Loot availability/distribution in adventures

SNIP
1 provided 2 items
1 provided a single item

These last 2 example are the kinds of situations that lead to people being upset. I do feel that when magic items do appear that not enough appear to avoid disappointment at a table. When 2 items appear, 2 players get money, XP, and an item, 2-4 only get money and XP. It’s hard to find a table that won’t argue, especially if an item can be used by more than one person. In my earlier post I gave suggestions to increase choice to players. I liked the situation where the list appearing on the cert and each character got 1 item, that was great.

Keep item frequency the same, let them appear very rarely, don’t allow the Marketplace, in module or out. But when they do appear in module make it easier to avoid disgruntled players by giving them all an item.

Thank you Vault thats a great return to the orginal question/issue, and I agree with the base of your argument, that is where pople are having issues.

however instead of giving them all an item, maybe a particular favor instead?, if magic items are so rare even getting access to purchase one is worth a significant favor?

–just a thought

These last 2 example are the kinds of situations that lead to people being upset. I do feel that when magic items do appear that not enough appear to avoid disappointment at a table. When 2 items appear, 2 players get money, XP, and an item, 2-4 only get money and XP. It’s hard to find a table that won’t argue, especially if an item can be used by more than one person. In my earlier post I gave suggestions to increase choice to players. I liked the situation where the list appearing on the cert and each character got 1 item, that was great.

There are times when it is reasonable to include multiple items to be found (i.e. enemy base of operations, group of high level enemy combatants, lost tombs and fortresses). There are times when it is makes no sense whatsoever (i.e. single adversary with or without a bunch of minions who wouldn’t be equipped with special items/any items at all). That’s from a writer’s perspective.

This is something that bothers me though. When did we (as a community, as a larger society) develop a mentality where “If he/she gets one, I should get one too, and it’s not fair if I don’t”? I’m not being sarcastic or facetious here, I’m genuinely curious. When did the perspective of disappointment when you don’t get something while someone else does become the dominant perspective? Is it the dominant perspective?

I suppose more immediately pertinent to the discussion: Would you rather have a whole lot of generic magic items floating around out there, like D&D where every one and their dog has a bag of holding, or a Belt of Giant Strength +4 (until they can afford the Belt of Giant Strength +6)? Or would you rather have cool items with a story, your story?

If that’s the issue, my question is, how does it make you feel? Honestly? And why do you feel that way? Not *you* personally of course, John, but anyone asking that question of me.

As a writer, I want to put cool stuff in for people to find. Heck, I have put in a fair bit of interesting, un-certed stuff that people could pick up for the flavour value. Some of these things even have actual bonuses. But I also realize that I can’t put in something for everyone, every time.

Which leads me to being Campaign staff; at this level, we can look across adventures and try to provide a good cross-section of loot for everyone, while still fitting it to the stories that are being told. We haven’t gotten to everywhere yet, we haven’t told a fraction of the stories there are to tell, but we’ll get there. Slowly but surely, so long as the players bear with us and we have the judges to share the stories, we’ll tell some great stories, and there’ll be some great stuff to steal too.

I’d be really interested to see how many Heroes have little to no magic items… and how many Heroes have lots. Because I honestly don’t think there are too many people who haven’t gotten anything, and I don’t think there are too many people who have gotten more than a couple things at most. But I could be wrong.

One thought I had that could help players feel less like they are missing out is, if a player misses out on all special items, allow the player to take the replay cert on their first run-through (and allow them to take the primary cert at a later time). That way, they may have a chance at a special item on a different character sometime in the future from that adventure.

That’s one thing I’ve always been curious about (but it doesn’t bother me) – why was it decided that on replays with different characters, players can not get any special loot? I don’t know of any other living campaign that handles it that way (all the ones I know of treat each character as completely separate with all the same options for loot).

I’ve been lurking on this discussion for a while now, just mulling over how I feel about the issue.

First off, my primary PC has played all but 2 modules, yet — excluding runes and higher quality weapons/armors — has only taken magic items when the module gave out one item per PC, so everyone got something.

Does this bother me? No.
Even a little? No.
Do I feel my PC is at a disadvantage because she hasn’t gotten any of the cool magic items? No.

Why not? My PC is defined by her background, her abilities, her spells, what she can do and has done, not by what she carries around with her. Sure, there are magic items that would be nice to have, helpful, useful things. But are they required to make an effective PC? No. Do they define who the PC is? No way.

From the perspective of a GM, with her own home game, magic items are a pain in the neck. The distribution is never perfect. How many times have I heard, “He’s got 3 magic items, but I only have 1!” How many times have I crafted the perfect magic item for a PC, only to hear the player complain “It’s an ok sword, but it doesn’t have this ability, or that quality, or whatever.” Makes me want to wring their necks!

In a world-wide campaign, these issues are multiplied 100 fold! At least.

My thoughts and suggestions:

— Keep Arcanis focused on the story, not the magic items. The story is what makes Arcanis different and is the reason why many of us are here. Continue adding flavor items that give little or no bonuses — those are wonderful! Keep the appearance of magic items rare and the access to runes and higher quality weapons/armor reasonable. Let the story drive the availability of these rewards.

— Make all magic items unsellable. Perhaps allow them to be traded to NPCs, for a favor or other consideration, but not money or other magic items. This gets rids of the issue with players who take items just to sell them for cash.

— I don’t like the idea of allowing replays to take items. Someone replaying a mod has too much prior knowledge about the mod to make this fair.

— I don’t like the idea of a marketplace, because I think it would quickly add way too much magic to the campaign.

— I do like the idea of allowing each PC opportunities to “build” their own defining magic item. They could use cash, favors, maybe even talents to do so. In game-world terms, I’d describe this as “commissioning an item.” Then having master craftsmen enhance it over time. Or perhaps allow a PC to take one of those cool flavor items and have it enhanced it over time? I’d limit each PC to one and only one such item. Period. And I’d probably limit how often an item can be “enhanced,” e.g., once every X modules.

Oops….

Left out a word, my bad.

I like the idea of a favor to get something or better yet have something made (especially as regards to weapons and armor) for you. This makes the item unique to you.

I also see no need for making changes to the item distribution rules as they stand now. I dislike the “if its ‘perfect’ for more than one character then give out another” option. Defining what the term means is nigh-impossible.

I’ve missed a number of really neat items that would absolutely help my character’s survivability factor. But I am not losing sleep over it, and he has survived all adventures since then still.

There is enough gold and opportunity in the adventures that a player can get specific runes that their characters would like, which do enhance the abilities/skills of their character without completely changing the power curve one way or another.

I’ve been fortunate, my character is a val’Dell martial that uses a spear. There have now been 2 different times where a spear has been in an adventure as certed or special treasure, plus there was a chance in one event to get an item crafted. So my character is rather flush with a few items that have important stories/meaning to him that are also effective for his profession.

The notion of a system/process where characters can get items commissioned by using influence, favors, etc is intriguing.

So I say keep items, not just the magical ones, as story driven.

I haven’t met players who take fewer ‘risks’ with their secondaries, but I HAVE come across players who play with secondaries (using foreknowledge of what is going to happen) who make decisions so they get the best gear, then using willing intermediaries are able to transfer the best gear to their primaries when they didn’t get it the first time.

This isn’t to say it happens often, or even recently, but I have heard and seen this happen.