1. Rusty Swords. They can still be Smelted down and recycled. Metal in a world where metal is hard to come by can be a valuable commodity.
2. Timber Pedestals. Found a half dozen made from mahogany being used by the BBEG to support his collection of Bells. They were worth 500gp each (Exotic timber).
3. Bones of a Monster. Turned out a complete Dragon Skeleton was worth more pound for pound than silver.
4. A Live Stirge. This little blood sucker is worth about a thousand GP alive in the big city market place (100gp if you sell him to the local merchant).
1. Rusty Swords. They can still be Smelted down and recycled. Metal in a world where metal is hard to come by can be a valuable commodity.
Yeah, no. The only time that kind of thing has come up is as a "gotcha" after the fact by a lousy DM who didn't feel like telling his players that the "rusty, worthless, complete crap" weapons were the ONLY treasure of the first dungeon and we had "failed" by failing to retrieve them despite having no problem buying steel for ourselves during character creation.
2. Timber Pedestals. Found a half dozen made from mahogany being used by the BBEG to support his collection of Bells. They were worth 500gp each (Exotic timber).
"Gee, tree stumps that are worth decades of serf labour, each?"
3. Bones of a Monster. Turned out a complete Dragon Skeleton was worth more pound for pound than silver.
For what?
And was there any indication that this was a possible reward, and not simply a Crap DM's excuse for arbitrarily punishing players who didn't read his mind?
4. A Live Stirge. This little blood sucker is worth about a thousand GP alive in the big city market place (100gp if you sell him to the local merchant).
Why?
(See also, previous questions)
Your GM is boring and you should stop playing with him. If you are the GM, you should stop running games.
NEXT?
5. Sharp Gravel on cave floor. Turned out to be small gems that had been rolling around in crud and crap for a decade (20gp each).
I had a rogue who made a point of collecting any random object or item he encountered and then using whatever skill he had to make a use for it. Thus turning `junk`into treasure, or at the least usable items, such as
-6)Stealing a class from a tavern, and later using it to get a small circumstance bonus to listen through doors and walls.
-7) Bone dust from a trap that ground it`s victims up, orriginally just description by the DM, I filled my pockets and a sack full, later used it when encountering some sticky issue with spider web trap. DM`The whole floor is covered with super sticky web, nearly impossible to move over` rogue `well I have this bag full of bone dust here, would it be enough to cover a path across the floor` DM `.......yes....`
-8) a burnt charcoal from a fireplace, later used to make marks and to see what was written on the
-9) A Magic Coin of Decision, this gold coin can be used to magically make decisions, just flip in in the air and catch it....... 1gp turned into 20gp thanks to another player`s total gulibility both in character and out of character The stick-o-directions was a tougher sell though.
-10) a sack of bandit heads, cause nothing distracts city guards from the fact that you are a criminal with a price on your own head better then a sack of other people`s head with prices on them.
-11) I`ve only gotten away with selling a ladder as two 10 foot poles and a dozen torches once.
-12) broken glass=free caltrops
Why?
(See also, previous questions)
Your GM is boring and you should stop playing with him. If you are the GM, you should stop running games.
NEXT?
This is probably the most needlessly aggressive post I've seen on this board.
"I disagree with your reasoning behind this little idea therefore your GM is crap." If my players thought to do things like this I'd reward them accordingly. Get over yourself.
And to contribute to the thread:
13) Any magic item that seems useless at first glance. You'll find a use for it eventually.
Nowadays the DM I play under gives me the third degree because I pull some dragon teeth off of an old skull. I think I'm going to start grabbing everything that isn't nailed down and laugh maniacally or something when I do.
Protip: Dragon Teeth make excellent and awesome daggers/shortswords.
The creatures themselves can be a source of non-obvious treasure as well, I once played as an evil cleric and would take control of any undead that I could (and made undead of fallen foes). By the end of every battle I had a new host of meatbag minions to replace the ones that had fallen in combat.
In a cruel twist of fate, I was one hit killed by a critical from a vampire with a powerful weapon. The vampire spawn that I had been controlling up to that point immediately surrounded and attacked my party.
Protip: Dragon Teeth make excellent and awesome daggers/shortswords.
Very true. But daggers cost all of one or two gp. Hardly game breaking.
I had a paladin in 3.0 that was on the lookout for a black dragon skull. He was going to carve a bastard sword out of one of the horns then have it enchanted to be stronger than steel. The idea was to have a non-metal sword that was immune to acid. I never did find that skull.
Also, in our new 3.5 evil campaign, we were all trapped in an icy prison. A little frost elemental served our meals, and i managed to convince him to come with us, and stone shaped a little sphere for him to stay in. black market elemental slave for sale!
I started a shorter campaign with a DM who I hadn't ever played with before, and prior to and after that, I was one of those guys who would salvage every part and piece of value I could from weird monsters. (Another pro tip: mindflayer tentacles make great whips, apparently. I was paid out the yang for the ones I made in one campain, lol.) So when I start doing my salvage thing, he tells me to be "very specific" about what I'm salvaging from the T-Rex who tried to eat me. An hour later, he tells me to stop, because I've gotten the party to skin the whole thing and begin drying and scraping the hide, while I've been filling vials with different organs, blood, juices, etc...
I hadn't even gotten to the teeth and carved bone weapons yet
Bards are such great skill monkeys, and I was capable (with some assistance, of course) to do all I was laying out for him. After that, if I got too in depth on the salvage, he would joke about the pack of 40 epic dire wolves wanting to get their dinner from the corpses, lol. They must have eaten a few thousand gold worth of stuff I left behind I haven't read the whole thread of course, but I would suggest to anyone who wasn't severly pressed for skill points to take some kind of basic skill like carving, or weaving, or something of the like. When you get out on an adventure far away from home and you cut off a chunk of branch from some exotic tree that doesn't grow where you're from, carving it carefully into something passable nets a nice bit of extra income when you get back. And you can always 'apprentice' yourself out while you're on downtime to the locals crafters for a percentage of the profits. Being a bowyer on my rangers has made me nice bits of extra income, same thing with blacksmithing (as well as armor or weapon smithing) on my warrior types, or a scribe/illustrator/illuminator/cartographer on my wizards. Essentially, get your toon a 'hobby' and make extra income during your rest times.