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Rasman
2010-01-19, 12:21 AM
Crafting is a class skill for most classes, but I rarely see people mention anything about it when talking about their builds.

Is crafting, of any kind, worth taking at all? If so, what kind of crafting do you like to use?

Innis Cabal
2010-01-19, 12:23 AM
Its for roleplay mostly, it seems. Or item creation

Glimbur
2010-01-19, 12:35 AM
Or theoretical discussions of breaking WBL via Wall of Iron and Fabricate. Or qualifying for a couple of PrC's.

The problem is that money is cheap and that special items aren't special unless they're magic, which Craft doesn't cover. Sure, you could be a master swordsmith as a fifth level character, but mechanically you're much better off with ranks in Tumble or Balance or UMD or Spot or... it's a flaw of the skill system.

Lycanthromancer
2010-01-19, 12:46 AM
I generally do use crafting with my high-Int characters, who don't really need ranks.

After all, 10 (Take 10) +4 (Int) +4 (Aid Another x2) + 2 (MW Tools) +3 (Psicrystal...maybe) + Apprentice (Craftsman) means you can get some decent Craft rolls even without ranks. Lets me (slightly more than) triple my wealth at level 1.

Kelb_Panthera
2010-01-19, 01:10 AM
As long as you don't need the skill points for anything else it can be a cheap way of getting mundane items, which is quite useful up until around level 10~12ish. It's very nice for a poison user or anyone who wants to use a very heavy armor without without having to pay full price. You can use it to make a few bucks during down-time if your craft is alchemy or some other high-value, high-demand items. If you're warforged a decent craft modifier is as close as you get to natural healing (not counting a PrC.) The uses are there, but they don't get much mention because a lot of people don't like the rules, often citing that "it takes too long." A high craft modifier can make the spell fabricate freakin' sweet. A few other spells benefit from crafting ability too IIRC. If you want a truly useless skill, look at profession. Beyond profession (sailor) in a nautical campaign, the only use for profession is to qualify for a handful of PrC's and most of those aren't worth taking.

Edit: craft becomes *MUCH* more useful if you use the optional rule from complete (something) that says you can voluntarily raise the DC by increments of 10 to hasten the process.

Tavar
2010-01-19, 01:15 AM
Isn't that a standard rule in the Player's Handbook/SRD?

Kelb_Panthera
2010-01-19, 01:29 AM
Huh, so it is. I thought it was from one of the completes :smalltongue:

JonestheSpy
2010-01-19, 02:17 AM
Well, it's worth taking as character development, and I have my own house rules to make crafting a lot more important. In my campaigns, creating magic items requires a spellcraft check to succeed, and the DC is a LOT higher if you don't make the item yourself and the enchantment isn't happening during the item's creation. It can be somewhat lower if the enchanter is working directly with the smith/weaver/etc during the item's making, but it's still significantly harder.

If you think about the great fantastic stories and myths, this makes a lot more sense than the wizard just buying a sword off he Masterwork aisle of the shop and then throwing some spells on it. Magic itmes are created by dwarven smiths, fairies, djinns, legandary figures like Weland and Govannon, or even more unknown sources - your average wizard doesn't just whip them out himself.

Sstoopidtallkid
2010-01-19, 02:28 AM
Well, it's worth taking as character development, and I have my own house rules to make crafting a lot more important. In my campaigns, creating magic items requires a spellcraft check to succeed, and the DC is a LOT higher if you don't make the item yourself and the enchantment isn't happening during the item's creation. It can be somewhat lower if the enchanter is working directly with the smith/weaver/etc during the item's making, but it's still significantly harder.

If you think about the great fantastic stories and myths, this makes a lot more sense than the wizard just buying a sword off he Masterwork aisle of the shop and then throwing some spells on it. Magic itmes are created by dwarven smiths, fairies, djinns, legandary figures like Weland and Govannon, or even more unknown sources - your average wizard doesn't just whip them out himself.But the craft DCs are easy for a Wizard. Martial melee weapon is DC 15. Most DCs will be 20 or lower. At 5th level, assuming no investment, a Wizard will have +5 from Int, which means he autos the longsword. Masterwork tools and an aid another check(someone in the party should hit it easily enough) make all but the highest when taking 10.

Traikan
2010-01-19, 02:32 AM
One of the players in my next group will be running a homebrewed class between the two of us, the "Master Craftsman". He's got around 7 craft skills maxed out, and a slew of abilities all about using them in absurd ways, most importantly replicating spells for the purposes of crafting items and accelerating the process.

Why yes, his character is a gnome.

I'll let you know how it turns out.

Signmaker
2010-01-19, 02:39 AM
The best I've seen it used is with Craft (Alchemy) via a very specific PrC. Even then, it was only viable due to the downtime involved.

ericgrau
2010-01-19, 02:42 AM
It tends to take to long for the fast paced life of an adventurer to be worth it. It's better for NPCs. Ditto for profession and perform. Well, except bards must have perform but even then I often get the minimum ranks.

JaronK
2010-01-19, 02:42 AM
I use crafting pretty much all the time. It's incredibly good when starting out in low level games... start out having already crafted your gear, and you get it MUCH cheaper. Plus, for many classes it's easy to have the necessary skills to start out... Wizards have Magecraft, Clerics have Divine Insight, and so on, so you don't even need to put in ranks.

Later on, obviously Fabricate makes it much better. You can make some impressive stuff too... Suslean (sp?) chainweave Mithral Mechanicus Gear for a tank, for example, or Muffling Shadowsilk Leather Armor for the Rogue. Enchant it later. There's lots of mundane gear that's handy.

JaronK

Grifthin
2010-01-19, 03:20 AM
Craft Crossbow smith - Used mostly to create bigger and better "clips" for my repeating crossbows so that I can dakka things for longer without reloading. IE 25 bolt clip is miles more awesome than the 5 bolt clip. This is on a straight human fighter mind you.

Kelb_Panthera
2010-01-19, 07:00 AM
I almost forgot, while it is a corner case, the Shadow-Smith in ToM requires craft, but then actually does something pretty cool with it. Reach into the shadows, make a craft check, bam. You've got whatever it is you need, as long as it doesn't matter that it's made of shadow-stuff.

Rasman
2010-01-19, 07:18 AM
I almost forgot, while it is a corner case, the Shadow-Smith in ToM requires craft, but then actually does something pretty cool with it. Reach into the shadows, make a craft check, bam. You've got whatever it is you need, as long as it doesn't matter that it's made of shadow-stuff.

oh yeah, I remember that actually, that is PROBABLY the most original use of Crafting I've seen in the game, tbh

would Craft Alchemy be worth picking up so I can get my own Alchemist's Fire and variations of it? especially with a GM that is either overly paranoid that I'm trying to do something OP (He wouldn't let me buy Blessed Bandages for Pelor's sake) or he just likes being in control of the item flow, this way I can just make whatever cool thing I want

Are there any other Craft (______) that have any practical combat use, besides poisons (which I keep being told are relatively weak)

EDIT: Looking at CrystalKeep, I found paints that give interesting effects that require Craft (Painting) to be able to make. Are any of these particularly useful without being overly...odd...

Everyman
2010-01-19, 08:21 AM
Crafting as written is sadly very inefficient for a PC, for all the previously mentioned reasons. However, a little creativity with the rules can make it a whole lot of fun.

For example, my wife is planning on building a character focused on crafting traps and alchemic items. In addition to the standard rules for making traps (using the DMG, DMGII, and Combat Trapsmith in Comp. Scoundrel), I'm allowing her to improvise traps using gear on hand (at a +10-15 DC). As long as she can think of a way to MacGyver-ize stuff around her into tools, I'll let her have her fun. Likewise, I'm going to allow her to scale the potency and effectiveness of her alchemic items by increasing the craft DC as she goes (more damage from alchemist fire and acid, higher save DCs for thunderstones, stronger tanglefoot bags, etc). Not sure how I'm going to scale the DC yet (thinking +10 Craft DC for +1d6 damage, +2 save, etc).

Oh, and thank you for reminding me of those Marvelous Pigments. PCs aren't the only ones who can have fun with Craft, after all.

Foryn Gilnith
2010-01-19, 09:11 AM
The only craft skills I ever invest more than one rank in are Alchemy and Poisonmaking (and even then rarely). I take one rank to represent that the PC can make money using his craft (and was therefore not a hobo before adventuring), but that's pretty much it.

Craft (alchemy) covers drug creation, I believe, and can substitute for poisonmaking with a -4 penalty. Poisonmaking makes poison, obviously. Both of these have been used heavily in shadier campaigns.

Also, Profession (Siege Engineer) and Profession (miner) are decent.