D&D - Shopping

Baileyborough

Hey,

I'm a new DM starting a campaign with some friends, and I just wanted to know, how do you guys handle shops and stores in game?
We're not too pedantic about supplies etc, but at the same time, the monetary gains become pretty meaningless after a while, so how do you manage shops/stores and supplies?

Thanks,

Conor.

SageinaRage

It depends on the kind of game you're running. If you're going for a gritty realistic sort of game, then you'll need to keep closer track, because money will be scarce, the players will need supplies more, etc. If you're going more for a cinematic action kind of game, then it won't matter as much, if it matters at all.

OptimusZed

I tend to play shopkeepers as incredibly shady. Sort of a buyer beware situation.

Usually with rather tightly limited inventory that probably doesn't include what the PCs were actually looking for.

But I DM Dark Sun, so I'm basically required to be a dick.

SageinaRage

As an example, I think I should start having shopkeepers try to overcharge the players more in my warhammer fantasy game, since it's pretty gritty and low power and all that, and also because I want to reward the players who have haggle, and make it useful.

Terrendos

I run 4e so it may be a bit different if you run 3.X or below.

Basically, when I design a city, I will set a limit on the highest level magic item the players can find available there. If it's a tiny little farming community, they'll be hard pressed to get a level 1 or 2 magic item. In a larger city, they can probably find just about any Heroic Tier magic item.

My homebrew setting features an empire's capital city that is essentially one of the largest and most powerful places in the entire world. Because of the huge population and the massive amount of trade, I rule that they can find essentially any non-artifact magic item they want. However, the problem then becomes locating a seller. Because the city is so massive, there are dozens of different shops that might have the magic item they're looking for, so it becomes a skill challenge to locate the object. Typically the challenge would just dictate exactly how long they spend searching, unless it's really rare (or I don't want them to have it) and they roll very poorly.

With the magic item changes (delineating a difference between common/uncommon/rare items) the rule changed to "any non-rare item" but since there's all of a dozen of those or whatever, it's not that big of a deal.