Level Up (A5E) Gathering Spell components

[Larnievc]

If you gather spell components while travelling you get a monetary value in components. Can anyone tell me what that means? I’ve always played a component pouch or focus as like a weapon: have none of either means no spells with component requirements.

So if I have 3gp worth of components: what exactly does that mean?

 

[tetrasodium]

If you gather spell components while travelling you get a monetary value in components. Can anyone tell me what that means? I’ve always played a component pouch or focus as like a weapon: have none of either means no spells with component requirements.

So if I have 3gp worth of components: what exactly does that mean?

I think It's for spells with a costly component. If bob has a spell that requires a 50gp diamond & is traveling 10 days he could "find" one. In general I don't think that there are many spell coimponents that would work for it unless it's being used in the event of something like a shipwreck where everything was lost.

 

[WarDriveWorley]

What tetrasodium said. Also I kind of hand wave it a bit and let players count the components found as kind of a shadow resource that they can quantify them once they have enough. So let's say my party is traveling and the mage is gathering components while doing so. They travel for a week and he finds 75 gp worth of components. Looking at his spells he doesn't have anything with costly components so he continues to just track them as "components". The following week he finds another 40 gp worth and asks me if he can "trade" 100 gp of the components he has for a 100 gp diamond for identify. Me, being the kind and generous DM I am , allow it so the mage now has the diamond for identify, plus another 15 gp of "components". that can be used later as appropriate.

 

[le Redoutable]

I thought you were talking about spell components and spell levels ( like in " to decrease the spell level you add a rare component " )

 

[Larnievc]

What tetrasodium said. Also I kind of hand wave it a bit and let players count the components found as kind of a shadow resource that they can quantify them once they have enough. So let's say my party is traveling and the mage is gathering components while doing so. They travel for a week and he finds 75 gp worth of components. Looking at his spells he doesn't have anything with costly components so he continues to just track them as "components". The following week he finds another 40 gp worth and asks me if he can "trade" 100 gp of the components he has for a 100 gp diamond for identify. Me, being the kind and generous DM I am , allow it so the mage now has the diamond for identify, plus another 15 gp of "components". that can be used later as appropriate.

That’s an idea I shall adopt in my game. Cheers

 

[tetrasodium]

IIRC in one of the early versions of d&d there was an option that allowed material components to replace a somatic or a verbal component to a spell. I don't remember the specifics but think it was a certain number of gp per spell level for the component. Having components gathered like that replace a seen or a verbal component could be another way of using it.

 

[WarDriveWorley]

IIRC in one of the early versions of d&d there was an option that allowed material components to replace a somatic or a verbal component to a spell. I don't remember the specifics but think it was a certain number of gp per spell level for the component. Having components gathered like that replace a seen or a verbal component could be another way of using it.

I'm fairly certain that was from the 2nd edition book Spells and Magic, but I may be misremembering it

 

[Stalker0]

One other option is you could allow those components to be used for "magic item creation". So maybe the 100 gp of components could be a downpayment and starting to create a magic sword. If you have a game where you want to encourage magic item creation, that is one way to spark it.

While you could be specific: You gained 100 gp of X that is used in flaming sword creation....personally I would just keep it generic and let the players decide what it goes to, otherwise the tracking can get onerous fast.

 

[evildmguy]

Thanks for the ideas! I'm going to start a LU campaign soon and am glad I can read up on threads like this beforehand.

I'm torn on using components. Back in the day, I did use the rules of 3E gaining and having spells and that was enough to limit the spells the casters had access to. The rest of the group was not willing to wait the day per spell level to learn a spell for all spells they wanted. Or there was a time constraint so they had to choose. That worked well but was changed for 3.5 onward. With regards to components, again, the most powerful spells having components limited things well. You can't run around with stoneskin on all the time without it costing a lot!

I do like the idea of a generic spell pouch that has X gold of components and just subtract when a component has a cost. I also like gathering spell components and as someone mentioned, assuming they trade up from time to time.

I guess what I'm waiting for, or will have to scrounge up and write myself, is the supplement that expands on components, spell foci, and having them make more of a difference in a game. Things like using something to enhance a spell. I have used red gems for fire spells, blue gems for cold, green for poison or acid, etc. More damage, greater range, or other benefits from having components. (I also have real things I can hand out to use for said gems, so it's more fun to track. I hope.)

The idea for me is not to penalize but enhance gameplay and give options. I don't want to take away a class ability of casting spells but hopefully give them tough choices to make. Do we sell these gems because we need the coin? Or let the caster use them to bump their spells?

 

[Larnievc]

I do like the idea of a generic spell pouch that has X gold of components and just subtract when a component has a cost.

It’s worked for my campaign. I also let them buy specific things that don’t get destroyed in the process and use the pouch for things like rare herbs or inks etc.