Fortune and Loss

[SableWyvern]

I'm toying with the idea of using random roll to assess the financial status of PCs when large gaps in game time occur between adventures. This is only idle tinkering at the moment, opinions sought.


Fortune and Loss:

D20 Next Result
<3 +3 Lost Everything: 2d6 sp to spend on new gear. Unspent money may be kept.
3-5 +2 Hard Times: Reduce wealth to 10d6sp. Add 5d6 sp in cash or gear.
6-8 +1 Getting By: Reduce wealth to starting budget, or replace all wealth with starting budget/package. Add 2d6-2 sp in cash or gear.
9-12 +1 Getting By: Reduce wealth by 10d6sp. Add 5d6 sp in cash or gear.
13-16 +0 Getting By: Increase or reduce wealth by d100 – d100 sp.
17-19 -1 Good Times: Increase wealth by starting budget.
>19 -3 High Living: Increase wealth by starting budget times 1d4+1.

Wealth includes cash on hand, as well as all equipment including clothes. Gear includes all items with a cash value.

The next column provides a modifier to the player's next roll on the Fortune and Loss table.

 

[SableWyvern]

Oops. Forgot to add, characters with the Wealth feature may reroll once each time they check this table. If they choose to do so, they must accept the result of the second roll. Any such reroll is always unmodified.

 

[The King]

I'm toying with the idea of using random roll to assess the financial status of PCs when large gaps in game time occur between adventures. This is only idle tinkering at the moment, opinions sought.

Do you have special rules for expert gamblers ? :wink:
At character generation I would ask my players what their PCs do of their leisure time, (if they like to visit old family members or the girl friends they collected in each city, pratice hunt, etc.), what is (are) their purpose(s) in life and then apply modifiers.
A scholar won't usually spend his money as a barbarian or as a noble.

Your players should explain what their PCs do and play it as this can be the starting point of the next adventure (be it in an inn after a brawl or in a library while searching for a scroll).

 

[slaughterj]

I need no random roll for such, instead, I will decide what the PCs start each adventure with, which may be affected by the previous adventure, but also by the adventure they are about to embark on - thus, if I need them to start penniless, they will, no die roll needed as that would only interfere.

 

[The Warlord]

This reminds me of Warhammer quest, letting a die decide what happens to you between adventures.

Though your chart looks good, I think it can potentially wreck havoc on a game designed to be 'episodic'. If I plan for them to be poor and on the run yet they roll up 'good times' or 'high living', they may look to pay off their troubles. Not really in the spirit of S&S.

As an old WHQ player, I've thought of a chart lke this as well, but have ultimately settled on the game as is, where the GM dictactes what the players start with, so the only thing they can come to depend on is their wits.

Just an opinion.

 

[Sutek]

Do it like this.

1d6 per game day of down-time between adventure. 1d6 x 10 if by the week.

Each player rolls his dice and adds it up: That's the ammount of gross value he has.

GM does the same and subtracts from the player total to come up with a net. Yes, this can put that player in debt!

Hierlooms or special personal effects (like a sword maybe, or a spell book or a certain amulet) or anything that is adventure/campaign driven doesn't go away. Perhaps even armor coul dremain untouched, although debt could be taken as damage rolls to the armor.

EXAMPLE: I roll 3d6 for 3 days spent relaxing between adventures and the GM does also. I get 12 and the GM get a 17. I have to lose 5gp worth of stuff (money or items).

Crank up the GM die type the further the PCs get from thier homeland. This could be arbittrary, but keep it sane. Perhaps it could be worked out using over land travel rules. If the PC is 2 weeks from home, increase the die type (or even the numnber of dice).

 

[SableWyvern]

A couple points clarifying my thoughts.

First, the amount of downtime I would be using this for would be in months or occasionally years. For shorter spans, I would likely just make a decision based on what the character has been doing, perhaps influenced by my thoughts on what I would like them to have next session.

Given that, the table wouldn't need to interfere with what the character was doing through most of his down-time, as it would only represent his fortunes in the immediate span before the next session begins.

Finally, I would not feel obliged to utilise the table on every occasion. Where I felt a fixed level of wealth was appropriate due to however the character spent the down-time, or in the event of an overriding concern for the ongoing story, those factors would be considered in lieu of the table.

Sutek, you offer a potentially viable alternative, if d6 x 30 or 40 is added for monthly periods. That does perhaps make the chances of gaining considerable wealth a little too high for my liking, though. I certainly like the idea of armour degradation being an option for reducing wealth, and will be stealing that one.

 

[AZZA]

I need no random roll for such, instead, I will decide what the PCs start each adventure with, which may be affected by the previous adventure, but also by the adventure they are about to embark on - thus, if I need them to start penniless, they will, no die roll needed as that would only interfere.

As an old WHQ player, I've thought of a chart lke this as well, but have ultimately settled on the game as is, where the GM dictactes what the players start with, so the only thing they can come to depend on is their wits.

I'm right there with you guys. One of the big plusses for me when I started Conan was not having to worry about how much treasure the characters obtained in an adventure. Loot the merchants house, sure makes no big difference in the long run.
Since there isn't really that many pieces of equipment that are worth so much that characters really need to "save up" I don't see that they are disadvantaged and it helps them move away form the D20 mindset of,"collect your enemies weapons and armor to sell". There just isn't any need.
Aaron

 

[Arthas the Lich King]

Just use the high wealth option in the book dude, it works fine for episode like adventures.

 

[SableWyvern]

High wealth only affects cash on hand, not gear. I'm looking for an arbitrary way to quickly determine how a character has fared overall during an extended period of downtime.

Also, the high living rules don't allow for PCs to accumulate more over time, only spend. I will use the high living rules continuous segments of the campaign, but they do not in any way do what I am looking for when gaps in time occur.

GM fiat is a fine solution, but I'd prefer not to have to make judgement calls all the time on when characters should lose their favoured equipment. A random table allows the results to be arbitrary, inconsistent and largely outside of my responsibility. I know my players well enough to be able to say that they should enjoy this (even if it's sometimes enjoyment at each others expense 8) ).

Where the decision is made by me alone, it becomes harder to strip three characters of everything and leave another two profitting.

 

[SableWyvern]

Here's three things that I'm hoping a rule along the lines I have proposed can achieve:

Reinforce the idea that the characters are all off doing their own thing a lot of the time; that the campaign isn't just about the PCs, but more specifically what the PCs do when they're all together. (Edit for clarification -- this effect achieved by disparate results between characters).

Create opportunities for characters doing well to gloat, characters not doing well to either whine or expalain how much wealth they had only a week ago. Closely linked to that, to give all the players something real within the game world that has come from their endeavours between sessions, so that those less prone to thinking about those things are placed in a position where they need to think about it more (ie, what happened to my character that provided him wealth, or stripped it from him).

To alter individual strengths, and by extension the balance in the party, from session to session, so that different strategies and methods of cooperation become necessary. At the crudest level, if the scholar is laden with alchemical fires one session, a tank decked out in heavy armour the next, different solutions to problems become necessary.