There is a hell of a trove of magical items and valuable high-end mundane goods in Felltower . . . on the corpses of the fallen delvers "slain by a beholder."
But the PCs left a lot in town.
What the hell happens to that stuff?
Stuff left in town all goes away when the PC dies. It gets confiscated by some authories, legally claimed as abandoned property by the landlord, taken by the church or wizard's guild in some cases, and so on. It's not accessible to current or future PCs. With some exceptions, but they're generally very narrow and determined by me on a specific basis. I don't see any of them relevant here. The upside of stuff left in town is that it's invulnerable to theft and you don't need to explain where exactly it is. It can't be lost in the dungeon. But, equally, it can't be recovered from the slain in the dungeon.
Here are a few items I'm pretty sure are gone, not to return until some coicidence puts them back into play. If then.
- The Orichalcum Key. The key to the big orichalcum doors was in Ulf's possession, as far as I can tell, but in town. With luck, the key will end up with the church to be handed out to delvers who the church needs to use it. Or in a curio shop waiting to be discovered and purchased. Or with the wizard's guild. Or in the king's massive vaults along with the Ark of the Covenant. But for now, the riches and challenges beyond the doors will remain there undisturbed . . . unless another key is found.
- The iron flask. Wyatt had it, double-tied down with ropes, to keep it away from Ulf and curious Gerry. But he also left a note in Ulf's room leaving everything to the church. If someone opens that, and honors it, before Wyatt's room is cleaned out . . . it might end up with the church. Or an unwary person might open it. Or a wizard might buy it. It's incredibly unlikely someone will just hand it to delvers and ask them to open it. So it's very likely out of play.
- Many magic javelins. Heyden has a few, but Bruce and possibly others had some of the magical javelins recovered from Sakatha's lair. Those left in town are certainly gone. Oh well. Maybe more exist in other dungeons? Yet more victims of "save it until we really, really need it."
- Possibly other items. I'm not even sure. But the usual rules apply - if a current PC doesn't have it down on their sheet, it's gone. Many items have gone away that way. Hey, people lose stuff. It happens. Only evil stuff tends to resurface, and only then if it amuses the Fates (okay, the GM), in the hands of the corruptible or evil.
It's tempting to list what the lost items did . . . very tempting. I did it for the Razor in DFT3. But equally, I've found that secrets held are secrets you can use later. Maybe in 2023, or 2033, I'll need to have that iron flask appear, or some other item left behind to turn up, to make something work. It's times like these I feel much like the Old Meddler in Glen Cook's "Dread Empire" series, pulling at the strings of past victories and defeats to web them together into a new plot. So maybe it'll need to keep as a secret.
You have done a lot to emulate the early D&D play style, not just the use of a mega dungeon. Why don't you enact that primordial rule, the will? It was present in OD&D (Underworld & Wilderness Adventures) and BD&D (magenta Moldvay Basic rulebook) [I've forgotten if it is in the blue Holmes Basic rulebook, but it doesn't seem to have survived to later rules.] This allows the player to carry items to a future character at death, if they aren't lost in the dungeon. You could of course take a more realistic approach and require the beneficiary to exist and be named when the will is created, thus avoiding "my next character gets everything"...the player would have to create said character and actually play them to gain the benefits of the inheritance and if they no longer like the concept and want a different character they can create a new one but the items still go only to the named inheritor. And of course the inheritor must be able to pay the inheritance tax. If the value of equipment exceeds the cash left after taxation, the item gets taken by the crown or forcibly auctioned to pay the tax and any leftovers go to the inheritor as silver. I like these kinds of rules. Maybe you don't, so I ask why it is you haven't enacted them. Do you forsee problems, not like the idea of new characters having a leg up, does it not play well with point buy characters (maybe add a boon that a player can buy at creation that allows inheritance, but eats up a lot of points the character would otherwise need, anywhere from 25 or 50pts to inherit a specific item to starting as a henchman level 125pt character with full inheritance), did you not encounter that rule before and didn't think of it?
ReplyDeleteFor some reason I never answered your questions here, Alex. That's unusually rude of me.
DeleteIt's really the point buy issue - you get $1000 in starting gear and extras cost extra points. I don't know that I like what setting the precedent of "new guy gets old guy's stuff." My players wouldn't abuse it, but it would still rub the game system a bit wrong.