Minimalist treasure 2: generating hoard types

Continuing from the previous post, I wanted a way to generate treasure without complicated tables. The goal: a single roll that tells you not just how much treasure there is, but what kind — and how much of it is worth carrying.

Introduction (designer's notes)

Modern economists, following Aristotle, identify (at least) three qualities of sound money: portability, divisibility, and durability. In D&D, coins are certainly durable, but portability and divisibility are more situational. Few millionaires keep a significant share of their wealth in one-dollar bills — and no one with fifty thousand dollars in assets holds it as a single diamond. The denomination also has to match the transaction. Nobody buys a Ferrari with piles of dimes.

Put simply, the wealthier a person is, the more efficient their treasure tends to be per pound.

A handful of silver coins offers more divisibility than gold, but the gols is more portable. A gem offers more portability still, at the cost of divisibility, since dividing a ruby makes it lose most of its value.

In D&D, perhaps only a dragon — a compulsive hoarder by mythological nature — would accumulate the kind of mixed, inefficient pile that the encumbrance system is quietly designed to punish. Everyone else, given the choice, gravitates toward the top of the table.

This system takes all of this into account. If I may say so, it ended up being a lot easier to use than I expected.

The system

You already know the total value of the hoard (roughly 100 gp per HD, as discussed before; a lair of 100 bandits has a hoard worth about 5,000 gp). This roll tells you the composition — what the treasure is made of, and how efficiently it's packed.

Roll d20, then add +1 for every 1,000 gp in the hoard, up to a maximum of +20 (corresponding to a 20,000 gp hoard). Larger hoards should be broken into smaller parts and rolled separately. The result determines treasure type from the table below.

Roll	Treasure type	Value density
0 or less	Low-value or heavy objects (junk, pelts, tools)	= gold / 1,000
1	Reroll -10	—
2–9	Copper	= gold / 100
10–11	Reroll ±10	—
12–19	Silver	= gold / 10
20–21	Reroll ±10	—
22–29	Gold	= gold
30–31	Reroll ±10	—
32–39	Platinum	= gold × 10
40–41	Reroll ±10	—
42–49	Gems & Jewelry	~ gold × 100
50–51	Reroll ±10	—
52–59	Magic items	~ gold × 1,000
60	Reroll +10	—
61+	Legendary item or artifact	~ gold × 10,000

A quick note on the value density column. Each tier is roughly 10× more efficient per pound than the tier below — a clean order-of-magnitude progression that makes the table easy to understand.

And this progression looks very reasonable and not that far from the original. Consider:

Gems and jewelry in B/X are worth about 1,000 times their weight in gold (the 100× figure in our table is a deliberate simplification). In the real world, everyday jewelry is worth only slightly more than its gold content, but gems span an enormous range — common stones are worth a fraction of gold per gram, while fine rubies and emeralds can reach 2,000–5,000×.

Magic items vary immensely in price and weight, but 1,000× their weight in gold is not absurd as a round number. The spread is enormous: a Ring of Invisibility is roughly 3,300 times more valuable per pound than +1 plate armor, which works similarly to the gem range — the same category contains both a pebble and a diamond.

Because of that, gems and magic items might deserve their own sub-tables (which are already in B/X, AD&D etc.).

Treasure composition

The digit at the end of your result — the ones place, from 2 to 9 — tells you how heterogeneous the treasure is. This is where Pareto comes in: if a player takes only 20% of the treasure by weight, how much of the value do they recover?

• Digit 9: 90% of the value is in the top 20% by weight. Highly varied — gems scattered among coins, a magic item wrapped in cloth at the bottom of a chest of silver.
• Digit 5: roughly 50% of the value in the top 20%. Moderately mixed.
• Digit 2: 20% of the value in the top 20%. Nearly homogeneous — a chest of nothing but copper pieces, uniform all the way down.

A result of 24 (gold, digit 4) means: the treasure is worth its weight in gold on average, and taking the best 20% by weight recovers about 40% of the value (this 40% is mostly platinum pieces, some gems, etc.). A result of 27 (silver, digit 7) means: it's heavy and low-value on average, but picking carefully gets you 70% of the value in 20% of the weight — there's some gold in there.

Results ending in 0 or 1 are rerolls: 0 means roll again and add 10, 1 means roll again and subtract 10. This preserves the natural 20 as a potential windfall and the natural 1 as a setback, while keeping the table open-ended in both directions. The +20 cap means most large hoards cluster in the gold-to-platinum range, with gems and magic items requiring either a lucky roll or a genuinely exceptional hoard.

Treasure appearance

Homogenous treasure (i.e., digit 2) is easy to describe. For example, result 22 is basically a big pile of gold, etc. Mixed treasure, however, will look mostly as one tier below. E.g.,  result 25 is maybe almsot half silver, around 20% gold, around 20% copper, and only a bit of platinum.

Pocket money

Individual creatures carry roughly 1% of the lair's total value on their person, in the same denomination as the main hoard, provided they can carry it. A gnoll lair worth 3,000 gp in silver means each gnoll carries about 30 gp worth of silver coins — enough to be worth mentioning, not enough to change the logistics. This also gives the party a small preview of what's coming: creatures carrying gold suggest a gold hoard ahead; creatures carrying gems suggest something more interesting.

Outliers

Even a very small hoard can contain gems and magic items. This isn't usually a problem — as noted above, both categories vary enormously in value. A potion might be worth 50 gp, a semi-precious stone even less.

If you roll gem and magic item values separately, you face a choice: fix the results to match the hoard's overall scale, or let the dice fall and accept that a lone goblin might be carrying a ring of inestimable value. Maybe that deserves a table of its own... but that's a post for another day.

Carrying mixed treasure

The digit makes it possible to record treasure concisely and make decisions about it later. A player might note "Treasure: 3,000 gp, platinum (34), 30 pounds" — meaning the hoard is platinum-tier and the digit is 4. Back in town, or at a bottleneck in the dungeon, they can decide to keep only the best 20% by weight: that recovers roughly 40% of the value, or about 1,200 gp, at one fifth the encumbrance. If they have a cart, they take it all. If they're fleeing through a collapsing corridor, they know exactly what to grab first and what to leave behind — and they have a number to justify the decision at the table rather than an argument.

Pareto to infinity?

The system can recurse. A gold-tier hoard contains a platinum-tier sub-hoard — roll again to find what share (the digit, as before). That platinum sub-hoard may itself contain a gem-tier portion, and so on, until you've identified the single most valuable in the pile. Stop whenever the detail stops being useful, or when the digit is 2 (meaning a uniform pile of coins, homogeneous all the way down). In theory you could choose the best gem in a handful... But few adventurers are wealthy enough to leave any gems behind!

Time is money

One thing I haven't analyzed here (nor have I seen it addressed in any D&D rulebook) is the time required to sort a hoard. A disorganized dragon hoard could take hours to sift through properly. Most human-administered treasures, by contrast, will have at least some organization and can probably be assessed and selectively looted in a few minutes, depending on size. In a rush, however, PCs might be forced to carry a few random bags and trust their luck!

But does this actually make sense?

Yes!

For example, if you rolled 24, this is what a treasure could look like. This is mostly AI-generated but fixable by adding more copper and gems, and probably a human with excel could do a similar job.

Hoard: ~10,000 gp total, result 24 (gold tier, digit 4)

Item	Weight	Value	% of value
30,000 cp in copper coins	300 lb	300 gp	3%
40,000 sp in silver coins	400 lb	4,000 gp	40%
3,000 gp in gold coins	300 lb	3,000 gp	25%
120 pp in platinum coins	12 lb	600 gp	6%
5 gems (avg 80 gp each)	0.1 lb	400 gp	4%
2 pieces of jewelry (avg 200 gp)	0.2 lb	400 gp	4%
1 magic item	0.5 lb	1,000 gp	10%
Total	~1,013 lb	~9,700 gp	100%

The top 20% by weight is ~203 lb. That's:

• the magic item (0.5 lb, 1,000 gp)
• the jewelry (0.2 lb, 400 gp)
• the gems (0.1 lb, 400 gp)
• the platinum (12 lb, 600 gp)
• and about 190 lb of gold coins (1,900 gp)

Total: ~203 lb, ~4,300 gp — about 44% of the value in 20% of the weight.

Minimalist weapons (2026)

I've tried this before: rationalizing B/X weapons and giving a few extra options without too much complexity.

I also gave weapons more reasonable prices and weights (encumbrance system to follow).

Now I'm writing my "OSR Minimalist" again and this is what I'm going with.

This is my latest attempt, and I'm quite happy with it. 

Tell me what you think! Did I miss anything?

Melee Weapons

In the case of melee weapons, the damage, price, and weight are determined by size. Small and medium weapons can be hurled at enemies (20').

 In the case of melee weapons, the damage, price, and weight are determined by size.

 

Size	Damage	Price	Weight
Small (S)	1d4	$3	1/3
Medium (M)	1d6	$5	1
Large (L)	1d8	$10	2
Great (G)	1d10	$20	2

 

Small weapons can be used in the offhand and thrown (20 feet). E.g., dagger, dart, sap.

Medium weapons are used in the main hand and can likewise be thrown (20 feet). E.g., short sword, hand axe, light mace.

Large can be used in one or both hands (+1 damage when used with both). E.g., longsword, dane axe, heavy mace.

Great weapons must use two hands to attack. Two-handed sword (zweihänder, claymore), great axe, lucerne hammer, maul, most polearms, etc.

 To further differentiate weapons, here are some optional traits.

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§  Expensive: double the cost.

§  Quick: if you roll minimum damage, make one immediate free attack against the same target (once per turn).

§  Reach: attack from second row (5' extra).

§  Charge: double damage on a charge or when set against one.

Here are some common weapons:

§  Axes, maces (M, L, G). +1 to hit shields, heavy armor, hard or brittle targets. Axes also get +1 against wood and maces +1 against stone.

§  Brass knuckles (S, $1). 1d2, quick.

§  Clubs (S, $1). No special features.

§  Daggers (S). Expensive, quick.

§  Flails (M, L, G). +1 to hit shields or heavy armor, +2 if both, -1 if none.

§  Javelins (S). Thrown 30', weight ½.

§  Kick (S). 1d2; on a natural 1, risk falling prone.

§  Pole weapons (L, G). Expensive, reach, charge, plus same effect as axe and mace.

§  Punch (S). 1d2−1, quick.

§  Quarterstaffs (L, $3, 1d4 damage). Reach or quick (choose when attack).

§  Spears (M, L, G). Reach.

§  Swords (M, L, G). Expensive, quick.

§  Warhammers and warpicks (M, L, G). +2 to hit heavy armor, hard or brittle targets, -1 against unarmored and soft targets.

L and G weapons: +1 damage vs. larger-than-human foes, −1 to hit smaller-than-human ones. Swords and spears get +1 damage if M, +2 if L or G. 

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Ranged Weapons

 All ranged weapons require ammunition and two hands to operate. 

Weapon	Damage	Price	Weight	Range	Notes
Sling	1d4	$2	1/3	40'	-
Short bow	1d6	$20	1	60'	-
Long bow	1d6	$30	2	70'	-
Crossbow	1d6	$40	2	80'	Slow

• Slow: spend one round reloading between shots. 

Ammunition costs:

• Arrows or bolts — 20 for $5, weight 1.
• Sling bullets — 30 for $1, weight 1.

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Note: I may or may not combine this with an optional critical hit checklist (and fumbles) to give weapons even more distinctions.

Also, let me know: would a list of ~24 weapons be easier to grasp than this "choose the size of your weapon" scheme? Or something else (e.g., list of weapons and sizes versus separate list of traits...)

I'm leaning towards leaving lhe list of simple weapons in the minimalist version and adding the full list as separate and optional.

Example (unfinished):

#	Weapon	Size	Damage	Price	Weight	Traits
1	Punch	S	1d2−1	—	—	Quick
2	Kick	S	1d2	—	—	On natural 1, risk falling prone
3	Brass knuckles	S	1d2	$1	0	Quick
4	Dagger	S	1d4	$6	1	Expensive, quick, thrown 30'
5	Club	S	1d4	$1	1	—
6	Javelin	S	1d4	$3	½	Thrown 30'
7	Axe, mace	M	1d6	$5	1	+1 to hit shields, heavy armor, hard or brittle targets
8	Flail	M	1d6	$5	1	+1 vs shields or heavy armor, +2 if both, −1 if neither
9	Spear	M	1d6	$5	1	Reach
10	Sword	M	1d6	$10	1	Expensive, quick
11	Warhammer, warpick	M	1d6	$5	1	+2 to hit heavy armor, hard or brittle targets; −1 vs unarmored
12	Axe, mace	L	1d8	$10	2	+1 to hit shields, heavy armor, hard or brittle targets
13	Flail	L	1d8	$10	2	+1 vs shields or heavy armor, +2 if both, −1 if neither
14	Quarterstaff	L	1d4	$3	2	Reach or quick (choose when attacking)
15	Spear	L	1d8	$10	2	Reach
16	Sword	L	1d8	$20	2	Expensive, quick
17	Warhammer, warpick	L	1d6	$10	2	+2 to hit heavy armor, hard or brittle targets; −1 vs unarmored
18	Axe, mace	G	1d10	$20	2	+1 to hit shields, heavy armor, hard or brittle targets
19	Flail	G	1d10	$20	2	+1 vs shields or heavy armor, +2 if both, −1 if neither
20	Pole weapon	L	1d8	$20	2	Expensive, reach, +1 to hit shields, heavy armor, hard or brittle targets
21	Pole weapon	G	1d10	$40	2	Expensive, reach, +1 to hit shields, heavy armor, hard or brittle targets
22	Spear	G	1d10	$20	2	Reach, disadvantage within 5'
23	Sword	G	1d10	$40	2	Expensive, quick
24	Warhammer, warpick	G	1d10	$20	2	+2 to hit heavy armor, hard or brittle targets; −1 vs unarmored

Minimalist Treasure

I'm working on my minimalist OSR doc again, and this time I think I'll actually publish something before the end of 2026. 

Today, I tackle treasure.

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A Note on the B/X Economy

Analyzing the treasure tables was a somewhat frustrating experience. Things don't seem to make much sense, even after years of forcing myself to accept that D&D's economy doesn't work like the real world. When trying to make sense of treasure weights, I kept noticing that many simple objects — knives, swords, bows — are worth their weight in silver or more. This could, at first glance, be justified by imagining a world where gold and silver are extremely abundant but skilled craftsmanship is rare. But when you start relating this to specific creatures and thinking of commerce across towns, the logic doesn't hold up.

Take kobolds. Their treasure is mostly copper, and often they carry no treasure at all. Maybe the game doesn't want you to get rich by robbing them. Yet a kobold armed with a shortbow is, by the standards of this economy, extraordinarily wealthy, since a shortbow is worth almost its weight in gold. A spear is worth roughly its weight in silver.

Copper, as a whole, serves almost no function in the game's economy. It appears in treasure tables, weighs the same as any other coin, and is worth one hundredth of a gold piece. The average adventurer  (or kobold) would accumulate and transport weapons and simple manufactured objects rather than copper coins, even accounting for depreciation and indivisibility, since the value-to-weight ratio is up to a hundred times better. The fact that travelling is not easy or safe in most D&D worlds makes the whole issue more obvious - the cost of moving copper around would probably vastly surpass any gain you can make. The wages of hirelings/retainers would hardly pay for that service, maybe not even their food.

Aristotle listed portability, durability, and divisibility as the essential characteristics of money. Copper fails the first test badly enough that it feel useless as currency in a D&D world.

And now I can't unsee this. It simply doesn't make sense. 

Before giving up completely: in my last campaign I divided the weight of all coins by ten. I don't know if this actually fixes the underlying problem, but with some good will it seems to work well enough at the table. I also prefer to use: 1000 cp = 100 sp = 10 gp = 1pp, just because it is simpler.

With that brief aside, let's move on. I'll analyse the system as originally written, but keep in mind by the end I'll still coins that are much lighter.

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Let's do this anyway!

I started by giving each creature 100 gp of treasure per Hit Die in another post. Dragons are a different case entirely; they double, triple, or multiply both value and weight. They are, in the most literal sense, hoarders of useless coins.

The other half of the equation is weight. In B/X, every coin weighs (about) one tenth of a pound, and the encumbrance system punishes anyone who doesn't think before filling their pack. With this ruler it's possible to calculate the value density of each treasure type (how much each pound the adventurer decides to carry is actually worth). Before presenting the three groups, I must add that about five treasure types (I, L, M, N, and O) that exist in the tables aren't assigned to any monster in the entire canonical B/X (neither in Moldvay's Basic nor Cook's Expert), so I ignored them for now.

With the remaining types (those actually used in the bestiary) ranking by gp/lb reveals three groups with sufficiently clean boundaries. I used AI for some of the math, so please correct me if I'm wrong - I had to revisit it several times.

BTW, OSE's Treasure Types, reproducing the logic of B/X, have been invaluable to this post.

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Group 1 — Heavy treasure

Types P, J, Q, K, B, C · average ~3 gp/lb

The weight of this treasure is dominated by low-value coins. Type P is pure copper (0.1 gp/lb). Type J, the kobold lair, mixes copper and silver to reach 0.3 gp/lb. Q and K are small amounts of silver and electrum. 

Bugbears, ghouls, wights, gargoyles, ogres, all varieties of lycanthrope, minotaurs, owl bears, harpies,  hold treasure with a density between 3.5 and 3.7 gp/lb. As inefficient per pound as a kobold lair, just heavier. Types B and C are dominated by copper, silver, and electrum, with only a small chance of gems and an even smaller chance of a magic item. 

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Group 2 — Mixed treasure

Types R, H, E, D, S, F, G, A · average ~11 gp/lb

Gnolls, hobgoblins, lizard men, and orcs (type D, 9.5 gp/lb) sit alongside elves and doppelgangers (type E, 8.5 gp/lb), medusa and shadows (type F, 15.9 gp/lb), dwarves (type G, 17.3 gp/lb), and at the top of the range, troglodytes and bandits (type A, 20.1 gp/lb). The treasures balance coin volume with gems, jewelry, and platinum in a way that converges on the same efficiency band — roughly 5 to 20 gp/lb.

The most noticeable member of this group is the dragon. Type H — exclusive to the six dragons in the bestiary — has only 8.0 gp/lb, virtually identical to a gnoll lair, and well below the dwarves and medusa sharing its group. 

B/X really is a game about killing dragons: few things make you richer faster than finding a sleeping dragon on its hoard! 

The problem is carrying it... Type H includes 50% chances of 1d100×1,000 silver coins, 1d4×10,000 electrum, 1d6×10,000 gold, dozens of gems and jewelry, and a handful of magic items at the top — producing an expected weight of ~6,180 pounds, more than an adult African elephant. The dragon hoards incomparably more, accumulated over centuries, mountains of low-value coins with rare items buried somewhere in the middle.

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Group 3 — Value-dense treasure

Types U, V · average ~92 gp/lb

OSE call these two types "group treasure".

Type U (66.5 gp/lb) covers a sprawling list of apparently unrelated creatures: acolytes, normal humans, bears, great cats, giant lizards, bandits, pirates, merchants. What they share is that their treasures are light and proportionally rich in value per pound, with small chances of gems, jewelry, and magic items that punch far above their weight.

Type V (121.9 gp/lb) the best "pound-for-pound" treasure assigned for monsters belongs to the cave bear, the sabre-tooth tiger, the gelatinous cube, the halfling, the medium, the noble, and the veteran. Silver, electrum, gold, platinum, gems, jewelry, occasional magic item — in quantities so small that the total weight is nearly negligible, but the composition so clean that almost every ounce counts.

Why do wild animals have such great treasure? The most common interpretation in the OSR community is that these are the remains of what the animals ate — previous adventurers, merchants, unlucky travelers. The gelatinous cube dissolves organic matter and low-denomination coinage, leaving behind only what's worth carrying. Apparently monsters do not eat copper and silver, maybe because it is worse for your health... 

BTW, here is an odd comparison. A fight with a 4 HD black bear is not a great deal when a 4 HD gargoyle will give you almost ten times more treasure — though that treasure weighs more than 100 times more. 

This assumes both treasure are in their lairs; since the treasure is not individual, we can also assume that a group of gargoyles will be twice the size of a group of bear in the wilderness. The gargoyle's treasure is still better because of Pareto.

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Pareto in the dungeon

Vilfredo Pareto observed in the 19th century that 80% of wealth belonged to 20% of the population, a power law that repeats across complex systems. In any mixed B/X treasure, if the adventurer ranks items from highest to lowest gp/lb and starts carrying in that order, the first 20% of the weight typically delivers between 60% and 80% of the total value. 

So all these complex treasure types and logistics to bring the treasure to the city are a bit useless.

Copper is just not worth carrying, except apparently buy a few poor or hoarding monsters. Silver probably becomes obsolete after few levels, then gold. But you can just ignore tons of treasure and still get most of the value from a few gems and magic items.

This, in my opinion, is far from ideal; too many complex subsystems of rolling treasure that have no significant consequences.

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A minimalist version?

This kind of pointless complexity is one of my least favorite aspects of classic D&D. Twenty-two treasure types, five coin denominations, weights, probabilities, magic item subtables — all of it rewarding spreadsheet thinking more than adventure. Which parts actually make the game more interesting?

The analysis suggests the answer is simpler than the tables imply. Strip away the unassigned treasure types and three groups cover everything a DM actually needs.

The bottom tier — around 1 gp/lb — is for savage monsters and humanoids, undead, and the creatures that accumulate wealth without understanding it: kobolds, berserkers, bugbears, ghouls, wights, harpies, lycanthropes, ogres, owl bears, gargoyles. Their treasure is dominated by copper and silver, heavy for what it's worth.

The middle tier — around 10 gp/lb, roughly equivalent to its own weight in gold — covers organized humanoids and higher monsters: goblins, gnolls, hobgoblins, orcs, elves, dwarves, medusa, doppelgangers. This is the baseline of the game's economy, the chest-full-of-gold-coins standard. Dragons sit here too, which is the most counterintuitive result of the entire analysis: a dragon hoard is not more refined than a gnoll's, just incomparably larger. Moving it is the adventure.

The top tier — 50 to 100 gp/lb — belongs to the chests/lairs of wealthy individuals: merchants, nobles, knights, pirates, acolytes, high-status NPCs. Gems, jewelry, platinum, the occasional magic item, almost no dead weight.

A clean minimalist rule falls out naturally: 1 gp/lb for savage monsters, 10 gp/lb for organized humanoids and most monsters, 50–100 gp/lb for the hoards wealthy and powerful. The 100 gp per HD heuristic handles value; these densities handle weight. Between the two, any treasure can be improvised in seconds without opening a table.

And, again, since few creatures are travelling with more treasure that they can carry, a sufficiently large group may have a few leaders (with extra HD) carrying more valuable treasure, including magic weapons. Likewise, a high-level NPC will likely carry valuable stuff. This has an interesting side-effect of naturally making high-level PCs uninterested in pillaging anyone but the highest-level foes, which I really like.

Individuals will only carry a fraction of the treasures on themselves. Like in the originals, maybe give them a handful of coins (say, 3d6), with total value of around 1 GP per HD (meaning everyone carries silver, mostly, with some copper or gold). IF they have no lairs — for example, travelling nobles and merchants — they must carry all their treasure amongst themselves. Assume few would carry enough treasure to slow them down, so the either have horses, donkeys, and so on, or a few valuable gems.

As for wild beasts carrying high-value treasure because they've eaten adventurers — it's a fun image, especially for the gelatinous cube, but it doesn't hold up. Such creatures would devour goblins and peasants far more often than merchants and knights, which would predict copper-heavy loot, not platinum. Simpler to say wild creatures have no treasure at all (except in lairs) — or assign a value to their pelts and parts instead.

Which leaves the question of lairs. As a rough heuristic, we can try using the same 100 gp per HD we used for most creatures. Honestly, I'd divide the treasure of wild creatures by 10 or something similar; a lion's den is simply not that full of valuable treasure.

Dragons are a special case and should stay that way. They are the only creatures that genuinely deserve complex, idiosyncratic treasure — it fits their mythological origins, their centuries of accumulation, their sheer scale as opponents. Keep them as written. A dragon hoard should feel different from everything else, because it is.

Finally, to put some variety back without restoring the full complexity: a couple of short random tables for special cases.

Maybe this is easy to do with a dice pool - roll 1d10 for each 100 gp expected. In the main table, poor creatures get -1, rich ones get +1. Add other types of coins if you want. For example:

Main table

d10
0–1	Copper coins
2–4	Silver coins
5–7	Gold coins
8	Platinum coins
9–10	Special (roll below)

Special — d10

d10
1	Platinum coins
2	Gems
3	Magic item
4	Potion
5	Scroll
6	Map (treasure, dungeon, or secret route)
7	Art or jewelry
8	Single incredible gem (x10 value)
9	Document (deed, letter of credit, incriminating secret)
10	Pelt, trophy, or caged creature

This way you can keep the treasure "mini-game" if you want, and even have some rare events... A kobold carrying a gem he doesn't know the value of. A pirate ship with a crate of stolen art. The skeleton of a hero in the smilodon's lair, still gripping his magic sword. Treasure maps, unidentified potions and forgotten artifacts. These exceptions are what make individual encounters memorable — and they work precisely because the baseline is simple enough that the exception stands out. 

I'm not 100% happy with this yet, but it is a start.

The Chronicles of Amber (1-5), Norwegian Wood, The Stranger, Ultralearning

I hesitated a little before writing a review of these books, mainly because I don't have many positive things to say about them, and to be honest I was a bit cautious to criticize books that are so widely loved. 

That said, a negative ou neutral review can be just as useful as a positive one, so I decided to share my impressions anyway. Also, I din't quite regret reading any of these books, even if the experience was not as valuable to me as reading Kafka, Wolfe, Borges or Moorcock, to name a few authors that might share some themes.

The Chronicles of Amber (1-5), by Roger Zelazny

This is a well-known series, listed in Appendix N of D&D. I read the first pentalogy, which, curiously, wasn't even finished when AD&D was published in 1977. It is a middling adventure fantasy: a mix of predictable ideas and genuinely interesting ones, quite reminiscent of Michael Moorcock's Elric and its concept of the multiverse. Its influence on D&D is obvious, particularly in the conception of demigods and the planes of existence.

The books are full of adventure, epic battles, knights and unicorns. The fantasy, however, is somewhat generic, and the naming conventions are curious (there are references to Avalon and Merlin entirely outside of an Arthurian context, for example). The characters, with the possible exception of the narrator, feel a bit shallow and hard to tell apart. The intrigue tends to rely on the same repetitive devices: someone pretends not to know what they know, or pretends to be someone else, or forges someone's death etc. This happens repeatedly across different books, and sometimes the scheming characters feel incredibly naive after many lifetimes in a court of intrigues.

Overall, it is an enjoyable, light and fun read, with something of a Young Adult feel, though there are a few darker scenes (some very good) and some interesting ideas around the multiverse. There are also cool, interesting twists that finish each separate book, although the ending of the pentalogy is somewhat confusing, and I felt no urge to continue to the remaining volumes, except maybe to reach a more satisfying conclusion, if there is one.

Unfortunately, the series falls a bit short of the works that likely inspired it, such as Anderson, Moorcock, and others. It does, however, surpass a good deal of modern fantasy, and remains a fun read that can certainly provide inspiration for your D&D games, especially at higher levels of play.

Norwegian Wood, by Haruki Murakami

I have to admit that some parts of this book are beautifully written, and that I read it almost compulsively, trying to figure out where the story was headed. Some passages are really quite good. Even so, the hype surrounding the book remains somewhat mysterious to me.

The novel follows a university student who is thoroughly disengaged from his own life, surrounded by deeply depressed people. The exception, perhaps, is the protagonist and his friend, who seems to attract an endless stream of interested women for reasons the text never makes entirely clear, given that neither of them displays any particularly positive qualities.

The protagonist is a hornier version of Holden Caulfield with considerably better luck with women, and seems to have a surprisingly easy time with them despite an apparent lack of ambition, social graces, or redeeming qualities in general. When he does choose to show restraint, he does so without any apparent moral conviction, and surrenders it again without much of a struggle. The other characters, for their part, are profoundly depressed, some to the point of suicide, others struggling with serious hardships such as cancer and poverty (with the exception of one friend that seems to be devoid of empathy and even more successful with women).

Although the protagonist mentions his interest in Western literature, the atmosphere of inexplicable gloom surrounding some of the characters reminded me more of Osamu Dazai than of any European influence. Though perhaps there is also some Camus at work here (and also The Catcher in the Rye, which the author mentions IIRC), as the next book suggests.

The depressing, existential tone is probably the whole point of the book. I didn't find it particularly enjoyable or enriching, but it may be an interesting experience if that sounds like something you'd like.

The Stranger, by Albert Camus

The Stranger is a classic of absurdism with an enormous cultural influence. Much like the previous book, it features a protagonist who is thoroughly disengaged from his own life and fate, but in an even more radical and unsettling way, and without the excuse of being a teenager. It is almost impossible not to wonder whether the protagonist has some serious neurological condition, though his emotional detachment does not make him any less irrational than the other characters, who are guided by their own equally misguided emotions, such as the romantic interest who insists on pursuing him despite his obvious indifference.

In Kafka's The Trial, the accused desperately tries to prove his innocence before a completely surreal judicial system. Here, the accused is indifferent to proving his own innocence, which is questionable to begin with, even when faced with a system that, while unhinged, seems to follow some internal logic and might perhaps have responded to a coherent defense.

The absurdity of the protagonist's thinking and the circumstances surrounding him are, in all likelihood, precisely the point of the book. But, as with the previous entry, that does not make it a particularly enjoyable read.

Ultralearning, by Scott H. Young

This is a book about intense, self-directed learning, and I found it quite useful. I reviewed and summarized it, and added a few study tips for 2026, over on my other blog, which focuses on self-development. If that interests you, check out that post and the others in the same blog:

https://allinspiringideas.blogspot.com/2026/02/ultralearning-by-scott-h-young-review.html

https://allinspiringideas.blogspot.com/