Gold loot

[Legacy_Xardex]

               I have my loot pretty much set but im at loss on how to balance out gold. I have trouble figuring out a good formula that would give appropriate amount of money to a PC for killing a mob.

What kind of solutions would you suggest? Should I give geometric or exponential amount of gold depending on level of encounter? What about if there are multiple party members? Should they all get the same or a % of it, or split it evenly?

Items are no problem because there are no shops to sell them at, which makes me even more afraid that the amount of gold from drops could easily mess up the economy&trade between players.

Any insight appreciated!
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Xardex, 29 novembre 2011 - 06:24 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_WhiZard]

               

Xardex wrote...

I have my loot pretty much set but im at loss on how to balance out gold. I have trouble figuring out a good formula that would give appropriate amount of money to a PC for killing a mob.

What kind of solutions would you suggest? Should I give geometric or exponential amount of gold depending on level of encounter? What about if there are multiple party members? Should they all get the same or a % of it, or split it evenly?

Items are no problem because there are no shops to sell them at, which makes me even more afraid that the amount of gold from drops could easily mess up the economy&trade between players.

Any insight appreciated!

The simplest way is to just drop items, and destroy a random item producing its GP value.  This will let the system handle the calculations for you.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Rolo Kipp]

               <grabbing as much...>

I would (and will) determine gold based on NPC type, as well as level. You will never find a gold coin on an Amethyst rat. You will never find gold on animals or vermin or... well. You get the idea.

As for the split, why not give the party control of that? Let the party founder set sharing options when they form the party and make sure the different options are posted to each member when they join. This way, if the PCs don't want to deal with the chore of manually splitting the loot, they can automate it, but if they want to micromanage it, they have that option as well.

<...of the gold as he can>
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_WhiZard]

               

Rolo Kipp wrote...

I would (and will) determine gold based on NPC type, as well as level. You will never find a gold coin on an Amethyst rat. You will never find gold on animals or vermin or... well. You get the idea.

This filter would also apply to items as well, like rats shouldn't get a shortsword, potion, or magic scroll.  Since Xardex is not using merchants, he could value things like rat skins at 0GP value, so all he would need is the item filter and not a subsequent gold filter.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_wyldhunt1]

               All the advice posted is good, and uses the same basic idea as ours. Check for the NPC type and HD and base the loot off of those numbers. Tweaking the numbers until you get a working economy is always the hard part, and usually winds up being an ongoing process for a while. Try to get it where you expect it would be close and expect to change it later once you see how it's going.
Working economies are hard to find anywhere... games or real life. Don't sweat it if your first estimate is off.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_SKIPPNUTTZ]

               I use a custom xp system that rewards xp to all party members within 40 meters, based on challenge rating, player level, and group size of course. This has a cap per kill set at whatever I choose as a constant variable for the module. In my case the max a player can get for killing normal mobs is 100, and the cap for killing bosses can never be reached (100,000) unless i tweak the formula, it's just not possible to add challenge rating that high, I think CR starts overflowing around 30k or so. I just recently added a function to add gold at the same time as xp using these same values. This helps keep a very even hold on players advancement in both power and wealth.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par SKIPPNUTTZ, 02 décembre 2011 - 10:54 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Rolo Kipp]

               <pulling an old scroll or two...>

Re: economies: Zachary Booth Simpson's "The In-game Economics of Ultima Online"
is a very succinct summation.

Also, it's worthwhile, *always* worthwhile, to browse S.John Ross' Blue Room

@WhiZard: Yup, and an elegant sidestepping of the whole "determine gold separately" thing.

@wyldhunt1: When even the Big Boys with a staff of dozens have to continuously tweak their economies, there is no shame, and a great deal of reward <puns always intended> in staying on top of your game. :-)

@SKIPPNUTTZ: Although that seems to be a quick and effective control from the administration standpoint, I have personal conceptual issues with the whole "kill things, get rewarded with gold" deal.  I also have issues with the "violence is the fastest, bestest way to advance your character" deal (which this approach promotes (IMO)).

These are my own personal issues and I don't mean to start a BBQ, but only to point out that the approaches WhiZard, wyldhunt1 & I mentioned would be suitable for other xp/loot systems. I.e. it seems more flexible, to me.

<...from the shelf>
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Rolo Kipp, 02 décembre 2011 - 04:40 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_SKIPPNUTTZ]

               Well I also have some quest chains that reward gold/xp, but killing mobs and farming xp is the only real way to advance your character in my PW. Grinding XP = extra bonuses to dmg/hp. Gold is the only way to advance in gear lvl too since everything for the most part is forged at 200% markup.