Within Dungeons and Dragons the clatter of coins across a table, the gold in the bandit’s pocket, and the horde of a powerful monster are all commonplace. These staples of the genre contain an even more common staple within the fantasy ttrpg, money. Money is a reward for every quest, every loot check, and every secret treasure. But what do the the players do with it and how do we, the DMs, make sure that the reward of their epic adventures is more than a number on a character sheet. That’s what I plan to explore on this Special of Wednesday. Now let’s talk Money.
Talking with your Players
Now let’s get the obligatory DM advice out of the way. Talk with you players. Before you start your campaign ask your players what they want to do. If they want to build a town (yes this happens), then there is an easy solution to your money problems. If they don’t tell you anything that you believe could be turned into a money sink then you need to take a different approach. Ask them what they expect to be able to do with their coin. Do they want to be able to buy magic items and all types of useful items or do they want to be able to hoard it. Whatever they decide you can twist your game to fit the player’s unique monetary goal.
Now that that’s out of the way let’s get to the more specific examples of money sinks and other monetary tools for your game and how to implement them into your game.
Limiting Money
This is something that I personally use to great effect. I give my players a limited amount of money as rewards and instead award them with other things, usually consumables. This allows the players to never have as much money as they wany and therefore the importance of money is greatly increased.
Sometimes my players are bothered by the small fiscal rewards of certain quests, but to relieve this I tell my players that the average person, in D&D, makes approximately 6 silver a day. I don’t remember where I found this, but I do believe that this is official. So, when my players got mad about only being rewarded 50 gold to exterminate some monsters, I reminded them of this fact to put in perspective how much 50 gold actually is. It also helped that the quest also had another reward, access to a metal that would be gained from the mine that they were clearing out (something that would be useful if you take my advice on a future topic of this post).
Using this technique has caused my players to become greedy. They constantly want more money and are rather possessive of the money that they do have. Though this could be in part due to the personalities of my players, but I believe that it will make a normal personal lean more towards the greedy side.
This technique tackles the problem of money being useless or some pointless number by making it rare, and well scarcity increases demand (its basic economics).
Stores
A more concrete example, instead of the technique like the last one, are stores. Stores allow your players to but what they need or want, and therefore get rid of that ever-amassing number on their character sheet. What these stores contain is entirely up to you as a DM, but what type of advice would that be “it’s up to you.” While what’s in the store is on you (I know contradictory much), I do have some tips to help make stores a money sink.
- Make a memorable store and merchant. This helps you from needing to constantly create new stores, but most importantly it gives players something to get attached too And, hopefully, a reason to come back.
- Allow the store to contain what the players need or want. If a player wants a flametounge (a magic fire sword), allow your store to have it. While there are limits to this, since a regular store isn’t going to be carrying some ancient artifact. Your players will never go to a store if it never has what they want.
- Make the items in the stores out of reach. Make that magical sword just out of the reach of the player or party’s pockets. This gives the player a goal and a reason to come back. Finally, it gives them a reason to look forward to erase that number at the bottom of their character sheet.
- This last piece of advice is something that I do personally, a lot. I create items that do things that I believe would interest my players or something they have said they wanted, but with a twist. One recent example of this was when a player wanted a horse. I gave him a hat, at a low price, that would allow him to cast the steed spell and therefore is horse. But the wizard that sold it to him gave a special requirement: if the player ever stops wearing the hat, he will lose it and therefore his horse. Trust me when I say that I plan on making it hard to keep that hat on. I do little things like this to give players the specific things that they want without them being overpowered, but also letting them have fun, and a little challenge, in a unique way.
Crafting
Crafting items is rather close to stores, as players will commission, pay for, an item and then get it, but it is unique in the way that it allows players control over what is created (or at the least what it is made out of). Allowing your players to craft their own items or pay someone to craft for them is another great use of their gold. Some advice is the same as the advice for the stores: have a memorable blacksmith, allow your players to craft what they want (within reason), and make it out of reach.
In the case of crafting I do something different when it comes to out of reach item. This now comes in the form of needed materials. Allow your players to make an item but the y need to traverse the world to find the blood of a troll and that flower that only grows on the tallest mountain. You can have collected these materials be an entire adventure in and of themselves or you can allow ingredients to show up along your players travels (like with my players early that got metal as a reward).
Two more bits of advice. If your players are making already existing items, make sure that the hassle is worth the reward. If the items being crafted are homebrew, make sure they are powerful. Your players are going to be spending a lot of time and money, since crafting an item cost more than buying one, so make sure that those crafted swords and shields kick some serious goblin butt.
Property
Allow your players to buy and upkeep stores, castles, and other properties. I am not an expert on this and won’t act like I am, as my players have never gone down this path (no matter how much they plan to make that town). But I do have some advice:
- Don’t allow their property to be at peace. Allow their inventory to be stolen, their farm attacked, castle sieged. Or if your players are into more political matters: properties face taxes, subterfuges and criminal charges for suspected illegal behavior (whether or not your player have partaken in any). I believe that this gives something that put a lot of money worthwhile, since it will be a source of adventurer, and for the DMs it will probably force them to spend more money to get things fixed.
There are resources out there for those that find this interesting. If you are looking for official D&D content, there is Acquisitions Incorporated. If you are up for some homebrew, check out Matt Coville’s Strongholds & Followers Book (Not sponsored by the way).
Conclusion
I have run out of ideas, but I think that was at least a good start for plenty of you DMs. Just have fun with it and I’m sure your players will too, as long as you respect their desires as well. If you have any other ideas to keep you players gold in check, comment and share with the other DMs below.
And if nothing else works, you could always just KEEP THEM POOR! *Evil Laugh* *evil laugh* *evil lau…*