fulfilled."

Combined, this means PC's don't have to run into issues with being higher level than the settlement they are in unless the DM really wants them to.

[Perpdepog]

graystone wrote:

Perpdepog wrote:

This feels a bit like a stereotype, and not one I agree with. It's not how I'd be running things, anyway. If there is a crafter in the party then why not give them blueprints for higher-level items? And once they have those blueprints they should be able to produce them anywhere they can find the time and materials to do so.

I don't see it as a "stereotype" and don't really see it the same way. From my point of view, the general progression is from smaller locations to larger, so the natural progression for items bought flows. IF you trip over a high level pattern before you could buy it, sure you can do that but I don't see a reason to have crafters get one before buying items of similar levels: in a similar way, someone could trip over a job much higher than the local they are in too. I mean, it's cool if YOU pass out free stuff for crafters but I don't think that's the general way things go: while I've seen some formula as treasure [usually uncommon+], the VAST amount of them I see PC's get is though cash transactions.

Perpdepog wrote:

This sticks out to me as a specific way to throw crafting characters a bone, by making their equivalent "earn income" type activity more widely applicable at their level, no matter where they are. Not to say that crafting couldn't use some tweaks--I'm all for things like reducing the number of days an item takes to make, or just using the normal earn income rules, if the item is significantly below-level, for example--but it feels like a stretch to assume that all GMs who restrict settlement level would do the same for crafting just because.

I'm not sure why crafters would NEED to be thrown a bone. They have the ability to create items that might not be widely available by making them once they get a formula for it in return for it taking more time: seems balance as is without giving them any extras.

PS: I would agree with some tweaks for sure.

Ah, I see the difference in our thinking. I was approaching the idea from a more sandboxy direction. Like the party going from a big city off on an adventure, and coming across a lower-level town, or at least, a smaller, less central town. Those are the kinds of places where crafting might earn its keep; the crafter can still work at their highest-level task no matter where they are, unlike someone with lore who is using that lore to make income, because not all towns, regardless of their level, may have the necessary infrastructure to support it.

[Proven]

graystone wrote:

There is also this in the rules: "If a character’s level is higher than the settlement’s, that character can usually use their own influence and leverage to acquire higher-level items, as they convince shops to place specialty orders or artisans to craft custom goods, though it might take a bit of time for such orders to be fulfilled."

Combined, this means PC's don't have to run into issues with being higher level than the settlement they are in unless the DM really wants them to.

This definitely looks like a release valve for players that don’t take crafting, but that along with the other options you and others have mentioned for creating downtime choices all end up being methods for seasoning to preferred taste. At least that’s what I’ve concluded since my last post. You have options for whether your player wants to invest in crafting or not, just as you have options for loot depending on whether players are willing to give other weapons a try with different runes or if they’ll always just want to stick with their single weapon until they can upgrade the runes on it.

[Reverse]

What appeals to the character to spend gold on is fundamentally different from what appeals to the player, which is where the economy mostly falls down.

If the character makes enough money to buy back their families lost farm and retire to it - a fairly easy goal for adventurer money - the character gets what they want. But the player actively gets punished - they're out of the game until they have another character to play (and so most players won't design characters with goals like this, or those goals will get subsumed by play goals "Someone has to stop the Devil Lord from rising! If I retire to my farm, he'll burn all the land sooner or later!")

Things that would be fun for the players to have aren't all that fun in the game. Most people here would far rather lie around on a tropical island eating fancy meals with their beautiful harem of expensive girlfriends and boyfriends than spend their money on tools that make them better at their job then risk their life crawling through a sewer with that tool.

For the player in real life, you'd get to experience the joy of what that food tastes like, how good the sex with your harem feels, how warm the sun is, how relaxed you feel.

In a game, the GM tells you that the sun beats down pleasantly upon you, your loins quiver, and a very pleasant day passes. It's 20 seconds of entertainment for the player, and actively boring when the GM describes similar circumstances over and over again.

Fantasy economies of tabletops will never make sense when player goals don't align with PC goals for spending.

[Claxon]

Reverse wrote:

Fantasy economies of tabletops will never make sense when player goals don't align with PC goals for spending.

And that is why the ideal situation is to effectively remove gold as a means of character progression.

Use automatic bonus progression, but take it even further.

ABP currently provides attack bonus, weapon damage bonus, multiple skill bonuses, saving throw bonuses, AC bonus, an ability score and perception bonus.

But that still leaves a fair amount of magical items that players might be hungry to purchase.

If those items were not acquired via gold, but rather via another system gold could be a narrative device used to purchase things not important to combat. And personally that's where I'd like things to be.

A system that said "Hey, you're level 10 you get 1 level 10 item, 2 level 9 items, 3 level 8 items, and up to 10 items of level 7 or below" or something like that would be great.

We really just need to disconnect gold from character power.

[AlastarOG]

Claxon wrote:

Reverse wrote:

Fantasy economies of tabletops will never make sense when player goals don't align with PC goals for spending.

And that is why the ideal situation is to effectively remove gold as a means of character progression.

Use automatic bonus progression, but take it even further.

ABP currently provides attack bonus, weapon damage bonus, multiple skill bonuses, saving throw bonuses, AC bonus, an ability score and perception bonus.

But that still leaves a fair amount of magical items that players might be hungry to purchase.

If those items were not acquired via gold, but rather via another system gold could be a narrative device used to purchase things not important to combat. And personally that's where I'd like things to be.

A system that said "Hey, you're level 10 you get 1 level 10 item, 2 level 9 items, 3 level 8 items, and up to 10 items of level 7 or below" or something like that would be great.

We really just need to disconnect gold from character power.

And remove the intrinsinct agressive capitalist overtones of PF1E/DND5E!!!??

Gygax would ROLL IN HIS TOMB, YOU COMMUNIST!!

But seriously that sounds like a good idea.

As a rule if I want an altruistic heroic party I tend to run a scale of ABP that may go up to that level, and run tier based XP (when you reach X point, you level). That way diplomacy, negotiation, altruism and such do not hamper character play.

If I run an evil party, I make them count every bit of XP and scrounge for every bit of loot they can, that way everything becomes a meat and gold bag waiting to happen, and alternate solutions to bloody violence have to be weighted against possible gain.

[vagrant-poet]

Claxon wrote:

Reverse wrote:

Fantasy economies of tabletops will never make sense when player goals don't align with PC goals for spending.

And that is why the ideal situation is to effectively remove gold as a means of character progression.

Use automatic bonus progression, but take it even further.

ABP currently provides attack bonus, weapon damage bonus, multiple skill bonuses, saving throw bonuses, AC bonus, an ability score and perception bonus.

But that still leaves a fair amount of magical items that players might be hungry to purchase.

If those items were not acquired via gold, but rather via another system gold could be a narrative device used to purchase things not important to combat. And personally that's where I'd like things to be.

A system that said "Hey, you're level 10 you get 1 level 10 item, 2 level 9 items, 3 level 8 items, and up to 10 items of level 7 or below" or something like that would be great.

We really just need to disconnect gold from character power.

I've done it. It's great.

I have often reverted to letting consumable be purchasable, and it's a decent middle ground in certain campaigns.

Other campaigns, you want people finding treasure. Generally, as long as its' open and clear from session 0, people have no problem with "Treasure" being handled in a way that's thematically appropriate to a given game.

I ran a bunch of heroes of the people games in Ravounel, no gold for items, ABP, other magic items were gifts from the community to use to continue to be heroic.

Meanwhile in Abomination Vaults I'm using XP and gold as written because it suits an explicitly dungeon-crawling romp. Mostly finding and using what they find, means the amounts of hard cash they have in town is not enormous at low levels either.

[Kasoh]

Claxon wrote:

We really just need to disconnect gold from character power.

I cannot disagree strongly enough. Without a secondary gold economy for player power, the game is just less interesting and compelling. Tying every piece of player power to level over incentivizes leveling. Just handing out items when you level up is more of the same.

Nothing feels more artificial than just getting item upgrades because you level up. Starfinder's Ship Upgrading system uses it and its pretty meh.

I've played in games where there wasn't a money sink for the treasure the players got. And the money itself loses its value. 'I haven't spent the last hundred gold I got, why do I need more? There's nothing to buy.'

How a player spends their liquid wealth, what treasure a player turns into gold, and how they handle their fiscal obligations is an important aspect of the game I would hate to see diminished with 'Well, you level up. Here you go.'

[Claxon]

Kasoh wrote:

Claxon wrote:

We really just need to disconnect gold from character power.

I cannot disagree strongly enough. Without a secondary gold economy for player power, the game is just less interesting and compelling. Tying every piece of player power to level over incentivizes leveling. Just handing out items when you level up is more of the same.

Nothing feels more artificial than just getting item upgrades because you level up. Starfinder's Ship Upgrading system uses it and its pretty meh.

I've played in games where there wasn't a money sink for the treasure the players got. And the money itself loses its value. 'I haven't spent the last hundred gold I got, why do I need more? There's nothing to buy.'

How a player spends their liquid wealth, what treasure a player turns into gold, and how they handle their fiscal obligations is an important aspect of the game I would hate to see diminished with 'Well, you level up. Here you go.'

I cannot disagree strongly enough with you, since to maintain a semblance of power you have to so tightly regulate and prevent the acquisition of wealth (or the ability to spend it on items above your level) to prevent players from being more powerful than they should.

You have to create artificial constructs to stop it.

Or we could just stop pretending altogether, eschew such things, and use a system (that while obviously a game construct) doesn't add layers of complexity for no real reason when both methods achieve the same basic result.

We're doing the same thing, your version just has extra steps.

[The-Magic-Sword]

graystone wrote:

Proven wrote:

Isn’t there a line in the GMG where they state that settlement levels in Golarion are generally capped around level 10 or 15?

Not that I know of. It's possible I haven't seen it but a quick search didn't bring it up.

Temperans wrote:

The only guideline I found for city level was that a metropolis was level 8 or higher. With the level of inhabitants having an effect. But it didn't say exactly how.

Yep, that's what I found. The settlement level isn't the whole story though. Settlement Abilities can boost level for buying/jobs too:

"Artists’ Haven: It’s easier to find higher-level tasks involving Performance or art, as well as buyers willing to pay more for art objects."

"City of Artisans: Items of up to 4 levels higher are available from a particular category the settlement."

There is also this in the rules: "If a character’s level is higher than the settlement’s, that character can usually use their own influence and leverage to acquire higher-level items, as they convince shops to place specialty orders or artisans to craft custom goods, though it might take a bit of time for such orders to be fulfilled."

Combined, this means PC's don't have to run into issues with being higher level than the settlement they are in unless the DM really wants them to.

Personally, and I know this is a modification to the rules, I'm electing to disregard that "If a character’s level is higher than the settlement’s, that character can usually use their own influence and leverage to acquire higher-level items, as they convince shops to place specialty orders or artisans to craft custom goods, though it might take a bit of time for such orders to be fulfilled." line for my games.

The system almost feels like it was designed and balanced without that, and then that was tacked on at the end. I'd treat it more like guidance intended for certain campaigns where PCs don't have convenient settlement access, and the almighty plot demands they just be able to get what they want/need from anywhere. But for more holistic games where downtime, settlement statblocks, and other 'world resources' matter I would absolutely restrict it by settlement level (modified by special abilities, obviously) which benefits crafters to some extent and encourages more planning and logistical play.

Either that, or they decided it was just broadly too restrictive a requirement to have item access be governed by settlement level, or made crafting too important, but I'm more inclined to think that based off the way settlement abilities can increase item level, that was intended to be a meaningful restriction (gold scales exponentially, so buying higher level items is pretty restricted as is.)

[Kasoh]

Claxon wrote:

We're doing the same thing, your version just has extra steps.

Hardly. I don't care if the players have level appropriate gear. If they choose to fritter away their money on things that don't benefit their characters mechanically, that's a choice I respect by not pasting over it by giving them more stuff.

And if they spend all their money on larger over leveled purchases, that creates deficiencies elsewhere and can be exploited, but their choice has meaning.

And if I gave away too much treasure and the PCs are over wealthy, well, I did that to myself, but its not like the game cares. So they have an easier time fighting monsters. Oh no.

The entire game is a series of artificial constructs. Its not like PCs ever get more gold than the GM gives them. And choosing how much gold to give PCs is no more work in either system, because you still have to reward them. But removing the system all together is just another step towards people playing make believe instead of Pathfinder.

If my version has extra steps, its extra steps for the players who frankly, do not have enough responsibility anyway.

[graystone]

The-Magic-Sword wrote:

The system almost feels like it was designed and balanced without that, and then that was tacked on at the end. I'd treat it more like guidance intended for certain campaigns where PCs don't have convenient settlement access, and the almighty plot demands they just be able to get what they want/need from anywhere. But for more holistic games where downtime, settlement statblocks, and other 'world resources' matter I would absolutely restrict it by settlement level (modified by special abilities, obviously) which benefits crafters to some extent and encourages more planning and logistical play.

Either that, or they decided it was just broadly too restrictive a requirement to have item access be governed by settlement level, or made crafting too important, but I'm more inclined to think that based off the way settlement abilities can increase item level, that was intended to be a meaningful restriction (gold scales exponentially, so buying higher level items is pretty restricted as is.)

I think it's because they do not want to have to artificially inflate the level of some of the settlements in the world just so some items exist in the world: otherwise there is a need to place a level 20 settlement in the world so that all the items in the world can be bought. With this rule, a Dm can have ANY settlement the base of operations and allow the party to keep up with the items they need in exchange for a little downtime.

[Proven]

The-Magic-Sword wrote:

graystone wrote:

Proven wrote:

Isn’t there a line in the GMG where they state that settlement levels in Golarion are generally capped around level 10 or 15?

Not that I know of. It's possible I haven't seen it but a quick search didn't bring it up.

Temperans wrote:

The only guideline I found for city level was that a metropolis was level 8 or higher. With the level of inhabitants having an effect. But it didn't say exactly how.

Yep, that's what I found. The settlement level isn't the whole story though. Settlement Abilities can boost level for buying/jobs too:

"Artists’ Haven: It’s easier to find higher-level tasks involving Performance or art, as well as buyers willing to pay more for art objects."

"City of Artisans: Items of up to 4 levels higher are available from a particular category the settlement."

There is also this in the rules: "If a character’s level is higher than the settlement’s, that character can usually use their own influence and leverage to acquire higher-level items, as they convince shops to place specialty orders or artisans to craft custom goods, though it might take a bit of time for such orders to be fulfilled."

Combined, this means PC's don't have to run into issues with being higher level than the settlement they are in unless the DM really wants them to.

Personally, and I know this is a modification to the rules, I'm electing to disregard that "If a character’s level is higher than the settlement’s, that character can usually use their own influence and leverage to acquire higher-level items, as they convince shops to place specialty orders or artisans to craft custom goods, though it might take a bit of time for such orders to be fulfilled." line for my games.

The system almost feels like it was designed and balanced without that, and then that was tacked on at the end. I'd treat it more like guidance intended for certain campaigns where PCs don't have convenient settlement access, and the almighty plot demands they just be able...

This is exactly why I see it as a release valve. At the end of the day, it’s still the players having to do “GM may I,” as it’s up to the GM to decide if you can special order this type of item from this town or not. It’s still up to the GM to decide how he wants item economy to be, and if the GM messes up and gives too few items it’s another option to help quickly correct it.

[Verdyn]

Kasoh wrote:

I've played in games where there wasn't a money sink for the treasure the players got. And the money itself loses its value. 'I haven't spent the last hundred gold I got, why do I need more? There's nothing to buy.'

That sounds like a boring group to play with. Why aren't they having their characters spend that wealth on things their characters would really do if they had extra cash laying around? Fund a church/temple, fund an archeological expedition, throw a ball and shmooze with the upper crust. Excess wealth and no items to spend it on is only boring if you emphasize the social aspects of your characters and ignore that they should have and be sating these very human needs.

There are entire games built around doing this and they work so why can't it work for PF2?

[graystone]

Verdyn wrote:

That sounds like a boring group to play with. Why aren't they having their characters spend that wealth on things their characters would really do if they had extra cash laying around? Fund a church/temple, fund an archeological expedition, throw a ball and shmooze with the upper crust. Excess wealth and no items to spend it on is only boring if you emphasize the social aspects of your characters and ignore that they should have and be sating these very human needs.

It can be JUST as boring to have to come up with, more and more varieties of things to blow money on. After your 5th ball or 12th temple fund... it gets old. Do we get a big chart and figure out what we're throwing our cash away today like a mad lib? 'So we're going to spend' *roll dice* '300 gp on' *roll dice* 'an expedition to' *roll dice* 'study ancient' *roll dice* 'cryptids from' *roll dice* 'your dreams'. Cool, that killed a minute or two but is it exciting? do it 50 more times and see if it is.

[Tender Tendrils]

The problem is dungeons & dragons started out as an extension to a wargame - the player characters where expected to invest most of their gold in castles and armies, but that fell by the wayside but no one bothered to adjust the game to compensate for that lack of a money sink.

The best thing I can think of (aside from encouraging an environment where your players are invested enough in the setting and their characters that they just spend the money organically on stuff that isn't a +1 to hit) is to use some of the subsystems in the GMG, and allow the players to invest money to get ahead in those subsystems.

If a campaign is structured around victory points (say, to track a war effort or the PCs campaign to recruit allies to face the big bad) then you can give them opportunities to put down large amounts of gold to earn victory points - for example, hiring a mercenary company or bribing an official to vote in their governments council to join your cause.

If you use the research subsystem, your players can invest in a library or university and then they gain bonuses when conducting research there.

With the Reputation system, throwing a fancy party or buying property or giving someone money as a favour could give reputation bonuses.

The leadership subsystem I think is the best for spending money - if the campaign has the players running an adventurers guild or mercenary company or small fiefdom or thieves guild or whatever, they will probably need to invest anyway in a base of operations (as the system only specifies that expanding the base of operations and upkeep costs are taken care of by your lieutenants/followers, not obtaining the base, and arguably only upgrades to increase the capacity of the base are taken care of, not special stuff like adding a portal or a mages tower) and you can let them invest money to either advanced the organization by recruiting, or to do stuff like better equip the organization (which you can then tie into the game later when the big bad sends an army to siege your keep or the town guard goes after your thieve's hideout).

I think one of the adventure paths also has rules for building and upgrading a castle? That could be another framework for investment, though again you would need to structure a decent part of the campaign around that castle so that the upgrades matter.

[Temperans]

If the game didn't have such a tight math I would agree. But when every weapon and armor enchantment matters, its not that easy.

Automatic progression has its own problems where you are just becoming more super human as opposed to just more skilled.

Finding the right balance is very hard and no one can agree.

[Verdyn]

graystone wrote:

It can be JUST as boring to have to come up with, more and more varieties of things to blow money on. After your 5th ball or 12th temple fund... it gets old. Do we get a big chart and figure out what we're throwing our cash away today like a mad lib? 'So we're going to spend' *roll dice* '300 gp on' *roll dice* 'an expedition to' *roll dice* 'study ancient' *roll dice* 'cryptids from' *roll dice* 'your dreams'. Cool, that killed a minute or two but is it exciting? do it 50 more times and see if it is.

Then that's a failing of the GM or the game system. Those investments should always have a payoff. That temple should become a source of potions and a place that the PC who founded it wants to see grow and prosper. That expedition should yield historic artifacts and clues to some ancient events of the path that may yet be relevant to the PC's current issue. The ball should lead to the PC's induction in high society and them wanting to keep spending on it because they have useful contacts there.

Downtime activities are only as boring as you make them and it sounds like too many players and GMs think that anything that doesn't involve dice should just be skipped over.

[Amaya/Polaris]

If you expand ABP or invent a meta-resource to cover all of the magic character-power stuff the game normally expects you to buy for progression...suddenly, you don't have to give out tons of money all of the time. You don't need piles of treasure in dungeons, payouts from every town and lord, scaling odd-job money, or at least not increasingly huge/valuable amounts of each.

Being much more modest with the money given out might afford more that needs to be, and can be, done with that money. Like, maybe the tariffs, living expenses, mundane equipment and personal motivations will actually matter throughout the campaign if you have to be judicious with your funds, rather than mostly only mattering for a few levels at most. No need for every campaign without meta money-sinks (cough cough, D&D 5E) to become a game of "how do you use your wandering-billionaire-philanthropist levels of wealth". At the same time, it might have more of an impact if the money you've been working with has been pretty reasonable and suddenly your party happens upon a huge windfall.

As a bonus, without money being part of character progression and balancing, you can just estimate costs and payouts and such based on knowledge of your local currency. Could make the daily-living part easier and more relatable, or at least more of a thing.

[Kasoh]

Verdyn wrote:

Kasoh wrote:

I've played in games where there wasn't a money sink for the treasure the players got. And the money itself loses its value. 'I haven't spent the last hundred gold I got, why do I need more? There's nothing to buy.'

That sounds like a boring group to play with. Why aren't they having their characters spend that wealth on things their characters would really do if they had extra cash laying around? Fund a church/temple, fund an archeological expedition, throw a ball and shmooze with the upper crust. Excess wealth and no items to spend it on is only boring if you emphasize the social aspects of your characters and ignore that they should have and be sating these very human needs.

There are entire games built around doing this and they work so why can't it work for PF2?

That specific game was played in the Fifth edition of "The world's most popular role playing game" but I doubt it would have made any large difference. In that circumstance it was "We're on the trail of this cult, so we're in town for one night before heading back off into the wilderness, is there anything useful we can spend this 3,000 gold on? No? Potions? No?"

Some games have no downtime. It happens. Or, we all made selfish characters who don't care about the communities we travel through. Or, we're here to get slay cultists and level up. Or *make something up its a fantasy game and anything is possible*.

[Verdyn]

Kasoh wrote:

That specific game was played in the Fifth edition of "The world's most popular role playing game" but I doubt it would have made any large difference. In that circumstance it was "We're on the trail of this cult, so we're in town for one night before heading back off into the wilderness, is there anything useful we can spend this 3,000 gold on? No? Potions? No?"

Some games have no downtime. It happens. Or, we all made selfish characters who don't care about the communities we travel through. Or, we're here to get slay cultists and level up. Or *make something up its a fantasy game and anything is possible*.

That's a group and/or campaign issue at that stage. After you've broken up that cult and, presumably, gained even more loot there should be a chance to spend it and enjoy some downtime. Without such breaks your characters would get run down, even heroes need to go home to a beer and a warm bed once in a while.

It's fine to have pure hack and slash games, I've run my share, but in those, I tend to give out rewards that are more interesting than gold. If you're going to let your PCs have heaps of gold while also giving them 'nothing' to spend it on you're doing it wrong.

[graystone]

Verdyn wrote:

Then that's a failing of the GM or the game system. Those investments should always have a payoff. That temple should become a source of potions and a place that the PC who founded it wants to see grow and prosper.

You are conflating a payoff and exciting: nothing about getting a few potions is different than buying some and you could see a temple prosper without cash but actually doing something for them. Nothing about spending cash on it stops it from being boring.

Verdyn wrote:

That expedition should yield historic artifacts and clues to some ancient events of the path that may yet be relevant to the PC's current issue. The ball should lead to the PC's induction in high society and them wanting to keep spending on it because they have useful contacts there.

Sounds pretty boring IMO for the expedition and nothing about the ball requires cash: skill checks and doing the work is more exciting than 'here's some cash, can I get some contacts...'.

Verdyn wrote:

Downtime activities are only as boring as you make them and it sounds like too many players and GMs think that anything that doesn't involve dice should just be skipped over.

But you haven't been talking about Downtime activities, but tossing cash to someone else that does Downtime activities... YOU aren't fixing the church, you're paying for someone else to. YOU aren't setting up the ball, someone else is. YOU aren't going on an expedition. Now if you're plying out a ball or party, then you aren't doing a Downtime Activity but an encounter. So tossing cash at new downtime activities is boring and not a step up from spending cash on items.

[Verdyn]

graystone wrote:

Verdyn wrote:

Then that's a failing of the GM or the game system. Those investments should always have a payoff. That temple should become a source of potions and a place that the PC who founded it wants to see grow and prosper.

You are conflating a payoff and exciting: nothing about getting a few potions is different than buying some and you could see a temple prosper without cash but actually doing something for them. Nothing about spending cash on it stops it from being boring.

Verdyn wrote:

That expedition should yield historic artifacts and clues to some ancient events of the path that may yet be relevant to the PC's current issue. The ball should lead to the PC's induction in high society and them wanting to keep spending on it because they have useful contacts there.

Sounds pretty boring IMO for the expedition and nothing about the ball requires cash: skill checks and doing the work is more exciting than 'here's some cash, can I get some contacts...'.

Verdyn wrote:

Downtime activities are only as boring as you make them and it sounds like too many players and GMs think that anything that doesn't involve dice should just be skipped over.

But you haven't been talking about Downtime activities, but tossing cash to someone else that does Downtime activities... YOU aren't fixing the church, you're paying for someone else to. YOU aren't setting up the ball, someone else is. YOU aren't going on an expedition. Now if you're plying out a ball or party, then you aren't doing a Downtime Activity but an encounter. So tossing cash at new downtime activities is boring and not a step up from spending cash on items.

You can as easily have those characters participate in those activities as downtime activities.

However, you can also do something common to video games and include gold sinks that provide greater and greater passive bonuses. Gloomhaven does this by encouraging you to balance spending gold against spending money on the town and unlocking new items and quests alongside temporary bonuses.

Both of these are still more interesting and human than just having your band of murder hobos horde gold that, were their characters played like actual people, would surely be spent on something.

[Matthew Downie]

Verdyn wrote:

Kasoh wrote:

That specific game was played in the Fifth edition of "The world's most popular role playing game" but I doubt it would have made any large difference. In that circumstance it was "We're on the trail of this cult, so we're in town for one night before heading back off into the wilderness, is there anything useful we can spend this 3,000 gold on? No? Potions? No?"

...

That's a group and/or campaign issue at that stage. After you've broken up that cult and, presumably, gained even more loot there should be a chance to spend it and enjoy some downtime. Without such breaks your characters would get run down, even heroes need to go home to a beer and a warm bed once in a while.

...

If we're talking about the major dragon-themed adventure for 5e, then when you break up the cult and save the world, the campaign ends and the characters are retired.

Arguably it's a campaign issue if you DO want to stop and invest money in building churches. It suggests there's little sense of urgency or forwards momentum. The characters in Lord of the Rings never have as much downtime as that.

[graystone]

Verdyn wrote:

You can as easily have those characters participate in those activities as downtime activities.

But then it has nothing to do with money. Those same downtime activities can happen with or without it so it doesn't help with the 'what to do with cash' issue.

Verdyn wrote:

However, you can also do something common to video games and include gold sinks that provide greater and greater passive bonuses. Gloomhaven does this by encouraging you to balance spending gold against spending money on the town and unlocking new items and quests alongside temporary bonuses.

You could do anything you want but there really isn't anything in the rules about it. And as above, there is nothing special about cash: there isn't a reason if you can throw cash at it that you can't use skills, spells, ect too. Instead of cash to the church, you can heal followers, build a wall, fix a roof, ect. The difference is that you're more invested when you're doing more that just throwing cash at it.

Verdyn wrote:

Both of these are still more interesting and human than just having your band of murder hobos horde gold that, were their characters played like actual people, would surely be spent on something.

I'm not sure I see it as much differently: you're 'buying' something in either case: it being a bonus or an item isn't much difference IMO. If you are acting like real people, you're most likely doing something instead of repeatedly tossing cash to others to something with it. I mean it's fine if someone WANTS to be a philanthropist, but should they have to be to have something to do with their money? If we where playing like 'normal' people, we'd stop adventuring after we got enough to live off the rest of our life...

[vagrant-poet]

Alfa/Polaris wrote:

If you expand ABP or invent a meta-resource to cover all of the magic character-power stuff the game normally expects you to buy for progression...suddenly, you don't have to give out tons of money all of the time. You don't need piles of treasure in dungeons, payouts from every town and lord, scaling odd-job money, or at least not increasingly huge/valuable amounts of each.

Being much more modest with the money given out might afford more that needs to be, and can be, done with that money. Like, maybe the tariffs, living expenses, mundane equipment and personal motivations will actually matter throughout the campaign if you have to be judicious with your funds, rather than mostly only mattering for a few levels at most. No need for every campaign without meta money-sinks (cough cough, D&D 5E) to become a game of "how do you use your wandering-billionaire-philanthropist levels of wealth". At the same time, it might have more of an impact if the money you've been working with has been pretty reasonable and suddenly your party happens upon a huge windfall.

As a bonus, without money being part of character progression and balancing, you can just estimate costs and payouts and such based on knowledge of your local currency. Could make the daily-living part easier and more relatable, or at least more of a thing.

Came here to make a similar reply. You remove gold as advancement in a game where you don't want gold as incentive. You replace it with other themes and methods of playing so you can tell a different story. And that often gives you freedom to just not give out much gold, etc. Or when you do, it's a genuine windfall that is meaningful in itself.

[Temperans]

Considering that most people in pathfinder could live confortably with 100 gp for a year or two. But a kingdom/city easily requires thousands upon thousands just to keep running.

Most people wouldn't go out to adventure because its to risky for the value. Merchants and craftman can make due with their sales. Nobles can make due with taxes. Those who do go out to adventure have to either build up a large sum of money to then retire; Or, continue to go out adventuring to keep their live style.

In any case an adventurer has no reason to go face stronger enemies unless they want more money. But if you are going to face bigger enemies you need better equipment. Thus players are stuck. If they keep facing the same enemies then "the game is boring because its too easy", but if they fight stronger enemies "the game has a problem because I have to buy more equipment".

[Kasoh]

Temperans wrote:

Considering that most people in pathfinder could live confortably with 100 gp for a year or two. But a kingdom/city easily requires thousands upon thousands just to keep running.

Most people wouldn't go out to adventure because its to risky for the value. Merchants and craftman can make due with their sales. Nobles can make due with taxes. Those who do go out to adventure have to either build up a large sum of money to then retire; Or, continue to go out adventuring to keep their live style.

In any case an adventurer has no reason to go face stronger enemies unless they want more money. But if you are going to face bigger enemies you need better equipment. Thus players are stuck. If they keep facing the same enemies then "the game is boring because its too easy", but if they fight stronger enemies "the game has a problem because I have to buy more equipment".

The risk to reward ratio for adventuring is pretty outrageous though, compared to the rest of the economy. For me, that's something I like, because it clearly explains why so many people are willing to engage in the behavior at all.

A level 3 expert in a skill can Earn Income (presuming 262 working days at an on level DC) and generate 131 gp a year.

An adventurer might level up 19 times in a year (Depending on table play, but most APs resolve themselves in about a year of game time in my experience) and end up with 20,000 cash in addition to their gear. And that's without getting into a level 20 PCs earning potential for Earn Income activities.

And all they have to do is be willing to die and sacrifice their sanity to the ancient horrors and modern threats that plague the world.

I'm sure someone with a more critical eye for the economics of it would look askance at these numbers. Who can even afford to pay high level adventurers, where does that income come from, and a laundry list of other questions that push against all common understanding of how it works. I like answering "But how do they eat?" or ponder fantasy logistics as much as the next pedant. Marvel No-Prizes abound for explaining to yourself or your group how this all manages to stay afloat in universe. That's an enjoyable past time. In-universe explanations for odd setting aspects is fun.

The base mechanics of the game offer gold as a separate track of player power with exponentially increasing numbers. Even after the change from PF1 where PC wealth ended in the millions of GP to PF2 where its merely hundreds of thousands.

I think that removing that separate track of player power makes for a poorer play experience. This is an opinion born out of experience as a GM watching how players interact with rewards material and intrinsic and as a player.

Obviously, you have to do what is best for your table. If that's ABP and reworking the entire printed gold economy then go through that work. I think default experience is better mechanically and less effort which means I also get to ask myself strange questions like "How much would Absalom pay a level 16 city watchman? What civil service benefit package could compete with an adventurers expected gross income?" And that's fun.

[thejeff]

Temperans wrote:

Considering that most people in pathfinder could live confortably with 100 gp for a year or two. But a kingdom/city easily requires thousands upon thousands just to keep running.

Most people wouldn't go out to adventure because its to risky for the value. Merchants and craftman can make due with their sales. Nobles can make due with taxes. Those who do go out to adventure have to either build up a large sum of money to then retire; Or, continue to go out adventuring to keep their live style.

In any case an adventurer has no reason to go face stronger enemies unless they want more money. But if you are going to face bigger enemies you need better equipment. Thus players are stuck. If they keep facing the same enemies then "the game is boring because its too easy", but if they fight stronger enemies "the game has a problem because I have to buy more equipment".

In the vast majority of games I've played and I believe in the cast majority of APs, the main motivations aren't the money. The money comes because the game needs it, but the characters get caught up in the adventure for other reasons.

There certainly is a style of game where the characters treat adventuring as a job, but I don't think it's nearly as common as it's often portrayed.

[Temperans]

I mean I feel most people in setting don't adventure and just live in whatever job they can do. Adventuring is something that is honestly very much relegated to, "mercenary for random stuff that might happen".

[thejeff]

Temperans wrote:

I mean I feel most people in setting don't adventure and just live in whatever job they can do. Adventuring is something that is honestly very much relegated to, "mercenary for random stuff that might happen".

And even most "adventurers" are on some quest, not mercenaries looking for random stuff to do. Think most AP plots, for example.

[Temperans]

Idk about quest, just because there is a plot or a goal doesn't stop it from being "mercenaries doing random things".

[thejeff]

Temperans wrote:

Idk about quest, just because there is a plot or a goal doesn't stop it from being "mercenaries doing random things".

Doesn't stop it, I guess, but it also doesn't have to structured that way. If you've got a goal the characters are committed to, they don't need to be hired on a regular basis to motivate them.

Basically, "mercenaries" is one basic fantasy rpg style, but it's not the only one and it's far from necessary.

PCs can have plenty of reasons to go fight stronger enemies than "we want more money".