MAGIC ITEM PRICE LIST

I have in the past resisted the temptation to post such a list of magic item prices as these lists usually invite more trouble than they are worth. However, with a few paragraphs of explanations, perhaps the interested reader will be able to avoid the pitfalls often associated with such a page. At least, in my mind, if they draw the wrong conclusion even though these explanatory paragraphs exists and proceed the tables of items, then I feel it is not my fault but their own.

Skip To The Tables (I've already read those paragraphs once)

First, many DMs hate the idea of magic shops even existing. I believe the reason for that is simply because too many of the pitfalls which I will try to allay too often crop up and give them headaches, but I will try to deal with those now. Done as I have done it, I feel magic shops (at least in the largest cites) would be realistic and reasonable (and NOT having them would actually be unrealistic in a magic filled culture, since when an obscene profit is to be made, not finding a way to do it runs contrary to human nature). Also, having such shops does NOT make it easy for characters to skip adventuring or questing for such things. The DM still controls what is available in these shops and how much money the characters have, so properly handled, the number of quests will not be diminished due to the presence of these shops, yet their existence does offer more options for the DM.

Magic shops are not like grocery stores, however, where you go in, expect to find the item on the shelf for a fixed price, pay it, and then leave. First of all, the desired item may NOT even be there, and most of the time this will probably be the case. The prices given in these tables are only what the item has sold for in the past WHEN they had such an item for sale. Second, there are no regular suppliers to these magic shops. You may actually have a legitimate complaint if your grocery store doesn't have bread or sugar or milk on hand as they are EXPECTED to, but magic shops are not like that. What they have, they have by luck, and expecting a regular supply of these items is foolish. Third, you do not find these items on shelves or even in plain view. They are hidden in the back where the customers may not go. All deals are handled over the counter with a shop representative. So, you can't even go in just to browse; not really. And lest a thief think they can sneak in and steal items, let me assure you the magical protections for such a shop are fantastic, each shop owner literally controlling all magic within the shop's area (a very expensive and immobile field, but it serves to easily thwart even arch mages if need be, so unless you feel on par with them, you best let that idea go right now). Fourth, magic shops DO NOT manufacture magic items. I can't stress this enough. Wizards and priests and perhaps various races and the GODS do that. True, the alchemist shops do tend to make their own potions, but the magic shops do not make magic items, nor do they even identify them (mage guilds or individual mages may do that for a fee).

Magic shops just deal in used magic items brought in from the field and sold by adventurers who do not need the item right then, or need a different item or the cash more. Sometimes, just to split up the proceeds of an adventure fairly, a particularly valuable item may be sold for cash since that is easy to divide. These shops will sell items for the listed price (if they happen to have them), but will only buy such items at 70% of that value. This is how they make a profit (and an obscene one at that).

If you wish to trade magic for other magic they have on hand, you can get a better deal (perhaps 80% to 90% of the list price in trade value. If you wish an item less valuable than the one you trade for, the remainder or difference will be given in cash, but only 70% of that. For example: You have a Ring of Blinking (35K - 40K GP), but do not want it. You'd rather have Boots of Elvenkind (15K GP), and they happen to have those. So, you trade. The ring goes for 36K this time, but in trade, that becomes worth 32.4 (90%). 32.4 -15 = 17.4 remainder. You want the rest in cash. 17.4/.9=19.33 is the 100% value (reversing the 90%), but you only get 70% of that, so 19.33x0.7=13.53K GP. So you get 13.5K GP (round off error in shop's favor) and your Boots of Elvenkind in exchange for the Ring of Blinking). The DM will do this math for you, so you need not be too worried if math is not your thing.

As the party progresses and they become more affluent and wealthy, they will probably find that items become more readily available to them (within their price range, whereas before they were just outside of their price range even if the shop luckily had such an item). This usually happens when the party's power level is comparable or exceeds the item's power level that they wish to purchase. For example, a +2 sword starts to get into their price range (unless all party members pool their cash so they may buy an item of power earlier) at about the time when they may start finding +3 items in the field (since they are now high enough to deal with such adventures). All of this makes it easier for the DM to award treasure in something other than large piles of gold coins (or whatever), and that, in turn, makes it more realistic.

Initially, one may seem shocked at the prices compared to standard book prices or compared to what they've seen in other worlds (but that is usually when they wish to buy magic, for I rarely hear them complain about the fantastic value of magic items they wish to sell). This is not surprising as the actual value of a coin varies radically from one DM to the next or from world to world. On some worlds, for example, your character could live like a king for a month on a single gold piece, a few copper coins is an adequate bribe, and the thought of acquiring a few hundred gold in one score is the subject of an epic yarn. On another world, 1 GP is nigh valueless and you can't live a single day on such an amount. A bribe of 1 GP would be insulting, and to reach the epic one need deal with millions of gold pieces. My world, hopefully, falls somewhere in between, but these things ARE relative, so be careful.

My monetary system is decimally based. Here, we have:

0.01 MP = 0.1 PP = 1 GP = 10 EP = 100 SP = 1000 CP = $100 U.S.

I like doing this as it gives the players (usually) a better feel for the economics of the game. However, this makes most adventurers, after they get going, millionaires by our standards, which is fine as they no longer need to dwell on the mundane (like they did at lower levels, fretting about the cost of a drink, a loaf of bread, etc., as such things are not very interesting to me or most players beyond a certain point). However, magic costs millions of dollars (silver pieces) or thousands of gold, so even though they are rich compared to the masses, they still do not have all the cash they will need for the sorts of things they do (without many adventures under their belts, at any rate).

To give you a rough idea of some economic markers, a Raise Dead Spell cost 5,000 GP or $500,000. That's half a million bucks just for the attempt! A full powered wish may run 160 - 200 K GP, or $16,000,000 to $20,000,000. These things are by no means common or cheap (though wishes are a bit more powerful and permanent on my world than the standard write ups give them credit). All of that makes wishes cost more and makes them rarer, but they are more powerful, so you need less.

Also, most permanent magic items may require a Permanency spell. Since that spell alone costs 10,000 GP or so, no one should expect items of true power (+2 or better for example) to start anywhere less than that. And with other factors thrown in (manufacture costs for highest craftsmanship, for example, materials, and highly skilled labor, not to mention the possibility of constitution loss for the manufacture of such items), the actual starting price of many permanent magic items may be around 15,000 GP. I wouldn't expect many adventurers to have that sort of free cash flow until 7th level or more, so if you're lower than that and want some more powerful items, you better believe you'll have to adventure for them rather than buy them. Nuff said.

I hope the above paragraphs will start to give you a feel for where you may find your character (economically speaking). Below, you will find a few tables with various magic items and their purchase prices associated with them. The prices are in thousands of GP, so if it says 15, for example, that means 15,000 GP.

These tables are NOT meant to be complete listings of the items available, but only sign posts to help you gage what a similar item may be worth if not listed, or a range of prices for the listed items. Naturally, the tables are always subject to revision, and any mistakes in them will be corrected without apology when discovered. That is, if I did something dim and listed a Staff of Power for 10,000 GP, if I correct this and say it is wrong, you should not expect your character to benefit from my oversight or mistake.

Finally, unlike most of the other tables amongst these "shopping lists," you may not assume you can automatically find these items and purchase them. This may be true of wine, clothing, and even mundane weapons and the like, but when it comes to actual magic items, each transaction must go through the DM. Thus, even though I wouldn't care if you subtracted the money for a lantern and simply added it to your list of equipment (provided you had the money and were in a place where it was reasonable to expect to be able to buy such things, or the item didn't take a great deal of time to custom fit it to yourself like a suit of platemail), I certainly WOULD care about magic items, and you may not purchase them without the DM's direct supervision.

Email Jim Your Comments (Send Praise, Critique, Complaints, Suggestions, Ideas, Corrections, or Submissions).

MAGIC ITEM TABLES

As a word of warning, the way I arranged these tables (html wise) makes it necessary for you to have your browser WIDE enough to accommodate side by side viewing, else they will overlap, and that's unreadable. If this happens to you, just make your window wider and it should be fine.

I have tried to include the more commonly sought after items in these tables, and have deliberately excluded items I felt were ridiculous or too powerful or too "something." Also, many items are not listed as their powers vary too greatly to easily put a price for them in a table, but would practically need a table in and of themselves (ioun stones comes to mind, for example). If you do not see an item there, however, it may be available on my world; you'll just have to ask.

Under weapons, I have listed simply PRIMARY WEAPON. This was meant to convey a general price range for most weapons, like swords, maces, axes, flails, tridents, etc. as they are all comparable in price. The ARMOR is not all listed, and you may wonder why, for example, leather is more expensive than studded leather, or spears and bows are more expensive than other primary weapons. This all results from the notion that metals hold magic well whereas softer items (string, leather, paper, wood, etc.) do not hold magic as well, and thus to get the same amount of magic on them actually takes more effort. This makes them cost more, even though they may not be as effective at protecting you. Of course, past +3, such "soft" items are as rare as hen's teeth, even though in an AD&D world, this may not be as rare as you think. It is still pretty darn rare, nevertheless.

NOTE: One effect of the enchantment process used to make magic items will transform normally soft metals like mithral, as well as platinum, gold, and silver, into unusually hard and strong metals. Also, the stronger the magic, the more multi-phasic the enchanted metal becomes. If the magic is dense enough, part of the existence of the item will be on other planes in addition to the prime material plane. Hence, magical items sometimes appear to be lighter and stronger than the metals from which they are constructed. Furthermore, this multi-phasic existence tends to give all metals a silvery, steel like color no matter from what metals they are constructed. This is a side effect of the enchantment process for swords, armor, and other like "plus" protective devices, but is usually not a property of the enchantment process for rings, jewelry, and other similar items. Thus, even a gold sword would appear to be made of steel. Magic adheres to mithral better than any other metal and this property, as well as the others mentioned, is why mithral magic weapons and armor are the best, as well as the most expensive in existence. The reason why the various metals in magic weapons looks like steel is because the aura reflects and/or radiates that color while absorbing others. Naturally, most magic items of mithral are only coated or layered in the metal, or perhaps bonded to a lesser metal or folded into the metal using layers (like along the hard edge of a steel sword in a katana) rather than items of pure mithral. Or sometimes they are just alloyed with the mithral, which also makes a decent lattice structure and numerous magical bond sites.

Enchantment success rates given below are for nominal conditions. Extraordinarily good conditions and/or materials and workmanship will improve the chance of success just as poor workmanship and/or materials will lessen it. If the creator is 21st level or higher, add 5%, and if 17th level or lower, subtract 5%.

The first column is the "PLUS" of the item you are trying to make. The second column (N to N+1) is the % chance of success of going from a +N item to a +(N+1) item. For example, trying to further enchant a +3 sword to +4 sword has a 35% chance of success (and a 65% chance of destroying the item). The next column (going from 0 to +N) is the overall % chance from making an item from scratch and enchanting it all the way to +N. For example, going from +0 to +4 in one go has a 15.96% overall chance to succeed (and a 84.04% chance of failure). Naturally, this is still done in stages, so only the second column is really used with multiple rolls, one roll at each stage of enchantment, but the third column will tell you what chances you can expect overall before you start such an undertaking.

As you can see, less than 1% of all attempts to make a +5 item from scratch will succeed, and that's only 1 out of 125, so 124 people have paid the price for failure in centuries past. Thankfully, these items tend to last centuries (isn't magic nice?).

Though not strictly true, it is generally accepted that only items of mithral could ever be enchanted past +5 (though runic metals are a possibility), and items of platinum or better are needed to make +4 items, gold or better for +3 items, electrum or silver for +2 items, and many +1 items are typically made of iron or steel.

• M = Mithral
• P = Platinum
• G = Gold
• E = Electrum
• S = Silver
• C = Copper
• I = Iron or Steel.

Generally, 3/10ths of the weight of the item must be of its primary metal, 2/10ths of the next lesser metal, and 1/10th of the next lesser metal. The rest is probably iron or steel and of excellent workmanship (perhaps dwarven).

If the most valuable metal in the sword is a capital letter, then add 5% for each CAPITAL letter to the RIGHT of that letter. If the primary metal is lower case, then subtract 5% for EACH letter (Capital or otherwise) to the LEFT of it.

EXAMPLES: We wish to make a +3 sword from a +2 sword. If it was made out of mithral, then there are three capital letters to the right of M, and this will add 15% to the 60%, so the chance would be 75%. 70% for a creator of less than 18th level, but 80% for a creator higher than 20th level. As you can see, mithral takes magic better. Now, if this sword had been made, instead, out of gold (gold being its primary metal), then only 5% would be added to the 60% as only one capital letter is to the right of the "G" in the +3 row. If the primary metal were steel or iron, then the inferior materials would cause a penalty of 6x5% or 30%, reducing the 60% to only a 30% chance of success, as there are 6 letters to the left of the "i" in the +3 row. This penalty is the price for making magic items out of inferior metals, but sometimes, they do it anyway to save on money. True, further enchantments may be much harder, but then, they are concerned with the here and now and what they can afford at the moment. The DM will ONLY tell you what your item is made out of if you hire a mage or priest (probably for 100 GP or so), to determine its composition.

Should one roll higher than the chance of success, the item is destroyed, though half its metal can be salvaged. For example, take a long sword, its weight about 4 lbs. If made of out Gold as its primary metal, this means 3/10ths of 4 lbs is gold, 2/10ths is electrum, and 1/10th is copper. The other 4/10ths is probably iron. This means this sword had 1.2 lbs gold, 0.8 lbs electrum, 0.4 lbs copper, and 1.6 lbs of iron in it. But, failure yields only half of this in recovery, so you get back 0.6 lbs gold, 0.4 lbs electrum, 0.2 lbs copper, and 0.8 lbs of iron.

Here are the coin weights in case you're interested.

Most +1 or +2 items are made of steel. If an item is made of lesser material, it may not even be possible to further enchant it (while realistically expecting it to work). Before any attempt is made to further enchant an item, the PC should have a mage or priest (depending on the item) confirm its makeup. As most metals end up looking like steel when enchanted, simple tests (density, hardness, color, etc.) are insufficient to ascertain it chemical composition.

Finally, most further enchantment processes will require, at a minimum, and Enchant An Item and Permanency Spell. This pair of spells costs about 20,000 GP, and with a few other considerations, one may expect (if they are willing to risk their magic item) to pay at least that plus more to further enchant their item. You may, therefore, discern that these manufacturing prices typically cost MORE than magic shop prices, and you'd be right. But those items are used, may not be available for a long, long time (if ever), and have probably been paid for by others in decades past whereas commissioned items will probably work (depending) and are more likely to find their way into your hands WHEN you want them.

Minor items can SOMETIMES forgo the Permanency Spell. These items are either one shot items (like arrows or bolts), non rechargeable items, +1 items (as the magic is still not TOO dense), or small compact items such as daggers. Though not mentioned above, it is also possible to use gems to do certain "tricks" to forgo these spells, but these gems begin to cost as much as the spells (usually), so it makes little difference.

NOTE: The reason Permanency cost so mush is this: There is a 5% chance the mage will lose a point of constitution when cast on an ITEM (it is only an automatic loss when he cast it upon himself). This usually requires a Wish to regain such a lost point. But as this loss happens only 1 out of 20 times, they will charge you 1/20th the price of a wish (whether they lose constitution or not, just to spread the cost around) in addition to their other normal charges, thus adding 10,000 GP right on the top of the other 10,000 GP for these two spells and the mage's time. Of course, if a mage really liked you, for example, AND he didn't lose a constitution point (lucky him), he may forego that extra 10,000 GP just for you, you wonderful person you :-{)

• Let's Go Shopping For Animals And Livestock
• Let's Go Shopping For Armor And Shields
• Let's Go Shopping For Clothing
• Let's Go Shopping For Miscellaneous Equipment
• Let's Go Shopping For Provisions
• Let's Go Shopping For Tack And Harness
• Let's Go Shopping For Transports
• Let's Go Shopping For Weapons

© February of 2000
by
James L.R. Beach
Waterville, MN 56096

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