I guess they came back for round two. I didn’t realize we were doing continuity now. Neat.

As it happens, we’ve already had the discussion about fiscal pvp, so what do you say we talk about the other thing going on in today’s comic? Depending on how you’ve decided to structure your game, loot can be commonplace, impossibly rare, or anything in between. In that sense, a couple of measly copper pieces after a dragon fight is either an injustice or a king’s ransom. That leads me to believe that the loot itself is relatively unimportant. In reality it’s player expectations that you have to manage.

Take my recent encounter with the shopping monster. It was my Pathfinder megadungeon, and the PCs had been adventuring for a good long while since last they’d seen the magic merchant. I put an apparatus of the crab in the magic merchant’s stall, mostly as a “no way in hell will my players shell out 90K for this thing” item. I posted the loot list to the group’s Facebook page. It included stat boosting items and class-specific items and big six items. Here’s a smattering of responses:

“Yessssssss crab tank!”

“I just noticed it and want this campaign to go on a ghost in the shell tangent.”

Heavy Breathing Cat

The party bought quite a bit of sweet-ass loot that day, but the majority of their excitement was reserved for the apparatus of the crab. They took it for a victory lap. They began training their mounts to operate its levers. One player is asking for a way to roll up a new PC specifically designed to be a steam tank pilot. All this for an item widely reviled as mechanically weak. I guess one man’s trash is another man’s treasure.

Here’s today’s discussion question then. Have you ever been disappointed by treasure? Conversely, have you ever been overwhelmed by the awesomeness of your quest reward? Let’s hear your tales of phat lootz in the comments!

ARE YOU AN IMPATIENT GAMER? If so, you should check out the “Henchman” reward level over on The Handbook of Heroes Patreon. For just one buck a month, you can get each and every Handbook of Heroes comic a day earlier than the rest of your party members. That’s bragging rights right there!