This topic became a much deeper dive than originally imagined.

I would like to thank the OG GM for covering this topic on YouTube. Link to the video here. It’s a good video and brings up a lot of good points about how to administer magic shops in a fantasy game.

I would like to delve a bit more into the why and the deeper ramifications of magic in fantasy worlds. This actually went from a simple discussion about magic shops to an entire exercise in world building. Personally, I have talked the topic of magic shops and if/why they would exist or not for years with friends and family. It comes up every time a new campaign begins.

*Side note: I’m doing this to take a break from the news of the WotC/Hasbro layoffs. I’m still pretty upset with Wizards of the Coast letting people go especially during the holiday season. More on that tomorrow when I’ve maybe calmed down a bit.

Why are magic shops such a big deal?

Mechanically, in terms of the game (any fantasy TTRPG,) they offer a chance for players to buy all kinds of crazy magical loot with gold instead of going out adventuring for said items. Part of this is a side effect of not having magic be a rare and special thing. Some old timers refer to this as a “Monty Haul” style of play where magic items and spells are fairly common.

The other mechanical problem is the outright breakdown of the local economy. Suddenly, or maybe not so suddenly, the magic shop proprietor has more gold than the town would ever see in the course of its existence all in the pockets of one person. The poor hirelings who work for 2 copper per day carrying torches for these adventurers don’t even get paid that well. If we adapt the local economy to function on a higher scale, what does it do for the surrounding towns, traders, and even nations.

Narratively, characters roll into a small town nearest whatever cairn they just pillaged and try to unload vast amounts of gold and unwanted items. Admittedly, these adventuring types have put themselves in ridiculous amounts of danger in obtaining this lucre mountain. In the barest sense they went out and robbed graves and killed any number of relatively harmless creatures for it. (That poor, innocent dragon who never ate any of the locals for example.)

There’s a train of thought here.

Here’s where everything kinda took a turn in thought for me. If a magic shop exists, it will mean there is a market for magical goods and services in the local economy. That would imply magical goods are known to exist elsewhere in the world. Obviously someone has brought this treasure forth and decided to sell it meaning there are other items more valuable out there in the world, probably in the hands of some adventurers.

How special is magic? If a shopkeeper can afford to buy and sell these items, how special are they? Is magic so common that an adventurer can afford to part with it? If there are places deep underground worth risking life and limb to find treasure, where did these places come from? How is it that the party is the first one to discover these things?

Let’s go down the Rabbit Labyrinth a bit further.

(*Oh, that is so gonna be a thing now…)
Deep below the surface of the world, vast necropoli exist just waiting to be pillaged. How did they get there? What happened to the civilization that constructed these cities? Why does no one on the surface remember these things? How is it that some mage/scholar/sage is finding this knowledge in a musty forgotten tome, but the guy out on the street hocking magical wares doesn’t know about it? 

Not to mention that the current surface world has all of this magic around that it can be bought and sold? What kind of economy is this? Fantasy medieval nothing, this would begin to look like some sort of magicpunk setting where even farmers have +1 plows being pulled by flying oxen. Why cut trees and build log cabins when someone could cast a spell to magically summon a mansion?

OG GM mentioned this in his video, but I don’t know if he realized how profound it is. If offensive spells are like owning a firearm, why wouldn’t everyone and their dog be using one?

What? Someone is breaking into my mansion? Ma, go hide the kids and summon 911 while I get my magical missile scrolls and head downstairs. I’m taking the potion of acid breath just in case.

Where does it end? At what point does magic mean anything? At the point of being able to buy and sell magic spells, potions, scrolls, and weapons are not as special any more. It gets to the point where Role Master becomes more like Minecraft. The magic is just… technology.

What’s the alternative to having magic shops in a TTRPG?

I’m planning a new campaign world setting where magic is very special. If the characters find a +1 dagger, it’s going to mean something. It’s going to have a name. Potions and scrolls might be a bit more common, especially amongst the nobles, scholars, and royalty. A magical sword or armor will be such a rare find that no one would dare part with it except upon death.

This really is a worldbuilding exercise from the ground up. How did magic get into the world? Maybe the prior civilizations had a lot of magic. Maybe a council of mages grew so powerful they took over a society and leveled it during some magical apocalypse. Maybe an even older stratus of society just discovered magic and it was so powerful that it caused an extinction level event.

Oh, but what of Elves and Dwarves?

Surely a race that lives hundreds of years would remember the prior civilizations, right? They might even be the prior civilization. If there are beings capable of living longer than a human lifespan, they would be more likely to craft magic items because they can put the time an effort into making an item.

If a magic shop owner wanted to make money, their best bet might be to work with elves or dwarves. Maybe it takes them longer to make an item, magical or otherwise, but maybe they wouldn’t place as high of a value on magic. Their “regular” item quality might be ten times what a human master craftsman can do. Unfortunately, a human craftsman might die in the amount of time it takes an elf to finish one sword.

Elves and dwarves might have better access to magic than humans. They’ve had more opportunities and access to magic formulas and components. They can wait on herbal components to grow. They can spend decades looking for components. Humans aren’t so lucky.

Magic as a cottage industry.

I think we tend to forget that medieval society lacked mass production. A cobbler made shoes and sold them, probably out of their home. A candlemaker did much the same. General stores weren’t much of a thing. Therefore, perhaps magic item shops wouldn’t exist except in larger cities.

In smaller towns and villages, the solution might be if you need a “magical” scroll, one would seek out a scribe. If one needed healing, they could seek the barber or apothecary. Herbalists, sages, scholars, and other knowledgeable experts might also be of use to those seeking aid for various problems.

There’s always a chance an unscrupulous seller might be peddling total fakes. Medieval Europe undoubtedly had its share of snake oil salesman and other fine charlatans. There’s also the possibility of a well meaning yet unskilled person selling trinkets and potions to ward off evil and other such superstitious thoughts. I think that might be more likely in a fantasy setting that someone setting up a magic item stand in the middle of town.

There could be traveling merchants, a sort of medieval entrepreneurs who travel from one town to the next picking up a few unique items from each town and taking them to the next one over to sell. Such merchants might even hire adventurers to accompany them on the road as protection from bandits and the like. Such a merchant might pick up a unique or unusual item that might have a little bit of magic. Merchants of this type would undoubtedly be wary of adventurers and the like trying to sell them magic items. Bad investments that won’t sell to the townsfolk aren’t of much value to any merchant.

My answer to the existence of magic shops.

I say it all the time. It’s your game. Do whatever you think is best for you and your players. What works at my table might not work at yours and vice versa.

I personally intend to run my next fantasy campaign a bit differently than I have in years past. I may have some folks in larger villages and towns who sell a scroll or odd potion here and there. I want to try to trim some of the magical fat from my game. The +1 dagger someone finds at Level 3 might be with them their entire career because +2 or +3 daggers will be rare finds. Many magic items will have names and might even gain new powers as time progresses.

I remember Old School games when we would roll on the treasure tables after a monster encounter and wonder why if a goblin had a Ring of Invisibility why he wasn’t using it. Why would someone be packing a Sword of Sharpness around and not use it on the adventurers bearing down on them? If they had +3 Full Plate armor, why weren’t they wearing it instead of lugging it around. Sometimes non humanoid monsters would have these items as a result of a run in with other adventurers or as a part of a larger maze complex built from the ruins of yore, but obviously a Carrion Crawler isn’t going to be using a Wand of Fireball.

As always, thank you for stopping by. I hope this article inspires you or adds to your campaign in some way. I certainly paused to reexamine the nature of magic in my fantasy campaigns. I appreciate you being here. Lots of things in the works during the days to come. Happy holidays.