Quote:
Originally Posted by Steve Plambeck
Unless you are specifically setting your campaigns in Cidri, the availability of anything in the secondary world the GM has built is entirely up to the GM. I wouldn't call deviations from Cidri economic norms house rules, I'd call that the setting.
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Exactly. The prices and availability of things mentioned in ITL are just starting places. While a GM could choose to have everything in ITL available everywhere and always cost the same amount (ignoring even the rules for finding and negotiating for expensive and rare items in ITL), if a GM is interested in prices, they may want to adjust local prices and availability for various things (including magic or fine weapons) in each part of their campaign world.
If only 1 in 200 people is a wizard, and only some of those are IQ 14+, and only some of those know how to enchant weapons, and only some of those actually do enchant weapons, and only some of those sell enchanted weapons, and even those people only spend some of their time enchanting weapons, then there's an unknown (by PCs anyway) and possibly quite small number of enchanted weapons available for sale.
In some places, there could also be few fine or very fine weapons available. In other places, they might be more abundant. Maybe a dwarven nation has many master armorers, but they mostly make fine axes and dwarf-sized fine plate. Maybe most fine swords are made in some other country, while another country makes lots of fine spears, but almost all of them are sold to the military.
Considering supply and demand, unless there's a universally high supply, prices are probably going to be higher than listed. (And since the costs of enchanting a weapon are close to the listed sale prices, all the more reason to ask for more than what ITL lists as the price.)
With magic and fine weapons being different things, with different limited cost curves that don't limit each other, and different types of experts' time required to create them, it's hardly a matter of one being better than the other.
A broken fine weapon can be repaired, but loses its magic. A lightning bolt may de-enchant a magic weapon. A magic weapon isn't visibly improved, but can be detected magically.
Moreover, given the price curves of magic weapons, if fine weapons are also available, it tends to be a good idea to enchant a fine weapon rather than an ordinary one.
And so on. There are endless ways a GM can color their campaign with such situations, which tend to be rather more interesting and relevant to play than trying to figure out the supposedly "best" choice for an imaginary character looking at the prices listed in ITL.