Post/Author/DateTime	Post
bitznarf 03-30-07, 03:51 PM	I've got a question that I'm hoping somebody has a reasonable answer too. In light of the recent threads relating to writing adventures, I'm taking a look at the core writers guidelines and template. I'm curious why gold received for loot, coins, magic items are calculated as if there is always 6 members in the party as opposed to the actual number present.
smerwin29 03-30-07, 03:57 PM	I've got a question that I'm hoping somebody has a reasonable answer too. In light of the recent threads relating to writing adventures, I'm taking a look at the core writers guidelines and template. I'm curious why gold received for loot, coins, magic items are calculated as if there is always 6 members in the party as opposed to the actual number present. Because when treasure was divided by players at the table, you were seeing players going out of their way to keep players away from the table so they could play with 4 players and get more treasure. It was so bad that I witnessed players threatening other players to stay away from mustering to keep them away.
bitznarf 03-30-07, 04:00 PM	Ah, thanks. Can I still grumble about it, as where I live we are often stretching for that 4th player? And would love to have a 5th and 6th?
Madfox11 03-30-07, 04:56 PM	There is no law against grumbling, rambling and venting. Just try to do so in a civil way when on these boards, and it helps if you say so at the start. To be honest, I always love reading a well-thought out rant ;) Note though that besides the mentioned reason, the other is game balance. D&D is balanced on a specific gold:xp ratio. While I am aware that some people think the ratio is too low for LG, but whether that is true or not, it does not change the fact that an increased treasure division with the same xp eventually leads to balance issues. One can always argue they are not big enough to disrupt the game, but than the other reason kicks in: it caused greedy people to kick out other players. Pieter Sleijpen RPGA Living Greyhawk Circle Member The Splintered Suns
bitznarf 03-30-07, 04:59 PM	I don't see the reason behind a 'game balance' argument. Wouldn't the max gold still be capped at the same point?
Madfox11 03-30-07, 05:00 PM	If you would apply that than this rule is actually in the players benefit since it allows us to add more treasure and hence more item access ;)
bitznarf 03-30-07, 05:04 PM	Hmm, this is quite true. It's when the gold total comes out undercap that this rule is to the players detriment. Doesn't change the fact that 'game balance' is a poor argument in support of the rule however.
taylorj 03-30-07, 05:11 PM	Hmm, this is quite true. It's when the gold total comes out undercap that this rule is to the players detriment. Doesn't change the fact that 'game balance' is a poor argument in support of the rule however. It would tend to encourage metagaming if the gold-per-mod changed based on the number of people at the table. It's often enough of a pain in the rear trying to organize tables so that they're balanced and at the right APL without having the additional problem of potentially causing people to get less money. Making the gold totally independant of the number of players (ie, always divisible by 6) vastly simplifies things. Something that's usually not a problem and removes a lot of metagaming complications is a big plus.
bitznarf 03-30-07, 05:18 PM	How does this interact with overcap gold? Does any gold not taken by a party memeber, ie the vacant 5th or 6th PC's share, become overcap, or does it just disappear as if it had never existed?
kenobi65 03-30-07, 05:36 PM	How does this interact with overcap gold? Does any gold not taken by a party memeber, ie the vacant 5th or 6th PC's share, become overcap, or does it just disappear as if it had never existed? As I understand it, it'd be overcap, and thus, disappears at the end of the adventure (but can be used in the meantime). It does mean you can be a little metagamey when you're at a 4-person table, and use small consumables you find (potions, etc.), knowing that it's highly unlikely that using them up would keep you from gaining maximum GP at the end.
Samwise 03-30-07, 06:47 PM	As I understand it, it'd be overcap, and thus, disappears at the end of the adventure (but can be used in the meantime). It does mean you can be a little metagamey when you're at a 4-person table, and use small consumables you find (potions, etc.), knowing that it's highly unlikely that using them up would keep you from gaining maximum GP at the end. It is not overcap. The missing players do not exist, and their shares are not hovering about, available to be used, until the adventure ends. If it were, we would be right back to having people want to play at 4 person tables because they might be able to get free consumables after the first encounter.
Lightblade 03-30-07, 07:49 PM	Hmm, i may have made mistakes in overcap calculations, when figuring out if there was enough money for NPC spellcasting at the end of the mod. Perhaps that could be written in the LGCS somewhere? IE the shares are divided by 6, regardless of the people at the table, so do not consider the shares a 5th or 6th PC would have received when calculating overcap gold...
Samwise 03-30-07, 08:12 PM	What more should it say? "The loot total is the number of gold pieces each character gains if the foes are plundered of all their earthly possessions." (emphasis mine) (Adventure Template, Treasure Summary, 2nd paragraph, 1st sentence.) If there is no fifth or sixth character, they don't gain any gold, at any time, and can not contribute, in whole or in part, to any expenditures the party makes. Nor is there an actual calculation of "over cap gold" in any general sense. What you do is: "Once you have subtracted the value for unclaimed treasure from each encounter add it up and that is the number of gold pieces a characters total and coin value increase at the end of the adventure. Write the total in the GP Gained field of the adventure certificate." (Adventure Template, Treasure Summary, 5th paragraph.) That is limited by: "This number cannot be greater than the max GP possible for the APL you played, unless one of the following conditions apply:" (LGCS 597, page 9, 17. GP Gained, 2nd sentence.) "Over cap" gold, such as it is, only comes into existence at this point, when the amount received is found to be greater than the max allowed for the APL, and only exists on a specific AR. No AR, no over cap gold. Even if the gold was presumed to exist for these phantom characters, only the player of a phantom character could authorize any use of that gold. Since you can not get the permission of that player to buy a consumable, or chip in for a raise dead, you can not use any of "their" gold, over or under the cap, for any purpose whatsoever. The rules for this are already written. As long as you follow them and don't add any extra steps, there is no way to wind up with extra gold from phantom players being available.
JamesMaissen 04-02-07, 01:21 AM	What more should it say? It probably should say it directly and explicitly. The system doesn't make awhole lot of sense as it stands (atleast to me), so people can easily make honest mistakes. Capping the gold to a certain fixed max per person I can understand so as to retain a degree of overall control and uniformity. However not being able to sell items for half doesn't seem to automatically follow to me as even needed let alone intended. I'd just as easily assume they just simplified things by always dividing by 6 rather than some grand design to make additional rules simply to have them. -James
clannagh 04-02-07, 01:36 AM	I had the impression that under the current system 4 person tables get the same as they always would and 6 person tables get loot as if they played as 4. In other words its not 4 person tables getting "done in" its the 6 person tables getting a benefit.
Samwise 04-02-07, 02:46 AM	It probably should say it directly and explicitly. The system doesn't make awhole lot of sense as it stands (atleast to me), so people can easily make honest mistakes. it does say it directly and explicity. Look at the segments I quoted. Gold is given out to characters. It is not given to the party as a whole to be later divided up by however many characters actually played, or whatever else. The value of each item is listed so you can subtract it from the total available if the PCs use a consumable during the adventure. The only way you can make a mistake, easily or otherwise, is to not follow those instructions. Capping the gold to a certain fixed max per person I can understand so as to retain a degree of overall control and uniformity. However not being able to sell items for half doesn't seem to automatically follow to me as even needed let alone intended. I'd just as easily assume they just simplified things by always dividing by 6 rather than some grand design to make additional rules simply to have them. -James At no point should you ever be calculating what an item is sold for, or trying to figure out whether to divide by six or any other number. The amount of gold each character gets for any magic item is set in the treasure summary. You do absolutely no calculations to figure out what this is, you just look up the item and read the value next to it. The only calculation you might have to do is subtracting the value of any consumable used from the total available at the end. Would you like me to post the entire Treasury Summary text here? It is very explicit about who gets what ("each character"), and what they get (the values listed for loot, coin, and magic). Never does it allow for selling an item directly, getting half value, then figuring out what each character would get. If you ever do that you are not following the instructions in the adventure. There is of course an addendum to this that I am hesitant to discuss since I don't want to confuse the issue. In the adventure template, in the encounter section, there is blue text that explains for authors how to calculate what each character gets for loot, coin, and magic. This section is very clear and direct, although it won't ever be seen by someone running an adventure. It doesn't have to be, the calculations have been done for you, and all you need to do is read the value listed in the adventure text. But for reference, these calculations are: Loot: Divide the full market price by 12. Coin: Divide the full maket price by 6. (This includes gems and jewelry, which have a market price.) Magic: Divide the full market price by 12. These factors are based on loot and magic being sold at half price, while gems and jewelry are sold and full price, and then the values being divided by 6. Again though, these calculations have been dont for you! You never have to perform them. You just look in the text of the adventure for the relevant figures.
JamesMaissen 04-02-07, 12:06 PM	At no point should you ever be calculating what an item is sold for, or trying to figure out whether to divide by six or any other number. The amount of gold each character gets for any magic item is set in the treasure summary. So let me understand this with the following proposed senario: The party finds 250 gold in diamond dust off of an enemy wizard who had stoneskin prepared but never got the chance to cast. They decide to hand it to the party wizard to use for the stoneskin that he, himself, had prepared. He casts it on the party fighter using up the component. Is this allowable? I would have thought that the answer would be yes. Am I wrong? -James
bitznarf 04-02-07, 12:17 PM	Sam: I have seen mods where not all the possible loot was taken into account in the treasure summary, and thus the DM had to figure out how these rules worked in LG on the fly. This is the sort of area where confusion can make weird things happen.
Samwise 04-02-07, 12:21 PM	So let me understand this with the following proposed senario: The party finds 250 gold in diamond dust off of an enemy wizard who had stoneskin prepared but never got the chance to cast. They decide to hand it to the party wizard to use for the stoneskin that he, himself, had prepared. He casts it on the party fighter using up the component. Is this allowable? I would have thought that the answer would be yes. Am I wrong? -James Generally, I expect the answer would be not really. That would be loot on the NPC. In the listing, assuming he has nothing else, the treasure entry will indicate: Coin: 42 gp If you have 6 PCs, they could pool that coin for the wizard to cast stoneskin. If you have 4 or 5 PCs, you don't have enough. Conversely, if he had a scroll of stoneskin, it would be listed as: Magic: scroll of stoneskin (79 gp) So you could use that (assuming a read magicis available of course), or wait and collect the gold at the end. Again, read the Treasure Summary section of any adventure. You simply don't get anything like that directly at any time. It isn't a magic item, and it isn't mundane gear.
Samwise 04-02-07, 12:25 PM	Sam: I have seen mods where not all the possible loot was taken into account in the treasure summary, and thus the DM had to figure out how these rules worked in LG on the fly. This is the sort of area where confusion can make weird things happen. That's a bit different. That is an adventure missing information for whatever reason. But even in such a case, you should never be considering giving the PCs treasure for people not there. In such a case, if you were sure there was missing treasure, I would (and have) simply defaulted to the max for the APL. But I wouldn't feel comfortable saying there was even more overcap.
bitznarf 04-02-07, 12:28 PM	Well, in the mod I have in mind, according the the treasure summary, there was only 281 gp available in the mod. And even taking into account this extra, it doesn't reach the 450 max for an intro.
Samwise 04-02-07, 12:34 PM	Well, I ran one where there was simply no entry in treasure for an entire encounter in the summary. There was in the text, but not the summary, and the text clearly indicated max was available. Again, that's a pretty specific situation, and shouldn't be anywhere near the default.
Lightblade 04-02-07, 02:26 PM	Generally, I expect the answer would be not really. That would be loot on the NPC. In the listing, assuming he has nothing else, the treasure entry will indicate: Coin: 42 gp If you have 6 PCs, they could pool that coin for the wizard to cast stoneskin. If you have 4 or 5 PCs, you don't have enough. Conversely, if he had a scroll of stoneskin, it would be listed as: Magic: scroll of stoneskin (79 gp) So you could use that (assuming a read magicis available of course), or wait and collect the gold at the end. This is the part that's hard to swallow for me. I see how running any other way would create an over-cap advantage for smaller tables (and thus shouldn't happen), but it really is a kludge to make the gold system work. Player: "I cast Idenify using the pearl we found on the evil wizard." GM: "Sorry, guys. His pearl is only worth 66 gp, so you can't use it for idenify" Player: "Huh? What the heck was he planning to do with it?" GM: "Well, he was hoping he'd run into six adventurers instead of four, so that his pearl would end up being worth 100 gp."
taylorj 04-02-07, 02:48 PM	Again, read the Treasure Summary section of any adventure. You simply don't get anything like that directly at any time. It isn't a magic item, and it isn't mundane gear. In one mod I'm thinking of, the NPC description for an enemy caster has "X uses of material component for Stoneskin" listed in their inventory at certain APLs, but in the treasure description for that encounter, it's not listed, there's just a value given for "Loot". I'd be inclined to say that someone could use it in the adventure, and the gold expended comes out of the final treasure value for the mod, in the same way that you can take and use potions found on enemies. But most people wouldn't even think to ask about it. Normally it's just "we Greyhawk the bodies" and then it's on to more interesting stuff.
Samwise 04-02-07, 04:50 PM	Yes, it is a kludge. Bear in mind the other side of that though: As long as you find 250 gp of coin, you could, theoretically, "spend" that immediately as the material component for a stoneskin spell because of how LG tracks expensive material components - by raw gp value only and not by type. So the silliness has benefits both ways. And also, despite the legitimate issues being raised in the thread about undercap, there is a very definite problem with overcap gold upsetting the balance by allowing excessive amounts of free consumables and free spellcasting.
catsclaw 04-02-07, 06:18 PM	And also, despite the legitimate issues being raised in the thread about undercap, there is a very definite problem with overcap gold upsetting the balance by allowing excessive amounts of free consumables and free spellcasting.Of course, overcap gold is only an issue for any specific module -- sure, you had access to items and magic you wouldn't have otherwise had, and maybe that prevented you from using a bunch of consumables you would have otherwise, but it all resets at the end of the mod. Undercap gold follows you -- miss out on half the gold for a mod, and there's just no way to make that back up, short of dying and replaying a level.
Samwise 04-02-07, 06:32 PM	Of course, overcap gold is only an issue for any specific module -- sure, you had access to items and magic you wouldn't have otherwise had, and maybe that prevented you from using a bunch of consumables you would have otherwise, but it all resets at the end of the mod. Undercap gold follows you -- miss out on half the gold for a mod, and there's just no way to make that back up, short of dying and replaying a level. That is not correct. The consumables you used and NPC spellcasting you paid for out of overcap would otherwise have had to come from your equipment gold. It "stays" with you in the form of gold and consumables on your character sheet that you never spent or used. The only thing that "resets" at the end of every adventure is the running tally of overcap gold. If you get 1,000 gp overcap but only spend 800 gp overcap, you "lose" other 200 gp overcap, and may not apply in the next adventure. You still got to spend 800 gp that did not have to come out of your pocket, and so you are still 800 gp ahead of the wealth by level guidelines. Further, undercap gold is at least partially corrected by overcap gold. If you come up short 500 gp in one adventure, you just need to spend 500 gp out of overcap in the next adventure, and you are even again. Given that there are a lot more overcap adventures than undercap adventures out there, it is much more likely that PCs will wind up way ahead of the curve than behind it, since you can much more easily get away with spending 50-100 gp out of overcap each adventure to make up for an occasional shortfall.
catsclaw 04-02-07, 11:25 PM	That is not correct. The consumables you used and NPC spellcasting you paid for out of overcap would otherwise have had to come from your equipment gold. It "stays" with you in the form of gold and consumables on your character sheet that you never spent or used.That's true, to an extent -- but I've found the opportunity to spend overcap gold rarely comes up in practice. Maybe it's just the valuable stuff is usually at the end of the mod, after you've had the opportunity to go shopping already, or I'm reluctant to spend gold I find earlier before I verify that we're overcap. Maybe I'm playing too low for it to matter, or players in Verbobonc just don't take advantage of it. But I've seen a lot more people burn through 10-20 CLW charges on a wand than I've ever seen pick up a single potion of CLW from overcap gold. I still think undercap gold is more of a problem, long term, than overcap gold.
Samwise 04-02-07, 11:40 PM	That's true, to an extent -- but I've found the opportunity to spend overcap gold rarely comes up in practice. Maybe it's just the valuable stuff is usually at the end of the mod, after you've had the opportunity to go shopping already, or I'm reluctant to spend gold I find earlier before I verify that we're overcap. Maybe I'm playing too low for it to matter, or players in Verbobonc just don't take advantage of it. But I've seen a lot more people burn through 10-20 CLW charges on a wand than I've ever seen pick up a single potion of CLW from overcap gold. Perhaps you are. Ive seen a lot more people eat up free raise dead's than I have worry about a potion of cure light wounds. And I've had people ask whether I mind burning wand charges casually. The whole point of a consumable item is to consume it, and that's what I do. Otherwise it is just wasted gold on my character sheet, as much as if I bought a cloak of resistance and never wore it for fear it might take damage. You also miss that overcap gold can be spent on spellcasting as the adventure winds down. A few free cure diseases or low level remove curses add up very quickly. Yes, a lot of this depends on whether people expect overcap gold. Some do, and get an extreme advantage from it, and that has been a problem.
Mommy was an Orc 04-03-07, 01:44 AM	I think there's three issues with the current system as is: It needs to be excessively clear. It might make sense for someone who has played with the system for a long time, but it isn't natural for an item to be sold for 6K if the party is a party of 6 and 4K if the party is a party of 4. It should be consistent on the other side, too. Just recently, I played a mod where the party had the option of hiring a guide - the cost of the guide should be per character, not a set cost. That not only emphasizes that the APL system is an artificial measure of treasure, but also keeps it fairer per table. Which actually brings up the 3rd and much larger problem - if treasure is artificial in value, there's no reason for a 6K item to be worth 6K. It should be whatever value is necessary to make the treasure values work out for APL. If that number is 500 gold, great. If it is 6K gold, that's great too. I think that would eliminate a lot of the problems with the current treasure system. Namely over the cap gold, which is really just an excuse for a lot of authors to go: "See how I can abuse the EL system? I'll be nice and toss in a free Raise Dead for you so you can admire it, but not hate me for killing your character off. Heck, you should thank me because now you're ahead of the gold curve."
MatteBlack 04-03-07, 09:40 AM	There is no law against grumbling, rambling and venting. Can we review this policy?
Timlagor 04-03-07, 12:20 PM	My explanation is that 6 adventurers can get a better deal from the merchants than 4 can. Whether this is by being more intimdating or diplomatic or splitting up and visiting more merchants or having better contacts or whatever, they get more money for their loot. If the module lists a component I will let it be used. Missing cash was usually mysteriously spent on wild parties that the PCs can't remember :D [the more ascetic donated it to good causes ..and the really stingy got swindled :devil:]