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Post by waysoftheearth on Jul 20, 2014 5:53:54 GMT -6
How many magic items should a 7th level fighter have? Or a 12th level magic-user? Or any other character? Here is one way to figure it out. |
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Post by Finarvyn on Jul 20, 2014 7:17:44 GMT -6
A really interesting concept, but I shudder at the prospect of rolling up magic items for a character starting at 12th level. The key for me is that you have to get your players to buy into the "you can't use it, you lose it" notion. Otherwise they may try to band together to swap items with each other, blowing the power level up. Like it. I'll have to try a couple to see how it comes out.  |
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Post by waysoftheearth on Jul 20, 2014 7:24:45 GMT -6
A really interesting concept, but I shudder at the prospect of rolling up magic items for a character starting at 12th level. Compressing years of weekly gaming into a single dice task is a mission, especially since the treasure tables are a bit fiddly. But I agree that this kind of thing is begging to be automated so you just need to click "go" and it happens. The key for me is that you have to get your players to buy into the "you can't use it, you lose it" notion. I guess it was intended for the referee, not the players. I started on this to figure out what items high level pre-generated PCs and NPCs should have in an adventure I'm writing, but then I realised it had more general application. If your players don't like what you offer, they can start with 30-180 gp instead  |
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Post by talysman on Jul 20, 2014 15:40:40 GMT -6
I know this is specifically for Delving Deeper, but I think the method used for high-level bandits or other men-as-monsters in Monsters & Treasure has its merits, especially since the 5% per level formula can be simplified to "Roll level or less on d20 three times". This gives every character 0 to 3 magic items, with better chances for more items at higher levels:
Fighter: roll once each for Armor, Shield and Sword.
Magic-User: roll once each for Wand/Staff, Ring and Misc Magic.
Cleric: roll once each for Armor, Shield and Misc Weapon, replacing edged weapon result with Wand/Staff.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Jul 20, 2014 17:47:30 GMT -6
I think the method used for high-level bandits or other men-as-monsters in Monsters & Treasure has its merits, especially since the 5% per level formula can be simplified to "Roll level or less on d20 three times". This gives every character 0 to 3 magic items, with better chances for more items at higher In fact this is exactly where I started. It certainly is quicker, but I found that the results seemed a bit "light on" (especially for high level pre-generated PCs) and had very limited variation. That's why I started thinking about what magic-items a high level PC should have in terms of his XP total, and the treasure hauls he must have taken in order to earn that XP. As can be seen by the couple of examples already posted higher level PCs would realistically have significantly more magical loot than the M&T method suggests. |
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Post by talysman on Jul 20, 2014 18:21:06 GMT -6
I think the method used for high-level bandits or other men-as-monsters in Monsters & Treasure has its merits, especially since the 5% per level formula can be simplified to "Roll level or less on d20 three times". This gives every character 0 to 3 magic items, with better chances for more items at higher In fact this is exactly where I started. It certainly is quicker, but the results seemed a bit "light on" (especially for high level pre-generated PCs) and of very limited variability. That's why I started thinking about what magic-items a high level PC should have in terms of his XP total, and the treasure hauls he must have taken in order to earn that XP. As can be seen by the couple of examples already posted higher level PCs would realistically have significantly more magical loot than the M&T method suggests. Not really so sure about this, since we can figure that some of the XP may (must?) have come from selling magic items... plus we have lost items, broken items, etc. On top of that, there's just a matter of personal taste. Does everyone really want games where 6th level characters are *expected* to have at least 9 items? I think I'd be happy with the M&T approach, plus one or two extra items and a few consumables (not all of which get immediately consumed.) So, to the previous list, add one bonus item roll for every 6 full levels and one consumable for every 4 full levels, based on class: Fighter: Bonus = Misc Weapon or Ring, Consumable = Potion Magic-User: Bonus = Misc Magic or Ring, Consumable = Scroll Cleric: Bonus = Ring, Consumable = Potion |
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Post by waysoftheearth on Jul 20, 2014 18:45:12 GMT -6
Not really so sure about this, since we can figure that some of the XP may (must?) have come from selling magic items... plus we have lost items, broken items, etc. OD&D doesn't give XP for magic-items, or for selling them--at least not until the FAQ article, which advises that magic-items should have minimal XP award, and then immediately goes on to detail XP awards for them! FWIW, the method I described does include "losses" and "consumed" items, albeit rather abstractly. On top of that, there's just a matter of personal taste. Does everyone really want games where 6th level characters are *expected* to have at least 9 items? The method I described implies a 6th level fighter can possibly have up to 9 magic-items. In practice he is extremely unlikely to actually have 9; Mushgnome posted an example of a 6th level dwarf who finished up with 4 magic items. I think I'd be happy with the M&T approach, plus one or two extra items and a few consumables (not all of which get immediately consumed.) So, to the previous list, add one bonus item roll for every 6 full levels and one consumable for every 4 full levels, based on class: Fighter: Bonus = Misc Weapon or Ring, Consumable = Potion Magic-User: Bonus = Misc Magic or Ring, Consumable = Scroll Cleric: Bonus = Ring, Consumable = Potion It seems that you're arriving at the same place via a different method talysman. The method I described is mathematically derived from the game tables (with a few assumptions); the method you've described is based on what you intuitively feel is "about right". It think both are valuable methods. I agree that every referee is ultimately going to use what he feels is "about right" for his own game, but I think it's still valuable to know what the printed rules imply. You're then better equipped to make informed adjustments to your game. |
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Post by bestialwarlust on Jul 21, 2014 10:02:45 GMT -6
The way I'v always done it is just eyeball it. I tend not to give out a lot of magic in my games anyway so my average would be lower. But this is an interesting method I'll have to look at more deeply.
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Post by aldarron on Jul 26, 2014 20:09:25 GMT -6
Very clever! Its a nice little thing to add to the toolbox for sure and I think I'll be trying this from time to time. I like it.
The one conceptual difficult I see is the assumption that classed characters are always adventurers who must have gained their higher levels (and magic items) the same way the player characters do, namely through dungeon raiding. I feel like that's not really the default assumption of the game.
What I do is combine the method from the description of Bandits in Monsters & Treasure, page 5 with the guidelines on page 19 of U&WA. So , by M&T there will be a chance of 5% per level that the man type encountered will have from 1 to 3 magic items. Therefore, I allow a 5% chance per level, rolled 3 times. For each positive result, I roll on the appropriate U&WA table. This is easily done with fighting man and cleric, because the U&WA percentiles add up to 100, but the magic user table sums up to 110% and so must be adjusted.
Yeah, it's a whole lot of dice rolling...
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Post by cooper on Jul 27, 2014 13:02:13 GMT -6
I like the exploration of the number of magic items based on the treasure table, but ultimately isn't indicative of actual play given item use, destruction or other visisitudes of role-playing life (giving items to henchmen, dying etc).
the best, most reasonable is probably gygax's chart in ad&d DMG to quickly determine the magical contents.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Jul 27, 2014 17:37:40 GMT -6
FWIW, the method I described does--albeit crudely--account for the expenditure of consumable items, and also for the possibility of loosing, trading, selling, giving away, etc. of magic-items along the way.
The notion of giving magic-items away to henchmen is, IMHO, quite reasonably represented by the practice of eliminating duplicate items of the same type.
Thus, if a fighter were to roll two or more magic swords, he would keep only one of them for himself (his choice), and the remainder would be struck off. These "stuck off" items have (presumably) been given to henchmen, or otherwise parted with along the way.
The truth is that no summary method can truly represent all the myriad possibilities of actual play. The point of these methods is only to approximate what might have happened.
When I get around to automating the method I described I think it will become clearer whether it is overly generous or not, and at that point it will be trivial to "adjust" the scale of items generated "to taste" by altering the assumed ratio of XP earned from treasure versus other sources.
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Post by cooper on Jul 27, 2014 20:57:43 GMT -6
ah, but how often does a party need to hex crawl to a dungeon and then what are the odds of coming across a lords castle or wizards keep? they stand a good chance of losing a magic item each time this occurs.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Jul 27, 2014 21:41:44 GMT -6
ah, but how often does a party need to hex crawl to a dungeon and then what are the odds of coming across a lords castle or wizards keep? they stand a good chance of losing a magic item each time this occurs. These odds can be calculated, if you like, but as I already mentioned this kind of "loss" is accounted for--whether or not it is accurately accounted for is the question. I don't think it's easy to know this one way or the other. To know for sure we would either have to: a) sample broadly from multiple games in play, or b) assume that games generally tend to reflect the proportions stated in the rules. In this case I've simply done the latter. FWIW--if we assume Delving Deeper's random wilderness tables (which are derived from Outdoor Survival), then a stronghold will occur in approximately 1 hex in 50. The players will then need to pass nearby in order to attract the attention of the resident--and if the players find a dangerous/hostile resident are they likely to pass that way again? And should they be noticed and challenged, a fighter will demand a joust and/or payment in gold. A cleric/anti-cleric will demand a tithe of 10%/40% of the players' wealth. It is only a magic-user who will demand a magic item (or gold if they don't have any) from the players, and then it is but one item from the whole company of players, not one item per player. So yes, if there are strongholds literally everywhere, this kind of magic-item loss could significant, but on average I don't think it would skew the results overly. |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 31, 2014 13:22:16 GMT -6
Seems like a pretty good system to guide you in creating NPCs and when adjusted for the level of magic in your campaign a way to check now and then and see if you are being more stingy than you intended or more free-handed than you intended with the PCs.
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