I'm currently DMing a game of Lost Mines of Phandelver and to be honest I'm kind of uncomfortable with the treasure the players are amassing: in a single room with 4 baddies, they got 75cp, 55sp, 22ep, 15gp and a gem worth 30gp between 5 players.
Am I worrying about nothing? It just seems like an awful lot of loot for a very small level 3 encounter :/
The only thing money is good for is getting the more expensive, non-magic armors and the occasional spell component. Which they should be getting soon-ish anyways. If anything, people tend to complain that there's not enough things to spend gold on in the first place, and it just accumulates.
yeah thats my concern, one player has already changed main weapons a couple of times before they started to get skint, i can imagine by level 10 theyre literally gonna be throwing gold coins as distractions and not really caring about treasure
That's a problem of the game in general. Gold, generally speaking, is meant to be an alternative XP track for equipment in most games. So, your options may involve lack of treasure, or a magic item economy, or just ignore it and focus on other things.
Here's a link for some fan-made magic item prices if yoy're interested in that route: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8XAiXpOfz9cMWt1RTBicmpmUDg/view Alternatively, I personally sell magic items through an Auction House system in my games. Provides some downtime challenges, while keeping them off the common market, and allows you control over how much they spend on each. Can be fun to roleplay out as well, and a good outlet for any unique materials or items they find.
It can also be used for the Downtime activities in XGtE or DMG, which I've been using my own games and they've added some interesting things to the games. Using it between adventures for living expenses can eat it up as well, and you can generate some stuff out of that if they opt for lifestyles that aren't just standard. All of this is really dependent on how time passes between adventures in your campaign though.
If it is becoming an issue, you could also consider introducing something that is way overpriced that the desperately need, or perhaps someone(or something) steals their gold? I wouldnt personally do it too often unless its meant to be a story arc option, but it might be an interesting turn of events. My first thought was a goblin like creature (similar to the treasure goblins in Diablo 3) that steals gold to bring to their master. My Storm Kings Thunder character is ammassing gold as much as possible because I want to learn how to craft and make an earing with a gem in the middle and swirling metal designs that twirl around it that I could eventually enchant it to do something like a minor hyptnotise, or something cool like that. It is a non exsistant item with a severe unlikelyhood of happening, but it's a fun goal to work towards, and it makes loosing money so much more painful! I find that kind of thing fun, and so, depending on the players, setting a goal or having setbacks might be valuable to them as well.
Lifestyle expenses (per day): 4g for a wealthy lifestyle, at least 10g for aristocratic lifestyle
Skilled hireling: 2g per day
Spellcasting services: 10-50g for a 1st or 2nd level spell
Training (new language or tool proficiency): 250g
Spell scrolls and magic items alone are a bottomless pit for money and get exponentially more expensive with each new spell or rarity level. And that's without getting into big picture activities like trying to start your own guild, fortress, adventuring company, etc.
I'm currently DMing a game of Lost Mines of Phandelver and to be honest I'm kind of uncomfortable with the treasure the players are amassing: in a single room with 4 baddies, they got 75cp, 55sp, 22ep, 15gp and a gem worth 30gp between 5 players.
Am I worrying about nothing? It just seems like an awful lot of loot for a very small level 3 encounter :/
The only thing money is good for is getting the more expensive, non-magic armors and the occasional spell component. Which they should be getting soon-ish anyways. If anything, people tend to complain that there's not enough things to spend gold on in the first place, and it just accumulates.
yeah thats my concern, one player has already changed main weapons a couple of times before they started to get skint, i can imagine by level 10 theyre literally gonna be throwing gold coins as distractions and not really caring about treasure
That's a problem of the game in general. Gold, generally speaking, is meant to be an alternative XP track for equipment in most games. So, your options may involve lack of treasure, or a magic item economy, or just ignore it and focus on other things.
Here's a link for some fan-made magic item prices if yoy're interested in that route: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8XAiXpOfz9cMWt1RTBicmpmUDg/view Alternatively, I personally sell magic items through an Auction House system in my games. Provides some downtime challenges, while keeping them off the common market, and allows you control over how much they spend on each. Can be fun to roleplay out as well, and a good outlet for any unique materials or items they find.
It can also be used for the Downtime activities in XGtE or DMG, which I've been using my own games and they've added some interesting things to the games. Using it between adventures for living expenses can eat it up as well, and you can generate some stuff out of that if they opt for lifestyles that aren't just standard. All of this is really dependent on how time passes between adventures in your campaign though.
In all our campaigns we have adopted the milestone advancement for both exp and money as described in XGTE: https://www.dndbeyond.com/compendium/rules/xgte/shared-campaigns#CharacterAdvancement
This seems a lot more reasonable in terms of money earned and speeds up games incredibly, you don't have to keep track of all the bit of currency that drop in encounters. Actual items are excluded from this system and follow this other guide: https://www.dndbeyond.com/compendium/rules/xgte/dungeon-masters-tools#AwardingMagicItems
If it is becoming an issue, you could also consider introducing something that is way overpriced that the desperately need, or perhaps someone(or something) steals their gold? I wouldnt personally do it too often unless its meant to be a story arc option, but it might be an interesting turn of events. My first thought was a goblin like creature (similar to the treasure goblins in Diablo 3) that steals gold to bring to their master. My Storm Kings Thunder character is ammassing gold as much as possible because I want to learn how to craft and make an earing with a gem in the middle and swirling metal designs that twirl around it that I could eventually enchant it to do something like a minor hyptnotise, or something cool like that. It is a non exsistant item with a severe unlikelyhood of happening, but it's a fun goal to work towards, and it makes loosing money so much more painful! I find that kind of thing fun, and so, depending on the players, setting a goal or having setbacks might be valuable to them as well.
There's no such thing as "too much money" in D&D. Here's a list of expensive things players would love to spend money on if given the chance:
Spell scrolls and magic items alone are a bottomless pit for money and get exponentially more expensive with each new spell or rarity level. And that's without getting into big picture activities like trying to start your own guild, fortress, adventuring company, etc.