Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 tonybot May 11, 2011 15:03:32	Hi, I'm a relatively new DM and I'll be running the Vault of Darom Madar this sunday. I'm feeling pretty confident about most things, I'm making a bunch of changes to make it fit into a one shot format. My big question: how much treasure should the players be able to walk away with from the vault? the adventure seems to have suggestion for how much is there but not how much the players would actially be able to keep. I will have 5 player character at level 1 if that matters for any calculations. Thanks!
#2 siromega May 11, 2011 15:36:40	When I ran through this I gave them the standard Party Number - 1 amount of items but a 4000 gold, seeing as how the deal was they'd get a 10% cut of the treasure (hence the last guy got a little over 400 gold, which when pulled in with his current cash actually gave him enough to get two level one magic items) I say don't be stingy, it's a magic vault that's been sealed for ages, give them a nice reward. Few words of advice: If you have fumbling breakage, do not give everyone a weapon, as at level one that will be a cruel slap in the face when it breaks. Shields/armor/equipment/potions/etc. are your best bet here. If you are using Brutal Breakage, still give weapons out judiciously, becasue otherwise they will never reroll and it'll be a useless rule that'll be forgotten about until much later until they get enchant magic item or find a reliable magic item dealer, both of which are ultimately at your discretion.
#3 Ozmodious May 12, 2011 7:37:13	What I did when I ran it was have them hired for 1 item of their choice ( first pick) from the treasure. Then let each of then choose  a magical item ( non metal) from level 1-4. They are now level 7 and each of them use that same item they picked on that adventure. There was no other loot for the players and that seemed to have worked out well.
#4 mach4 May 13, 2011 21:22:32	I say don't be stingy, it's a magic vault that's been sealed for ages Be stingy. If you are judicious, then make sure that things fail, run out of uses, get confiscated as contraband by a band of templars, etc. It's Dark Sun after all. Players should be more than hesitant about being walking arsenals of enchanted gear that will draw the attentions of everyone else around from templars in the cities to every roaming elf tribe in the wastes.   If you have fumbling breakage, do not give everyone a weapon, as at level one that will be a cruel slap in the face when it breaks. Shields/armor/equipment/potions/etc. are your best bet here. It should be a slap in the face and a nice and early way to drive home that Athas is neither fair nor friendly.
#5 siromega May 13, 2011 23:47:12	Be stingy. If you are judicious, then make sure that things fail, run out of uses, get confiscated as contraband by a band of templars, etc. It's Dark Sun after all. Players should be more than hesitant about being walking arsenals of enchanted gear that will draw the attentions of everyone else around from templars in the cities to every roaming elf tribe in the wastes. That can apply for any other campaign setting though, I mean obviously if your running aroung with a giant obsidian longsword of flamey death +2 then you should  probably try to hide that, but who's gonna pay too close attenttion to your boots? It should be a slap in the face and a nice and early way to drive home that Athas is neither fair nor friendly. Debatable, I try to drive home that point by making combat and RP neither fair nor friendly, with slaves, death, starvation, survival, etc. **** around with mechanics is fun but I'd rather they get the point that just be frustrated at me for enforcing an optional rule for the campaign setting. That could just be my table though, we all like to argue and debate stuff haha
#6 mach4 May 14, 2011 8:09:39	but who's gonna pay too close attenttion to your boots? Each to their own for sure, but I would imagine most city and large fort gate guards that included a caster on occasion (likely a defiler in the case of the cities) would perform either random or routine detect magic on select people passing through, or greedy elven raiders in the wastes, or druidic hermits with a distate of anything that may be tied to arcane casters and it's workings, or unscrupulous nobles sizing up a group that is well trained in arcana before trumping up some charge to have the players arrested on and their gear added to his trophy collection for an upcoming dinner for his peers, or the merchant smugglers the player's just hired to get them and their contraband gear passed any of these obsticales with their skin intact. Those raggedy sandles could lead to a whole world of hurt (and adventure in the process).
#7 siromega May 14, 2011 15:04:44	Well you just helped me figure out how to make my DS game a little bit more interesting haha
#8 drummingdm May 18, 2011 13:05:45	I'm a bit of a jerk when it comes to Dark Sun rewards.  I pretty much throw the expected wealth by level stuff out the window and say, "The world is piss poor, and so are you." For The Vault of Darom Madar I made the treasure be actual, physical, metal coinage.  Unspendable in the cities, and Templar-bait outside of them.  They transported the piles of gold and silver coin back to Tyr, smuggled them through the gates by bribing a Templar, and then immediately turned the coin over to a merchant trading house, getting a TERRIBLE rate on the return - they got maybe 10% of the actual physical value of the coinage due to the dangers inherent in "laundering" the metal coinage.  My PCs still ended up with vouchers from the merchant house they could cash in for things like mounts and gear, but they got very little in the way of actual physical reward - something I love about Dark Sun.
#9 mach4 May 18, 2011 13:27:29	I'm a bit of a jerk when it comes to Dark Sun rewards.  I pretty much throw the expected wealth by level stuff out the window and say, "The world is piss poor, and so are you." For The Vault of Darom Madar I made the treasure be actual, physical, metal coinage.  Unspendable in the cities, and Templar-bait outside of them.  They transported the piles of gold and silver coin back to Tyr, smuggled them through the gates by bribing a Templar, and then immediately turned the coin over to a merchant trading house, getting a TERRIBLE rate on the return - they got maybe 10% of the actual physical value of the coinage due to the dangers inherent in "laundering" the metal coinage.  My PCs still ended up with vouchers from the merchant house they could cash in for things like mounts and gear, but they got very little in the way of actual physical reward - something I love about Dark Sun. Well played. In the end I think it depends on your game table's general themes. More heroically themed games may be less adverse to the PCs being the exception to the rule of poverty, anti-magic bigotry, etc while more survivalist themed groups may not be.