First time DMing, and I'm modifying Waterdeep: Dragon Heist a little bit to match a tempo for my players, with a large part of that being them hustling to make ends meet and feeling like they never *quite* have enough for everything they want to do. For example, the big reward from Ch 1 will be something that the PCs can purchase from Volo instead of just being given it – at a discount, but Volo is a man trying to fund expensive expeditions! That sets up Ch2 and maybe Ch3 to be something the PCs use to get acquainted with the town and its factions/guilds, build a holistic sense of identity and purpose, and work towards a big ticket goal while balancing individual objectives. They do, of course, get the thing in the end and before the major events of Ch3 – if they want it! I just want them to really feel like they worked for it, so it's a bigger deal for them as characters and as players.
Making that easier, I homebrewed and borrowed from others side quests and such to provide ways to make money. I also am thinking to swap out the faction renown system for simple cash rewards (PCs get the same benefits, I'm just saying instead of tracking renown they can get cash AND renown).
But I wonder too what the scale of prices and prizes should be? For example, silvering a weapon costs 100gp, a common healing potion is 50gp, daily rent for a single-bed tavern room is like 1-2gp a day in a typical tavern, less in the low-income wards and more in the high-income wards. I was thinking to make the Ch 2 deed cost 5000gp – a doable, if substantial, sum that the PCs could pool for. And according to the Sane Price PDF the kind of weapons and armors and items that can be found in stores in the city (+1s for example) would cost about 1000gp; blue+ items are just not generally available for sale. (I also figure that if I **** this up, I can deus ex machina a way to compensate).
With all that in mind, has anyone run the market economy of Waterdeep and can share some pointers for avoiding overindulging or underindulging the PCs? Like, if I say a PC receives 100g instead of 1 renown alone, would that "feel" substantial based on usual costs; similarly, would an easy-medium homebrew side quest reward of 500g be scaled correctly for that?
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
First time DMing, and I'm modifying Waterdeep: Dragon Heist a little bit to match a tempo for my players, with a large part of that being them hustling to make ends meet and feeling like they never *quite* have enough for everything they want to do. For example, the big reward from Ch 1 will be something that the PCs can purchase from Volo instead of just being given it – at a discount, but Volo is a man trying to fund expensive expeditions! That sets up Ch2 and maybe Ch3 to be something the PCs use to get acquainted with the town and its factions/guilds, build a holistic sense of identity and purpose, and work towards a big ticket goal while balancing individual objectives. They do, of course, get the thing in the end and before the major events of Ch3 – if they want it! I just want them to really feel like they worked for it, so it's a bigger deal for them as characters and as players.
Making that easier, I homebrewed and borrowed from others side quests and such to provide ways to make money. I also am thinking to swap out the faction renown system for simple cash rewards (PCs get the same benefits, I'm just saying instead of tracking renown they can get cash AND renown).
But I wonder too what the scale of prices and prizes should be? For example, silvering a weapon costs 100gp, a common healing potion is 50gp, daily rent for a single-bed tavern room is like 1-2gp a day in a typical tavern, less in the low-income wards and more in the high-income wards. I was thinking to make the Ch 2 deed cost 5000gp – a doable, if substantial, sum that the PCs could pool for. And according to the Sane Price PDF the kind of weapons and armors and items that can be found in stores in the city (+1s for example) would cost about 1000gp; blue+ items are just not generally available for sale. (I also figure that if I **** this up, I can deus ex machina a way to compensate).
With all that in mind, has anyone run the market economy of Waterdeep and can share some pointers for avoiding overindulging or underindulging the PCs? Like, if I say a PC receives 100g instead of 1 renown alone, would that "feel" substantial based on usual costs; similarly, would an easy-medium homebrew side quest reward of 500g be scaled correctly for that?