Wealth

One thing that people have struggled with over the two semesters in my campaign is the Wealth system. It is rather confusing to a lot of the players and so I hope to clarify a bit here.

After playing in the D&D system, a lot of people get used to the gold coins and how those work, unfortunately, switching to a new system (or having never played before) the idea of a "wealth bonus" is quite abstract (as the rules introduce it as). With this, the idea of a fluctuating wealth bonus is confusing. Basically, wealth bonuses vary based on the purchases you make. When you want to buy something, you roll a D20 and add the value of the wealth bonus you have to the number that you roll on the die. If you purchase something which is worth more (by the purchase DC it has) than 15... you decrease your characters wealth bonus by 1.

EXAMPLE: Your character, Johnny, has a wealth bonus of 17. He is looking at buying a PDA (from the consumer electronics section) with a Purchase DC of 16. With this, he must roll a d20 (which he rolls a 7 on) and adds his wealth bonus to the result. With this he gets a 7(d20)+17(wealth bonus)= 24. He can successfully buy the PDA. As the PDA was worth more than a Purchase DC of 15, he reduces his wealth bonus to a 16.

Not so hard is it? Next, if an item is worth more than the wealth bonus you have, you subtract a value from your Wealth Bonus based on how different the two numbers are. If it is an item that has a Purchase DC of 1-10 points higher than your Wealth Bonus, you decrease your wealth bonus by 1. If it is an item that has a Purchase DC 11-15 points higher than your Wealth Bonus, you reduce your wealth by 1d6 (roll a 6 sided die and subtract the number shown from your wealth bonus). if it is an item that has a Purchase DC 16 or higher than your Wealth Bonus, you reduce your wealth by 2d6.

EXAMPLE: Your character, Johnny, has a wealth bonus of 2. He is looking at buying a Gas Mask (from the survival equipment section) with a Purchase DC of 13. With this, he must roll a d20 (which he rolls a 14 on) and adds his wealth bonus to the result. With this he gets a 14(d20)+2(wealth bonus)= 16. He can successfully buy the PDA. As the Gas Mask was worth 11 points more than his wealth bonus, he rolls a six sided die (result was a 1) and subtracts that value from his wealth bonus. He keeps a wealth bonus of 1.

Not too difficult is it?