Claudius Maximus
2016-03-13, 02:12 PM
Ever wanted to know exactly how much gold/treasure to give per point of experience? With the existence of wealth by level, surely there's a theoretical ratio. I put together a chart using some of the numbers already available in the DMG, using the following principles:
3.5 assumes 13.33 CR-appropraite encounters, or the equivalent thereof, in a given level.
The DMG gives numbers for average treasure for encounters of any given CR on page 51. We'll assume a CR equal to party level for these amounts.
By multiplying these amounts by 13.33, we can get the gross amount of expected gold gained during a level. This is higher than the amounts seen in the WBL chart because some of the money is assumed to be spent on scrolls, resurrection spells, etc. The DMG even talks about this disparity, but many DMs forget it.
By dividing the gross gold gain for a given level by the number of experience points it takes to advance to the next level, we can get a ratio of XP to GP rewards.
With that in mind, here's a chart of the results I put together:
Advancing from...
XP:Gold Ratio
Raw Numbers
1-2
1:1
1000:1000
2-3
1:1
2000:2000
3-4
1:1
3000:3000
4-5
1:1
4000:4000
5-6
1:1.06
5000:5333.33
6-7
1:1.11
6000:6666.66
7-8
1:1.24
7000:8666.66
8-9
1:1.42
8000:11333.33
9-10
1:1.66
9000:15000
10-11
1:1.93
10000:19333.33
11-12
1:2.27
11000:25000
12-13
1:2.72
12000:32666.66
13-14
1:3.33
13000:43333.33
14-15
1:4.05
14000:56666.66
15-16
1:4.88
15000:73333.15
16-17
1:5.83
16000:93333.33
17-18
1:7.06
17000:120000
18-19
1:8.7
18000:156666.66
19-20
1:10.7
19000:203333.33
To use the chart, just multiply the amount of XP you want to give by the gold ratio number in the middle column above. This is very useful for keeping treasure in line with abstract XP rewards like roleplaying XP or quest XP. It's also useful to lazy DMs like myself that would rather issue undefined blobs of treasure the PCs can use to "buy" stuff.
Some of these findings are very interesting. Notably, until you hit level 5, you get the exact same amount of XP and GP. What an incredibly useful guideline for DMs of low level games, which can be found absolutely nowhere in the DMG. Otherwise we can observe the runaway scaling of money in 3.5, the better to help you afford those exponentially priced magic items.
I'm not exactly a math whiz, so if anyone takes issue with these numbers or wants to correct something, I'm all ears. In any case, I hope someone else finds this chart useful.
3.5 assumes 13.33 CR-appropraite encounters, or the equivalent thereof, in a given level.
The DMG gives numbers for average treasure for encounters of any given CR on page 51. We'll assume a CR equal to party level for these amounts.
By multiplying these amounts by 13.33, we can get the gross amount of expected gold gained during a level. This is higher than the amounts seen in the WBL chart because some of the money is assumed to be spent on scrolls, resurrection spells, etc. The DMG even talks about this disparity, but many DMs forget it.
By dividing the gross gold gain for a given level by the number of experience points it takes to advance to the next level, we can get a ratio of XP to GP rewards.
With that in mind, here's a chart of the results I put together:
Advancing from...
XP:Gold Ratio
Raw Numbers
1-2
1:1
1000:1000
2-3
1:1
2000:2000
3-4
1:1
3000:3000
4-5
1:1
4000:4000
5-6
1:1.06
5000:5333.33
6-7
1:1.11
6000:6666.66
7-8
1:1.24
7000:8666.66
8-9
1:1.42
8000:11333.33
9-10
1:1.66
9000:15000
10-11
1:1.93
10000:19333.33
11-12
1:2.27
11000:25000
12-13
1:2.72
12000:32666.66
13-14
1:3.33
13000:43333.33
14-15
1:4.05
14000:56666.66
15-16
1:4.88
15000:73333.15
16-17
1:5.83
16000:93333.33
17-18
1:7.06
17000:120000
18-19
1:8.7
18000:156666.66
19-20
1:10.7
19000:203333.33
To use the chart, just multiply the amount of XP you want to give by the gold ratio number in the middle column above. This is very useful for keeping treasure in line with abstract XP rewards like roleplaying XP or quest XP. It's also useful to lazy DMs like myself that would rather issue undefined blobs of treasure the PCs can use to "buy" stuff.
Some of these findings are very interesting. Notably, until you hit level 5, you get the exact same amount of XP and GP. What an incredibly useful guideline for DMs of low level games, which can be found absolutely nowhere in the DMG. Otherwise we can observe the runaway scaling of money in 3.5, the better to help you afford those exponentially priced magic items.
I'm not exactly a math whiz, so if anyone takes issue with these numbers or wants to correct something, I'm all ears. In any case, I hope someone else finds this chart useful.