Books and Knowledge as Reward?

[Unoriginal]

Books can be a pretty interesting way to "flesh out" NPCs and the places where they live. An hobgoblin captain having an essay on elven tactics, a wererat's lair containing the prayer book of their latest victim or the autobiography of an Empyrean found in an evil cultist's library can add some flavor to what otherwise would be a generic bad guy's room, and of course, books can also serve as hints and clues for the rest of the scenario: all of the exemples given earlier can give players indications or ideas about what's going on, and "go grab the enemy's papers to get infos" is not an uncommon plot point.

But, my question is, as players, have any of you ever seen books be used as reward/treasure due to the knowledge they contained (and not in a "it's relevant to the current scenario" way), or used books in this fashion as DMs? And if you have seen that, did the players bother taking the books for more than just how much they were worth in gold?

I've seen spellbooks be used as reward, of course, and I've seen a few time books that were expensive enough by themselves that they were treated like art items (ex: "this is a very well-made illuminated manuscript of a legend, it's worth X gp"), but I've never seen books be used as reward in a "this is a book on medicinal plants, it might be useful" or "those texts about fiends are very interesting, any scholar would be happy to add them to their collection" manners.

I'm sorry if I'm not being clear.

[HandofBlades]

I do this all the time in my game. For 3.5 I did a lot of this book once read gives you a plus one to blank skill or something to that affect and if it was something powerful like reading this book gives rogues an extra dice of sneak attack I made it so that the book was so complex only a rogue could understand it.

For 4th I tended to do things like this book teaches interesting knowledge or a plot hook with the occasional when reading this book you find a magic formula that reduces the cost of enchanting an magic item by 1/4 to 1/2.

For 5th super easy to give books that give advantages on checks like medicine or Arcana when used during down time or short rests. Or even if you read this book over x days you get a plus 1 to a skill. Also great to throw neat little ways to open said books. A maidens kiss only opens if you speak abyssal and say open and the like. The whole view lets you flesh out the world with great titles such as. The macab arcana of zemphala. Then they read the book plus one to Arcana and then they find the wizard tower in major disrepair and book it is zemphala's tower. Makes the world seem alive and cool.

It makes it so you can give neat little exposition dumps or buffs to people include it in treasure and maybe give situational bonuses if people take the time to learn the lore of your world. Makes them take ownership and makes them more invested in the world.

[Marvnmartian]

Personally ive used books as language dumps for all of my languages in 5e, so if a character wanted to learn a new language but didn't have the 250 days to spend in a town with someone who speaks the language I would add these books to book shops in towns to allow players to buy them and be able to read during rests to learn the language over time.

also ive found unless you run with a lot of wizards/knowledge clerics the intelligence skills get thrown to the way side because most classes have int as a dump stat, so I prefer to have a book about Arcana, History, Nature and Religion since those would be books that would be written and let players get a flat +5 buff/advantage if they spend time reading the book before making a check i usually say 10 minutes

[Avigor]

I once (in a guild library, not as loot) got what was described as a "draconic rosetta stone" that allowed me to learn Draconic in record time; that particular rogue wanted to learn it in case he ever got his hands on kobold trap building instructions or such.

[DarkKnightJin]

The DM of the game I'm currently in has expressed that she is thinking of/going to include some cantrips for the casters that they normally wouldn't be able to get. Haven't had a chance to ask for more details on this, but I like the idea. It'd make the character more unique, which is always good.
Cleric. Bam. They now have Mage Hand or Prestidigitation. It'd wonderful added flavor, and tie into the non-combat pillars of the game.

[Temperjoke]

I think it really depends on the sort of game being run, as well as the characters and how long you're planning on having them. You'd need a player that'd be interested in their character having that sort of collection, as well as some place to put it. It also falls on the DM to make having a book collection relevant as well. I mean, having the ability to research in your own personal library is great if you have books that are pertinent to the story or your needs. "I have the most exhaustive collection of knowledge on the 9 Hells in the city!" "That's nice, but we need to know about the Abyss."

Rewards like this can also be good for a player who wants a legacy sort of thing, like loot and such his first character receives are inherited by his second, third, etc.

[Jaelommiss]

While playing a wizard in HotDQ my DM gave me a book penned by multiple solars, pit fiends, and balors (or at least written from their perspective) regarding all sorts of planar things and containing knowledge that was absolutely considered in the wrong hands by merely existing. A pit fiend decided that we were vulnerable enough (we were level four to six at the time) to just take it from us. I think that the DM just wanted to see how I'd respond.

We were chased by hellhounds and other devils for a while. Every night I would copy down parts of the book. I contacted an arcanoloth that the book identified as an information broker to set up an auction. The pit fiend stopped chasing me (and probably lost his position) after I sold information regarding his cults and followers on multiple material planes to a pair of angels and a fey queen in exchange for protection, atonement (LE is fun, but never say that to a planatar), divine blessings, and the queen's patronage. I'm not sure that my DM was expecting me to enter planar politics at level seven, but it all worked out in the end. The book was helpful later in the adventure path.

It also looked pretty on my shelf between my growing collection of magical theorems and research journals about dragons.

[Sigreid]

It all depends on how the players see their characters. I have a character that spends a good deal of his wealth building a library. To him a book is most definitely a reward. I've played characters that don't go into any knowledge skills. If they find a book the only question is whether it's worth enough at market to make it worth packing it out.

[Waterdeep Merch]

During the last edition, I gave all of my players a godly artifact near the beginning of a long campaign. One of the most useful turned out to be a book which was a holy artifact tied to a god of knowledge. The book's pages were entirely blank except for once every day when you could ask the book a question. The pages would then fill with the answer to that question, as best to that god's knowledge. Which was usually encyclopedic.

I also like giving the party books that pertain to rare and strange information, or guidebooks. So long as they possess them and have the time to flip through the pages, they can use it for either bonuses or automatic knowledge regarding the book's topic. For instance, if they found a prolific book on demonology, the players would recognize a balor on sight and have a fairly high chance of recognizing fiendish rune markings.

[ImproperJustice]

In an old campaign of mine, the PCs found an ancient chapel from a long lost race, and recovered tge equivalent of a Bible from that culture.

As one of the PCs (a bard) learned the language of the lost race, she then began studying the book with the party cleric and learned that it’s contents would put to rest a thousand year old religious debate, and helped unite two massive religious denominations prior to a massive war for the fate of the universe.

This was purely side plot that I didn’t expect anyone to ever get into. But....go scholars!

[Laserlight]

I've had characters who would value books as books, not for any mechanical benefit. In fact, my current character, a gnome wizard/ knowledge cleric, is one. My DM asked what one magic item I wanted, and I told him ”I don't need a wand, I don't need armor; what I need is, let's call it a Library Coat. Like a wearable Bag of Holding for books.”

[Slipperychicken]

In an age where books must always be written and copied by hand, they should have a good sale value to reflect their rarity and labor-intensiveness. I've looted whole bookcases worth of books and made a good profit from it.

I like reading books and documents in-game. When a topic relating to one of them comes up, it gives me some leverage in terms of already knowing what's going on and what to do. I can ask if a situation would be covered by the book, and that gives my GM an easy way to infodump it for me, potentially without a knowledge check.

[JackPhoenix]

In addition to ton of lootable books without any practical use (that were left where they were), I've given two books useful books to my players. One was tome on planes, with various informations about the planes, their inhabitants and some planar mechanics, but the most important feature was the plan for a ritual to set up semi-permantnt portals to each plane. The rituals required some special circumstances, and the portals had to be made from rare and expensive materials linked to the plane in question (I can't find the file with details right now, but I remember portal to Shavarath, the Battleground being made out of fused weapons... weapons actually used in battle before and including some magical weapons). It also had (originally unplanned) role in the campaign, because it could've been used to solve certain problem requiring access to massive amount of positive energy to nuke zombie apocalypse in progress.

The other was house Vadalis research journal concerning Blink Dogs, with details about their behavior and biology, how to train them, and enough information to learn their language. Studying it, besides allowing to learn "speak" Blink Dog, would give advantage on animal handling. As he characters killed most of the dogs in question, it was uncertain they could use those abilities in the future, so they could just sell it back to Vadalis for hefty sum.

And my current character is a wizard, being bookworm comes with the territory. I expect to loot any unattended book I'll come across.

[the_brazenburn]

In Rise of Tiamat, there is a library full of books. Some of these books can give you proficiency in a particular skill if you spend enough time studying them.

[Sjappo]

In Rise of Tiamat, there is a library full of books. Some of these books can give you proficiency in a particular skill if you spend enough time studying them.
I've had players cart of an entire library they stumbled upon. It was pretty localised campaign. They made a deal with a local curios peddler and they made a tidy sum. I had the peddler take a cut and pay the PC's as the books were sold. They had a nice steady income that rose as the rose in levels.

Books as plot points are pretty common. Especially diaries. Or arcane tomes.

But you could also let the PCs find a diary with some tactical musings in it, in which a NPC gives away his MO. That way the PCs can plan for the inevitable encounter. Baddy the Wizards always opens with Fireball followed by a summon monster spell.

[Clone]

I think an important thing to do is NOT give books a gold value. I've noticed other players around my table, somtimes myself included, not caring about what the seemingly important books (or sometimes even items) are the second we hear its price tag.
In my own campaign I made this mistake when I described a tapestry which had potentially paramount plot point priority to the party. They were legitimately interested in it, asking about different details of it and conversed on what it could be telling them. When one of the players asked "how expensive does it look?" and made a check to see it was worth like 100GP, they stuffed it into a bag of holding and not only forgot about their conversation but forgot it was in there to begin with!

Notes, books, and diaries however which I didn't say had a value not only are taken more seriously but are brought up time and time again for information and references, regardless if it has relevance to what they are doing or not.

[Ivor_The_Mad]

It depends on the campaign if it plays a key roll then I guess it would make sense or if someone has a very scholarly character and they collect books, I have given the party a book giving information on a creature to help them face it.