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View Full Version : DM Help Plausible ways to keep up with WBL in RP-heavy campaigns



OttoVonBigby
2017-11-13, 05:05 PM
I'm seeking any and all ideas to counter the following natural tendency I've observed in myself as a DM:

Because our campaigns seldom involve traditional "dungeon crawls," and are more focused on interaction and problem-solving, GP rewards tend to lag behind WBL because the actual combats that occur tend to either be Climactic Face-Offs with a Villain, or Incidental Creature Encounters in Transit. The latter type, I find, can rarely plausibly result in meaningful treasure; these players are not the sorts that will gut the wyvern that descended upon them solely on the off-chance that he's got diamonds in his stomach. And the former category of combat happens too rarely in a campaign to be feasible, even if I multiply the "appropriate" GP reward significantly to compensate for my stinginess.

One idea I've already had is to increase my use of non-monstrous encounters, i.e. bandits and alignment-opposed murderhobo parties. This is slightly tougher to DM, however, especially when one character decides not to TAKE these bad guys' stuff but instead to go off on a huge boring tangent to try and return said stuff to its rightful owners. Or worse, redeeming the bad guys and letting them KEEP their stuff.

Rewards of cash and high-end gear for services rendered, e.g. from rulers or guildmasters or the like, are another good way, but they don't come up that often, and some groups are so eager to avoid Official Attention that this becomes unviable.

I've even had the party stumble upon an unexpected cache of valuables buried in the wilderness--which strikes me as plausible exactly once.

So I open the floor: what are some creative, clever, maybe surprising, and/or ideally REPEATABLE mechanisms to move beyond the GP-per-head model in a halfway-plausible, sandbox-style game?

RazorChain
2017-11-13, 05:15 PM
First you should feel lucky for you non murderhobo players.

Just give them rewards for deeds done. They did a good thing for a wealthy merchant and he rewards them.

The villain had a treasure room

There are myriad of ways to get gold into the picture.

Or just rewrite the economy and give gold some value

Or just focus less on loot, seems it isnt important to the players

Anonymouswizard
2017-11-14, 05:07 AM
First off, Wealth by Level is by it's very nature an abstraction. In some ways it's a side effect of levelling rules of early D&D (2000gp for a Fighter to make second level), in some ways it's an attempt to say that 'you should have X magic items by this level', in some ways it's an attempt to balance Mundanes and Magicians by giving mundanes magic items (please ignore the fact that magicians also get them).

On that note, easily the most believable way to increase a character's wealth is via magic items and gemstones as payment (depending on the level). Nobody in D&D land will actually carry around a sackful of gold when buying stuff, if they have all that gold it's locked in their keep (giving the players one can also boost them closer to WBL), otherwise people will be carrying around a couple of expensive magic items and some gemstones, as well as a purse with some gold and silver in it for purchases, and organise payments for larger items in gold or goods (paying a smith for that suit of full plate in both iron and gold for example, or a crate of wine and twenty pounds of wheat).

If you're worried about PCs lagging behind Wealth by Level, just remember that they're likely to be able to use magic items and they're the most valuable thing in the books by a significant margin.

redwizard007
2017-11-14, 08:05 AM
Land. The income stream from traditional sources can be as lucrative as you like. Perhaps a vein of silver or copper has been found on the PCs land. Perhaps they lost fewer sheep to wolves this year. Perhaps a new well has increased crop yields this year. All of these can be great sources of income.

Titles. If the king names you Lord Admiral, there may be a significant stipend. Likewise for lesser titles.

Prizes. Win a tournament. Sell the trophy. Instant cash.

Bounties. Bankers (the Medici, not Wells Fargo) might need something seized for an unpaid debt and the PCs get a cut.

Posted rewards. Monetary rewards for everything from bandit slaying, to exploration could be common.

Investment. Whether backing a ship on a trade mission, or loaning money to a local business, investments can return a solid profit. They can also be a total loss, but may be recoverable through clever adventuring...

Traditional loot. Selling horses and gear of fallen foes could also work, but your group seems resistant to this one.

Edit: exploration could also lead to exploitation of native peoples. See 1600-1900 Earth for examples. This was a HUGE stream of revenue.

Do any of these work for you?

NRSASD
2017-11-14, 08:29 AM
Two questions for you:

1. What do you mean by a higher focus on interaction and problem solving? Are we talking like politics? Natural hazards? Any/all challenges have the potential to make cash, since someone wanted this problem solved in the first place. The source of said cash depends on the problem at hand.

2. If combats are so rare, is WBL actually important to follow? When combats do occur, just base them off the characters' current WBL, or the average of their level and their WBL. Personally I think you'd be better off maintaining verisimilitude than struggling to find increasingly improbable sources of hard currency.

Possible sources of cash not listed previously:

Resources: Even if they don't have land, they can still make quite a pretty penny selling the locations of mineral deposits/good farmland/rare timber to the appropriately interested parties. This dovetails quite nicely with the WBL problem, because they get a nice cash reward up front and don't have to worry about exploiting the resource themselves.

Stipends: Presumably, somebody important wants whatever problem the party is facing solved. The important guy might be willing to pay up front or loan out some nice gear, at least til the problem is solved. If something bad were to happen to this important guy (with or without the PCs involvement), they can't really return the loaned items.

Pex
2017-11-14, 08:34 AM
Each character has a special magic item that increases in power as the character gains levels. Your choice whether the player chooses how with limitations you set forth or you choose how that the character will still like.

OttoVonBigby
2017-11-14, 10:45 AM
Lots of cool ideas, everybody, thanks!

Here's one I stumbled upon: WAR! Specifically, the likely significant amounts of portable gold/gems on hand in the officer's camp to pay the mercenaries (http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/11/14/two-unexpected-ways-in-which-mercenaries-affected-ancient-battles/). The PCs can steal said gold/gems from the enemy and thereby impair their effectiveness in the war. And if they do this of their own initiative, they keep the spoils :smallbiggrin:

Alcore
2017-11-14, 12:11 PM
Great! Lower WBL? Weaker creatures!

You have escaped rocket tag!
(Though it sounds like rockets ain't their thing)



http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/ultimateCampaign/campaignSystems/investment.html

Once had a dragon PC where two thirds of the starting hoard was investments. The rest she was wearing (her lair was usually unguarded). Basically once a year she would tour 'her' land and collect gold. If she slept through it then it was added to the pot for yet more gold. These would also spawn quests of their own;

Dragon gives 10k to Noble for Granary/Mill and he orders PCs (not necessarily us) to clear a patch of land. Peasants would then come and make farmsteads. More quests would follow as nature encroached back. Point was dragon would make 300 a year.


-----------


Stronghold builders guide.

A 3.5 book that lets players own strongholds. If by resource can make 1-3% a year (month?) If they have space and 20 mooks to do the work.



----------

War and kingmaker!

The kingmaker rules are broken and crude but good at bringing in gold by the truckload. The kingdom building rules, however, are much better written and provide some gold (more than the ways mentioned) but is rather involved.

redwizard007
2017-11-14, 12:27 PM
I can't believe I forgot tribute.

Oh, powerful wizard. Here is a gift of ________. Please do/don't do this thing that you could do.

Or rewards...

Oh, mighty warrior. Thank you for ________. Please accept this gift in thanks.

It would be rude to turn down a gift, right? Yes, it can feel like a video game quest reward, but who cares.

Jay R
2017-11-14, 12:28 PM
I understand the situation as you described it, but you left out one crucial fact.

Are the players having fun? If so, don't change anything.

If not, consider the advice above in this thread.

But ask that crucial question first.

Piedmon_Sama
2017-11-15, 02:18 PM
rewrite the economy and give gold some value

I run a campaign that sounds similar to yours. My players are far more interested in intrigue and interacting with the campaign world than dungeon-crawling. That has its upside but it means unfortunately their wealth remains anemic compared to their level.

Although it's too late now for me to employ this option (I've already written a whole backstory for the currencies of my setting) I'd like to back RazorChain's suggestion here as an elegant and effective one.

Basically, it's fairly well known that the price in gold for common equipment as well as the amounts of treasure recommended per encounter are completely unrealistic. Gygax himself in the AD&D1e book mentions this but wanted the treasure hoards in his game to reflect what you would see in fairy tales and fantasy rather than a realistic quasi-medieval setting. So you could quite justifiably scale it back by dividing the cost of everything by 10, in goldpieces---so a longsword is now 1.5 gp, a suit of scale mail is now three gp, a potion of Cure Light Wounds now five, etc. Based on my reading of what prices we have for the late Middle Ages, that becomes fairly close to the purchasing power of real life coinage. You could persuade your players that this is a good idea because it makes the setting much more economically realistic (and much like historical periods D&D is modeled on, real estate and property becomes much more important than coin, which becomes largely a tool of merchants and small exchanges) and allows them to focus on diplomacy, intrigue or whatever else beyond chasing down the next chest of coins.

Another thing you might consider is generally waving the small costs of life by having patronage play a greater role in the campaign (if you aren't doing so already). So if the PCs are on a mission for Duke X, he gives them his seal which will guarantee them free room and board throughout his realm, provided they work towards completing his task. This lets the PCs A) feel important B) removes a lot of beancounting and C) involves the PCs actively with the campaign setting.

Airk
2017-11-15, 02:36 PM
I have a counterquestion.

Why do you care? Wealth by Level is basically a thing that the designers created because they were trying to give standard guidelines for how tough monsters should be to be an "even match" for a party of level X. They needed to establish that, no, that party of level 10 adventurers is, in fact, expected to have about Q Much resources in the form of gold and magical doodahs, or what they said would be a fair encounter for them wouldn't be.

But it doesn't sound like you've got a game in which on-level encounters matter a whole lot anyway. So why are you worried about Wealth By Level?

Recherché
2017-11-15, 02:45 PM
I'm in a slightly similar campaign for Pathfinder and one of the ways the GM balances things out is by giving us free magic item crafting feats so the party can do twice as much with half the gold and a lot of downtime. - shrug- It's kinda quirky but it works for us.

Grod_The_Giant
2017-11-15, 09:55 PM
You could switch over to something like Pathfinder's Automatic Bonus Progression (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/other-rules/unchained-rules/automatic-bonus-progression/) or my War Against the Christmas Tree (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?282541-The-War-Against-the-Christmas-Tree-Eliminating-Magic-Item-Dependency-(3-5)). If your players and campaign don't fit with the "loot everything!" expectation, change the rules so that loot and character power aren't linked so much anymore.

OttoVonBigby
2017-11-16, 08:34 AM
I have a counterquestion.

Why do you care?

Well, it's true, I'm not exceedingly concerned about this. But I look at this party's gear, and I look at what the level-appropriate monsters can do, and I perceive some fragility. So once or twice I've felt the need to pull my punches, which lowers XP, etc. etc. My goal really is not so much to slavishly adhere to the WBL guidelines, but to reduce the disparity to a noticeable extent.

This is definitely a campaign wherein patronage can be a big factor; it's a highly mobile party with one of those Quests Requiring Back-and-Forth Treks Around the Four Corners of the Known World. Land ownership, not so much (and in fact, previous campaigns where PCs get a demesne and a keep and all that have had...mixed results for us).

Piedmon_Sama
2017-11-16, 11:43 AM
Well, as feudal economies can show us, you never need to visit or be anywhere near a piece of real estate to make it work for you. If the PCs are granted a profitable piece of property (like, idk, let's say a flour mill right next to a danish shop) let's say they are granted it in usufruct, which means basically "you can do whatever you want with the property if it makes it more profitable, and even keep like 99% of the money, since when you die either your heirs will become my vassals or the deed comes back to me."

So since they have no time or interest in selecting only the finest wheats, sugars and all-natural ingredients to grow their Danish business, they hire a manager to do it. If he's good at his job he can expand the operation, adding a second millstone, a new wing, a coffee stand and a small reading selection etc. and it gets more profitable. Depending on how feudal you want to get the manager is like a ministerial, so he gets a decent wage but most of the profits still go back to you. Finally, when you have made the greatest pastry and coffee shop plus bookstore in town and your mill churns out bread and the property cannot be expanded on any further, you go back to the Duke (or whoever) and you're like, how about you buy this from me for [annual profit]+10% then when the price of wheat skyrockets because Sauron's Orcs burned down the Shire or whatever and nobody buys danishes you laugh and laugh and laugh and you use your money to buy waterfront condominiums.

e: obviously a drawback with this method is you can't really stop your managerial professionals from skimming off the top. At the same time the amount of corruption is self-limiting since if your middlemen skim too much, you kick in their door and spur-rake them in the face Knightly-style.