All About Magic Items, Potions, and Other Loot

Magic items and potions are a big part of d&d and we have had several previous encounters with the mechanics surrounding the finding, buying, making, and eventual selling of these items. Similarly, I have had a strained relationship with the d&d economy and my past campaign’s logical distribution of random piles of gold. This article will either cover or link information about all of the above.
Throughout this document, I will split up the definition of Loot into two categories: Valuable Items and Mundane Loot.

• Valuable Items refer to Magic Items, Potions, or other more rare valuables like rare reagents, essences, inks, or magical ores. These are things you might actively be hunting down or will be more delighted to see than just a pile of coins or a box of old wine.
• Mundane Loot refers to any coins (Gold being the most common), mundane trinkets, gemstones, scrap, fabrics, or anything else you might find on a d100 random loot table. Generally, this is anything not defined as a Valuable Item.

Finding Loot

I have garnered a reputation for being pretty stingy with loot, and while I can argue some of my hoarding habits, I know a lot of it comes down to me just not thinking about it. In my defense, you all don’t usually go out of your way to find loot, which has always been an option available to you. This is intended both to help me keep on top of actually handing out loot and to highlight some ways you guys can seek loot yourselves.
You can find loot in a number of ways. The most straightforward way to find loot is by adventuring and running into it by chance; as you travel and stick your noses in places they don’t belong, you are likely to find forgotten trinkets, buried treasures, or powerful items locked away in ancient tombs.
Another way to find loot is to actively look for it. This could be in the form of buying the goods, stealing them, or tracking them down in the wilderness. The following is a list of the most common ways to find loot:

• Buying loot. For anything other than raw coin, there’s usually someone willing to sell you an item you’re looking for. However, the rarer the item, the less likely someone is going to be around to sell it to you. See the following section for a more in-depth look at buying Valuable Items. For Mundane Loot, you can usually track someone down to sell you something you’re looking for with relative ease. Still, you may have to travel to meet a merchant with the items you’re looking for, and you need to have the gold to buy what you’re after.
• Selling Other Goods. For Gold specifically, the best way to actively hunt down coins is to partake in marketplace trade. You are likely to find plenty of junk you don’t need that would be better used in the form of gold, and others in the world may find more value out of your junk than you do. Most Mundane Loot other than actual gold can be sold to fill your pockets with coins.
• Stealing. In some cases, you might find it easier to nab the loot off of someone compared to pulling together the gold to buy it cleanly. You will still need to find the location of specific items you’re searching for or the person who has it in order to steal, but most everyone has Gold if that’s what you’re after. Depending on the value and security of the item in question, theft may be as simple as a Stealth or Sleight of Hands check, or it may be an entire infiltration mission. We will work out the difficulty of your heist if you ever crave a little bit of delinquency.
• Tracking. You may want to find the location of legal loot on your travels before you set off on a new adventure. This could be in the form of tracking a war-band to pick up after their spoils, or it could be done by finding a treasure map or poking around for rumors on a treasure cache. In any case, there’s plenty of ways to actively track down loot you are looking for. Spells like Locate Object are great magical metal detectors for when you are near a potential treasure trove, and spells like Legend Lore may point you in the direction of any loot you’re looking for.

Random Loot

When you stumble across loot on your travels or hunt down treasure, you will likely not know everything that shiny chest contains. That’s what all those lovely random loot tables are for! On top of that, the loot of the world has no idea what your “level” is, but that’s the best way I have to make sure you are getting an appropriate amount of money on your travels. All that to say, there will be some randomness in loot in general, moreso for Mundane Loot than Valuable Items.
The best place to find loot while adventuring is in the form of hoards. Hoards are not exclusive to dragons; this term is just used to define any significant cache of loot, usually found after traversing a dungeon or slaying a powerful foe. A hoard will be more substantial than generic loot and is more likely to contain Valuable Items. Hoards also don't include any reward or payment for your services (like if you were being paid for killing a monster), so you’re likely to get a significant paycheck for that kind of work.

Loot Calculations

In order to be transparent with how much loot or money you will likely get each level, I have done some research and made some guidelines for what you should expect during my campaigns. These were decided by using average values calculated by official WotC loot and gold tables by other people on the internet.
The following table will show you how much value you should be finding in just coins. Total Accumulated includes the values from previous levels. This also does not include any gold you might actively hunt or work for.

Raw Gold Table

Player Level	Average Gained Per Level	Total Accumulated
1	15	15
2	31	46
3	62	108
4	123	231
5	205	436
6	282	718
7	395	1113
8	592	1,705
9	826	2,531
10	1,275	3,806
11	1,803	5,609
12	2,335	7,994
13	2,869	10,813
14	3,355	14,168
15	3,863	18,031
16	5,490	23,521
17	7,506	31,027
18	9,568	40,595
19	13,102	53,715
20	16,636	70,351

*Level 1 gold does not include any starting gold you may have rolled, as most characters will spend the majority of that gold on equipment
The following table will show you the raw value in other junk you find. It is the exact same value as the Raw Gold. In other words, half of the loot you find will be coins and the other half will be alternative loot. Still, here’s the table for reference. This also does not include any mundane loot you might actively hunt or work for.
I will be using this website to ensure the value of random loot is kept in line with what I’m promising.

Other Mundane Loot Table

Player Level	Average Value Per Level	Total Accumulated
1	15	15
2	31	46
3	62	108
4	123	231
5	205	436
6	282	718
7	395	1113
8	592	1,705
9	826	2,531
10	1,275	3,806
11	1,803	5,609
12	2,335	7,994
13	2,869	10,813
14	3,355	14,168
15	3,863	18,031
16	5,490	23,521
17	7,506	31,027
18	9,568	40,595
19	13,102	53,715
20	16,636	70,351

The following table will tell you how many hoards you should expect to encounter in each phase of the campaign (by level category, since hoard tables are split up this way normally) and how valuable those hoards should be without Valuable Items. Total Accumulated includes the values from previous levels.
The “number of hoards” is entirely calculated by me. It’s a rough guess for how many dungeons, boss creature treasures, or other large caches of loot you might encounter during that point in the game. My reasoning is that you all spend so little time in levels 1-4, you spend the majority of time in levels 5-10, and after that point the dungeons and bosses get so grand that each one takes up more significant time. This also does not include any hoard you might actively hunt for.
This table will also include the number of Valuable Items you should expect from any hoards, since you all are more likely to hunt for specific magic items and other high value loot. I’m not robbing you of any value I promise, magic item calculations are just disgusting.

Hoard Table

Player Levels	Expected Number of Hoards	Average Valuable Items Per Hoard	Average Hoard Gold Value	Total Accumulated Value
Levels 1-4	1	3	296	296
Levels 5-10	4	5	3,857	15,724
Levels 11-16	2	10	31,500	78,724
Levels 17-20	1	20	322,000	400,724

Buying Valuable Items

As a table, we don’t usually buy Valuable Items. Only recently did we actually get concrete prices for Magic Items and Potions, but on top of that nobody at the table looks to buy things like reagents or other crafting components. This might continue, but just in case, I want to make clear and defined rules for how one might seek a Valuable Item through trade.

Rarity

The rarity of the item you are looking to buy will affect how easy a seller is to locate. For the most part, Common and Uncommon magic items or potions will be easy to come by, whereas the rarer items will require you to go out of your way looking for a seller.
Here’s a general description for each tier of rarity so you know what each tier really means. Just to be clear, rarity does not equal power or exact value. It just defines how many of that item exist in the world and / or how hard it is to make. The more rare an item, usually, the stronger it is, but that is not always the case.

Seller Rarity Definitions

ItemRarities	Description
Common	A Common item is just that; something you see on the regular. Apothecaries will usually have Health Potions stocked, taverns will buy Beads of Refreshment to clean dirty water, shiftweave suits are commonly sold to performers, and prosthetic limbs are crafted for veterans. You will have no trouble finding such items to buy.
Uncommon	Uncommon items are also self explanatory; these items won’t be everywhere like Common items, but you won’t have to look far to find them. Adamantine armor will be crafted for wealthy soldiers, most nobles will own an amulet of Proof against Detection and Location, a group of adventurers will often carry a Bag of Holding, and exceptional craftsmen may forge +1 grimoires to sell to higher-end mages. You might not find an Uncommon item in absolutely every marketplace, but it won’t be a lofty endeavor to hunt one down.
Rare	Rare items start to be more of a challenge to find. Other than a chance +1 weapon or armor and the occasional Potion of Superior Healing, these items won’t be found at any marketplace. These items are likely to be wealthy family heirlooms, belong to battle-hardened adventurers, or tucked away by dedicated scholars. You will have to go out of your way to find someone skilled enough to craft these goods, strong enough to wrestle these goods out of a monster’s hoard, or well traveled and witty enough to haggle their way into possessing such an item. Still, it’s not impossible to find someone who got their hands on a rare item and is looking for someone to buy it off them. You will likely have to advertise a bounty for this kind of an item or go on a small hunt to find whoever might be willing to sell, though.
Very Rare	Very Rare items are even more sparse than rare, evading even the most well traveled or dedicated treasure hunters. Few ever get their hands on these items, let alone are willing to sell them. With enough hunting and haggling, you might be able to convince someone to let go of a Bobbing Lily Pad or some Oil of Sharpness, but the majority of these items are too useful or powerful for anyone to want to give up. You will likely not find a seller for these items, but you may find out who owns one or what monster has laid claim to one by asking seasoned treasure hunters or casting spells like Legend Lore to find them.
Legendary	Legendary items are what literal legends are made of. There may be only a handful of these items even in existence, let alone on the same plane as you at any given time. If anyone is selling a Legendary item, they are likely tricking you, unaware of the item’s grandeur, or they themselves have been tricked into buying a fake. These items are so few and far between that they are often crafted specifically for their wielder; the most common place you will find Legendary items is with the person who made it or who it was made for, or a powerful monster who managed to pry it from said person’s hands. You might never find someone selling any Legendary items, but I will be more likely to lay them out near the end-game as a story item.
Artifact	Artifacts are one-of-a-kind, and can be a little misleading. Many items are classified as “Artifact” just because there is only one of them in existence, but plenty of them are less powerful than even a Very Rare item. If you make your own crappy magical spoon that makes everything taste like chocolate, it would count as an Artifact just because there’s only one. Still, some genuinely powerful things are also rightfully classified as Artifacts. Sentient magic weapons that were once powerful Demon Lords now imprisoned in the magical steel, body parts from long-dead hags or archfey that have their wills still bound to their bones, and suits of armor bound with the sentience of all the souls used to create them are a few examples of the grandeur Artifacts can get to. That being said, there’s no way you will be able to find someone selling a powerful Artifact unless I specifically have a story reason to place it on your path. The Athaneos, for example, is an Artifact.

Finding a Seller

Each of the rarity descriptions gives you a vague idea of how hard it is to find a seller, but what does that actually look like?
You can go about finding a seller in a variety of ways. For Common or Uncommon items, just asking around is usually enough to point you in the right direction. Rarer items might need a more thorough search, and that’s where spells like Legend Lore come in handy.
Generally, if you put in the effort and take the time to find an item, and I deem it appropriate for your level, you’ll likely get what you’re after eventually.

Prices

If you find someone who will sell you a Valuable Item, you need to actually have the coin ready to spend on it. Valuable items aren’t cheap, and the higher in rarity you go the more expensive Valuable Items will get.
I will be using the prices outlined in the Kibbles Compendium of Craft and Creation for the most part. Anything not included here will be made using these prices as a guideline.

Making Valuable Items

Making magic items is not new for us; this is the most exciting way to get your hands on an item, making it yourself gives you full agency on how fast you work towards an item and what you will eventually get. It’s also one thing to claim that your character is a master craftsman, and a whole different feeling getting to actually show that off.
The rules I will be using for any crafting system, including Alchemy, Poisoncraft, Enchanting, Blacksmithing, Cooking, Wand Whittling, Spell Scribing, Leatherworking, Tinkering, Woodcarving, Runecarving, and Engineering, can be found in the Kibbles Compendium of Craft and Creation.
In addition to these rules, I want to implement a new system for knowing and learning recipes. I think one thing that messed with my games’ economies in the past was allowing you all to act as industrial assembly lines for magic item or potion making, without considering how your characters even know the recipes for such items, and who on earth would be buying them in the first place (more on that later).
From now on, in order to craft an item, you must know the recipe of that item.
If your character doesn’t have proficiency in any crafting tool, you don’t know any crafting recipes. You will have to spend time with someone who knows the craft to learn recipes, and you’re much better off trying to learn the tool before looking into any specific item.
Upon starting with or gaining proficiency in a crafting tool, you learn all Common recipes that require that tool and ten Uncommon recipes that require that tool. If you have or gain expertise in a crafting tool, you learn all Uncommon recipes that require that tool and five Rare recipes that require that tool.
The Compendium specifies the related tool for each type of craft, but I have also made a few changes to that: Both an Herbalist Kit and Alchemy Tools can be used for Alchemy or Poisoncraft, and both tool kits grant you the same learned recipe pools.
You can learn new recipes in two ways:

• Study. You can find someone to teach you recipes they know, or find written recipes on your travels to copy down and make sense of for yourselves. This will take time and will cost you gold for any lessons or materials used in the process, similarly to a Wizard learning a new spell. It won’t be nearly as expensive, though; For each rarity level of the recipe, the process takes 2 hours and costs 20 gp.
• Trial and Error. You can attempt to learn a specific item’s recipe by guessing at the required steps yourself; first, you must spend 2 hours studying the item you are attempting to craft. You must know of the item’s existence in order to study it. This can be by reading about the item, seeing it in action, or comparing it to other similar items. An Arcana check is required for anything magical, and a Research check is required for anything non-magical, the DC of which is equal to the item’s crafting difficulty DC. You make this check normally if you currently possess this item or have consumed it (for a potion or food item) recently, otherwise the check will always be made with disadvantage. Casting the Identify spell on an item counts as an automatic success on this roll. On a failure, you must wait until after your next field rest to study the item again. On a success, you learn the components required to craft an item and may begin the guesswork; during this process, you will roll to craft the item as you normally would, but you have disadvantage on any crafting check you make. A failure while guessing in this way counts as three failures for any standard crafting process. Once you successfully make an item this way, you learn the recipe.

Keep track of your learned recipes like you would keep track of your spells known.

Using Spell Scrolls

As a small addition, I'm moving the rules for how you all can use Spell Scrolls in here for ease of access. I didn't like having a whole separate article for it, so here you go:

A spell scroll bears the words of a single spell, written in a mystical cipher. If the spell is on your class’s spell list and of a level you can currently cast, you can read the scroll and understand the casting without the need to make a check. Otherwise, the scroll is unintelligible and must be studied in order to understand the spell's effects and cast without issue. Casting the spell by reading the scroll requires the spell’s normal Casting Time. Once the spell is cast, the words on the scroll fade, and it crumbles to dust. If the casting is interrupted, the scroll is not lost.

If the scroll is unintelligible to you, you may learn the nuances of casting spell in your free time. You must spend a total number of hours equal to twice the level of the spell (minus Intelligence + Arcana, minimum of one) studying the scroll. This can be done while doing light activity, but not during a short or long rest. A warlock with the invocation "Aspect of the Moon" may study while resting. Once you have studied a spell, any scroll containing that spell is legible to you and requires no further studying. This level of study is not adequate enough to be able to cast the spell normally or make scrolls of the spell.

When using a scroll without understanding the spell, you must make an ability check using your Spellcasting ability to determine whether you cast it successfully. The DC equals 13 + the spell’s level. On a failed check, your action is wasted, regardless of the casting action used, but the scroll remains in-tact. You cannot cast another spell of 1st level or higher, or use another Spell Scroll, during your turn once you attempt to use a Scroll (regardless of your success).

Once cast, unless it is on your class’s spell list and your own saving throw DC and Attack bonus would be higher (in which case, you use your own bonuses), the level of the spell on the scroll determines the spell’s saving throw DC and Attack bonus, as well as the scroll’s Rarity, as shown below:

Scroll Rarity Table

Spell Level	Scroll Rarity	DC	Attack Roll
Cantrip	Common	10	+3
1st	Uncommon	12	+4
2nd	Uncommon	13	+5
3rd	Rare	14	+6
4th	Rare	15	+7
5th	Rare	16	+8
6th	Rare	17	+9
7th	Very Rare	18	+10
8th	Very Rare	19	+11
9th	Legendary	20	+12

A Wizard can copy a Wizard spell on a spell scroll just as spells in a normal spellbook can be copied. When a spell is copied from a spell scroll, the copier must succeed on an Intelligence (Arcana) check with a DC equal to 10 + the spell’s level. If the check succeeds, the spell is successfully copied. Whether the check succeeds or fails, the spell scroll is destroyed.

Selling Valuable Items

Like I warned, this is something I didn’t ever think about (aside from Orville that one time). I waved it away as convenience at the time, but this is something I need to keep track of from now on.
If you want to start your own apothecary or magic item emporium, you need to consider your target market. Finding buyers for expensive items will be tough and take time; it might end up being more productive sticking to the things people can actually afford. Of course, you are welcome to flood the market with cheap, powerful items if you really want to sell your +3 weapons at 10 gold apiece, but don’t be surprised when every enemy you face now has their hands on the very same weapons.
Rarity will come into play when finding a buyer in the same way it affects finding a seller. Here’s a more brief description from the seller’s point of view:

Buyer Rarity Definitions

ItemRarities	Description
Common	These items are used in many people’s day-to-day lives; it will be easy to find someone willing to buy a common item.
Uncommon	These items are well known and offer most buyers an advantage they are willing to pay for and can afford; not everyone will be willing to buy an Uncommon item, but you will be able to find a buyer with relative ease.
Rare	These items, while very useful, tend to get too expensive for most people to afford, especially considering that most people don’t have their entire bank accounts stowed away in their pockets. You will need to seek out nobles or rich knights in order to find someone willing to buy these pricey items, and you will likely need to arrange a time and place to host the exchange.
Very Rare	These items start to get egregiously expensive, even too much for most nobles unless they have a very specific agenda in mind. You will likely have to hunt down a buyer, and may face consequences if you don’t check who you’re selling such powerful items to.
Legendary	Good luck finding anyone who can afford this item, even if they desperately want it. You’re more likely to attract the attention of skilled thieves or assassins looking to pluck it from you instead of lawfully barter.
Artifact	Beyond just convincing someone that such an item really exists, there’s no way someone would have the money to buy a genuinely powerful Artifact from you unless it’s the devil himself. And if you sell the Athaneos to Lucifer… that’s on you.

Finding a Buyer

Each of the rarity descriptions gives you a good idea of how hard it is to find a buyer. Just like with selling an item, you can go about finding a seller in a variety of ways.
For Common or Uncommon items, just asking around is usually enough to point you in the right direction. Rarer items might need a more thorough search, and you may need to advertise your services to people who can actually afford them in order to gain any traction.
Like I hinted in the rarity list, advertising your powerful wares is likely to garner you the wrong kind of attention, so be ready to defend yourself and your craft if you aim big.

Prices

Like I said previously, I will be using the prices outlined in the Kibbles Compendium of Craft and Creation for the most part. Anything not included here will be made using these prices as a guideline.

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