Is it worth making magic/non-magic items?

[darkblust]

I'm playing in a new campaign,and i was hoping that somebody could tell me if it was worth taking feats in magic item making,or using skill points in weapon or amour creation.Is it practical?it might be worth saying that i'm playing a duskblade.ty

[Eldariel]

I'm playing in a new campaign,and i was hoping that somebody could tell me if it was worth taking feats in magic item making,or using skill points in weapon or amour creation.Is it practical?it might be worth saying that i'm playing a duskblade.ty

Craft-skills can be decent on low levels (1-3) for Int-based characters. As soon as you get past ~level 6 though, the amount of money you save by making stuff yourself is so miniscule it becomes a waste (exception being Craft: Poisonmaking; if you must make poisons, that's the only remotely economic way of going about it without magic - they're still expensive though). The Craft-feats though are better, but you have to be a full caster to efficiently use them for spell availability reasons. Craft Wondrous Items, Craft Magic Arms and Armor, Craft Rod and occasionally even Craft Wand can be handy.

It really depends on what's available in the world and what's not; the more you can buy, the less Crafts you need, but they still save substantial amounts of cash so they're never wasted. The XP you'll make up quickly enough; as you are a level behind, you'll get more XP from all encounters and thus catch up in XP.

[darkblust]

thanks for the advice.I probably will take craft magic arms/armor,but at a higher level and once i look at it more fully.

[ericgrau]

+1 to above. Non magic item skills are not worth it. Magic item feats are worth it. Typically you're best off taking non-expendable item craft feats since you spend the most gold on those items and that'll give you the most mileage out of the feat.

Often, but not always, you need certain spells to craft certain items, limiting you to certain classes. Your options are full caster level classes: wizard, sorcerer, cleric, druid and bard. Spontaneous casters may have difficulty with items that require lousy spells but a lot of required spells are good to know anyway and for some of the rest you can get scrolls.

Magic armor: Any class for +X. Wizard, sorc or bard for good rogue enchantments, even the last 2 since these spells are useful to know anyway.

Magic weapons: Clerics get the best enchantments IMO: holy (requires good domain) and merciful. Bard can do merciful too, with a cheap wand or scrolls. Anyone can do spell storing, also nice. Wounding goes to wizards only. All except bard can do energy damage; except only druid gets frost. Clerics and wizards can make bane; sorcs can too with some cheap scrolls. Any class can do +X, but don't bother with +X.

Rings: You need a cleric for ring of protection, but the misc rings require wizard/sorc/bard spells or bard skills. There are some other exceptions requiring cleric spells.

Rods: Metamagic rods require the metamagic feat, so anyone can make them. Most of the rest require wizard spells, with some cleric spells. Sorcerer and bards are lousy at rods, since you need so many different spells that you might not want to know.

Wondrous Items: Any class can make the stat boosters, though sorcerers and bards will have to pay 30% more (15% of the market price) to get these lousy spells on scrolls. Most of the good misc items go to wizards/sorcerers/bards. Having the crafts arms & armor feat opens up more options too.

I'd say cleric and bard are your best class choices, followed closely by wizards. Clerics because they can craft so many things and wizards because they can too, just not as many. Technically bards are a close 4th, but I put them in 2nd because bards (even core bards) can be awesome at a dozen things simultaneously without much of a drawback. Might as well add magic item creation to the pile of the party bard's responsibilities.

[Siosilvar]

--useful stuff to know--

And if you step out of core, the Warlock (at level 11, I think) can use Use Magic Device to mimick any spell for purposes of item creation.

[Jack_Simth]

I'm playing in a new campaign,and i was hoping that somebody could tell me if it was worth taking feats in magic item making,or using skill points in weapon or amour creation.Is it practical?it might be worth saying that i'm playing a duskblade.ty
Can be. Depends.

Magic items are already covered. As for nonmagical items...
For the most part, it doesn't matter. However, if you're not playing a class without any particularly useful class skills, and you end up with a lot of skill points (you rolled well on Int?), they can be useful, but they're not generally gamebreaking. You just pick up a Ring of Sustenance, sleep only 2 hours every night, and spend the extra hours of the day crafting mundane items. You want high DC, low-value items, for purposes of speed. Alternately, you take a Craft skill for a trade good (linens, say) for fast money-making. It doesn't get game-breaking until you get to Fabricate, though.

[Devils_Advocate]

If you want make bunches of magic items, play an Artificer (Eberron Campaign Setting). They're not limited by a spell list and get craft points that they can use instead of XP to make items. In addition to magic item crafting, they also get infusions that can enhance items short-term.

Craft is one of those skills that you only need to stick a few skill points into in order to be able to make checks by taking 10. Possibly 0 skill points. A dwarf with 16 Int can reliably pass the Craft checks to make any metal martial weapon or shield. Skill ranks just mean that he works faster.

A rules oddity here is that more expensive materials always take longer to work, because craft times are based on price. Of course, you could easily ignore that and use the prices of normal iron and wood versions of the things you're making to determine creation time.

Of course, as Jack_Simth notes, you can use the Fabricate spell to get around craft times entirely.

[TheThan]

I never liked the idea of crafting gear in DnD. The only exception is for background purposes. The same with magic shops, to me at least magic gear is something to be found.

Part of adventuring is to find magical and amazing weapons, armor and artifacts. Not to visit the local magic weapons/armor shop, and spend a crap ton of gold to upgrade your gear. You brave the dangers of fighting a dragon to take his hoard and you earn those riches. But to simply walk into a shop and say “I’ll take that +2 great sword of awesome” just puts me off to the whole concept of it.

It’s the same thing with crafting. Its much more thrilling to get a piece of magic gear from an adventure than it is to just craft it. But then again I don’t think that a party should need magic gear to complete quests, magic gear should make quests easier to complete, but not be mandatory. Yes, I know I’m at odds with the way most campaigns run and with the way the game works.

[Devils_Advocate]

Well, I don't like the idea that no one is willing to sell magic items, or that crafting them is impossible for PCs.

The problem, if one chooses to see it as one, is that the rules abstract everything away. All of this buying, selling, and crafting is treated as being so easy and trivial that the details can be completely skipped over.

And that's a legitimate setting assumption, but it doesn't have to be that way. Finding the relevant buyer, seller, or raw materials for an item arguably ought to be an adventure in itself. Handwaving all of it certainly eliminates a lot of potential plot hooks.

You can potentially add that sort of detail back into a game that abstracts those things by saying "OK, you get to make that transaction, but first you have to do this."

[Trodon]

And if you step out of core, the Warlock (at level 11, I think) can use Use Magic Device to mimick any spell for purposes of item creation.

close its 12

[#Raptor]

(exception being Craft: Poisonmaking; if you must make poisons, that's the only remotely economic way of going about it without magic - they're still expensive though).

Theres a way to get poison for free, have a animal give you its poison (handle animal ftw! :smallwink: ) wizards can get viper familars, rangers and druids can get alot of poisonous animal companions and spellcasters can summon animals.

"Snaaaaake poison, who wants to buy high quality snake poison?" :smallbiggrin:

[Eldariel]

Theres a way to get poison for free, have a animal give you its poison (handle animal ftw! :smallwink: ) wizards can get viper familars, rangers and druids can get alot of poisonous animal companions and spellcasters can summon animals.

"Snaaaaake poison, who wants to buy high quality snake poison?" :smallbiggrin:

Yes, I know. That's why I said "making them". There're billions of ways of getting poison, but making it the oldfashioned way is expensive. Minor Creation/Major Creation, summons, Polymorph, etc. are all great ways to use poisons without paying a dime. But that doesn't really help the poor Assassin who really just needs to get a few doses of Con-poisons but can't afford them.

[herrhauptmann]

I believe that the craft feats are best if your DM allows this rule: http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/we/20060526a&pf=true
It's a way that allows the crafter to have another member of the party burn XP for item creation, instead of the crafter.

Say a cleric of Gond takes 'craft arms/armor' at level 6, and plays until level 18. If the party is at all selfish, or the DM is stingy on handing out weapons and armor, the cleric could easily end up burning a few thousand points of XP to make items for other characters. Even if they supply the gold, that much lost XP can easily mean the difference between leveling up at opportune times, or being stuck just shy of the next level.

[bosssmiley]

I'm playing in a new campaign,and I was hoping that somebody could tell me if it was worth taking feats in magic item making,or using skill points in weapon or amour creation.Is it practical? It might be worth saying that I'm playing a duskblade. ty

This depends on 2 things:

Is your DM prepared to let the PCs craft items?
Is your DM prepared to throw out the b0rked stupidity of the RAW Craft and Item Creation rules, and instead allow non-casters to have (and make) nice things?

If the answer to both the above is "yes", then it might be worth playing a non-casting craft-oriented character (D&D as it stands grotesquely privileges caster types as item crafters).
If the answer is "no" to both, then you're just setting fire to skill points that could be better spent elsewhere.

[Sinfire Titan]

Take care: Crafting magic items may cost you XP, but it saves you a metric ton of GP. Even crafting your own magic weapon at the very least cuts the price in half. The Artificer taught CO the value of crafting magic items instead of just buying them.

Also, custom magic item creation can be broken wide open without even trying.

[cupkeyk]

i'll mention Craft Contingent spell, i think in complete divine or complete arcane or something. Best used for never to be memorized(for prepared) or added to known spell list(for spontaneous) spells due to rarity of necessitating condition type of spells. Like, Ray Deflection buy the scroll, make the contingent spell with the trigger as "I am the target of a ray spell"

[derfenrirwolv]

Item creation

I'm playing in a new campaign,and i was hoping that somebody could tell me if it was worth taking feats in magic item making,or using skill points in weapon or amour creation.Is it practical?it might be worth saying that i'm playing a duskblade.ty

Most of this depends on your particular DM and your class


The item creation skills are not practical for most campaigns. It simply takes too long to make anything useful and you can probably buy it anywhere you can find the setup to make them.


For dusk blades, how is your caster level calculated?


A note about creating magic items: For every day you spend making it, you have to cast the prerequisite spell on it. This means if you don't have access to the prerequisite spell, you need to have a friendly caster do it for you, which can get insanely expensive.

Brew potion: Good for a cleric, druid, or someone with a friendly cleric or druid in the party. Healing potions go a long way, and sometimes you need a heal when the cleric is busy

Craft magic arms and armor: You only need 1 magic weapon and 1 suit of armor, which you should eventually find while adventuring. I would only take this if you and or a party member use something unusual or exotic ( a lance or a spiked chain) AND your world is one where you can't buy or have made magic items for yourself.

Craft rod: Rods are ok and situational useful, not sure if i'd spend a feat on them. Although a party with 10 or so immovable rods and a good imagination can give a DM fits... Requires a very high caster level though

Craft staff: I don't think the duskblade's caster level goes up to 12.

craft wand: not the best for a spontaneous spellcaster. If you can cast the spell you can already do so repeatedly and don't need the wand. If you can't its harder to make the item.

craft wonderous item: Far and away the best feat on the list. Magic arms and armor will fill 2-3 slots for your character. CWI can give you magic helmet, goggles, necklace, robe/vest, cloak , belt, boots, bags of holding..... and i'm probably missing something. Its also items you're not as likely to find by adventuring. The problem is, for a duskblade, getting the spells you need cast on the item.

I would say overall... no. You're a melee magic hybrid, you need to be throwing your feats into your weapon fighting and your casting. let the pure casters pick up the item creation feats.

[Lycar]

If your DM allows Dragon material, there was a nice article in Dragon #358.

'Master's Forge - Crafting Legends'

Basically, you take the feat Artisan Craftsman (armourshmithing, bowmaking or weaponsmithing) and you learn certain 'tricks of the trade' with which you can add a minor bonus to a masterwork item your character creates.

You get to know 1 trick +1 per five levels of the appropriate craft skill.

So if your 10th level character has at least 10 ranks in, say, Craft (weaponsmith), he knows 3 tricks to improve the weapons he makes.

Unfortunately, some of the tricks are a bit too limited as written. For example, one trick is to add a 'Basket Hilt' to your swords, which give you a +4 on an opposed Disarm check to avoid being disarmed. As written, you can only ever add this to a sword. Not even to a rapier. I wholeheartedly suggest to ignore that limitation.

Other tricks give a +1 to AC when taking a total defense action, add a point or 4 of extra damage on a critical, add to the weapon's hardness and so on.

With armours, those can be made to weight a bit less, give an extra point of AC (!), or reduce spell failure by 5%.

Still you will want to have a high craft skill, since these tricks add to the DC of the craft skill check. Also, they increase the price a bit.

So maybe your character could be a master artisan and leave the actual magic enchantment to the full casters.

Lycar

[ericgrau]

Craft magic arms and armor: You can upgrade weapons and armor that you find with this feat. Or sell the loot you find to fund upgrades for your current weapons and armor. To upgrade you simply pay the difference when crafting.

[darkblust]

thanks alot.

[derfenrirwolv]

Craft magic arms and armor: You can upgrade weapons and armor that you find with this feat. Or sell the loot you find to fund upgrades for your current weapons and armor. To upgrade you simply pay the difference when crafting.

But is a duskblade going to have a high enough caster level to upgrade anything that they find?