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View Full Version : [3.5] Crafting, Artificers, and How to do it (as DM)



AngelOmnipotent
2009-07-26, 08:03 AM
I'm currently running an Eberron game for 2 Gestalt characters. Complete sandbox, all books available (but setting-based stuff other than Eberron goes by me first) they're coming up to level 2 and the campaign is based around Stormreach and Xen'Drik (although they're free to move anywhere they want to.)

One character has plans for a Warforged Artificer 20 (with racial substitute levels)//Wizard 11/Warlock 4/Effigy Master 5 and, of course, has plans to be crafting at every given chance.

There's a few bits and pieces I would like to ask:

1) Is there any "guide to crafting magic items" out there? My GoogleFu has been failing me.
2) As a DM, would you just let the player decide what they're going to make and have the character take time out to do it regardless of what it is, or would you add in some small adventure for them to find specific materials to make a certain item? How much should I actually do that, as I can imagine it will put the player off crafting at all if they need to go out and scavenge every piece of everything.
3) I know each crafting feat has its own descriptions, but I find it becomes rather vague when crafting either custom or complicated items. Is there any simple formula for finding the price/xp cost for custom items?
4) Does crafting magical items require any specific eg. Craft (Woodworking) check, or is that all factored in with the Feats? I know an Effigy requires Craft checks, so I wondered if any others do also.
5) The Artificer's plan is to also take Leadership and start up his own workshop that can craft items for him while he's away. Assuming the cohorts and followers have the appropriate skills and feats would this be possible? Also, would they be able to make his Effigy and/or Homunculus for him or would he need to do that himself?

I've just not dealt with making magical items as a player OR a DM and I'm looking forward to facing it in this game. I just need a bit of advice so it doesn't get messy.

Thanks in advance!

Abstruse
2009-07-26, 08:36 AM
With the campaign I've been currently running (thought not in Eberron), the typical handwave-solution has just been "Oh, you want to buy this/make this? OK, got the money?" However, in retrospect I'd definitely change that.

With scrolls, it's fairly straightforward. Pricy, specially crafted ink -- you buy it in a large town, or use craft (alchemy) to make up a batch yourself (there are tons of ways to make inks, many of them not involving squids or octopi).

With potions or other magical items, I'd now have them do research to figure out HOW to do it. So they've got the Brew Potion/Craft Magic X feat -- that means they're familiar with the basics of how to create their thing. However, that doesn't mean they've got the Master Ultimate Handbook of Potion Recipes in their back pocket. Make 'em work for it. Make them roleplay out the acquisition of the ingredients -- which, naturally, you have the list of ingredients for.

Potions are probably pretty easy. But crafting that flame-wreathed cold iron greatsword should take some doing -- hell, it could be a side-quest in and of itself. For example, first you'd need the proper cold iron ingots themselves, which you must obtain from the dwarven colony of Orehearth in the heights of the Ridgeback Mountains. (Whether that would be by persuading them of your cause or by outright theft is an open question.) Next, you would need to smelt the iron with a mixture of tungsten, rhenium, and red dragon's blood, using regular infusions of alchemist's fire (at least 200 gp worth, counted as part of the manufacturing cost of the magic item). Using a cold-iron hammer, you purify the spirit of the blade to forge it seven-fold into a masterwork blade, quenching it in water gathered from rain fallen on a volcano at each stage. Form the quillons and guard in the same manner. Wrap the hilt in red dragon's hide, secure it with a pommel crafted to hold fire opals worth no less than 500 gp (also counted as part of the manufacturing cost). Then, and only then, will you have a magnificent blade which will properly hold the magicks you wish to bind into it.

None of this "oh, I'll just buy a masterwork blade from the swordsmith down on the corner and enchant it" crap.

I say always try to link the ingredients or processes needed to the effect the crafter is trying to create. And hell, finding out just what process is necessary to craft the item should be half the fun. Some formulae might be purchased, sure, but a great many would be secrets tightly held by an elite order of smiths, or found as part of a treasure-trove in a long-lost cairn.

Eldariel
2009-07-26, 09:57 AM
I'm currently running an Eberron game for 2 Gestalt characters. Complete sandbox, all books available (but setting-based stuff other than Eberron goes by me first) they're coming up to level 2 and the campaign is based around Stormreach and Xen'Drik (although they're free to move anywhere they want to.)

One character has plans for a Warforged Artificer 20 (with racial substitute levels)//Wizard 11/Warlock 4/Effigy Master 5 and, of course, has plans to be crafting at every given chance.

There's a few bits and pieces I would like to ask:

1) Is there any "guide to crafting magic items" out there? My GoogleFu has been failing me.

Not to my knowledge, no. It's really simple though. Just pay the money and XP and use the given amount of days and the item will be ready; mostly it's too much hassle to play out acquiring the materials for each item separately and given the long days of crafting, it's easy enough to assume he's got the ways to acquire them given the money.


2) As a DM, would you just let the player decide what they're going to make and have the character take time out to do it regardless of what it is, or would you add in some small adventure for them to find specific materials to make a certain item? How much should I actually do that, as I can imagine it will put the player off crafting at all if they need to go out and scavenge every piece of everything.

Some very special items could require adventure, but mostly the big part of the item isn't the physical guise but the magic and that's hardly something you'd be buying.


3) I know each crafting feat has its own descriptions, but I find it becomes rather vague when crafting either custom or complicated items. Is there any simple formula for finding the price/xp cost for custom items?

In the back of DMG, but also right here in the SRD (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/creatingMagicItems.htm). Those are only guidelines though; continuous item of True Strike is more than 2000gp regardless of what the guidelines say. Generally it's a good idea to see the guideline cost and before approving, compare it to items of similar bonus and see what they cost (or even better, make the items yourself; custom items should always be made by the DM anyways as not all effects are meant to be available in items and especially not as continuous - you have to be very careful with anything continuous really).

So yeah, Boots of Expeditious Retreat being way cheaper than Boots of Springing and Striding...well, you can figure out how much you value the speed boost, but generally I find Boots of Striding to be perfect for the job for which they're made and Boots of Expeditious Retreat to cheapen the speed boosts too much. Just as an example.


4) Does crafting magical items require any specific eg. Craft (Woodworking) check, or is that all factored in with the Feats? I know an Effigy requires Craft checks, so I wondered if any others do also.

No Craft-checks for magic items. That's a big part of what makes the Craft-skills so pointless. If it were me, I'd tie making Magic Items to Crafts, but as it stands, you only need Crafts for non-magical items (and with the magic item costs, it's pretty much assumed you can afford the base item you start enchanting).


5) The Artificer's plan is to also take Leadership and start up his own workshop that can craft items for him while he's away. Assuming the cohorts and followers have the appropriate skills and feats would this be possible? Also, would they be able to make his Effigy and/or Homunculus for him or would he need to do that himself?

Given the levels, feats and resources (gold & XP - just track levels, no need to track the individual XPs of all of 'em; just keep track of the cohort), sure, it would be possible. It'd even be a great "stronghold" for him. They can make anything they qualify for. He'll probably still want a Dedicated Wright Homunculus (Eberron-book) to make stuff for him personally though, and stuff that in Bag of Holding and keep it along or so.

But yeah, nothing wrong with going for his own Workshop provided you approve Leadership (it's an incredible feat, but if you want it around, then this seems like one of the more interesting and fair uses of it - just beware the spell requirements of crafting items, those make low-level crafters very limited).

Abstruse
2009-07-26, 11:07 AM
Not to my knowledge, no. It's really simple though. Just pay the money and XP and use the given amount of days and the item will be ready; mostly it's too much hassle to play out acquiring the materials for each item separately and given the long days of crafting, it's easy enough to assume he's got the ways to acquire them given the money.
*shrug* Your mileage may vary. It's all a balance of fluff vs. crunch, really -- but at least in my opinion, do you want to be running a campaign/playing a character which involves imaginative roleplaying? Or do you want to just be a min/max'ing just-by-the-rules accountant who keeps everything in the abstract and handwaves everything?

Sliver
2009-07-26, 11:32 AM
Won't answer all your questions, but you may find this (http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=813665)useful

Eldariel
2009-07-26, 01:16 PM
*shrug* Your mileage may vary. It's all a balance of fluff vs. crunch, really -- but at least in my opinion, do you want to be running a campaign/playing a character which involves imaginative roleplaying? Or do you want to just be a min/max'ing just-by-the-rules accountant who keeps everything in the abstract and handwaves everything?

I definitely suggest saving that for the more special items; if we're talking about an Artificer building stuff for the whole party including tons of low-cost items, it'll get really tedious to play yet another material gathering adventure for 11000061th time.

Few related moments here and there is fine, but how you acquire materials for crafting items isn't the focus of the game (at least almost ever) and spending majority of the sessions just so the Warforged can get his materials straight for crafting doesn't seem like the most enjoyable way of playing D&D, especially for the other players.

Sliver
2009-07-26, 01:26 PM
I definitely suggest saving that for the more special items; if we're talking about an Artificer building stuff for the whole party including tons of low-cost items, it'll get really tedious to play yet another material gathering adventure for 11000061th time.

Few related moments here and there is fine, but how you acquire materials for crafting items isn't the focus of the game (at least almost ever) and spending majority of the sessions just so the Warforged can get his materials straight for crafting doesn't seem like the most enjoyable way of playing D&D, especially for the other players.

It really depends.. If your in town there is no problem saying that you didn't just sac some gold to the gods of item craft, but bought all the materials in the market..
But if you are in the wild, unless you have some way to carry a lab with all the items with you (like a portable hole maybe) then you could say that some materials need k. nature or something to find, while others aren't there at all and should be sought out or bought.. If you have a portable lab then you could say that it has all the materials you need with 10 "charges" (still pay for extra material, just count as if it was there), pay in advance while in town for any material you might need (say you buy one for 50k and claim it has all the material needed for the next 50k gp of crafting.. Or just ask them to pay in advance and specify what items they want to craft and say that those materials they buy, so they can't get others out of town.

Eldariel
2009-07-26, 01:37 PM
It really depends.. If your in town there is no problem saying that you didn't just sac some gold to the gods of item craft, but bought all the materials in the market..
But if you are in the wild, unless you have some way to carry a lab with all the items with you (like a portable hole maybe) then you could say that some materials need k. nature or something to find, while others aren't there at all and should be sought out or bought.. If you have a portable lab then you could say that it has all the materials you need with 10 "charges" (still pay for extra material, just count as if it was there), pay in advance while in town for any material you might need (say you buy one for 50k and claim it has all the material needed for the next 50k gp of crafting.. Or just ask them to pay in advance and specify what items they want to craft and say that those materials they buy, so they can't get others out of town.

Well, obviously - just because you don't play it out doesn't mean it can be implausible. You still have to have the means to get what you need. Just, I'm saying don't spend a session on "Ok, you start crafting that...what do you do? Go to the store? Ok, make spot & listen. Nothing happens. You're now at the store, which particular items are you looking for? Make an Appraise check on that and that and that's value and Knowledge on whether you know what you need. I assume you introduce yourself to the vendor and talk to him? Charisma-check for first impression, Gather Information to figure out what you need for what and Diplomacy to get something out of him. Also tell me what you say to him while at it. Ok, he replies this and this and this..." and so on. It can be fun once or twice, but when you do it for a billionth time, it just becomes tedious.

Sstoopidtallkid
2009-07-26, 02:05 PM
2) As a DM, would you just let the player decide what they're going to make and have the character take time out to do it regardless of what it is, or would you add in some small adventure for them to find specific materials to make a certain item? How much should I actually do that, as I can imagine it will put the player off crafting at all if they need to go out and scavenge every piece of everything.Let him craft without worrying about getting materials except for spending the cash. In Eberron, there are a lot of magic item crafters, so getting the raw materials for most items should be no more involved than getting the raw materials for soup in our world. If he wants to craft an intelligent item or something odd/OP like that, then yes, make a questout of it, but most of the time, it's too much trouble for something that's part of his class abilities.
4) Does crafting magical items require any specific eg. Craft (Woodworking) check, or is that all factored in with the Feats? I know an Effigy requires Craft checks, so I wondered if any others do also.No, and they probably shouldn't. Figure if you're making a magic sword, you start with a masterwork sword and cast a series of complex and draining spells on it, you don't melt it down and start over.
5) The Artificer's plan is to also take Leadership and start up his own workshop that can craft items for him while he's away. Assuming the cohorts and followers have the appropriate skills and feats would this be possible? Also, would they be able to make his Effigy and/or Homunculus for him or would he need to do that himself?If you're allowing leadership, he could get a bunch of magewright followers crafting, but most of them won't be able to make more than scrolls or potions, and will charge him 75% for it in the process(follower /= slave). Now, they could make Craft checks for him and similar, and toss Aid Another to his UMD checks, but he has to craft the gear.

Sliver
2009-07-26, 02:18 PM
Well, obviously - just because you don't play it out doesn't mean it can be implausible. You still have to have the means to get what you need. Just, I'm saying don't spend a session on "Ok, you start crafting that...what do you do? Go to the store? Ok, make spot & listen. Nothing happens. You're now at the store, which particular items are you looking for? Make an Appraise check on that and that and that's value and Knowledge on whether you know what you need. I assume you introduce yourself to the vendor and talk to him? Charisma-check for first impression, Gather Information to figure out what you need for what and Diplomacy to get something out of him. Also tell me what you say to him while at it. Ok, he replies this and this and this..." and so on. It can be fun once or twice, but when you do it for a billionth time, it just becomes tedious.

I think the first Knowledge skill should be enough, just to know that your char knows how to craft it.. You won't need more CHA checks later if you go to the same store (which is good because you then build up a reputation and can ask for favours that lead to cheaper crafting and maybe even plot hooks)..

Or, you know, not everyone play out their normal visits to the shop to buy every piece of equipment, so they don't have to play the material buying..

Eldariel
2009-07-26, 02:19 PM
Or, you know, not everyone play out their normal visits to the shop to buy every piece of equipment, so they don't have to play the material buying..

...that's exactly what I've been saying all along.