Choosing starting wealth (high lvl PC chat creation) Sane Item Prices

[Enderasha]

First off much thanks to Saidoro and Artisan_mechanicum for making the “Sane Magic Items” list. I like the way it works because I do agree the rarity of some items does not bely it’s actual value. Especially now with errata popping up like the uncommon Bard Instruments properly giving disadvantage to all charm and domination abilities.

That said, I am finalizing a higher level extra planar horror game (starting level 15) and have been puzzling over initial wealth. The players are aware I have not finalized it and I am always open to opinion.

If I were to use the sane magic item prices, is there a way to give starting gold that accounts for ‘found’ items and straight gold a player would accumulate along the way? I want to let them pick and choose by spending gold instead of a flat X uncommon Y rare Z very rare as not all items are created equal. I also know a party will sell items they don’t need to commission items they want as they climb the ladder.

Any ideas where to begin?

The charts for Medium+ fantasy seems like they point me towards roughly 20-30k in gold plus found items but 1) is that a perfect amount of gold and 2) how to value found items

[nickl_2000]

My personal opinion

1) They get 2000 gp spending cash
2) They get all the mundane weapon, armor, and items they want
3) They get two +1 items (weapons, armor, rod of the pact keeper, etc)
4) They get 1 choice for a custom list you make (most uncommon and some rares)
5) They get 1 DM made custom item made specifically for their character.

Overall this still gives the player the choice to pick what they want, gives them power you would expect from a 15th level character, and gives you the chance to give them something special to them.

[Tanarii]

I also know a party will sell items they don’t need to commission items they want as they climb the ladder.

If you want to account for that, you'll also need to figure out much downtime they had, and how they used it.

[Enderasha]

It is true it would require some working but from my experience playing games low to high there is always expected to be some downtime and/or shopping trips. Figuring that most expansive adventure modules cover 1-3 levels at most (not including the much larger ones like ToA and DotMM) there is at least a gap between.

This adventure is intended to be challenging and sometimes I don’t know if I agree with the DMG power level by a lot. They’re saying a level 15 character has two uncommon and one rare item. In every game I’ve played in by level 8 or 9 I have that much and arguably a few other non combat random things shared amongst the party for utility (bag of holding, wand of secrets, portable hole etc). In these cases the rare items the party had acquired were not on the high end of rare. A +1 armor or ring of protection (mantle being the uncommon one) not a Flame-tongue.

This is why I was leaning towards the Sane Magic Items pricing that was linked to these forums it takes the rarity and power level into account. But I’m not sure how to place a gold value.

Going back in time to 3.5 the starting wealth was a large number but all magic items had discreet costs so you could price out starting magic items and spending money. I just don’t know how to translate that to 5e using a price list.

Is this even possible?

If not I might lean towards something like what has been suggested already

[strangebloke]

Ah yes, the sane magic item prices. A fine resource.

some things like adamantine and mithril armor are underpriced, but overall its a great tool.

I would just say: "Party has 'x' gold, decide amongst yourselves how you want it divided." So the party can put aside a third of the cash for party items like bags of holding and then use the rest for selfish items like flametongues and rings of earth elemental command. They can't go full christmas tree since they're still limited by attunement, but you might throw in a statement like "No more than 4 items per person" or "no consumables" to avoid nonsense like someone buying a whole bucket of 'necklace of fireball' beads.

As to the issue of how much gold to give them, well... you just have to take into account how many 'levels' worth of magic items you've handed them. A +3 longsword at 15th level is at least as good as being level 16 with a normal sword.

Personally I'd go with "100 gp * starting level^2" for each party member. That's enough for them each to get +2 armor, +2 weapon, +2 shield, if they completely ignore everything else. It's pretty generous and I'd probably consider it 2 levels worth of magic items, but hey, its a high level campaign.


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