Too powerful regional feat: Mercantile Background.?

[VinnythePooh]

I have this feat which say that I can sell magic loot for 75% rather than 50% and once a month I can buy a magic item for 75% of its list price. I started this character at level 10 so this would AT BARE MINIMUM I would start off with 61250 rather than the standard 49000 for 10th level. Am I correct? My DM allowed the feat but I didn't really discuss with him the particulars even though he knows the premise of the feat

[Aegis013]

Discuss the particulars with your DM, as that is what will actually matter in this case.

I could see reasonable justifications for just about any approach ranging from you get no benefit at creation whatsoever and can only use after the game has started to you get a 25% discount on all items bought during character creation depending on the DM's aims and goals for the game. Anything said about it here on the forums will invariably take a back seat to what your DM decides for your specific case, after all.

[Biggus]

I agree that it's too powerful, especially since from now on the whole party will be getting a substantial amount of extra money every time you get some loot. In my games I reduce it to sell at 65% and buy at 85%. I do allow it to work retroactively though, I think it would be unfair not to since you can only take it at 1st level.

[VinnythePooh]

I would, but I don't wanna. He already kiboshed my wand of wand modulation from the complete scoundrel for my rogue which I was gonna use to cast any 3rd level spell off a fourth level wand. That spell needs an errata edit I think because it uses quite a bit of non specificity that I tried to finesse my way into. We're in the opening stages of the Expedition to the Demonweb Pits and I don't want to rely on my rookie cleric for buffs or healing. Crap

[pabelfly]

1) You don't know how much of your starting money would have been specifically from selling magical loot (as opposed to nonmagical loot or straight gold) so you don't know how much extra money you'd get. It's an "ask your DM" question.
2) I wouldn't be surprised if you got extra money, and other players also got the extra money (presumably, you would have sold magical loot for the other players too). If that happens, the enemies could well be buffed to give your group the level of challenge the DM desires to give you. I would not be surprised if the extra money you got, and will get in the future is actually not relevant.

[Aegis013]

I would, but I don't wanna. ...

If you're not willing to discuss it with your DM, the only safe route is to assume it provides you no benefit whatsoever during character creation.

If you want any benefit at all during the character creation process, the only option is to discuss what exactly that benefit would be with your DM because there is no RAW provided to precisely quantify what benefit it might provide you retroactively.

[JNAProductions]

If you're not willing to discuss it with your DM, the only safe route is to assume it provides you no benefit whatsoever during character creation.

If you want any benefit at all during the character creation process, the only option is to discuss what exactly that benefit would be with your DM because there is no RAW provided to precisely quantify what benefit it might provide you retroactively.

This. 100% this.

You need to work WITH the DM, not against them. They play the antagonists, they are not themselves a foe.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

If you're not willing to discuss it with your DM, the only safe route is to assume it provides you no benefit whatsoever during character creation.

He'd still get the bonus 300 gp for taking it, though.

Could I also suggest taking a few other feats for some major boosts in WBL?

Ancestral Relic basically gives you free WBL for having the feat. Bring a portable altar with you on your travels and sacrifice enemy strongholds with it. Buildings and other stronghold features are ridiculously expensive, and sitting on a rival religion church's roof and sacrificing their holy site is insult added to injury. You can also sacrifice cursed objects that you can't sell, and if you have the ability to create expensive objects via free and low-cost spells (and there are many; see wall of salt for a particularly good one), or you have items that duplicate themselves on use (see splitting aurorum arrows that split when fired and can be reconstituted after), you can have all the sacrificial fodder you want for your bonded item.

Item Familiar gets free +1 enhancements for a weapon or other object of your choice and turns it into an intelligent item. This can give all sorts of additional benefits, if you start digging into the intelligent item rules. Choosing the right object to boost as an item familiar is key to getting the most out of it.

Leadership can grab minions, including crafters and spellcasters, to bring in revenue. You could also potentially grab intelligent items with class levels.

Landlord is easily the most potent for the amount of money it gives you without additional resources to boost Leadership. It gives free money earmarked for improving a stronghold and matches your monetary contributions gp-for-gp, encouraging you to spend money to get money. Do note that there are magic/psionic items that can count as strongholds, and upgrading said items with offensive and defensive abilities is 100% doable. Daern's instant fortress is absolutely a good target for the Landlord feat, as is a psychoactive skin of proteus (which allows the wearer to take the form of an object, up to and including a building, which can be used as a stronghold). An enveloping pit (MIC) could count, as well, given it's a 5000 cubic foot space that can lived in easily enough, especially if additional upgrades are added to improve it further. I wonder how much additional cubic footage one could get out of an enveloping pit if you really wanted. Becoming Fine size and using furnishings to suit would certainly give a huge boost to the amount of effective space you could pack into it.

[Aegis013]

He'd still get the bonus 300 gp for taking it, though.

It's not safe to assume this would be above and beyond WBL at level 10, thus the only safe thing without discussing with the DM is to assume no benefit at creation beyond level 1 as this amount would just be subsumed into the WBL rather than added on top.

All of the other suggestions are extremely potent, though I think they should also be discussed with the DM in depth prior to taking them. If you don't, at least be sure you're very good at dodging flying DMGs.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

It's not safe to assume this would be above and beyond WBL at level 10, thus the only safe thing without discussing with the DM is to assume no benefit at creation beyond level 1 as this amount would just be subsumed into the WBL rather than added on top.

You gain the 300 gp on character creation. Note that this is whenever you create the character. If that's at level 10, you gain +300 gp at level 10 that can be spent however you see fit. If that's to be spent as a level 1 character prior to leveling (such as if you want to upgrade your unarmed strike to a masterwork weapon), then so be it.

All of the other suggestions are extremely potent, though I think they should also be discussed with the DM in depth prior to taking them. If you don't, at least be sure you're very good at dodging flying DMGs.

Fair.

[Darg]

I have this feat which say that I can sell magic loot for 75% rather than 50% and once a month I can buy a magic item for 75% of its list price. I started this character at level 10 so this would AT BARE MINIMUM I would start off with 61250 rather than the standard 49000 for 10th level. Am I correct? My DM allowed the feat but I didn't really discuss with him the particulars even though he knows the premise of the feat

As a general rule, a new character can spend no more than half her total wealth on a single item, and no more than one quarter the total wealth on consumables such as ammunition, scrolls, potions, wands, or alchemical items.

Even if the DM allowed you to start with an item benefiting from the feat, you're actually only saving 6,125 gp for a total of 55,125. One 24,500 gp item for 18,375 isn't all that bad

[Crake]

Even if the DM allowed you to start with an item benefiting from the feat, you're actually only saving 6,125 gp for a total of 55,125. One 24,500 gp item for 18,375 isn't all that bad

I think the idea was that, historically, you were only ever buying one item a month, to achieve your current loadout, since starting gear isn't all immediately purchased in one moment just before starting.

[Pugwampy]

I have this feat which say that I can sell magic loot for 75% rather than 50% and once a month I can buy a magic item for 75% of its list price. I started this character at level 10 so this would AT BARE MINIMUM I would start off with 61250 rather than the standard 49000 for 10th level. Am I correct? My DM allowed the feat but I didn't really discuss with him the particulars even though he knows the premise of the feat

Its either a strong or weak feat .

How many sessions is considered a month in your campaign ? How generous is your DM with giving gold in the campaign ?

A bit of extra starting gold because of your feat is not game breaking.

[Darg]

I think the idea was that, historically, you were only ever buying one item a month, to achieve your current loadout, since starting gear isn't all immediately purchased in one moment just before starting.

It's starting wealth, not spending cash over time. A reduced purchase price does not reduce the amount of wealth it is worth. As a DM I wouldn't even allow it to work until the game started because you're paying wealth, not gp. I compromised BECAUSE one could theoretically start the game with cash and immediately buy something for 25% off.

[Gnaeus]

Even if the DM allowed you to start with an item benefiting from the feat, you're actually only saving 6,125 gp for a total of 55,125. One 24,500 gp item for 18,375 isn't all that bad

The rule you cited says you can only spend half your wealth on an item, not that you can't have an item of value more than half your wealth. The feat modifies what you spend. You could buy a 32500 item, save 8000 gp, and get a better item than anyone else on your team, because you are only spending 24500 on it.

Not only is it RAW, it is common sense. The clear purpose of the rule is that you don't have all your WBL available at any one time, and that some of it may have come in the form of other items you are carrying.

[RNightstalker]

I'm currently playing a character with the Mercantile Background feat and the DM basically allowed me on use of the 75% purchasing power on 1 item/level we were starting at. We started at 9th level and I was allowed to use it for 9 items from starting gold.

[Darg]

The rule you cited says you can only spend half your wealth on an item, not that you can't have an item of value more than half your wealth. The feat modifies what you spend. You could buy a 32500 item, save 8000 gp, and get a better item than anyone else on your team, because you are only spending 24500 on it.

Not only is it RAW, it is common sense. The clear purpose of the rule is that you don't have all your WBL available at any one time, and that some of it may have come in the form of other items you are carrying.

Wealth is not fungible currency. A 100,000 gp sword is only worth 50,000 gp when sold. However, it's still 100,000 gp of your wealth. Paying only 75,000 gp does not reduce the portion of your wealth that the sword represents. That sword is still 100,000 gp of your wealth.

By RAW, wealth is not your purchasing power. It's the total value of your assets. If that were the case, then that 100,000 gp sword would be crafted for 50,000 + xp and sold for 25,000 by the player because wealth is your ability to buy things and not the value of items.

[Pezzo]

Wealth is not fungible currency. A 100,000 gp sword is only worth 50,000 gp when sold. However, it's still 100,000 gp of your wealth. Paying only 75,000 gp does not reduce the portion of your wealth that the sword represents. That sword is still 100,000 gp of your wealth.

By RAW, wealth is not your purchasing power. It's the total value of your assets. If that were the case, then that 100,000 gp sword would be crafted for 50,000 + xp and sold for 25,000 by the player because wealth is your ability to buy things and not the value of items.

I know you're talking about starting wbl, but if using wbl on levelling up, crafting items will be much worse than travelling the planes to buy what you want. Unless you're crafting a philactery.
Also the 100k sword would still sell for 50k because it's half the market price

[VinnythePooh]

NERFED. We play once a week on Saturdays. Now I gotta find a different regional feat by then for an orphaned (meaning regionally mutable) moon elf who, surprisingly, hates drow and whole character is geared towards killing them Ranger 5/ Rogue 5. Ideas?

[Crake]

Wealth is not fungible currency. A 100,000 gp sword is only worth 50,000 gp when sold. However, it's still 100,000 gp of your wealth. Paying only 75,000 gp does not reduce the portion of your wealth that the sword represents. That sword is still 100,000 gp of your wealth.

By RAW, wealth is not your purchasing power. It's the total value of your assets. If that were the case, then that 100,000 gp sword would be crafted for 50,000 + xp and sold for 25,000 by the player because wealth is your ability to buy things and not the value of items.

While i get where you’re coming from, i believe there is a rule
That says you can craft items with your wbl in order to exceed it, so such a rule would naturally extend to something like this.

Personally i resolve the problem by abolishing wbl and instead using automatic bonus progression from pf1e, with actual magic items occasionally making an appearance

[Troacctid]

NERFED. We play once a week on Saturdays. Now I gotta find a different regional feat by then for an orphaned (meaning regionally mutable) moon elf who, surprisingly, hates drow and whole character is geared towards killing them Ranger 5/ Rogue 5. Ideas?

Dreadful Wrath?

[pabelfly]

Maybe Education + Knowledge Devotion?

If you're going Ranger and want to hurt evil characters like Drow, you can always go with a Stalker of Kharash build and get Favored Enemy: Evil.

[Darg]

I know you're talking about starting wbl, but if using wbl on levelling up, crafting items will be much worse than travelling the planes to buy what you want. Unless you're crafting a philactery.
Also the 100k sword would still sell for 50k because it's half the market price

The thread is about starting a new character, not leveling up. As I mentioned earlier, buying things for cheaper does not decrease the value of wealth an item is.

While i get where you’re coming from, i believe there is a rule
That says you can craft items with your wbl in order to exceed it, so such a rule would naturally extend to something like this.

Personally i resolve the problem by abolishing wbl and instead using automatic bonus progression from pf1e, with actual magic items occasionally making an appearance

The DMG says nothing of the sort. At best it says characters are free to use the xp and gp awarded for creating a character above 1st in order to craft items. It does not say that the character should be allowed above WBL. In fact just before that it says that the DM is free to limit items to prevent an imbalanced character. And way before that on the same page my original quote is on it says you shouldn't allow items that make other party members jealous.

The benefit of a crafting feat is that you can get some custom gear out of it to start. Giving unfettered freedom to have double wealth at the start of the game is just not going to be fun for anyone but the crafter who no longer has to pay the liquidation tax on sold items to get their crafted gear

[RNightstalker]

NERFED. We play once a week on Saturdays. Now I gotta find a different regional feat by then for an orphaned (meaning regionally mutable) moon elf who, surprisingly, hates drow and whole character is geared towards killing them Ranger 5/ Rogue 5. Ideas?

Swift and Silent would fit the theme. Foe Hunter if the DM will let you apply it toward drow. Tireless so you can hunt. Blooded or Thug for the initiative boost.

[Crake]

The DMG says nothing of the sort. At best it says characters are free to use the xp and gp awarded for creating a character above 1st in order to craft items. It does not say that the character should be allowed above WBL. In fact just before that it says that the DM is free to limit items to prevent an imbalanced character. And way before that on the same page my original quote is on it says you shouldn't allow items that make other party members jealous.

The benefit of a crafting feat is that you can get some custom gear out of it to start. Giving unfettered freedom to have double wealth at the start of the game is just not going to be fun for anyone but the crafter who no longer has to pay the liquidation tax on sold items to get their crafted gear

Given that starting WBL has no restrictions on what you can buy, only how much you can buy, can you explain to me what the point would be in using item creation feats, and spending xp during character creation, if your starting wealth is resultantly the same? You literally just spend xp for no value based on your reading.

Also, unless you've picked up every single item crafting feat, it's not a doubling of starting wealth, only for items that come under your item creation feats.

Specifically, the section says:

Character-Created Magic Items: A PC spellcaster created at a level higher than 1st can use any of the XP and gp you have awarded to make magic items, provided that she has the proper item creation feats and prerequisites

So if you're level 7, the wealth by level table awards you 19,000gp, and you have 21,000xp. You can use any of that xp and gp to create magic items, as long as you meet the prerequisites. You effectively get the benefit of trading xp for more wealth (and would naturally start partyway through level 6 while everyone else starts at level 7)

Note that, while you have this extra freedom to spend your gold how you want, the DM is still the final arbiter on what you can purchase and craft. On that note, there are no actual hard rules about limits for purchasing items with wealth by level, the DMG merely recommends that the DM impose SOME kind of limit. What they are is entirely up to the DM.

[loky1109]

In my games no feats (not subj, not item creation) are working before finishing character creation. "Buying" items for WBL is part of character creation. And WBL isn't money. I don't let you translate WBL into gp.

[Darg]

Given that starting WBL has no restrictions on what you can buy, only how much you can buy, can you explain to me what the point would be in using item creation feats, and spending xp during character creation, if your starting wealth is resultantly the same? You literally just spend xp for no value based on your reading.

Also, unless you've picked up every single item crafting feat, it's not a doubling of starting wealth, only for items that come under your item creation feats.

Specifically, the section says:



So if you're level 7, the wealth by level table awards you 19,000gp, and you have 21,000xp. You can use any of that xp and gp to create magic items, as long as you meet the prerequisites. You effectively get the benefit of trading xp for more wealth (and would naturally start partyway through level 6 while everyone else starts at level 7)

Note that, while you have this extra freedom to spend your gold how you want, the DM is still the final arbiter on what you can purchase and craft. On that note, there are no actual hard rules about limits for purchasing items with wealth by level, the DMG merely recommends that the DM impose SOME kind of limit. What they are is entirely up to the DM.

Of course nothing is allowed except by DM fiat. So you can't say the default is no limit. You still have the general rules of no single item being worth no more than 50% of your wealth and the amount of consumables being no more than 25%.

Even then, none of that has anything to do with monthly discounts on purchasing items as is in the OP. Thus the prevailing rule is wealth, not purchasing power as the OP wants to believe. Thus using the general rule as a guideline you get 25% of a single 50% item as the maximum benefit because when you start the game it is during one of those months. Unless you believe they should get a 25% bonus to gp because that wealth could have been accumulated from selling all their items at 75%? "Hey, I've got an adventure coming up so I'm gonna sell all my items for 75% of their worth so I be ready to buy it all back at a 33% markup!" Or on top of that buying all of their items at a 25% discount because they weren't player characters beforehand so they didn't have the build up of wealth and item accumulation beforehand. They've got a lump sum of cash. If we say they 100% benefit from the feat over the course of x levels then their accumulated wealth has a theoretical limit of 187.5% of WBL. Which is even more imbalanced than the item creation feats.

Where is the line drawn? My opinion is that the feat has no effect because it has no rules for character creation. However, I'm willing to compromise because a theoretical character could take up to 50% of their wealth in gp to a store at the start of the game to buy a single item for a 75% discount and still fall under the general rule. In the case of the feat RAW is wealth, not purchasing power.

[Crake]

Of course nothing is allowed except by DM fiat. So you can't say the default is no limit. You still have the general rules of no single item being worth no more than 50% of your wealth and the amount of consumables being no more than 25%.

Where's that rule actually located? Because the DMG has this to say:

You’re free to limit what magic items characters can choose when they create characters of higher levels, just as if you were assigning those items to treasure hoards in the game. You can exercise an item-by-item veto, but an easier method is to use maximum cost for a single item as a limit. For example, while an 8th-level character has 27,000 gp to spend, you can limit him to owning no single item worth more than one-quarter of that, or 5,500 gp. This is a good way to prevent imbalances such as an 8th-level fighter with hardly a copper piece to his name who is armed with a nine lives stealer.
You could also limit characters to a certain type of magic item. For example, a player creating a 3rd-level character has 2,700 gp to spend, but you could rule that she can only equip the character with a minor magic item (one that could be obtained by a roll on the “Minor” column of one of the random generation tables in Chapter 7)

There are a couple of examples in there about what kinds of limitations a DM could impose, but no such hard rules about a limit of 50% of their wbl on one item, and consumables being no more than 25%, at least, not in the DMG. The suggested % value was actually no item above 25% even, not 50%, but again, that is just a suggestion, and the DMG encourages DMs to come up with their own limitations.

In my games no feats (not subj, not item creation) are working before finishing character creation. "Buying" items for WBL is part of character creation. And WBL isn't money. I don't let you translate WBL into gp.

The DMG explicitly allows players to use their wealth to fund item creation:

Character-Created Magic Items: A PC spellcaster created at a level higher than 1st can use any of the XP and gp you have awarded to make magic items, provided that she has the proper item creation feats and prerequisites.

Now, of course, if you want to limit that, that's fine, rule 0 and al that, but thems what the rules say, and because of that, there's definitely an argument to be made that wbl is more akin to purchasing power, and if you have an ability that increases the value of your purchasing power, that should be able to be applied.

Naturally, if the DM feels this will unbalance the game, they are free just veto it, but to imply that there is no argument to even be made on the topic is erroneous.

[Darg]

Where's that rule actually located? Because the DMG has this to say:



There are a couple of examples in there about what kinds of limitations a DM could impose, but no such hard rules about a limit of 50% of their wbl on one item, and consumables being no more than 25%, at least, not in the DMG. The suggested % value was actually no item above 25% even, not 50%, but again, that is just a suggestion, and the DMG encourages DMs to come up with their own limitations.

Page 42 under Making a New Character. Of course there isn't a hard rule. It's the DMG, there really isn't anything in there that's not meant to be taken as guidelines rather than a strict, no rule 0 allowed rule. "As a general rule" is as strict as the DMG ever gets. If that isn't good enough for RAW then nothing in the DMG could ever be argued for RAW. Thus both our arguments are meaningless because the only correct answer is "Ask your DM."

[RNightstalker]

...because the only correct answer is "Ask your DM."

That's quoteworthy right there!