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View Full Version : [3.5] The easy RAW loopholes.



Ernir
2010-11-16, 12:57 PM
I think we all know them. The tiny little (apparent) oversights in the rules that give all sorts of wonky results if played straight. I'd like to collect a list of these things (not necessarily just from Core).

I'll start with a famous example: Drowning.

When the character finally fails her Constitution check, she begins to drown. In the first round, she falls unconscious (0 hp). In the following round, she drops to -1 hit points and is dying. In the third round, she drowns.
First, drowning sets the HP of the drowning character to 0, with no exceptions for characters who are beneath 0 HP. Fix: Add exception.
Second, there is no mention of a way to stop drowning once the process has begun. Fix: Add clause about what happens if the character gains the ability to breathe again.


Note: This is not about game balance. It's about game rules that have easily fixed oversights.

Anyone got others?


EDIT: The list so far (formatting be damned for now):

Monks and unarmed strike proficiency:
Monks do not have proficiency with unarmed strikes. The obvious fix is to give it to them.

A number of various game-breaking holes compiled by Doc Roc:
Do I have any others?
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=137447


Ranged attacks and attacks of opportunity:
Ranged attacks provoke attacks of opportunity, but this is specified in the Standard Actions section of the Combat chapter. Full attacks (without distinction between ranged and melee) never provoke AoOs, according to the rules.

The obvious fix: each ranged attack, regardless of action type, provokes.

The zombie packet relay service:
One of my favourite RAW absurdities is this one:

An item can be passed from one end to the other of a line instantaneously.

While the commoner railgun doesn't work -- a thrown object deals damage as an improvised ranged weapon of its size, even though it just travelled faster-than-light before being thrown, there are interesting effects -- as an example, you can implement a basic internet over the 'zombie packet relay service'.

Headers would be transmitted orally (as a free action, no less), while request and response bodies would be transmitted in writing (presumably the server maintains a number of copies of any given resource, then distributes them when requested).

Certain things wouldn't work so well -- for example, none of the websites would be able to carry any kind of user-generated content, so things like wikipedia wouldn't work, but it would still be a fun addition to a parody campaign setting.

The solution would be to impose a limit on how far a chain can pass an object..
A couple of weight problems:

Soarwood weighs more than Darkwood (Soarwood items way 75% normal, Darkwood items weight 50% normal). Yet Soarwood is supposed to be lighter than air and ships made of the stuff can float in air... but Darkwood ones can't. WTF?

JaronK
Holy water and various other alchemical substances weigh less than air.

(flask weighs 1.5 lbs, holy water weighs 1.0 lbs.)

Signmaker
2010-11-16, 01:00 PM
Monks do not have proficiency with unarmed strikes. The obvious fix is to give it to them.

dsmiles
2010-11-16, 01:06 PM
Monks do not have proficiency with unarmed strikes. The obvious fix is to give it to them.

:smallconfused:
I don't get it. This is the monk blurb:

Unarmed Strike
At 1st level, a monk gains Improved Unarmed Strike as a bonus feat. A monk’s attacks may be with either fist interchangeably or even from elbows, knees, and feet. This means that a monk may even make unarmed strikes with her hands full. There is no such thing as an off-hand attack for a monk striking unarmed. A monk may thus apply her full Strength bonus on damage rolls for all her unarmed strikes.

Here's the weapon description of unarmed strike:

Unarmed Strike
A Medium character deals 1d3 points of nonlethal damage with an unarmed strike. A Small character deals 1d2 points of nonlethal damage. A monk or any character with the Improved Unarmed Strike feat can deal lethal or nonlethal damage with unarmed strikes, at her option. The damage from an unarmed strike is considered weapon damage for the purposes of effects that give you a bonus on weapon damage rolls.

An unarmed strike is always considered a light weapon. Therefore, you can use the Weapon Finesse feat to apply your Dexterity modifier instead of your Strength modifier to attack rolls with an unarmed strike

Emphasis added.
Kind of indicates proficiency, don't you think?

Doc Roc
2010-11-16, 01:08 PM
Do I have any others?
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=137447

Signmaker
2010-11-16, 01:09 PM
:smallconfused:
I don't get it. This is the monk blurb:

Here's the weapon description of unarmed strike:

Emphasis added.
Kind of indicates proficiency, don't you think?

Implies =/= Is. Improved Unarmed Strike only turns on no-penalty lethality.

Synapse
2010-11-16, 01:11 PM
:smallconfused:
I don't get it. This is the monk blurb:

Here's the weapon description of unarmed strike:

Emphasis added.
Kind of indicates proficiency, don't you think?

Sadly, no. IUS gives you new forms of damage with unarmed strike, but it does not give you proficiency. Unarmed Strike is a whole beast of weird in 3.5. PF at least went out and said everyone is proficient with unarmed strike, automatically.

Amphetryon
2010-11-16, 01:17 PM
:smallconfused:
I don't get it. This is the monk blurb:
<snip>
Kind of indicates proficiency, don't you think?

To clarify: The problem is that Monks are in the very rare category of base classes without "all Simple weapons" as a Proficiency, and do not include "Unarmed Strike" on their short list of weapons with which they have Proficiency. When the Class abilities were written, it appears that someone forgot that little tidbit.

Signmaker
2010-11-16, 01:19 PM
Unmorphed Druids don't either, amusingly.

lesser_minion
2010-11-16, 01:54 PM
Problem: You can make a hide check to hide behind a tower shield... which also hides the tower shield.
Solution: Rule that cover granted by your equipment does not allow you to make hide checks.

Some profit-related ones:

Problem: A Wall of Iron cast by an 11th level wizard can be sold as scrap, making about 1,000 gp in profit.
Solution: Impose a duration on the spell -- it's now protected by whatever your merchants do to protect themselves from magic-using cheats and thieves.

Problem: 10ft. poles cost more than quarterstaves and 10ft. ladders.
Solution: All ten foot poles now have hooks on the end.

Kobold-Bard
2010-11-16, 02:02 PM
Some profit-related ones:

Problem: A Wall of Iron cast by an 11th level wizard can be sold as scrap, making about 1,000 gp in profit.
Solution: Raise the material component cost to (Caster Level Squared) * 10gp.

Problem: A 10 foot ladder costs less than a ten-foot pole.
Solution: All ten foot poles now have hooks on the end.

Take ranks in Craft (Coin Minting).
Your result is 3x the value of what you put in, so every 3sp you make only cost you 1sp. Free Money.

Susano-wo
2010-11-16, 02:31 PM
To clarify: The problem is that Monks are in the very rare category of base classes without "all Simple weapons" as a Proficiency, and do not include "Unarmed Strike" on their short list of weapons with which they have Proficiency. When the Class abilities were written, it appears that someone forgot that little tidbit.

I would consider a person's fists to be natural weapons.:smallamused:

I think that's what the designers were thinking too, which is why they made the special rules to govern non IUS fisticuffs. Otherwise they could have just given a -4 non prficiency penalty and called it a day:smallsmile:

so by RAW, you can't really rule on unarmed strikes--that's the oversight. There is nothing saying whether or not the really are considered natural atttacks.

Poil
2010-11-16, 02:37 PM
Take ranks in Craft (Coin Minting).
Your result is 3x the value of what you put in, so every 3sp you make only cost you 1sp. Free Money.

Counterfeiting might cause some trouble though.

Kobold-Bard
2010-11-16, 02:40 PM
Counterfeiting might cause some trouble though.

You're not counterfeiting, you're crafting actual coins. It's not your fault they require less silver to make than their value.

Nero24200
2010-11-16, 02:43 PM
Problem: A 10 foot ladder costs less than a ten-foot pole.
Solution: All ten foot poles now have hooks on the end.

See...this one I never understood. If you cut a ladder in half you do not gain two poles. You gain two perforated planks of wood. I don't see how anyone could sell them as poles afterwards (even assuming you lived in a D'n'D-esc setting where there is apparently demand for them).

lesser_minion
2010-11-16, 02:48 PM
You're not counterfeiting, you're crafting actual coins. It's not your fault they require less silver to make than their value.

If the coin's precious metal content is less than its value, then it's counterfeit, practically by definition.

There actually isn't a RAW method for making actual coins, because this isn't Mints & Metallurgists.


See...this one I never understood. If you cut a ladder in half you do not gain two poles. You gain two perforated planks of wood. I don't see how anyone could sell them as poles afterwards (even assuming you lived in a D'n'D-esc setting where there is apparently demand for them).

I actually agree with you, but it's still a bit odd that a ladder would be cheaper. It's also still an issue, since not only are quarterstaves entirely free, but they have most of the same uses as a 10 foot pole, and a Large Quarterstaff is actually over 10 feet in length, so you could theoretically convert one into a ten foot pole by sawing the ends off.

Oracle_Hunter
2010-11-16, 03:07 PM
If the coin's precious metal content is less than its value, then it's counterfeit, practically by definition.

There actually isn't a RAW method for making actual coins, because this isn't Mints & Metallurgists.
And yet it is Basketweavers & Bakers? Or Laywers & Lumberjacks? :smalltongue:

I was going to point a hole in his argument, but there isn't one. For example, you don't make "counterfeit" longswords using the Craft method - or even "counterfeit" golden idols. This is just an example of RAW throwing up amusing little insanities.

The easiest fix for Craft & Profession skills is to get rid of them; as has been pointed out, this is Dungeons & Dragons after all :smallamused:


I actually agree with you, but it's still a bit odd that a ladder would be cheaper. The profiteering issue actually comes about when people start pulling a similar trick with large quarterstaves.
It's not that hard to trim the "tines" of a ladder and turn it into a pole. I mean, you have a dagger, don't you?

dsmiles
2010-11-16, 03:08 PM
A large quarterstaff costs nothing, but is over 10 feet in length (i.e. you can make it into a 10 foot pole by sawing the ends off).

That makes no sense. Why would you want to saw the ends off? The iron (or steel) caps help with the strength of the pole, right?

lesser_minion
2010-11-16, 03:18 PM
The easiest fix for Craft & Profession skills is to get rid of them; as has been pointed out, this is Dungeons & Dragons after all :smallamused:

Yes, and keeping one's equipment in good condition is an entirely valid part of that. As is having something meaningful to do when you aren't going into dungeons. Profession (Battlemaster) and Profession (Magic Tutor) can help in that regard.


That makes no sense. Why would you want to saw the ends off? The iron (or steel) caps help with the strength of the pole, right?

As far as I'm aware, most depictions of both quarterstaves and ten foot poles in D&D are unshod -- even if that weren't the case, there's still the question of why anybody would buy a ten foot pole if everything a ten foot pole does can be done with a quarterstaff.

Of course, the other fix you might be able to use is to add a price to quarterstaves and hand one out to every starting character for free.

Urpriest
2010-11-16, 03:24 PM
Every picture I've seen of a ten foot pole depicts it made out of metal. Not shod in metal, but made out of metal completely. Can someone point me to one where it's made out of wood?

dsmiles
2010-11-16, 03:35 PM
Every picture I've seen of a ten foot pole depicts it made out of metal. Not shod in metal, but made out of metal completely. Can someone point me to one where it's made out of wood?

Yeeesh...talk about a lightning rod...

lesser_minion
2010-11-16, 03:36 PM
Every picture I've seen of a ten foot pole depicts it made out of metal. Not shod in metal, but made out of metal completely. Can someone point me to one where it's made out of wood?

Both the 3.0 (page 110) and the 3.5 PHB (page 130) seem pretty clear on this -- compare the 10 foot pole with the tent pegs and battering ram on the same page, and with the various hafted weapons. Then compare it with the pictures of swords and the like.

And the materials to make such a pole would cost four times as much as the pole is supposedly worth, which would only make all of the jokes about pole manufacturers going out of business even worse.

Also, I don't think there'd be much benefit to making the thing from iron, at least not in terms of bending:

8 lb = 3.62873896 kg.

At a density of 7.0 kg.dm-3 for cast iron, that gives a volume of 0.519 dm3.

At a length of 30 dm, that gives a cross-sectional area of 0.0173 dm2, for a radius of about 7.42 mm.

The second moment of area about the diameter for such a circle is approximately 9.52e-9 m4, for a bending stiffness of approximately 1142 Pa.m4.

The mass per unit length of the pole is 1.21 kg.m-1, for a weight of 11.9 N.m-1 assuming an acceleration of freefall of 9.81 ms-2

For a uniformly distributed load p of 11.9 N.m-1 on a beam with bending stiffness EI of 1142 Pa.m4, that gives a tip deflection of about 0.10 metres when the pole is held horizontally at one end. That's just from the pole's self-weight.

That seems like it would be just enough to cause problems, even if it's not immediately visible to an observer, but it also doesn't look like it's significantly better than the bending you'd get from making the pole out of wood.

Oracle_Hunter
2010-11-16, 03:49 PM
Yes, and keeping one's equipment in good condition is an entirely valid part of that. As is having something meaningful to do when you aren't going into dungeons. Profession (Battlemaster) and Profession (Magic Tutor) can help in that regard.
Ha! Why pick something so dangerous as a Profession when Profession (Janitor) pays the same? :smalltongue:

And is "keeping one's equipment in good condition" is the reason for Craft, why don't we have rules for equipment decay like you find in Hackmaster? :smallamused:

No, they're just poorly conceptualized rules that really should be axed rather than fiddling around with them to make them work anything like they were "intended."

Z3ro
2010-11-16, 04:02 PM
Problem: You can make a hide check to hide behind a tower shield... which also hides the tower shield.
Solution: Rule that cover granted by your equipment does not allow you to make hide checks.


This is a common misconception; nowhere in the hide skill does it actually specify your equipment is hidden with you. Now yes, logically your equipment like your clothes would be hidden, but there's no reason something like a tower shield would be hidden as well.


And yet it is Basketweavers & Bakers? Or Laywers & Lumberjacks? :smalltongue:

I was going to point a hole in his argument, but there isn't one. For example, you don't make "counterfeit" longswords using the Craft method - or even "counterfeit" golden idols. This is just an example of RAW throwing up amusing little insanities.

The easiest fix for Craft & Profession skills is to get rid of them; as has been pointed out, this is Dungeons & Dragons after all :smallamused:


The problem with counterfeiting is not in the coins themselves; I can steal actual US paper and presses and make genuine US bills. That's still counterfeiting, however, as I have no authority to do it and if I'm found out it's still a crime.

Depending on how the authority is set up in your game the problem with counterfeiting is not the coins themselves, but the lack of authority to make them.

Oracle_Hunter
2010-11-16, 04:08 PM
The problem with counterfeiting is not in the coins themselves; I can steal actual US paper and presses and make genuine US bills. That's still counterfeiting, however, as I have no authority to do it and if I'm found out it's still a crime.

Depending on how the authority is set up in your game the problem with counterfeiting is not the coins themselves, but the lack of authority to make them.
This is only true with fiat money (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiat_money).

D&D assumes that 1 GP has exactly 1 GP worth of gold in it - this is why ancient Atlantian GP are fully convertable into contemporary coinage. You can change this, of course (I have) but it isn't RAW and it requires you to figure out exchange rates & such.

The amusing part here is that while the idea is obviously wrong ("using craft to makes coins for less than their face value") the steps to get there are hilariously RAW.

(1) I want to make coins, what skill do I use? Well, Craft is used for making physical objects, so let's use that.

(2) When using Craft, I look at the list price of the object (i.e. 1 GP) and "spend" 1/3 of its value on raw materials which I then use to make a perfectly legitimate coin.

Obviously the DM can say "no, you can't use Craft to make a coin" but there is no RAW justification for it - and plenty of RAW justification the other way!

I, for one, am deeply amused :smallbiggrin:

Z3ro
2010-11-16, 04:14 PM
This is only true with fiat money (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiat_money).

D&D assumes that 1 GP has exactly 1 GP worth of gold in it - this is why ancient Atlantian GP are fully convertable into contemporary coinage. You can change this, of course (I have) but it isn't RAW and it requires you to figure out exchange rates & such.

The amusing part here is that while the idea is obviously wrong ("using craft to makes coins for less than their face value") the steps to get there are hilariously RAW.

(1) I want to make coins, what skill do I use? Well, Craft is used for making physical objects, so let's use that.

(2) When using Craft, I look at the list price of the object (i.e. 1 GP) and "spend" 1/3 of its value on raw materials which I then use to make a perfectly legitimate coin.

Obviously the DM can say "no, you can't use Craft to make a coin" but there is no RAW justification for it - and plenty of RAW justification the other way!

I, for one, am deeply amused :smallbiggrin:

Yes, the coin would be "worth" 1gp, but you should realize that even gold is fiat currency. I work in finance and realize that many people like to call gold "real" money, but it's just a shiny metal. We assign it a value, just like paper. In D&D terms, that means 1gp is 1gp.

I understand the RAW argument, but my point wasn't that it wouldn't work, just that depending on the authority you'd get in trouble. If the royal treasury is the only one that can mint coins and you go ahead and do it without permission, RAW won't save you.

Susano-wo
2010-11-16, 04:20 PM
it took me a while to come around to the RAW craft minting is broken with real coinage arguemtn, but it is indeed creating something from nothing...or at least from less :P

the 10ft pole issue, even aside from the materials used issue, is selling price, not usefulness. a quarterstaff is free, and just about as useful for touching things from far away. The RAW trick w/ 10ft poles is about buying a ladder, breaking it, and selling it for the same price.

by RAW, only a 10ft pole is a 10ft pole, no matter how much you feel your broken ladder resembles it, and by common sense, a broken ladder does not have the same construction value as a 10ft pole, even if it is made of wood], so no one is going to pay the same price

its a fun joike, but it really doesn't work :P

Ilmryn
2010-11-16, 04:21 PM
To clarify: The problem is that Monks are in the very rare category of base classes without "all Simple weapons" as a Proficiency, and do not include "Unarmed Strike" on their short list of weapons with which they have Proficiency. When the Class abilities were written, it appears that someone forgot that little tidbit.

The Warblade has a similar problem. According to its description, it is proficient with all simple and martial melee weapons, making them the only class not to be proficent with slings and crossbows...

Oracle_Hunter
2010-11-16, 04:24 PM
Yes, the coin would be "worth" 1gp, but you should realize that even gold is fiat currency. I work in finance and realize that many people like to call gold "real" money, but it's just a shiny metal. We assign it a value, just like paper. In D&D terms, that means 1gp is 1gp.

I understand the RAW argument, but my point wasn't that it wouldn't work, just that depending on the authority you'd get in trouble. If the royal treasury is the only one that can mint coins and you go ahead and do it without permission, RAW won't save you.
With all due respect - D&D does not treat gold (or any of its currencies) as Fiat Money.
500 GP of diamond dust is an actual amount of diamond dust - it doesn't matter if you buy it on sale or not, or with Guilder GP or Florence GP. In fact, RAW does not even contemplate the process or import of minting; considering the above facts it seems unlikely that the rules intended for anything - let alone coinage - to be valued in accordance to supply & demand or any Real World concerns.

Moreover, Craft itself requires you to assign the value of whatever it is you are producing; to say that you produce a coin valued at 1 GP which is not, in fact, worth 1 GP is a paradox.

Now, I'm not saying that some force might not become peeved that you are minting money but none of the D&D Economics contemplates such a concern or even address it in fluff.

Z3ro
2010-11-16, 04:31 PM
With all due respect - D&D does not treat gold (or any of its currencies) as Fiat Money.
500 GP of diamond dust is an actual amount of diamond dust - it doesn't matter if you buy it on sale or not, or with Guilder GP or Florence GP. In fact, RAW does not even contemplate the process or import of minting; considering the above facts it seems unlikely that the rules intended for anything - let alone coinage - to be valued in accordance to supply & demand or any Real World concerns.

Moreover, Craft itself requires you to assign the value of whatever it is you are producing; to say that you produce a coin valued at 1 GP which is not, in fact, worth 1 GP is a paradox.

Now, I'm not saying that some force might not become peeved that you are minting money but none of the D&D Economics contemplates such a concern or even address it in fluff.

By the stricktest RAW, yes, everything in D&D has an inherent value. However, I have to take issue that the rules don't address variance in prices. While they don't specifically mention it, this one falls under the category of "too basic to mention". If there's an iron shortage in a kingdom you're trying to save, all iron-based weapons should cost more. Having them cost their usual price and saying "the rules don't address this situation" is ridiculous. The game is unplayable with that level of RAW adherence.

lesser_minion
2010-11-16, 04:32 PM
And is "keeping one's equipment in good condition" is the reason for Craft, why don't we have rules for equipment decay like you find in Hackmaster? :smallamused:

Players can learn the skills needed themselves, or retain someone who has the relevant skills -- thus, there's an in-game justification for the fact that their weapons aren't decaying. Even if nobody has come up with actual weapon deterioration rules that can be used without driving everyone insane, it's nice that the game at least allows groups to pay lip service to the issue, rather than acting as if it doesn't exist -- and equipment can always be damaged intentionally.

And Profession (battlemaster) is likely to be more fitting for Warblade McFighterpants than Profession (janitor), isn't it?

On top of that, the Craft and Profession rules are a handy way to adjudicate anything that a DM happens to think might be important in her setting that isn't already covered by the skill rules.

And, you know, a way for characters to make money and do something in their downtime, instead of sitting there twiddling their thumbs.

ScionoftheVoid
2010-11-16, 04:35 PM
The Warblade has a similar problem. According to its description, it is proficient with all simple and martial melee weapons, making them the only class not to be proficent with slings and crossbows...

Well, Wizards only have one simple weapon proficiency, so they are proficient with slings or crossbows at most.

lesser_minion
2010-11-16, 04:38 PM
Well, Wizards only have one simple weapon proficiency, so they are proficient with slings or crossbows at most.

Erm... no. That's commoners.

Wizards actually aren't proficient in the sling, however -- they are proficient in the "club, dagger, heavy crossbow, light crossbow, and quarterstaff".

Oracle_Hunter
2010-11-16, 04:39 PM
By the stricktest RAW, yes, everything in D&D has an inherent value. However, I have to take issue that the rules don't address variance in prices. While they don't specifically mention it, this one falls under the category of "too basic to mention". If there's an iron shortage in a kingdom you're trying to save, all iron-based weapons should cost more. Having them cost their usual price and saying "the rules don't address this situation" is ridiculous. The game is unplayable with that level of RAW adherence.

:confused:

Unplayable? My D&D adventures usually focus on going into dungeons, slaying dragons, and fencing the loot. For that, I find the rules are pretty adequate :smallamused:

Besides, I'd like to see you try and make D&D work at all if you assume non-intrinsic value. Do I get to Wish for more jewels if jewels are common in the area? Does it take more diamonds to resurrect someone when there isn't a diamond cartel in place? :smalltongue:

ScionoftheVoid
2010-11-16, 04:46 PM
Erm... no. That's commoners.

Wizards actually aren't proficient in the sling, however -- they are proficient in the "club, dagger, heavy crossbow, light crossbow, and quarterstaff".

Huh, could have sworn Wizards had that. Oh well, thanks.

Z3ro
2010-11-16, 04:49 PM
:confused:

Unplayable? My D&D adventures usually focus on going into dungeons, slaying dragons, and fencing the loot. For that, I find the rules are pretty adequate :smallamused:

My comment was more in terms of overall than just the money rules, my assumption that if you stuck to that level of detail on the money you'd stick to that level of detail on everything.



Besides, I'd like to see you try and make D&D work at all if you assume non-intrinsic value. Do I get to Wish for more jewels if jewels are common in the area? Does it take more diamonds to resurrect someone when there isn't a diamond cartel in place? :smalltongue:

In my games? Yes. It depends on what you interprit "500gp" of diamonds to be. Is it the value or the amount? In most of my sessions we go with the amount. It's nonsensical for a tiny diamond to power a spell if you're overcharged for it, while a giant diamond doesn't work if you get it for a discount. And how do you value things you don't pay for (like loot)?

You can't tell me you've never gone to a shop and haggled prices. If you've done that, you assume a non-intrinsic value as well.

The Glyphstone
2010-11-16, 04:56 PM
The Warblade has a similar problem. According to its description, it is proficient with all simple and martial melee weapons, making them the only class not to be proficent with slings and crossbows...

I wouldn't call that a mistake, actually. Maneuvers in ToB can't be used with ranged weapons, requiring the Bloodstorm Blade to do so. It's probably intentional that the Warblade not be capable of fighting at range with any weapon, if a rather dumb intention (lol fliers).

Oracle_Hunter
2010-11-16, 05:03 PM
You can't tell me you've never gone to a shop and haggled prices. If you've done that, you assume a non-intrinsic value as well.
Amusing! :smallbiggrin:
Items still have intrinsic value; their sale value may vary, of course. A gold-platted idol worth 5 SP has a sale price of 100 GP with the right amount of sleaze, yet even if you sell a tiny 10 GP diamond for 1,000 GP you still can't powder it and use it to power a spell.

But that's not what we're talking about at all. Behold, the majesty of the RAW!

To determine how much time and money it takes to make an item, follow these steps.

1.Find the item’s price. Put the price in silver pieces (1 gp = 10 sp).

2.Find the DC from the table below.

3.Pay one-third of the item’s price for the cost of raw materials.

4.Make an appropriate Craft check representing one week’s work.
We could argue about the definition of "price" I suppose, but I think using anything aside from "the list price in the PHB" results in even more hilarious outcomes. Likewise defining coins as having "no price" means I can summon an infinite amount of them with a Wish or anything else that limits the value of what I can summon. Only by stating that it is impossible to use Craft to create coins do you fix this problem - which only raises the question of how they were made in the first place :smalltongue:
I, certainly, am not arguing that a world without minting or supply & demand makes a whit of sense but we are talking about a game here. More importantly, there is not a principled argument for saying that the Crafting RAW does not mean what it says it means; any such argument can be used to justify increasingly insane results.

The point of this thread (such as it has one) is to identify "crazy RAW" and how to fix it. The obvious solution in all cases is just to say "no, you can't" but that is substituting Rule Zero for Rule Making.

Also: the Craft Minting example is a genuinely new one from the dozens of such "RAW LOLZ" threads I've read. More excitingly, it's the most compelling one of all!

lesser_minion
2010-11-16, 05:05 PM
Unplayable? My D&D adventures usually focus on going into dungeons, slaying dragons, and fencing the loot. For that, I find the rules are pretty adequate :smallamused:

But that's only a tiny fraction of what they're there for. You can make a perfectly serviceable D&D adventure out of venturing into the city's sewers to kill rats. Or a non-combat adventure where you convince the council to put aside their differences and do something about the Evil Death Plague of Death.

And, for that matter, the next non-combat adventure where you go out personally to find out where the Evil Death Plague of Death came from and how to stop it.

There is a reason why the level range of the game goes from "nobody" to "demigod".

Dungeons and Dragons might have those two things as its most iconic features, but they are certainly not all it does.

Oracle_Hunter
2010-11-16, 05:11 PM
But that's only a tiny fraction of what they're there for. You can make a perfectly serviceable D&D adventure out of venturing into the city's sewers to kill rats.

There is a reason why the level range of the game is so ridiculously wide.
I was making a bit of a joke at the hyperbolic statement that a Dungeon & Dragons rules set which does not adequately model the price variance of a kingdom with an iron shortage is unplayable :smalltongue:

Susano-wo
2010-11-16, 05:20 PM
By the stricktest RAW, yes, everything in D&D has an inherent value. However, I have to take issue that the rules don't address variance in prices. While they don't specifically mention it, this one falls under the category of "too basic to mention". If there's an iron shortage in a kingdom you're trying to save, all iron-based weapons should cost more. Having them cost their usual price and saying "the rules don't address this situation" is ridiculous. The game is unplayable with that level of RAW adherence.

I htink the point is that by RAW, you are making a gold coin, you put in 3silver and 4 copper into the process, and mint your gold coin. tada!
No, this is ridiculous, and would never happen in any but the most comedic games, but its a funny little RAW quirk.

Incidentally, I like having craft/perform/profession, and I don't think the game being called dungeons and dragons in any way affects their interest or appropriateness. I do think that you should adjudicate them with common sense, however. :smallbiggrin:

Though its true that they are not there for keeping up armor, etc. YOu can use them to represent that, but the game assumes that armor, like diamonds, is forever.:smallamused:
Furthermore, you don't need a craft skill to have people craft. IF there is no skill, it means the game is not concerned with it as a skill. If you are craftsman, you simply say you are (or possibly take a feat, or what have you). If you abuse this to try to get advantage in game, well that is where a GM comes in [to adjudicate areas left blank by the rules, or when the rules are contradictory]

Reverent-One
2010-11-16, 05:24 PM
Though its true that they are not there for keeping up armor, etc. YOu can use them to represent that, but the game assumes that armor, like diamonds, is forever.:smallamused:

Depends, if it's some form of metal armor, it'll only last until you run into a rust monster.

Susano-wo
2010-11-16, 05:27 PM
Depends, if it's some form of metal armor, it'll only last until you run into a rust monster.

or until sundered, yes :smallamused:

Z3ro
2010-11-16, 05:33 PM
Amusing! :smallbiggrin:
Items still have intrinsic value; their sale value may vary, of course. A gold-platted idol worth 5 SP has a sale price of 100 GP with the right amount of sleaze, yet even if you sell a tiny 10 GP diamond for 1,000 GP you still can't powder it and use it to power a spell.



This may be going into incredible tangent territory, but I want to talk about the quoted portion (I'll concede the rest).

Terms like "intrinsic value" really are meaningless. How do you measure such a value; there is no universal standard. At different times a gallon of water or a bar of gold would be worth more, yet nethier substance changes.

I take it by your response (correct me if I'm wrong) that you agree that a tiny diamond which is vastly overpriced does not meet the requirements of a "500gp" diamond. Assuming we agree to that, how is the RAW value of a diamond determined? Thus, no intrinsic value.

dsmiles
2010-11-16, 05:35 PM
Assuming we agree to that, how is the RAW value of a diamond determined? Thus, no intrinsic value.

Isn't there an app a table in the DMG for that?

lesser_minion
2010-11-16, 05:36 PM
Though its true that they are not there for keeping up armor, etc. YOu can use them to represent that, but the game assumes that armor, like diamonds, is forever.:smallamused:

If we actually had to keep track of equipment maintenance beyond having somebody on hand who knows how to fix stuff, then the entire D&D-playing community would have gone completely psychotic years ago, but it doesn't mean that the issue is -- or should be -- completely ignored.

And that's certainly not all the Craft skills do. All of the skills in the game can be worked into an adventure pretty easily if your DM and players are co-operating with each other.


I was making a bit of a joke at the hyperbolic statement that a Dungeon & Dragons rules set which does not adequately model the price variance of a kingdom with an iron shortage is unplayable :smalltongue:

To be honest, while it wouldn't be impossible to play, I don't think D&D would be particularly fun if people took the rules as written to that kind of extent. At least, not outside of parodies. As far as I'm aware, the designers agreed with me as well -- the DMG is pretty explicit that the listed prices for items are meant to be more of a guideline than some sort of commandment inscribed in stone.

Z3ro
2010-11-16, 05:39 PM
Isn't there an app a table in the DMG for that?

The problem is from spells with descriptions of "a diamond worth 500gp" rather than "a 10 carat diamond".

Coidzor
2010-11-16, 05:44 PM
I understand the RAW argument, but my point wasn't that it wouldn't work, just that depending on the authority you'd get in trouble. If the royal treasury is the only one that can mint coins and you go ahead and do it without permission, RAW won't save you.

I think you're missing the point of the thread, since this isn't about whether it'd fly in play, but whether it's RAW. Drowning someone wouldn't heal them in any sane universe, after all.

dsmiles
2010-11-16, 05:53 PM
The problem is from spells with descriptions of "a diamond worth 500gp" rather than "a 10 carat diamond".

Page 55 in the 3.5 DMG has a table. "A diamond worth 500gp" is just going to be a diamond, from the table, cut into several equal pieces. A "blue-white, canary, pink, brown, or blue diamond" is worth "2d4 x 1000gp." Divide by 500, and you know how many equal pieces it needs to be cut into to power that particular spell.

Cogidubnus
2010-11-16, 05:56 PM
By combining Dungeons and Dragons with sensible handling of the fantasy world's economy, I have created a new game, and a new setting for a campaign...

Imports and Exports!

Seriously, in a game where wealth almost equals power, if one country has an iron shortage, once the PCs get bags of holding/teleport they will start importing iron (possibly stolen from goblin mines) and flog it for more money (power).

Meanwhile, RAW says you can get your friend to buy a cheap diamond, attach huge sentimental value to it in thirty seconds, then buy it off him for 10,000 gp. After all, it's 'worth' that much because you're buying his love! And then you get your money back after the Resurrecting.

Curmudgeon
2010-11-16, 05:58 PM
Ranged attacks provoke attacks of opportunity, but this is specified in the Standard Actions section of the Combat chapter. Full attacks (without distinction between ranged and melee) never provoke AoOs, according to the rules.

The obvious fix: each ranged attack, regardless of action type, provokes.

Susano-wo
2010-11-16, 06:02 PM
If we actually had to keep track of equipment maintenance beyond having somebody on hand who knows how to fix stuff, then the entire D&D-playing community would have gone completely psychotic years ago, but it doesn't mean that the issue is -- or should be -- completely ignored.

And that's certainly not all the Craft skills do. All of the skills in the game can be worked into an adventure pretty easily if your DM and players are co-operating with each other.
.

I'm just saying that the craft skills are not included for this purpose. That's not why they are there. They are there to, well craft things.

You can use craft rannks in your game to 'fix' or maintain armor, but you can also say that you know the basics of maintaining your armor as part of, say armor proficiency. (and I do recall that I said I like having craft skills :smalltongue:)

lesser_minion
2010-11-16, 06:11 PM
I think you're missing the point of the thread, since this isn't about whether it'd work, but whether it's RAW. Drowning someone wouldn't heal them in any sane universe, after all.

I think this thread might be going off the rails a bit, tbh.

One of my favourite RAW absurdities is this one:

An item can be passed from one end to the other of a line instantaneously.

While the commoner railgun doesn't work -- a thrown object deals damage as an improvised ranged weapon of its size, even though it just travelled faster-than-light before being thrown, there are interesting effects -- as an example, you can implement a basic internet over the 'zombie packet relay service'.

Headers would be transmitted orally (as a free action, no less), while request and response bodies would be transmitted in writing (presumably the server maintains a number of copies of any given resource, then distributes them when requested).

Certain things wouldn't work so well -- for example, none of the websites would be able to carry any kind of user-generated content, so things like wikipedia wouldn't work, but it would still be a fun addition to a parody campaign setting.

The solution would be to impose a limit on how far a chain can pass an object.
[hr]

For a non-3e absurdity, I'm pretty sure Non-Euclidean Edition still has no rules for object hardness. This leads to hilarity such as a wizard who needs less time to tear apart a door with her bare hands than she needs to cast Knock on the same door.

(The flying rules, while bad, aren't actually quite as bad as I remember them -- even if there's no difference in how they fly, there are manoeuvrability differences, hummingbirds don't have to fly 10 feet every round, and you get a chance to recover every 500 feet you fall).

Ernir
2010-11-16, 07:05 PM
Yeah, this is getting off track. :smallannoyed:

D&D economics are a fascinating subject, but I don't think it is something that is trivial to change.


The Warblade has a similar problem. According to its description, it is proficient with all simple and martial melee weapons, making them the only class not to be proficent with slings and crossbows...
I gotta go with the "this was intended" crowd.


Take ranks in Craft (Coin Minting).
Your result is 3x the value of what you put in, so every 3sp you make only cost you 1sp. Free Money.
Don't all craft skills do that?

Anyway, professions/craft skills would require a bigger overhaul than changing a rules line.


Problem: You can make a hide check to hide behind a tower shield... which also hides the tower shield.
Solution: Rule that cover granted by your equipment does not allow you to make hide checks.
This is a common misconception; nowhere in the hide skill does it actually specify your equipment is hidden with you. Now yes, logically your equipment like your clothes would be hidden, but there's no reason something like a tower shield would be hidden as well.
I'd like more input on this one. Hide checks don't hide your equipment? If so, that's another problem. :smallconfused:


Some profit-related ones:

Problem: A Wall of Iron cast by an 11th level wizard can be sold as scrap, making about 1,000 gp in profit.
Solution: Impose a duration on the spell -- it's now protected by whatever your merchants do to protect themselves from magic-using cheats and thieves.

Problem: 10ft. poles cost more than quarterstaves and 10ft. ladders.
Solution: All ten foot poles now have hooks on the end.

Hmm. What do people say, should this belong on the list?

Esser-Z
2010-11-16, 07:10 PM
For the wall of iron...that's not a RAW glitch. That's basic logic. If I can create a permanent material with value. It makes perfect sense to be able to profit from that--no RAW issues allowed, just economic stuff and something-for-nothing, both of which are more in the realms of worldbuilding than rules.

lesser_minion
2010-11-16, 07:12 PM
Hmm. What do people say, should this belong on the list?

Both of them have been brought up repeatedly in the past, and implementing a fix is not a problem in the slightest -- the only issue is deciding what fix to implement.

The only reason I suggested gluing a hook onto the end of 10ft poles rather than lowering their cost or raising the cost of ladders is that this leaves a reason to actually buy them, rather than just using your trusty quarterstaff to achieve the exact same thing.

Although zero-cost quarterstaves are actually a problem themselves -- by RAW, that means they have no crafting time, and no materials are required. Taken to an extreme, that can be read as "you may spawn a quarterstaff at any time, as a free action".

The fix for that would be to raise the price of a quarterstaff to 1 cp, which means that they now have a crafting time, and there is actually some requirement to procure materials in order to make them.


For the wall of iron...that's not a RAW glitch. That's basic logic. If I can create a permanent material with value. It makes perfect sense to be able to profit from that--no RAW issues allowed, just economic stuff and something-for-nothing, both of which are more in the realms of worldbuilding than rules.

I certainly don't think the designers expected walls of iron to be sold for scrap when they wrote the spell, and you can double your WBL in a couple of days when you first get the spell.

Esser-Z
2010-11-16, 07:21 PM
Both of them have been brought up
Economy breakers are still a problem, and it's very fast compared with most other ways of making money without adventuring.

I certainly don't think it was intentional.

Sure, but I'd not classify it as a RAW loophole so much as abuse of a spell. It's not some sort of rules interaction that does it, it's just a use of the effect.

The spell does exactly what it's supposed to. You just happen to be able to more with that afterwards. That doesn't feel like a RAW Loophole to me, as such.

Jack_Simth
2010-11-16, 07:25 PM
You're not counterfeiting, you're crafting actual coins. It's not your fault they require less silver to make than their value.It is presumed part of the process is smelting the appropriate type of ore, which is of less value than the finished metal. You buy ore and coal from miners, smelt it into coins. You're purchasing raw materials, and putting work into making them into coins. The miners demand payment for their time, you're buying raw materials, and taking time to produce goods. Problem solved, strictly by way of fluff that's not clearly defined in the first place.

BIGMamaSloth
2010-11-16, 07:26 PM
Ilmryn about your warblade thing, its not a raw loophole its just worded poorly.

It means they can use all simple weapons ( melee and ranged ) and only melee martial weapons.

so they can use slings and crossbows just not martial ranged. :smallwink:

JaronK
2010-11-16, 07:31 PM
On the coins thing: it makes perfect sense. It's not that you're building a gold coin for less gold. It's that you're doing the job of turning raw gold ore into usable gold coins. Raw gold ore likely costs a good bit less than the pure extracted gold, and I imagine many countries would pay for the process of creating usable coinage. That's where your profit is coming from.

And yes, Warblades are intended as a melee class, so they don't get proficiency with ranged weapons (though Lesser Bracers of Archery solves this easily).

As for quarterstaffs being free: that's because they're considered to be basically a stick. You just pick one up (it has no value) and you're done. If you want a really nice one, with proper balance and all that, you have to actually work on it, add some nice leather, etc... and then you pay the masterwork cost.

JaronK

lesser_minion
2010-11-16, 07:34 PM
By the way, while I called it the zombie packet relay service, zombies don't actually work too well -- while being undead is a plus, the ability to speak is useful as well.

In case you're wondering, "talking is a free action" is not abused, if you're careful with your URI scheme -- you wouldn't have anything like the features of the real internet.


As for quarterstaffs being free: that's because they're considered to be basically a stick. You just pick one up (it has no value) and you're done. If you want a really nice one, with proper balance and all that, you have to actually work on it, add some nice leather, etc... and then you pay the masterwork cost.

I know the reasoning behind the rule -- however, not only does it seem seriously off (sticks that work as quarterstaffs at all are not common) -- but it can still be construed as a loophole.

Regardless of the quality, every actual quarterstaff appears to have, in the very least, been cut down to size and taken to a pole turner.

A stick straight off the ground is an improvised weapon, imposing a -4 penalty to attack rolls.

Myth
2010-11-16, 07:54 PM
Coins are an obvious exception guys come on. The raw materials needed to craft one gold coin is basically enough chunks of gold needed to fashion said coin. In other words, gold worth at least 1 gp.

So you'd be spending 1000 gp and a few days to craft 1000 gp. Congratulations.

Also, I'm not sure why anyone did not mention wish abuse.

Coidzor
2010-11-16, 08:02 PM
^: Another thing that comes up is that if it actually costs more, with labor, to mint the coin than the value you're creating with the coin... bad things happen to the economy if coinage is being minted at all. Then again, this might explain all of the ruins filled with coinage that are broken into so that people can have some money to spend without falling into the trap of paying to mint it themselves that caused the previous civilizations to fall.


I know the reasoning behind the rule -- however, not only does it seem seriously off (sticks that work as quarterstaffs at all are not common) -- but it can still be construed as a loophole.

Regardless of the quality, every actual quarterstaff appears to have, in the very least, been cut down to size and taken to a pole turner.

A stick straight off the ground is an improvised weapon, imposing a -4 penalty to attack rolls.

That's another bit of amusing RAW. Considering that the reason clubs are free is because they can be improvised from just about anything and yet if they were actually improvised they'd be taking the improvised weapon penalties.

Swooper
2010-11-16, 08:13 PM
Ilmryn about your warblade thing, its not a raw loophole its just worded poorly.

It means they can use all simple weapons ( melee and ranged ) and only melee martial weapons.

so they can use slings and crossbows just not martial ranged. :smallwink:
I've always read it like this, too.

Z3ro
2010-11-16, 08:24 PM
Enough D&D economics for now, I guess.



I'd like more input on this one. Hide checks don't hide your equipment? If so, that's another problem. :smallconfused:


Read the description for the hide skill. It never specifies what is actually hidden. It simply gives situations where you can hide and what penalties or bonuses you would receive. It's in the file of "so basic the rules don't cover it". The rules assume if you're hidden you're hidden, they didn't need to spell it out. Because of this, it doesn't explicitly say your gear is hidden, thus, no invisible tower shields.

Psyren
2010-11-16, 08:29 PM
Read the description for the hide skill. It never specifies what is actually hidden. It simply gives situations where you can hide and what penalties or bonuses you would receive. It's in the file of "so basic the rules don't cover it". The rules assume if you're hidden you're hidden, they didn't need to spell it out. Because of this, it doesn't explicitly say your gear is hidden, thus, no invisible tower shields.

That doesn't eliminate the new problem of detectable gear on a hidden character.

lesser_minion
2010-11-16, 08:29 PM
That's another bit of amusing RAW. Considering that the reason clubs are free is because they can be improvised from just about anything and yet if they were actually improvised they'd be taking the improvised weapon penalties.

I guess it's just a place where requiring a token investment would lead to a more sensible game -- the improvised weapon rules are there, but there's no need to use them if they also have non-improvised versions that are exactly the same thing.

As for money... that's basically a can of worms straight out of hell. Minting coins, in this case, consists of the coin being made and then having whoever backs the coin stamp a mark on it. Somebody, somewhere, has to be providing that service anyway -- in the same way that courts would keep an official set of measures if the currency was rice. As far as I'm aware, there's no reason why that would do any harm.

And note that gold, silver, and copper are all usually found as free elements, IIRC.

Personally, I just go with "magical ingredients == currency; currency == magical ingredients". This also fixes the "the magic knows what you paid for it" problem, although it could theoretically run into Gresham's Law.

JaronK
2010-11-16, 10:58 PM
^: Another thing that comes up is that if it actually costs more, with labor, to mint the coin than the value you're creating with the coin... bad things happen to the economy if coinage is being minted at all. Then again, this might explain all of the ruins filled with coinage that are broken into so that people can have some money to spend without falling into the trap of paying to mint it themselves that caused the previous civilizations to fall.

Coinage ALWAYS costs more with labor than the value of the coin itself. Minting coins is never free, after all. However, in the long term a stable economy with a unit of currency creates more value, as trade is greatly improved.

JaronK

Last Laugh
2010-11-17, 01:45 AM
Holy water and various other alchemical substances weigh less than air.

(flask weighs 1.5 lbs, holy water weighs 1.0 lbs.)

JaronK
2010-11-17, 02:25 AM
Soarwood weighs more than Darkwood (Soarwood items way 75% normal, Darkwood items weight 50% normal). Yet Soarwood is supposed to be lighter than air and ships made of the stuff can float in air... but Darkwood ones can't. WTF?

JaronK

ffone
2010-11-17, 02:58 AM
Coinage ALWAYS costs more with labor than the value of the coin itself. Minting coins is never free, after all. However, in the long term a stable economy with a unit of currency creates more value, as trade is greatly improved.

JaronK

+1. This is common misconception in RL too. Currency does not need to be cheaper to produce than its face value. Its value is in being used hundreds of times over to facilitate transactions in a manner preferable to 1. bartering 2. theft or 3. violence. Either time it's transacted, it has a value which is a small fraction of its 'face' value, and these add up.

Money is not value. Value is the stuff money is exchanged with.

Ernir
2010-11-17, 01:08 PM
Soarwood weighs more than Darkwood (Soarwood items way 75% normal, Darkwood items weight 50% normal). Yet Soarwood is supposed to be lighter than air and ships made of the stuff can float in air... but Darkwood ones can't. WTF?

JaronK
Holy water and various other alchemical substances weigh less than air.

(flask weighs 1.5 lbs, holy water weighs 1.0 lbs.)
Hah! Those are funny. :smallbiggrin:


Read the description for the hide skill. It never specifies what is actually hidden. It simply gives situations where you can hide and what penalties or bonuses you would receive. It's in the file of "so basic the rules don't cover it". The rules assume if you're hidden you're hidden, they didn't need to spell it out. Because of this, it doesn't explicitly say your gear is hidden, thus, no invisible tower shields.
That doesn't eliminate the new problem of detectable gear on a hidden character.
Psyren got what I was inferring. If the hide skill doesn't allow you to hide your equipment, you replace the Tower Shield Invisibility problem with the Invisible Man in Visible Clothing problem.

Z3ro
2010-11-17, 02:11 PM
Psyren got what I was inferring. If the hide skill doesn't allow you to hide your equipment, you replace the Tower Shield Invisibility problem with the Invisible Man in Visible Clothing problem.

That does indeed create an interesting problem. I guess Elan had it right after all.

Cogidubnus
2010-11-17, 03:51 PM
On the coins thing: it makes perfect sense. It's not that you're building a gold coin for less gold. It's that you're doing the job of turning raw gold ore into usable gold coins. Raw gold ore likely costs a good bit less than the pure extracted gold, and I imagine many countries would pay for the process of creating usable coinage. That's where your profit is coming from.
JaronK

There's only one problem with this argument. There's not a lot of gold ore around. Most gold, at least, according to my Chemistry lessons, is just gold, even the stuff under the ground.

It works with silver and copper though, mostly.

Doug Lampert
2010-11-17, 04:49 PM
Coinage ALWAYS costs more with labor than the value of the coin itself. Minting coins is never free, after all. However, in the long term a stable economy with a unit of currency creates more value, as trade is greatly improved.

JaronK

Edit: I missread JaronK and got it exactly backward. Sorry.

That said, the US government is presently minting coins that cost more to make than they are worth. So it isn't ALWAYS, it's almost always.

Look up the word Seigniorage in a good dictionary.

Seigniorage is the PROFIT made by minting coins, and is why minting is normally a government monopoly. Coins are almost always worth more than the cost of materials and labor to make them. The US penny is a serious aberation.

Aquillion
2010-11-17, 04:49 PM
That makes no sense. Why would you want to saw the ends off? The iron (or steel) caps help with the strength of the pole, right?Quarterstaves are worth nothing. Ten feet poles are worth money.

But it has to be exactly ten feet. Anything else? Doesn't count.

Hey, don't look at me like that. Those are the rules!

Actually, they aren't. I just realized that none of the ten foot pole exploits work. You can't just handwave "I do this and produce a ten-foot pole!" There are rules for crafting. If you want a ten foot pole, your materials have to be one-third the cost of a ten-foot pole... and your craft roll represents one week's work.

Yes, you have to roll.

No, you can't cut those bits off in under a week. Those are the rules. There are no rules for producing objects without using Craft.

You can't just cut a ladder or a quarterstaff into a ten-foot pole without a craft roll, no more than you could just handwave "I take my hammer and beat the ore into platemail." You gotta use the craft system if you want to craft a ten-foot pole.

And that says that it takes at least one week.

Also, while we're on the topic: Contrary to popular belief, you cannot produce quarterstaves instantly, even though they're free. In fact, you cannot craft them at all. The Craft rules say:


If the result × the DC equals the price of the item in sp, then you have completed the item. (If the result × the DC equals double or triple the price of the item in silver pieces, then you’ve completed the task in one-half or one-third of the time. Other multiples of the DC reduce the time in the same manner.)Quarterstaves cost 0. If your result is 2 or 3 times the price of the item, you complete it in the inverse of that -- 1/2 or 1/3 the time.

So let's see what happens. Since the price of our quarterstaff is zero, our result × the DC equals 0 times the price of the item. Therefore, we complete the item in a factor of the inverse of zero, or 1/0 times the time -- this number has no meaning. However, if you don't want your game to crash, you can just say that it clearly approaches infinity. Either way, your quarterstaff never gets finished, proving that it is impossible to craft quarterstaves in D&D by any means.

(This is why they are priceless, naturally.)

You can also get a cold iron quarterstaff for free, but cannot convert the cold iron into anything else. Pity.

dsmiles
2010-11-17, 05:37 PM
Page 55 in the 3.5 DMG has a table. A "blue-white, canary, pink, brown, or blue diamond" is worth "2d4 x 1000gp."

This was in response to something else, but I think it fits here. There are no rules for cutting gems, so if you cut a gem, it is apparently worth the exact same (variable) amount. I have a diamond worth 2d4 x 1000gp. I split it in two, now I have two diamonds each worth 2d4 x 1000gp? Just asking, because, if so, FREE MONEY!!!

Aquillion
2010-11-17, 05:52 PM
This was in response to something else, but I think it fits here. There are no rules for cutting gems, so if you cut a gem, it is apparently worth the exact same (variable) amount. I have a diamond worth 2d4 x 1000gp. I split it in two, now I have two diamonds each worth 2d4 x 1000gp? Just asking, because, if so, FREE MONEY!!!
No, you use the Craft rules. So the value of your diamond triples when you cut it, but you have to spend a long time cutting it (probably many, many weeks) based on how you roll and your skills.

You can also continue to cut it repeatedly forever, and its value just keeps going up.

dsmiles
2010-11-17, 05:54 PM
No, you use the Craft rules. So the value of your diamond triples when you cut it, but you have to spend a long time cutting it (probably many, many weeks) based on how you roll and your skills.

You can also continue to cut it repeatedly forever, and its value just keeps going up.

So, EVEN MORE free money than I had originally guessed?

Aquillion
2010-11-17, 06:04 PM
So, EVEN MORE free money than I had originally guessed?Well... sort of?

But it will take forever, and you could have gotten the same result by crafting... anything.

(Note: Not literally forever, unlike the quarterstaff example above.)

Coidzor
2010-11-17, 06:07 PM
That actually makes a certain amount of sense. Cutting gems well does add to their value. I believe those large diamonds become worth more once they've been cut and polished into several smaller gemstones. Going ad nauseum, of course...

dsmiles
2010-11-17, 06:09 PM
(Note: Not literally forever, unlike the quarterstaff example above.)The quarterstaff won't take forever, it will just cause a /0 error. (You know, IMPLOSION)

JaronK
2010-11-17, 06:10 PM
Going ad naeseum with the diamond cutting wouldn't work, because you pay 1/3 for raw materials for gem cutting... but the raw materials are uncut diamonds. Using cut diamonds as raw materials doesn't work.

JaronK

Sillycomic
2010-11-17, 07:14 PM
I'm not sure how the Tower Shield loophole works.

Tower Shields come with a hefty Armor Check penalty, which I assume is a game mechanic that punishes you for trying to hide with a tower shield in the first place.

Plus a tower shield is 45 pounds. Add that up with any other equipment you have means that you have encumbrance penalties on top of that.

If you want to hide after all those penalties... I guess that's up to you. It's possible.


However, I think what you are trying to say is that, because a tower shield provides you with cover and you can use cover to hide that you can then hide behind the tower shield and since it's your equipment it hides with you.

By Raw in order to hide you need cover or concealment.

Tower shield provides Cover.

From the SRD:

To determine whether your target has cover from your ranged attack, choose a corner of your square. If any line from this corner to any corner of the target’s square passes through a square or border that blocks line of effect or provides cover, or through a square occupied by a creature, the target has cover (+4 to AC).

This means according to the rules the person you are hiding from needs to see the cover in order for you to use it as cover. So... you can't hide with your shield and use it for cover at the same time.

If you hide behind your shield you have successfully hidden, but your opponent clearly sees a standing tower shield in front of him.

Endarire
2010-11-17, 07:15 PM
Get a coin, prefefably a valuable one.

Cut it in half.

Use make whole separately on each half.

You have two coins.

It works better with expensive materials, like big ol' diamonds.

Shatter the diamond into many, many pieces. On each, cast make whole.

dsmiles
2010-11-17, 07:16 PM
If you hide behind your shield you have successfully hidden, but your opponent clearly sees a standing tower shield in front of him.Unless you use Disguise to make it look like a pile of rocks. :smalltongue:

Curmudgeon
2010-11-17, 07:28 PM
Get a coin, prefefably a valuable one.
Cut it in half.
Use make whole separately on each half.
You have two coins.
No, you don't. You need to read the spell descriptions more carefully.
This spell functions like mending, except that make whole completely repairs an object made of any substance, even one with multiple breaks, to be as strong as new.
Mending repairs small breaks or tears in objects (but not warps, such as might be caused by a warp wood spell). It will weld broken metallic objects such as a ring, a chain link, a medallion, or a slender dagger, providing but one break exists. Make Whole works like Mending, except it handles multiple breaks. Mending repairs breaks, but does not replace missing materials. So Mending on a coin with a single break, and Make Whole on a coin with a single break, will function exactly the same: join the two halves together, or do nothing.

Note that half a coin is just as strong as a new whole coin, so doing nothing still satisfies the Make Whole spell description. :smallwink:

OracleofWuffing
2010-11-17, 07:29 PM
I'm not sure how the Tower Shield loophole works.

Tower Shields come with a hefty Armor Check penalty, which I assume is a game mechanic that punishes you for trying to hide with a tower shield in the first place.

Plus a tower shield is 45 pounds. Add that up with any other equipment you have means that you have encumbrance penalties on top of that.

Shield, Tower
This massive wooden shield is nearly as tall as you are. In most situations, it provides the indicated shield bonus to your AC. However, you can instead use it as total cover, though you must give up your attacks to do so.
By RAW, your attacker doesn't need to see the cover if you are using the Tower Shield method. You merely opt to use the shield as total cover, and you instantly gain the benefits of having total cover.


Hide (Dex; Armor Check Penalty)
...Total cover or total concealment usually (but not always; see Special, below) obviates the need for a Hide check, since nothing can see you anyway...
And that's why you don't need to worry about those penalties! :smallsmile:

Endarire
2010-11-17, 07:35 PM
Curmudgeon: If something is shattered, it has multiple breaks. It can be argued that half a coin is not as strong as a whole coin. There's less material, and half a coin may be more prone to breakage than a whole coin.

Semantics, I know.

Curmudgeon
2010-11-17, 07:41 PM
Curmudgeon: If something is shattered, it has multiple breaks. It can be argued that half a coin is not as strong as a whole coin. There's less material, and half a coin may be more prone to breakage than a whole coin.

Semantics, I know.
OK, I guess I screwed up using :smallwink: instead of :wink: there. The part about the strength is a(n obvious, I thought) joke. The main argument (about the spells not creating lost material) is serious.

Aquillion
2010-11-17, 07:41 PM
The quarterstaff won't take forever, it will just cause a /0 error. (You know, IMPLOSION)Yes, but that means forever, since your game will crash and your crafting project will never finish.

(Now I'm picturing amusing scenes of everyone at the table suddenly locking up and going rigidly motionless forever, or all the character sheets bursting into flame or getting sucked into a black hole that forms the instant the dice for the craft roll hit the table.)

Sillycomic
2010-11-17, 07:44 PM
Even providing total cover... the rules clearly state that the person you are hiding from needs to be able to see the thing you are getting total cover from.

Because you don't need to make a hide check doesn't mean anything. It's very easy to hide behind a huge door like shield (or pile of rocks with your awesome disguise skill) but that still means the person trying to look for you obviously sees a huge tower shield in the room.

Coidzor
2010-11-17, 07:45 PM
Yes, but that means forever, since your game will crash and your crafting project will never finish.

(Now I'm picturing amusing scenes of everyone at the table suddenly locking up and going rigidly motionless forever, or all the character sheets bursting into flame or getting sucked into a black hole that forms the instant the dice for the craft roll hit the table.)

Same ideas as the 1d2 crusader, really.

OracleofWuffing
2010-11-17, 09:29 PM
Even providing total cover... the rules clearly state that the person you are hiding from needs to be able to see the thing you are getting total cover from.

:smallconfused: No, they do not. "However, you can instead use it as total cover, though you must give up your attacks to do so." Thanks to the way that the Tower Shield entry is worded, you get total cover even if nobody's around to see you.

The line you quoted is how to determine if a target has cover from your ranged attacks. If you're using a Tower Shield for total cover, you already have total cover, so there's no reason to determine if you have cover. More or less, the tower shield rules are a specific exception to the Cover rules: otherwise, there'd be no way to get cover from a Tower Shield. At all.

Also, note that the line you quoted doesn't say that the person sees what you're getting cover from. :smallwink:


Because you don't need to make a hide check doesn't mean anything.
It means the penalties you were talking about are not a concern at all.

Galsiah
2010-11-17, 10:29 PM
On the whole quarterstaff issue, technically the quarterstaff is made instantaneously. Here's why: The issue here is by how much you beat the DC. The DC is 0. Any number times 0 is also 0, so the multiplier CANNOT be 1/0, in any instance, because 0*0=/= any number other than 0. The infinity in issue here is what is multiplied by 0 to make how much you beat the DC by. In other words, the 1/0 is what how many times you beat the DC by equals, hence your time multiplier actually is 1/infinity, which is infinitely small. Still breaks the universe, but in the opposite direction. Or maybe that's just how magic works, I dunno.

*technically x/0 is how many times you beat the DC by, with x= your result on the check

The Big Dice
2010-11-17, 10:49 PM
I just realized that none of the ten foot pole exploits work. You can't just handwave "I do this and produce a ten-foot pole!" There are rules for crafting. If you want a ten foot pole, your materials have to be one-third the cost of a ten-foot pole... and your craft roll represents one week's work.

Yes, you have to roll.

No, you can't cut those bits off in under a week. Those are the rules. There are no rules for producing objects without using Craft.
That means each coin in circulation, of every denomination, took exactly one week to make. Which just boggles the mind when you stop to think how long all those copper coins that no adventurer past 3rd level wants to even count, let alone pillage, must have taken to mint.

The Glyphstone
2010-11-17, 11:10 PM
Are we allowed to consider the Rules Compendium? It makes the Tower Shield issue even murkier by specifying that you must choose a specific facing to gain total cover along.

Sillycomic
2010-11-17, 11:15 PM
I'm going to make this as simple as possible.

Tower shield provides you with total Cover.

Total Cover says:


If you don’t have line of effect to your target he is considered to have total cover from you. You can’t make an attack against a target that has total cover.

How does this provide you with an automatic hide bonus that makes the tower shield hide with you? Raw merely states that the enemies can't make an attack against you with this total cover. (unless they're a spellcaster, in which case you just wasted a round)

It doesn't state you get an automatic hide check without all the penalties.

All enemies still see a tower shield in the room.

The best loophole you are saying is that Total Cover says that enemies can't attack you? And you want to say that this applies no matter where the enemies are in the room, how many there are and whether or not they actually see you?

Because you have a tower shield and you say, "I'm using it as total cover," that is your RAW loophole that no enemy in this particular room can then even try to attack you? (unless they're a spellcaster... ha ha, wow. Congrats. You just found a way for the ineffective fighter to be even more ineffective Good luck making your will save as the wizard plunges in to the depths of your mind and makes you cut out your own heart)

I would have to say no, simply because the Total Cover does not supersede the original Cover rules, which state the only way you are granted cover is if line of sight (or effect, or whatever) is blocked by something.

Total Cover rules do not dismiss this rule, merely adding to the rule that if you have more cover than normal you get more bonuses.

I see no loop hole here. And I see nothing in Tower Shield use or Cover rules that state otherwise.

DaedalusMkV
2010-11-17, 11:17 PM
That means each coin in circulation, of every denomination, took exactly one week to make. Which just boggles the mind when you stop to think how long all those copper coins that no adventurer past 3rd level wants to even count, let alone pillage, must have taken to mint.

Reread the Craft rules. Not only are there options for daily Craft progress, but there are also rules for what happens when you exceed the required value of the item.

It's still stupidly badly written; it takes an average highly experienced lvl 4 Smith well over a week to craft a single, basic Longsword. It requires over 15 assistants to be able to craft said sword in a day, and then he'll likely fail to finish it that day. And don't even get me started on the rediculous amount of time it takes to make Full Plate- over six months for an expert Armourcrafter (15 ranks)! Not to mention the 500GP worth of materials; that's 2500 pounds of Iron and the same in leather! Masterwork rules are even more nonsensical, since they're a flat rate; it takes about twice as long to make a Masterwork Chain Shirt as a normal one, but Full Plate only adds 10%...

OracleofWuffing
2010-11-18, 12:12 AM
I'm going to make this as simple as possible.

Tower shield provides you with total Cover.
...
It doesn't state you get an automatic hide check without all the penalties.
Hide (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/skills/hide.htm) says that if you have total cover, you don't need to make a hide check, it's obviated, you're hidden.


The best loophole you are saying is that Total Cover says that enemies can't attack you? And you want to say that this applies no matter where the enemies are in the room, how many there are and whether or not they actually see you?
The alternative is saying that I can only use a Tower Shield for total cover only when enemies are looking at me. Since the rules do not say that this is the case (they, in fact, simply say that I can use a Tower Shield as total cover with no stipulation whatsoever), yes, barring that whole Rules Compendium thing stating that it's going to be on one side. And even then, yay, I'm going to grab total cover to one whole side. Then hide.

Fun little side note here, if you say I can only use it for total cover when people are looking at me, then you can bet I'll be using it every five seconds for total cover. When I succeed in doing so, I will instantly know if anybody is trying to sneak up on me. :smallbiggrin:


Because you have a tower shield and you say, "I'm using it as total cover," that is your RAW loophole that no enemy in this particular room can then even try to attack you?
I did not say that, however, yes, the cover rules say that you cannot make an attack against a target that has total cover. On a second however, that does not require me to hide and is another matter completely. Until you apply what The Glyphstone said.


(unless they're a spellcaster... ha ha, wow. Congrats. You just found a way for the ineffective fighter to be even more ineffective Good luck making your will save as the wizard plunges in to the depths of your mind and makes you cut out your own heart)
I have no idea where you're going with this, as the topic's about RAW loopholes. Nobody's in this topic to make the ineffective fighter to look effective. In fact, I don't believe I've even used the word "fighter" in any of my posts in this topic. As a matter of fact, ignoring signatures, the only people that have mentioned fighters are you just now, and lesser_minion all the way back on page one. (And that was about a warblade who had fighter in his name.)


I would have to say no, simply because the Total Cover does not supersede the original Cover rules, which state the only way you are granted cover is if line of sight (or effect, or whatever) is blocked by something.
Total Cover is an original Cover rule, sounds like you're a bit confused. Check it out (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/combatModifiers.htm), total cover is a subsection of cover, it kinda has to supersede it by default. Besides, I was talking about the Tower Shield rule, which is clearly an exception to the Total Cover rule. Tower Shield specifically grants you Total Cover, which isn't part of the general Total Cover rules. When a specific rule conflicts with a general rule, I believe the preference is for the specific (furthermore, what source is more original when it comes to Tower Shields than the Tower Shield Description?). Otherwise, you create another loophole, and that is that the Cover rules won't allow the use of Tower Shields as any means of cover: Tower Shields are not Squares or Borders, and are usually not Creatures, thus they cannot be used to break line of effect for determining cover.

Humorously enough, this means if the target I have clear line of effect to gets any form of cover, I instantly know there's an invisible creature between us.:smallwink:

As the Tower Shield is part of your equipment, thus it is a part of you. When you're hidden and wielding it, it's hidden as well. Similarly, when a Ranger hides in natural terrain, he does not need to hide the natural terrain he's using to hide. When a Rogue hides, enemies don't see a floating full set of clothes standing there, because the Rogue's clothes are hidden with him. When a Barbarian hides, he need not worry about hiding his axe, broadsword, greatclub, or pink faerie tutu.

Finally, I'll reiterate a point here, and that's that you've yet to cite a rule which states that a creature must see the object which grants you cover.

Sillycomic
2010-11-18, 12:47 AM
I mentioned fighter because in the Tower Shield rules it says that you can still be targeted for line of effect... which means spells. So the wizard can still target you if you are using the tower shield for total cover, but the fighter can't have line of sight with you.

Which means by RAW, the wizard (any spellcaster) is allowed to see you, but the fighter (any melee class) is not. The Tower Shield Rules say that the Shield does not provide any sort of cover (and the SRD links Cover when it says this in the Tower Shield description) total or otherwise, when targeted spells are cast at you.


And I did mention the rule that says you need to see an object in front of you.

Cover says it pretty clearly.

Cover says you need a clear line of effect. If you are hiding with your tower shield, your tower shield can't provide line of effect. Why? Because your hide is better than his spot, so he doesn't spot the tower shield... meaning it can't provide you with cover.

Just like if you are hiding the enemy doesn't get a chance to spot any of your clothing, or your weapon... or any other equipment on you.

Wow. That's even better. It's not a loophole, it's a paradox. The only way to hide behind a tower shield is with total cover, however if you hide with your tower shield the enemy can't spot your tower shield, and you can't get the bonuses from hiding behind it. Interesting.

The Tower Shield simply says it provides you with Total Cover. I don't see where it says, "These rules are new rules to use instead of the original Total Cover Rules."

The SRD even links you to the page where Total Cover rules are stated when it says says, "The Tower shield instead gives you total Cover."

Hard to say that one set of rules overrides the other when the SRD is linking the rules you are saying that it is overriding.

I agree with you that Total Cover rules are more specific than the general cover rules, but I disagree that the Total Cover rules override the original Cover rules. It merely adds to them. If you have more cover than normal you get more bonuses.

Just like Soft Cover. It is merely adding more details to the Soft Cover versus Regular Cover rules.

You still need to draw your line to see whether or not the opponent can see you to see if you have normal cover, soft cover or total cover.

OracleofWuffing
2010-11-18, 01:30 AM
I mentioned fighter because in the Tower Shield rules it says that you can still be targeted for line of effect... which means spells. So the wizard can still target you if you are using the tower shield for total cover, but the fighter can't have line of sight with you.
And, yes, while that is a nice loophole, it still has no bearing on anything I said.


And I did mention the rule that says you need to see an object in front of you.
The rule you mentioned was this:


To determine whether your target has cover from your ranged attack, choose a corner of your square. If any line from this corner to any corner of the target’s square passes through a square or border that blocks line of effect or provides cover, or through a square occupied by a creature, the target has cover (+4 to AC).
Apart from the fact that you can't make a ranged attack against me because I already have total cover (thus you couldn't even use this rule in the situation you're discussing), you will notice that there is nothing in that rule saying that you see any hidden objects that I'm hiding behind. So I will reiterate the point, there isn't a rule saying you should see the tower shield.


Cover says you need a clear line of effect. If you are hiding with your tower shield, your tower shield can't provide line of effect. Why? Because your hide is better than his spot, so he doesn't spot the tower shield... meaning it can't provide you with cover.
And yet, the Tower Shield description says that I can use it to achieve total cover. I don't think the cover rules are supposed to be used to adjudicate how tower shields work, given that the rules have words for how tower shields work. (original source trumps external source, or something of that nature.)


Wow. That's even better. It's not a loophole, it's a paradox.
The two aren't necessarily mutually exclusive. :smallwink:


The Tower Shield simply says it provides you with Total Cover. I don't see where it says, "These rules are new rules to use instead of the original Total Cover Rules."
But there is no obligation for the rules to say as such.


I agree with you that Total Cover rules are more specific than the general cover rules, but I disagree that the Total Cover rules override the original Cover rules. It merely adds to them.
You see, there's something confusing about that point. If you're "adding to" existing rules, than you are overriding them: The original rule is that you don't get anything more than +4 to AC. Anything, even in addition to that, is overriding it.


You still need to draw your line to see whether or not the opponent can see you to see if you have normal cover, soft cover or total cover.
And as I've said before, you don't need to draw the lines. You only need to draw the line to determine if a target has cover from a ranged attack. If I use a tower shield for total cover, then that status is already known regardless of lines (and no ranged attacks can be made against me, making it impossible to draw those lines). Similarly, if I've casted Interposing Hand (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/interposingHand.htm), I have cover even though there is no square, border, or creature that would block line of effect as per the Cover rules.

So, yes, not only would Tower Shield not be able to provide total concealment despite the rules saying it is, but a spell whose summary is "Hand provides cover against one opponent" would be unable to provide cover against any opponent. :smallsmile:

Sillycomic
2010-11-18, 02:14 AM
The fighter/spellcaster cover thing wasn't in response to anything you or any one else said. It was simply my own thought when I read the rules. By Raw the Tower Shield only provides total cover for melee fighters, and not casters. By Raw once someone declares they are casting a spell at you, you no longer have any cover whatsoever (at least to them)

I thought it was interesting to note.

And I don't think Override means what you think it means. Override does not mean "in addition to."

Override means, "Ignore that rule cause it doesn't apply here. This one does."

In addition means, "That rule applies plus this rule applies as well."

Like if I say: You have to go to the bank. In addition you also have to get some milk.

This doesn't mean you no longer have to go to the bank. This means you need to go to the bank AND get milk.

But that's more of a semantic thing. We don't really need to get into that.


I am not sure about the rest of your argument. I clearly see the rules for Tower Shield saying that it grants you total cover, and a link to what total cover is in addition to actual cover. To me I can't interpret that as anything more than "When using this item, this rule over there applies. Go read it... it's a good rule! Don't worry, I'll wait. I have time."


Sorry, still haven't convinced me by RAW that the tower shield loophole works. Maybe it's just me and not being able to get past the whole cover thing. If it is, then so be it.

OracleofWuffing
2010-11-18, 02:39 AM
Sorry, still haven't convinced me by RAW that the tower shield loophole works. Maybe it's just me and not being able to get past the whole cover thing. If it is, then so be it.
So it be. I think we at least agree that if it doesn't work, we at least create a silly paradox. :smallsmile:

Getting away from this and on to a different loophole, Warlocks must be evil or chaotic-aligned. However, they lose nothing if their alignment changes, and aren't even prohibited from taking further levels in Warlock if they correct their alignment. a non-evil, non-chaotic Warlock can even take Prestige Classes to advance Eldritch Blast damage.

Caltrops come in 2-pound bags. It is unknown how many caltrops are in them.

On a similar note, while Quick Draw is supposed to apply only to weapons, anything can be an improvised weapon. So, Quick Draw applies to anything. I'm stopping the chain here. :smallwink:

If you noogie or dye a halfling's hair, it is no longer a halfling.

Physical Description: Halflings stand about 3 feet tall and usu- ally weigh between 30 and 35 pounds. Their skin is ruddy, their hair black and straight.
Mind you, I have no idea what race they become, but they clearly can't be halflings. :smalltongue:

ericgrau
2010-11-18, 03:17 AM
Line of effect is different from line of sight. You don't need to be able to see something to have line of effect; a straight line to it must merely exist.

As for total cover and hiding, IIRC it's mentioned in the hide rules. Total cover and total concealment remove the need for hiding because you can't be seen regardless of your check result.

I think the rules compendium rule about requiring you to specify facing for a tower shield when using it for total cover is a clarification. A tower shield provides total cover in the same way that a wall provides total cover, i.e., only to things that don't have line of effect to you.

Sillycomic
2010-11-18, 03:49 AM
I'm all for creating silly paradoxes. Seems funny. Like catching a glitch in the Matrix.

You hide behind your tower shield and all of a sudden you are like in some random parallel dimension... and Pun Pun shakes his head and starts chucking follower squirrels at you.

gorfnab
2010-11-18, 04:54 AM
Minor Creation spell + Black Lotus Extract

Lets see...
7.48 gallons in a cubic foot ~ 957 ounces = 957 vials (doses) of poison/ CL, sadly the poison only lasts 1 hour/ CL (or 2 hours/ CL if using Major Creation), however you could easily extend spell. Or just start your own assassins guild.

dsmiles
2010-11-18, 05:52 AM
(original source trumps external source, or something of that nature.)

Yeah, specific rules trump general rules. Total Cover being the general rule, and Tower Shield being the specific rule, here.

Shield, Tower
This massive wooden shield is nearly as tall as you are. In most situations, it provides the indicated shield bonus to your AC. However, you can instead use it as total cover, though you must give up your attacks to do so. The shield does not, however, provide cover against targeted spells; a spellcaster can cast a spell on you by targeting the shield you are holding. You cannot bash with a tower shield, nor can you use your shield hand for anything else.

When employing a tower shield in combat, you take a -2 penalty on attack rolls because of the shield’s encumbrance.

Total Cover
If you don’t have line of effect to your target he is considered to have total cover from you. You can’t make an attack against a target that has total cover.

Cover and Hide Checks
You can use cover to make a Hide check. Without cover, you usually need concealment to make a Hide check.

You need cover or concealment in order to attempt a Hide check. Total cover or total concealment usually (but not always; see Special, below) obviates the need for a Hide check, since nothing can see you anyway.

If people are observing you, even casually, you can’t hide. You can run around a corner or behind cover so that you’re out of sight and then hide, but the others then know at least where you went.So, a caster can still target you, unless you use your Tower Shield to make a hide check (which isn't actually a check at that point, you simply hide). Even then, if he/she/it Spots you, he/she/it can target you. To somebody in melee, you're basically invisible, unless they watch you duck behind your tower shield, then they can still figure out where you went (I imagine that they get a Spot check). Wow. Talk about a loophoole. Invisibility for 30gp.

Temotei
2010-11-18, 05:59 AM
I'm not sure if it's been mentioned, but simply resting in armor carries no penalties (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/equipment/armor.htm#sleepinginArmor). Go ahead and wear that armor all the time, since D&D characters don't need sleep.

Sillycomic
2010-11-18, 06:16 AM
Wizards require sleep, not just rest, for 8 hours.

Well, if they want to keep casting spells they require sleep. I suppose you could play a caster who doesn't sleep... or cast spells. You would be role playing your very tired commoner and saying, "It's all RAW baby!!!"

However, a wizard will hardly ever be in armor, and even then it's usually light armor. So, I guess it was pointless to bring it up.

K... nevermind then.

Curmudgeon
2010-11-18, 07:16 AM
Go ahead and wear that armor all the time, since D&D characters don't need sleep.
That depends. Do you ever want to move faster than a walk? Then you're going to need to sleep.
Hustle

A character can hustle for 1 hour without a problem. Hustling for a second hour in between sleep cycles deals 1 point of nonlethal damage, and each additional hour deals twice the damage taken during the previous hour of hustling. A character who takes any nonlethal damage from hustling becomes fatigued.

A fatigued character can’t run or charge and takes a penalty of -2 to Strength and Dexterity. Eliminating the nonlethal damage also eliminates the fatigue. Moving your speed in D&D is hustling.

panaikhan
2010-11-18, 08:41 AM
Something that has bugged me with at least one character build, maybe more.

While there are several ways to speed up drawing a weapon (either the action itself, or combining it with something else like a move), there seems to be no way to speed up sheathing a weapon.

dsmiles
2010-11-18, 09:41 AM
Moving your speed in D&D is hustling.

Only if you do something else in the same round.

Hustle
A hustle is a jog at about 6 miles per hour for an unencumbered human. A character moving his or her speed twice in a single round, or moving that speed in the same round that he or she performs a standard action or another move action is hustling when he or she moves.

MickJay
2010-11-18, 10:14 AM
It was mentioned in a different thread, but if Sleep is successfully cast on someone wearing a heavy or medium armor, then that person will be automatically fatigued the next day. After waking from the magical slumber you might take off your armor and rest/sleep in the most comfortable bed in the world for the rest of the day and night, but come tomorrow, and you're still going to be fatigued. :smallbiggrin:

Oracle_Hunter
2010-11-18, 10:30 AM
Spent a little time thinking about Craft. I don't think it causes the world to implode.

Y'see, it's not a strictly 2x Value becomes 1/2 Time; it's "double or triple equals half or a third" with other multiples behaving similarly. Now, I'm a bit rusty on my math, but how many times greater than 0 is 1? If it is 0 times greater, then the universe implodes; if it is an infinite times greater than the time it takes should approach zero.

lesser_minion
2010-11-18, 11:02 AM
Spent a little time thinking about Craft. I don't think it causes the world to implode.

Y'see, it's not a strictly 2x Value becomes 1/2 Time; it's "double or triple equals half or a third" with other multiples behaving similarly. Now, I'm a bit rusty on my math, but how many times greater than 0 is 1? If it is 0 times greater, then the universe implodes; if it is an infinite times greater than the time it takes should approach zero.

My understanding is that any number of copper pieces at all is infinitely greater than the price of the item -- as long as you can roll the craft check, you can create the item for free out of nothing. And since it takes no time whatsoever, you can try the craft check again if you fail.

In reality, quarterstaves might have been whittled from a reasonable piece of wood, but the most common setup would probably be to machine them, using the same basic method as you'd use to make ten-foot poles, hafts for hafted weapons, and polearms. Not that the rules address the need for a decently-equipped workshop in addition to your magic "artisan's toolkit".

Either way, the item is underpriced. A stick from the ground is, at best, an improvised weapon. A quarterstaff must have had some work put into it in order to get the properties the game ascribes to it, and given the setup you'd actually need, they certainly wouldn't be free.

Susano-wo
2010-11-18, 12:28 PM
I'd just like to pint out that total cover *usually* obviates the need for a hide check. IN other words, if you cannot see the person, they do not need to make a hide check, as no amount of spot can allow them to see you.

What constitutes usually is pretty much DM call. But if you can roll to spot the character behind the tower shield, then its pretty obvious that you need to roll to hide behind it. (or that the DC will be, what, 0? 0+hider's dex? since your roll is essentially 0...making it trivial to spot them.)

"aha, I use my tower shield for cover and hide without a check!"
Opponent takes 10 on spot
"yeah...I see you:smallannoyed:"

The sleep spell thing is one of my favorites...I just love the timing wording cauing effects to take place completely seperately from any sort of actual sensical framework. Reminds me of some magic: the gathering combos :smallbiggrin:)

I am a bit confused RE: crafting coins. if the coins have real value based on their weight in the metal, then while it costs more than the raw materials to make one, the raw materials should still come out to, say 1oz for a 1oz coin. But in Dnd, it comes out to 1/3oz for a 1oz coin, which is high-larious and silly.

Or am I missing something about the way coins were valued in ye olde days?

Oracle_Hunter
2010-11-18, 12:33 PM
I am a bit confused RE: crafting coins. if the coins have real value based on their weight in the metal, then while it costs more than the raw materials to make one, the raw materials should still come out to, say 1oz for a 1oz coin. But in Dnd, it comes out to 1/3oz for a 1oz coin, which is high-larious and silly.
Yep, which is why the Crafting RAW is hilarious :smallbiggrin:

It's long been noted that Craft RAW is silly, but this particular form of silliness is novel.

OracleofWuffing
2010-11-18, 12:54 PM
I'd just like to pint out that total cover *usually* obviates the need for a hide check. IN other words, if you cannot see the person, they do not need to make a hide check, as no amount of spot can allow them to see you.
Actually, the wording is "Usually (but not always; See special)" And then Special goes on to say... nothing about tower shields.


What constitutes usually is pretty much DM call.
If "It comes down to DM call" is the conclusion anyone draws, then as a topic about RAW loopholes, we've succeeded.

So... Anyone want to claim any loopholes in the Tome of Battle errata? :smalltongue:

MickJay
2010-11-18, 01:00 PM
Yep, which is why the Crafting RAW is hilarious :smallbiggrin:

It's long been noted that Craft RAW is silly, but this particular form of silliness is novel.

Or you could argue that any gold considered to be "raw material" is worth only 1/3 of a finished gold piece (even if by weight it's the same amount of gold), because of all the time and work necessary to purify, mold and mint it.

Similarly to iron ore and pig iron: a heap of ore might contain exactly the same (or perhaps even higher) amount of the metal than a formed lump of iron, but the lump of iron will be worth significantly more.

Finally, the markings on a proper coin are supposed to guarantee to whoever sees it that this coin does, in fact, have a specified gold content. This makes it a more desirable currency than supposedly golden discs manufactured by some random guy.

A couple of interesting practices used in the past: in specific circumstances that allowed such moves, rulers would recall every now and then old coins (and these would stop being an official currency) and would issue new ones - the amount of precious metal would remain the same, but people who had the old coins would only get, for example, 7 of the new ones for every 8 they brought.
Another one was issuing coins with lower precious metal content than originally, occasionally accompanied with the demand that the taxes were to be paid with the old coins.
Of course, any such moves were quite detrimental to the country's economy in the long run and were generally used only in cases of dire crisis - although there were cases where one state would mass produce counterfeit currency of another state, ruining its economy and raking in huge sums at the same time.

Aquillion
2010-11-18, 01:02 PM
Spent a little time thinking about Craft. I don't think it causes the world to implode.

Y'see, it's not a strictly 2x Value becomes 1/2 Time; it's "double or triple equals half or a third" with other multiples behaving similarly. Now, I'm a bit rusty on my math, but how many times greater than 0 is 1? If it is 0 times greater, then the universe implodes; if it is an infinite times greater than the time it takes should approach zero.It's not infinite times greater (infinity * 0 = 0). There isn't any number you can multiply 0 by to get 1; that number would be the inverse of zero, or (1/0), which is not a number.

Hence, the craft rules simply don't let you craft quarterstaves -- if you try, you get the nonsense result that it takes NAN * one week, which is NAN. You can't calculate how long it'd take to make a quarterstaff using the given rules, basically -- you get a divide-by-zero error.

Doug Lampert
2010-11-18, 01:35 PM
It's not infinite times greater (infinity * 0 = 0). There isn't any number you can multiply 0 by to get 1; that number would be the inverse of zero, or (1/0), which is not a number.

Hence, the craft rules simply don't let you craft quarterstaves -- if you try, you get the nonsense result that it takes NAN * one week, which is NAN. You can't calculate how long it'd take to make a quarterstaff using the given rules, basically -- you get a divide-by-zero error.

Speaking as a math Ph.D., infinity * 0 is undefined, not 0.

My Lebesgue Measure text include a specific statement, that for purposes of this text 0*infinity would be assumed to be 0 unless otherwise stated, but it was a specific exception and required specific mention, and even in that book formal statements of proofs NEVER simply assumed it without some basis for claiming it applied to the particular case.

In this particular case, the relevant rule is:
4.Make an appropriate Craft check representing one week’s work. If the check succeeds, multiply your check result by the DC. If the result × the DC equals the price of the item in sp, then you have completed the item.

From this we see that the item can DEFINITELY be crafted. All you need to do is roll zero on the check!

The rules go on to say that excess progress can be used to shorten the time or create multiple items, and lo! If we use those rules the time required is 0, because I need 0/X time per staff where X is the check result.

Edit: Just to clarify, if I roll EXACTLY 0 it takes one week, if I roll negative then I spend a week and make negative progress (making it harder to produce staves in the future presumably), if I roll any positive number I produce an arbitrarily large number of quarterstaffs in no time at all, or an infinite number if I actually spend a second round at it. Of course an infinite number of quarterstaffs represents an infinite amount of wood and presumably crushes anyone and everyone in the entire world as the staves fill all available space. But that's another problem.

DougL

Doug Lampert
2010-11-18, 01:40 PM
A couple of interesting practices used in the past: in specific circumstances that allowed such moves, rulers would recall every now and then old coins (and these would stop being an official currency) and would issue new ones - the amount of precious metal would remain the same, but people who had the old coins would only get, for example, 7 of the new ones for every 8 they brought.
Another one was issuing coins with lower precious metal content than originally, occasionally accompanied with the demand that the taxes were to be paid with the old coins.
Of course, any such moves were quite detrimental to the country's economy in the long run and were generally used only in cases of dire crisis - although there were cases where one state would mass produce counterfeit currency of another state, ruining its economy and raking in huge sums at the same time.

Wessex did quite well out of the periodic recall and reissue racket (I believe at 3 new coins for 4 old every 5 years). It did not ruin the economy as far as anyone knows, it paid for most of the country's cash budget, and Wessex coin is found all over northern Europe and down to the Black Sea because everyone knew it was good. It traded at a sufficient premium over metal value that turning in metal for conversion to coin was actually a good deal.

This lasted through the Norman conquest and IIRC continued up till the civil war between Stephen and Matilda.

Edit: Checking elsewhere on the net: this was established by Eadgar arround 975, and the recalls were every 3-6 years. Stephen was king from 1135–1154. So the system lasted about 170 years prior to someone screwing it up.

Skavengoblin
2010-11-18, 03:42 PM
Speaking as a math Ph.D., infinity * 0 is undefined, not 0.

My Lebesgue Measure text include a specific statement, that for purposes of this text 0*infinity would be assumed to be 0 unless otherwise stated, but it was a specific exception and required specific mention, and even in that book formal statements of proofs NEVER simply assumed it without some basis for claiming it applied to the particular case.

In this particular case, the relevant rule is:
4.Make an appropriate Craft check representing one week’s work. If the check succeeds, multiply your check result by the DC. If the result × the DC equals the price of the item in sp, then you have completed the item.

From this we see that the item can DEFINITELY be crafted. All you need to do is roll zero on the check!

The rules go on to say that excess progress can be used to shorten the time or create multiple items, and lo! If we use those rules the time required is 0, because I need 0/X time per staff where X is the check result.

Edit: Just to clarify, if I roll EXACTLY 0 it takes one week, if I roll negative then I spend a week and make negative progress (making it harder to produce staves in the future presumably), if I roll any positive number I produce an arbitrarily large number of quarterstaffs in no time at all, or an infinite number if I actually spend a second round at it. Of course an infinite number of quarterstaffs represents an infinite amount of wood and presumably crushes anyone and everyone in the entire world as the staves fill all available space. But that's another problem.

DougL

Thank you. This was seriously annoying me, so thank you for finally making sense.

If Result*DC = price, it is done. If Result*DC = 2*Price, it is done in 1/2 the time. We can continue this, but we can also simply say that : If Result*DC >= price, it is done (and possibly faster). So it can definitely be made.
But if Result*DC = X*price makes the object in 1/X the time:
Price = (Result*DC)/X or 0 = (some result)/X. There is no answer of course (undefined) for X.
Lets assume the Result*DC is constant (now represented by C), because its exact value does not matter, but will always be an exact value on any given roll.
We get Price = C/X. If we set Price to 0, we get undefined. But if we take the limit as Price approaches 0, we get that X approaches infinite.

Back to the other equation, we find that 1/X * T (for original time... a week) is how long it takes. In this, as X approaches infinite, we get that the time it takes is 0. (lim x -> 0 f(1/x) = 0)

You said it simpler... but I really wanted to address it more like a mathematical proof.


However this post was supposed to be used to find these rules AND find a simple fix for them. In this case, they could do several things: A.) make them cost 1 cp B.) say you must pay 1/3 the cost +1 GP, C.) clarify that using the craft skill takes at least one full round action.

On another problem: they could fix the craft(Minting) problem with this:
You cannot create any trade good using the craft skill.
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/equipment/wealthAndMoney.htm#
At the bottom you will see that most items are sold for 1/2 their price. While you only pay 1/3 the price in raw material for most items, and so are still making a profit, the profit margin is much less ridiculous.
So if we use this rule you cannot craft gems if they are trade goods, or if you rule they are not trade goods, you can only sell them for 1/2 their price (which would stink). This dramatically cuts down on the crazy profit. You would also want to rule that coins are trade goods of course... they are the currency after all.

Also, with "lighter then air" ingredients: Oil (1-pint flask) weighs 1 pounds, a flask weighs 1.5 pounds. Not just magical stuff is lighter then air, but oil is as well. So maybe those other things are simply oil-based. :smalltongue:

Also something odd: for manacles, here's what SRD says for odd sized manacles
"For a Large creature, manacles cost ten times the indicated amount, and for a Huge creature, one hundred times this amount. Gargantuan, Colossal, Tiny, Diminutive, and Fine creatures can be held only by specially made manacles."
Your telling me that they have manacles for creatures the size of an elephant, but you have to get one 'specially made' for an Imp? Maybe its just me, but I'm pretty sure that "handcuffing" an imp would be much more common then 'handcuffing' a HUGE sized creature.

Susano-wo
2010-11-18, 05:40 PM
Actually, the wording is "Usually (but not always; See special)" And then Special goes on to say... nothing about tower shields.


Yeah, it doesn't actually any exceptions below. All it talks about are case where you get stupid hide bonuses, etc. The fact remains that usually it obviates the need, not always. which brings me too...



If "It comes down to DM call" is the conclusion anyone draws, then as a topic about RAW loopholes, we've succeeded.

So... Anyone want to claim any loopholes in the Tome of Battle errata? :smalltongue:

Not actually. IF it comes down to "DM will rule otherwise," then yes. But if DM has to make a call for anything to happen (or not happen), then its a RAW loophole failure, because it doesn't function by RAW. There can be no pure RAW functioning of it, since it requires a DM to rule. These are two different types of DM interventions, and its a difference that people often get hung up on, when trying to prove RAW. :smallamused:

To put it more simply[hopefully]: not everything has a RAW ruling, since some things simply aren't covered, or some RAW specifies/requires DM adjudication (contact other plane, anyone?). So anything that cannot be ruled with just RAW cannot be a RAW loophole:smalltongue:


@doug: actually, you make the checks every day, right? so you can only make however many indicated by your check every day, regardless of how much time you spend on it:smallbiggrin:

OracleofWuffing
2010-11-18, 09:33 PM
To put it more simply[hopefully]: not everything has a RAW ruling, since some things simply aren't covered, or some RAW specifies/requires DM adjudication (contact other plane, anyone?).
But this one does have a RAW ruling: particularly, it works more often than not. :smallwink:

Skavengoblin
2010-11-19, 03:28 AM
Something funny about the tower shield dilema. In the session BEFORE reading this thread, I had the adventurers come across a tower shield standing upright in the middle of the road. Luckily (kinda) they noticed one of the hobgoblins hiding off to one side, and after shooting at him, the orc hiding behind the tower shield then popped out to shoot at them. This makes sense to me... why couldn't you use a shield to hide? OF COURSE people would see the tower shield... but would they have any idea why it was there? Probably not. Many people (especially PCs) are not afraid of the strange or unknown. Rather, many feel a need to discover the 'whys' behind it... even taking a step back would produce a lot of bad 'why answers' and few, if any, good 'why answers'.

As for the actual dilema being a loophole, I would say you can't say it is. There are no rules at all about equipment hiding or using cover. The only thing i can see is that because nowhere does it explicitly say that your shirt gets total cover from the tower shield, and since it does not get cover via the normal way (no line of site/effect), you could argue your shirt is still out in the open, ready to be the target of an arrow or what have you.

Sillycomic
2010-11-19, 05:01 AM
I guess if we are going for the absurdities of RAW, nowhere in the Hide check description does it say that your clothes/equipment are also hidden.

It's also interesting to point out that the effect of being invisible at no point in time says that any gear you are carrying is also invisible...

The best it says is this:

If an invisible character picks up a visible object, the object remains visible. One could coat an invisible object with flour to at least keep track of its position (until the flour fell off or blew away). An invisible creature can pick up a small visible item and hide it on his person (tucked in a pocket or behind a cloak) and render it effectively invisible.

However, if you are completely visible and put an item behind your cloak or in your pocket, it also would be effective invisible, wouldn't it? So... that doesn't help.


But the invisibility spell does say that your equipment and gear become invisible when you do. Weird how the spell would make such a distinction and not the special ability.

Heliomance
2010-11-19, 05:24 AM
It's not infinite times greater (infinity * 0 = 0). There isn't any number you can multiply 0 by to get 1; that number would be the inverse of zero, or (1/0), which is not a number.

Hence, the craft rules simply don't let you craft quarterstaves -- if you try, you get the nonsense result that it takes NAN * one week, which is NAN. You can't calculate how long it'd take to make a quarterstaff using the given rules, basically -- you get a divide-by-zero error.

Actually, infinity*0 does not equal zero. It's undefined. In the limit as f tends to infinity and g tends to 0, f*g could be anything. As an example, consider the behaviour of sin(x)*(1/x) as x tends to zero. Sin(0)=0, and to most intents and purposes, 1/0=infinity. However, the limit of sin(x)*(1/x) as x tends to 0 is in fact 1.

dsmiles
2010-11-19, 05:41 AM
and to most intents and purposes, 1/0=infinity. However, the limit of sin(x)*(1/x) as x tends to 0 is in fact 1.

1/0 does not equ-
http://komplexify.com/images/2010/Divide-by-zero-5.jpg

Heliomance
2010-11-19, 05:45 AM
1/0 does not equ-


I admit, it would be more accurate to say that 1/x tends to infinity as x tends to 0, but for our purposes it pretty much comes to the same thing.

MickJay
2010-11-19, 09:54 AM
Wessex did quite well out of the periodic recall and reissue racket (I believe at 3 new coins for 4 old every 5 years). It did not ruin the economy as far as anyone knows, it paid for most of the country's cash budget, and Wessex coin is found all over northern Europe and down to the Black Sea because everyone knew it was good. It traded at a sufficient premium over metal value that turning in metal for conversion to coin was actually a good deal.

This lasted through the Norman conquest and IIRC continued up till the civil war between Stephen and Matilda.

Edit: Checking elsewhere on the net: this was established by Eadgar arround 975, and the recalls were every 3-6 years. Stephen was king from 1135–1154. So the system lasted about 170 years prior to someone screwing it up.

Thanks for this example, I was thinking of a later period in Central Europe when I was writing my post. I should have also been clearer, the "screwing up the economy" was to refer only to lowering the precious metal content in coins - re-issuing coins was indeed more of a form of taxation.

dspeyer
2010-11-20, 12:08 AM
Nowhere are the base materials or craft DCs for coins given. Presumably the materials are a lump of lead and either a sliver of basilisk eyelid or a high-energy neutron source. The craft dc should be around 200 or so.

You could make gold coins from gold much more easily, just as you can make a chair from an Ikea kit much more easily than from raw wood. Sadly RAW provides no explicit mechanism for this. The tone vaguely encourages DMs to handwave as needed.

absolmorph
2010-11-20, 06:21 AM
Reread the Craft rules. Not only are there options for daily Craft progress, but there are also rules for what happens when you exceed the required value of the item.

It's still stupidly badly written; it takes an average highly experienced lvl 4 Smith well over a week to craft a single, basic Longsword. It requires over 15 assistants to be able to craft said sword in a day, and then he'll likely fail to finish it that day. And don't even get me started on the rediculous amount of time it takes to make Full Plate- over six months for an expert Armourcrafter (15 ranks)! Not to mention the 500GP worth of materials; that's 2500 pounds of Iron and the same in leather! Masterwork rules are even more nonsensical, since they're a flat rate; it takes about twice as long to make a Masterwork Chain Shirt as a normal one, but Full Plate only adds 10%...
You are aware that most smiths had a lot of assistants, right?
Right?
And that full plate was used primarily (almost exclusively, if I remember my history correctly) by the upper classes because it was incredibly hard to make? It has to have a good mixture of protection and mobility. The joints have to be able to move without ignoring protecting them. Chain mail was typically worn underneath (as part of the armor). Padded armor was worn under THAT. So, crafting full plate is actually crafting padded armor, chain mail and the metal shell.

dsmiles
2010-11-20, 08:22 AM
You are aware that most smiths had a lot of assistants, right?
Right?
And that full plate was used primarily (almost exclusively, if I remember my history correctly) by the upper classes because it was incredibly hard to make? It has to have a good mixture of protection and mobility. The joints have to be able to move without ignoring protecting them. Chain mail was typically worn underneath (as part of the armor). Padded armor was worn under THAT. So, crafting full plate is actually crafting padded armor, chain mail and the metal shell.

...and tailoring it to the individual. Plate armor was fitted exactly to the individual who would be wearing it.

PairO'Dice Lost
2010-11-20, 12:59 PM
You are aware that most smiths had a lot of assistants, right?
Right?
And that full plate was used primarily (almost exclusively, if I remember my history correctly) by the upper classes because it was incredibly hard to make? It has to have a good mixture of protection and mobility. The joints have to be able to move without ignoring protecting them. Chain mail was typically worn underneath (as part of the armor). Padded armor was worn under THAT. So, crafting full plate is actually crafting padded armor, chain mail and the metal shell.

The problem is that level 5-7 maps to the peak of RL human ability in terms of skills. Someone with 15 ranks in Craft: Armorsmithing is 12th level and should be like unto the God of Armorsmithing. A 1st-level smith should be working with dozens of assistants and taking months to make full plate with them, a 4th-level smith should be working with maybe one apprentice and making full plate in a month or so, and a 7th-level smith should be able to make full plate by himself in a week.

That, and with the game timescales as they are, (A) you can't make anything of substance during most adventures and (B) it's a lot faster to enchant things rather than make them yourself, so a suit of +1 full plate takes months to make and a day to enchant. Crafting is screwed up all sorts of ways from a verisimilitude standpoint.

Z3ro
2010-11-20, 01:14 PM
The problem is that level 5-7 maps to the peak of RL human ability in terms of skills. Someone with 15 ranks in Craft: Armorsmithing is 12th level and should be like unto the God of Armorsmithing. A 1st-level smith should be working with dozens of assistants and taking months to make full plate with them, a 4th-level smith should be working with maybe one apprentice and making full plate in a month or so, and a 7th-level smith should be able to make full plate by himself in a week.

That, and with the game timescales as they are, (A) you can't make anything of substance during most adventures and (B) it's a lot faster to enchant things rather than make them yourself, so a suit of +1 full plate takes months to make and a day to enchant. Crafting is screwed up all sorts of ways from a verisimilitude standpoint.

Level 5-7 does not map the peak of human ability. D&D as a whole is terrible for simulating realty; as a result, the peak of human ability is where ever the DM wants it.

As for your objections, (A) why are you making things instead of killing other things and taking their stuff? If you really are interested in the crafting aspect there are better games you could be playing besides D&D and (B) They're totally different things; masterwork armor is the peak of crafting ability, while a +1 enchantment is the bare minimum. Why shouldn't it take less time?

PairO'Dice Lost
2010-11-20, 01:31 PM
Level 5-7 does not map the peak of human ability. D&D as a whole is terrible for simulating realty; as a result, the peak of human ability is where ever the DM wants it.

It does (http://www.thealexandrian.net/creations/misc/d&d-calibrating.html) indeed (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=5106320&postcount=14). Neither of those is perfectly accurate (the Alexandrian makes a few errors in places), but somewhere between 5th and 10th level, you leave real-world reality behind.


As for your objections, (A) why are you making things instead of killing other things and taking their stuff? If you really are interested in the crafting aspect there are better games you could be playing besides D&D

If your fighter 6 with a blacksmith background wants to make himself a suit of full plate, he should be able to do so. Crafting adds options, and they should try to be as convenient and "realistic" as possible.


and (B) They're totally different things; masterwork armor is the peak of crafting ability, while a +1 enchantment is the bare minimum. Why shouldn't it take less time?

Because they do the same thing. Masterwork armor is the peak of human crafting; magic armor is supernaturally strong and protective. If you can wave your hands and make armor better than the best blacksmiths, who would bother? Yes, armor has to be masterwork to be enchanted, but by the time you can make mid-grade magical armor armor you can simply fabricate several suits of masterwork armor instantly, and the fact that you can buy +3 armor means that getting masterwork armor is trivial. Why include rules for doing it the mundane way if no PC is ever going to use them?

Z3ro
2010-11-20, 01:40 PM
It does (http://www.thealexandrian.net/creations/misc/d&d-calibrating.html) indeed (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=5106320&postcount=14). Neither of those is perfectly accurate (the Alexandrian makes a few errors in places), but somewhere between 5th and 10th level, you leave real-world reality behind.
I'm familiar with both of those and I don't wish to derail this thread again but just let me say; the difference between the basic human ability (level 1) and the peak (level 5) is not 20% (the difference in skill ranks between the two). The real issue is not that characters in D&D can do things regular people can't; they can. The issue is that D&D characters do not do things the way regular people do (even at level 1)




If your fighter 6 with a blacksmith background wants to make himself a suit of full plate, he should be able to do so. Crafting adds options, and they should try to be as convenient and "realistic" as possible.
At level 6 why are you crafting armor? Just buy some. You seriously expect to be able to make a suit of plate armor by yorself in one day and complain that the crafting rules aren't realistic?



Because they do the same thing. Masterwork armor is the peak of human crafting; magic armor is supernaturally strong and protective. If you can wave your hands and make armor better than the best blacksmiths, who would bother? Yes, armor has to be masterwork to be enchanted, but by the time you can make mid-grade magical armor armor you can simply fabricate several suits of masterwork armor instantly, and the fact that you can buy +3 armor means that getting masterwork armor is trivial. Why include rules for doing it the mundane way if no PC is ever going to use them?

Yeah, that's the point. Magic in the game makes many things pointless.

PairO'Dice Lost
2010-11-20, 01:53 PM
I'm familiar with both of those and I don't wish to derail this thread again but just let me say; the difference between the basic human ability (level 1) and the peak (level 5) is not 20% (the difference in skill ranks between the two).

In fact, 4 ranks can make a big difference. There are things (such as, say, DC 25 tasks) that level 1 characters with their 4 ranks can never accomplish that level 5 characters with their 8 ranks can accomplish 20% of the time.


The real issue is not that characters in D&D can do things regular people can't; they can. The issue is that D&D characters do not do things the way regular people do (even at level 1)

D&D characters are superhuman by real-life standards and do things differently from how it works in real-life, and then someone says "You shouldn't be able to [do X] because in real life [Y and Z]." You can't have it both ways.


At level 6 why are you crafting armor? Just buy some. You seriously expect to be able to make a suit of plate armor by yorself in one day and complain that the crafting rules aren't realistic?

I expect that, should a fighter at the peak of RL human blacksmithing training be unable to find a suit of full plate because it takes a dozen 1st-level NPCs 6 months to do it, he should be able to craft it himself.


Yeah, that's the point. Magic in the game makes many things pointless.

It makes most skill-based things pointless; that doesn't mean you shouldn't be able to do things with skills.

Z3ro
2010-11-20, 02:16 PM
In fact, 4 ranks can make a big difference. There are things (such as, say, DC 25 tasks) that level 1 characters with their 4 ranks can never accomplish that level 5 characters with their 8 ranks can accomplish 20% of the time.
So the difference between difficult and impossible tasks is 25%?


D&D characters are superhuman by real-life standards and do things differently from how it works in real-life, and then someone says "You shouldn't be able to [do X] because in real life [Y and Z]." You can't have it both ways.
I didn't ask for it both ways. This is a RAW thread.


I expect that, should a fighter at the peak of RL human blacksmithing training be unable to find a suit of full plate because it takes a dozen 1st-level NPCs 6 months to do it, he should be able to craft it himself.
Sadly, he cannot.


It makes most skill-based things pointless; that doesn't mean you shouldn't be able to do things with skills.
I actually agree with this (though I do think crafting is not one of those; players should craft less, not more). Sadly, again, that's the system D&D selected.

PairO'Dice Lost
2010-11-20, 02:22 PM
So the difference between difficult and impossible tasks is 25%?

If you go by the table of DCs, yes. They go up in 5-point increments, so there are cases where there's a one-level difference between "can do this taking 20" and "can't do this."

Susano-wo
2010-11-20, 03:11 PM
I just gotta say: players should craft as much or as little as they damned want:smallamused:

Really, whether the crafting system if good or bad, saying that its fine because players shouldn't be crafting is....can't think of a diplomatic word.

The players should have he options to play their characters. If that means that they are crafting armor, then that's what it means. You can either A: have a system that works well for it, or B: have no system at all, saying that the GM and player should just work it out, its not something that is important to the system, and so there are no rules for it.

Don't make a nonfunctional/poorly functioning system and say: well, why are you using it?:smallamused:

MickJay
2010-11-20, 09:55 PM
Consider this one: a pixie is a small sized creature, assuming a leather armor +2 on a standard issue pixie, it will have AC of 20, and an attack bonus of 5 with, say, a short sword.

A human fighter with Improved Disarm, a two-handed sword and an attack bonus of 5 will have 75% chance of missing it, or 25% probability of hitting the pixie.

If he tries to disarm it, though, he'd have the total bonus of 21, versus pixie's 5 (two handed weapon versus light weapon, plus one size category, plus ID feat). He's now got an 80% chance of swinging his two-handed sword to remove the tiny weapon from the pixie's hand, even though he'd have a hard time trying to hit the whole creature.

Runestar
2010-11-21, 05:57 AM
Personally I would use the ability to craft a life-sized replica of the Deathstar, and use my oddly innate proficiency to blow stuff up with it. Doesn't that exceed the weight limit, you ask? Not when there isn't any gravity, it doesn't :P

You are thinking too hard. Simply use shadow gossamer to create alchemist fires which deal 1000000d6 damage (using the epic alchemy use in ELH). :smallcool:

lesser_minion
2010-11-21, 08:31 AM
Actually, Weightlessness is not zero gravity -- it's usually caused by you falling with the same acceleration as your surroundings -- i.e. you still have weight, you just don't notice.

Even without that, the Death Star is also affected by its own gravity.

In other words, the Death Star exceeds the weight limit, no matter how you try to look at it.

Heliomance
2010-11-21, 01:22 PM
Nope, weight is a function of the local gravitational field. When the local gravitational field is zero, your weight is also zero.

The Death Star being affected by its own gravitational field is valid, however.

Skavengoblin
2010-11-22, 06:38 PM
Consider this one: a pixie is a small sized creature, assuming a leather armor +2 on a standard issue pixie, it will have AC of 20, and an attack bonus of 5 with, say, a short sword.

A human fighter with Improved Disarm, a two-handed sword and an attack bonus of 5 will have 75% chance of missing it, or 25% probability of hitting the pixie.

If he tries to disarm it, though, he'd have the total bonus of 21, versus pixie's 5 (two handed weapon versus light weapon, plus one size category, plus ID feat). He's now got an 80% chance of swinging his two-handed sword to remove the tiny weapon from the pixie's hand, even though he'd have a hard time trying to hit the whole creature.

Maybe this represents that you swinging your sword creates enough wind to disarm the pixie... ? You miss by a mile, but the wind you create with your mighty swing takes the sword right out of it's little hands. ... ...

I found another one. It uses the cleric spell "Brain Spider" (added w/ Psionics). Its material component is: "A spider of any size or kind. It can be dead, but must still have all eight legs."
As for what happens to a material component: "A material component is one or more physical substances or objects that are annihilated by the spell energies in the casting process."
Advanced Collosal Monstrous Spider (60HD) CR: 18. Avg HP: over 300.
Now yes, it IS a level 8 spell... you could kill this spider with other level 8 spells I'm sure... but still.

amaranth69
2010-11-22, 08:21 PM
You're not counterfeiting, you're crafting actual coins. It's not your fault they require less silver to make than their value.

The fact that you are not making coins for any particular civilization makes it counterfeiting. Coins are not made to be worth the price of the content of said coin, otherwise there would be no point in using it for currency.

MickJay
2010-11-23, 06:28 AM
The fact that you are not making coins for any particular civilization makes it counterfeiting. Coins are not made to be worth the price of the content of said coin, otherwise there would be no point in using it for currency.

You make counterfeit money only if you're putting on them symbols of an existing authority (especially one that's already issuing its own money). Coins made of gold, silver, copper etc. had the stamp on them for two main purposes: to assure the owner of authenticity (purity and size) of the coin, and to serve as propaganda of the ruler; they were supposed to contain exactly the amount of precious metal they "said" they were worth. One silver drachma (coin) weighted exactly one drachma (measure of weight), and had appropriately high purity. One golden coin of a specified type (e.g. florin) could be cut into 18 pieces, but these would still be worth the same as the whole coin, because at the end of the day it was the weight of the gold that mattered in transactions, not form in which it came.

The purpose of currency is to facilitate trade, and the government easily profits from taxes and tariffs on that. Before the advent of paper money, the only significant profit made from issuing currency alone could be achieved by debasing coinage. The increased number of coins in circulation (and the affirmation of the authority of those whose markings, names and slogans were carried on them) were the point of minting money.

JaronK
2010-11-23, 06:48 AM
Still, that's a point: the 1/3 cost = 1 result thing could be two things. It could either be getting paid for the result of making coinage (possibly by being charged a discounted price on raw materials under the agreement of making official coinage, combined with the coins being worth a bit more than the raw material they're made of). Or it could be making counterfit coin, in which case the 1/3 cost is because you're actually making gold coins with less valuable materials on the inside (consider a few ranks in forgery!). Either way, this makes enough logical sense that it's not much of a loophole.

JaronK

zmasterofjersey
2010-11-23, 07:05 AM
My comment was more in terms of overall than just the money rules, my assumption that if you stuck to that level of detail on the money you'd stick to that level of detail on everything.



In my games? Yes. It depends on what you interprit "500gp" of diamonds to be. Is it the value or the amount? In most of my sessions we go with the amount. It's nonsensical for a tiny diamond to power a spell if you're overcharged for it, while a giant diamond doesn't work if you get it for a discount. And how do you value things you don't pay for (like loot)?

You can't tell me you've never gone to a shop and haggled prices. If you've done that, you assume a non-intrinsic value as well.

This comic comes to mind. (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0677.html)

hewhosaysfish
2010-11-23, 08:32 AM
Here's a variation on the tune of 'item and raw material prices':

A 12.5 lb mithral chain shirt costs 1025gp. (25 because its a chain shirt, plus 1000 because it's light mithral armour)
A 12.5lb mithral block (for example, small plinth) costs 6250+gp or just over 6 times as much. (The price of the regular object plus 500x12.5gp for being made of mithral )

Oracle_Hunter
2010-11-23, 11:00 AM
Still, that's a point: the 1/3 cost = 1 result thing could be two things. It could either be getting paid for the result of making coinage (possibly by being charged a discounted price on raw materials under the agreement of making official coinage, combined with the coins being worth a bit more than the raw material they're made of). Or it could be making counterfit coin, in which case the 1/3 cost is because you're actually making gold coins with less valuable materials on the inside (consider a few ranks in forgery!). Either way, this makes enough logical sense that it's not much of a loophole.
So... when you use Craft to make, say, a Crossbow, are you making a counterfeit Crossbow or is someone subsudizing them? :smallconfused:

The whole problem with Crafting Coins is that there is no particular reason why Craft should work differently for coins rather than, say, golden idols or crossbows. It certainly isn't in the RAW, and even by RAI it starts creating more problems than it solves.

For example:
If your coins are "forgery" does this mean you can use Craft to make counterfeits without using the Forgery skill? How good a forgery is it? Does this mean it's actually easier to forge hard money (since practically everyone has Craft as a class skill) than it is to forge paper (which requires Forgery as a trained skill?).

Likewise, if 1 gold piece is not actually worth 1 GP except via fiat, then what's the discount rate between Atlantian Coins and modern coins? Do the Elven Kingdom and the Human Kingdom agree to fix their independently minted coins at 1 GP value despite only having 1/3 GP of gold in it?
Craft (Coins) is a perfect example of the unpleasant RAW loophole - you can't just handwave it away with "obviously the rules meant X" as you can with, say, Drown Healing. Aside from simply saying "you can't take Craft (Coin)" there's not self-consistent way to resolve the issue without spinning out a series of other loosely-related issues. Of course, fiating away Craft (Coin) raises the issue of "how does anyone make coins then" which - considering you can use Craft to make anything from traps to explosives - becomes awkward.

To pay lip service to the OP, the "easy" solution is to nuke Craft from orbit or make an exception to the rules for Crafting currency. Gemstones, at least, are made valuable due to skilled cutting; D&D assumes that currency like GP is inherently valuable and therefore perfectly fungible.

Susano-wo
2010-11-23, 02:15 PM
I would say the easy solution to craft is to either, Exterminatus, as Oracle recomentds, or simply remove raw from it. Work with the GM to come up with how much raw material you need based on what it is, and how much you want to get into the nitty gritty of it, then assign a DC based on difficulty of the craft.
This may or may not be profitable. The point of craft, I think, is to be able to craft, not to be able to make money at it. (of course, others may feel differently)

JaronK
2010-11-23, 02:59 PM
So... when you use Craft to make, say, a Crossbow, are you making a counterfeit Crossbow or is someone subsudizing them? :smallconfused:

No, you are making them for a different sort of market. In case you're wondering, if you make something with Craft: Baking, that's a different sort of market too. Crossbows don't have to deal with product spoiling (if you fail to cast Gentle Repose) despite the fact that baking products do, and coins don't deal with that either. Neither baking nor crossbows need to be either counterfeit or sold to the government of the appropriate area first.


The whole problem with Crafting Coins is that there is no particular reason why Craft should work differently for coins rather than, say, golden idols or crossbows. It certainly isn't in the RAW, and even by RAI it starts creating more problems than it solves.

Should baking work the same as crossbows, where if you make a lot of product and sell it three months later that's perfectly fine?


For example:
If your coins are "forgery" does this mean you can use Craft to make counterfeits without using the Forgery skill? How good a forgery is it? Does this mean it's actually easier to forge hard money (since practically everyone has Craft as a class skill) than it is to forge paper (which requires Forgery as a trained skill?).

I said one option is counterfitting, while another is the government you're making the coins for paying you to make the coins (I know, it's very different and strange for someone to pay you for your services). I also said I imagined counterfit coins would require some amount of forgery... the obvious amount required would be "enough that most people looking at it wouldn't notice" which is about 6 ranks if you take 10, have a +3 Int mod, and use a masterwork tool.


Likewise, if 1 gold piece is not actually worth 1 GP except via fiat, then what's the discount rate between Atlantian Coins and modern coins?

Good question. Perhaps you should look up how real coins worked, some of which indeed were worth more than their metal composition. Use that information to make your game world more realistic. How much is a piece of 8 compared to modern quarters? Quite a lot, in fact. But that's really a campaign specific question, isn't it?


Do the Elven Kingdom and the Human Kingdom agree to fix their independently minted coins at 1 GP value despite only having 1/3 GP of gold in it?

That too sounds like a campaign specific question. Normally, we'd assume every 1gp coin is worth 1gp, because this is a world where 1gp has magical effects (it determines spell component needs) so I guess gps have to be standardized in general.


Craft (Coins) is a perfect example of the unpleasant RAW loophole - you can't just handwave it away with "obviously the rules meant X" as you can with, say, Drown Healing. Aside from simply saying "you can't take Craft (Coin)" there's not self-consistent way to resolve the issue without spinning out a series of other loosely-related issues. Of course, fiating away Craft (Coin) raises the issue of "how does anyone make coins then" which - considering you can use Craft to make anything from traps to explosives - becomes awkward.

To pay lip service to the OP, the "easy" solution is to nuke Craft from orbit or make an exception to the rules for Crafting currency. Gemstones, at least, are made valuable due to skilled cutting; D&D assumes that currency like GP is inherently valuable and therefore perfectly fungible.

I'm not seeing the problem. You've got three perfectly viable explanations here.

First, that countries pay people to correctly turn gold into coins, and pay them the normal going rate (which is about 2/3 above the raw materials cost... since that's static across all industries, if they were to pay any less then people wouldn't want to make coins and would instead make, let's say, crossbows). This is not shocking at all. Coins wouldn't get made unless people did this. Coin makers have to eat too, after all.

Second, that coins are actually valued a bit above their raw materials cost, because a coin is worth more to traders than a lump of gold, being easier to move and work with. If you tried to barter today by giving people the value in trade goods of what they're trying to sell, they'd likely want more than the normal price, since trade goods are harder to move than money. You pay me in bolts of silk instead of 100 dollars, and I'm going to ask for significantly more than 100 dollars worth of bolts of silk, because I would have a tough time selling those bolts of silk. This can be combined with reason 1.

And finally, you could just counterfeit the stuff. This probably takes an appropriate forgery check in addition to the craft check, just like building a castle requires a Knowledge Architecture check to get the plans right before you start making the actual building craft checks. But you wouldn't need to go right to the government this way, which is probably useful if you're a fugitive or something. Plus, you might just destabilize the economy.

JaronK