Infinite Money with Rods of Wonder

[Silva Stormrage]

So reading the rod of wonder list description (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/rods.htm#wonder) I noticed two things. First no effect outright kills or damages the user (Except the one that shrinks but thats still not really harmful). Secondly it can create money with the spray of gems.

If you had a skeleton/dominated person/random minion that doesn't need sleep use the rod of wonder every round for a day how much money do you get?

From my calculations you end up getting on average 10800gp worth of gems. 10 Rounds in a minute, 60 minutes in an hour 24 hours in a day means 14400 activations of the rod of wonder. With a .03 activation chance thats 432 activations of the gem power. Which on average gives you 25 gp worth of gems.

Is this just another way that you can shatter the economy in D&D or did I miss something?

[Clistenes]

I'm not reading the description of the item right now, but I think those are suggestions for the DM, and that he's encouraged to customize the effect. Abusing the Rod of Wonder would be kind of suicidal in a "Summon Orcus and kick his balls" kind of way. Sort of like getting a Ring of Wishes and asking for godhood, you are asking the DM to screw you.

[Fable Wright]

Is this just another way that you can shatter the economy in D&D or did I miss something?

Well, the elephants and rhinoceri you summon might get upset and cause quite a lot of collateral damage, perhaps even killing the minion using the rod and/or smashing the rod. Also, there isn't actually a guarantee that the gem making power is in the rod.

[Ksheep]

"You want to do what with the Rod? OK, let me just pull up the table for the Deck of Many Things…"

[Kazyan]

I get the feeling that spamming a Rod of Wonder nonstop for hours is a terrible idea no matter who you are.

[Spuddles]

25gp a day for 12,000 gp in capital seems like a poor investment strategy, even ignoring the risks in abusing a rod of wonder.

[Silva Stormrage]

Well, the elephants and rhinoceri you summon might get upset and cause quite a lot of collateral damage, perhaps even killing the minion using the rod and/or smashing the rod. Also, there isn't actually a guarantee that the gem making power is in the rod.

Good point on that, I assumed they were summoned by a summon monster type effect and would poof in a round a level and wouldn't attack without direction. You could set up some repeating traps that would kill them, maybe rays of stupidity. Sell the animal meat for profit too? A bit more setup required though.

Also I assumed that the rod of wonder only had those effects I didn't think it was standard for the GM to update the rod with whatever he wanted. That does make it slightly suicidal.


Edit: @ Spuddles its not 25 gp a day. Its 25 gp per activation on average. You get 432 activations meaning 10800gp per day. You almost pay off the capital cost in 1 day.

[Zanthy1]

Good point on that, I assumed they were summoned by a summon monster type effect and would poof in a round a level and wouldn't attack without direction. You could set up some repeating traps that would kill them, maybe rays of stupidity. Sell the animal meat for profit too? A bit more setup required though.

Also I assumed that the rod of wonder only had those effects I didn't think it was standard for the GM to update the rod with whatever he wanted. That does make it slightly suicidal.


Edit: @ Spuddles its not 25 gp a day. Its 25 gp per activation on average. You get 432 activations meaning 10800gp per day. You almost pay off the capital cost in 1 day.

Nto only could you sell the meat/hides, but thats a little extra xp coming in. Unless you are too high a level to get xp for the critters summoned. However i also thought it was like the summon monster, and they would just stand around until they expire. Would love to know how this turns out!

[tiercel]

By default, the table given is the usual effects, and if you were to just occasionally use it in combat I'd expect that most DMs would just use that table.

As soon as you try to game an inherently random item by trying to make it a statistical sure thing, I'm pretty sure that the DM would eventually invoke the clause in the item's description (emphasis added):


A rod of wonder is a strange and unpredictable device that randomly generates any number of weird effects each time it is used. (Activating the rod is a standard action.) Typical powers of the rod include the following.

...i.e. the rod isn't necessarily limited to producing the given table, even by RAW -- so the DM doesn't have to even Rule 0 his way past such gamemanship.