Enchanting magic weapons and ammunition

[Goonthegoof]

I have a question: Could you buy/enchant individual arrows if you only wanted a few with a certain bonus? Say I wanted 5 +1 dragonbane arrows, could I purchase 5 for 400 gold or enchant 5 for 200 gold and 16 xp?

What I'm really leading up to is this: I really like Raptor Arrow relic (p56 MIC) and am wondering how much it would cost per arrow to add the splitting property.

[Kuma Kode]

Since the price is for 50, I would just divide by 50 to find the price per arrow. So long as you don't round down, that sounds fine.

[Curmudgeon]

Yes, you can create as few as 1 piece of ammunition with Craft Magic Arms and Armor. Whether your DM will make smaller lots of magic ammunition available for your character to buy is another matter.

Also how (or if) splitting would allow a Raptor Arrow to return to the bow is up to your individual DM. Note that you can only make use of 1 Raptor Arrow at a time, as it restrings itself on your bow at the beginning of the next round. Having two arrows strung on most bows prevents normal operation.

[Goonthegoof]

So since splitting creation cost is 18000 (not sure how to add +3 to raptor arrows) I could add it at a cost of 360 per arrow? *unsure*

Also I'd imagine since stringing an arrow is a free action unstringing it is too.

[Escheton]

Yeah...ya can't make relics. Nor could you make artifacts.

Upgrading one you come across is another thing.

[Goonthegoof]

Then what does the Sanctify Relic feat do? Because it seems to be listed in all those bits that say 'cost to create'.

[Fizban]

I'm pretty sure the Raptor Arrows are priced as normal weapons, not ammunition. So if you want to pump them up, it's going to cost you.

[Escheton]

yeah, good point. I wonder myself. I just went with the lore stating that it didn't become a relic item(with the relic power to go with it) untill a God used it.
Not being a God makes it hard to make one yourself, I figured.

[Goonthegoof]

Actually I looked through pretty thoroughly and I'm pretty sure they count as ammunition for pricing- In the creation part it says 6gp for a masterwork arrow. If it weren't priced as a single arrow that would be 300gp.

[Fizban]

Gut reaction: magic doesn't care about mundane pricing.

Edit: so, looked up the price on the raptor arrows. If they're priced as ammunition, then a standard 50 pack is an epic item. I do not think this is the intent. I think it is fairly obvious the pricing is a +1 returning weapon with a 2,000gp discount for the alignment restriction.

[Goonthegoof]

Except it does. The cost for enchanting a stack of 50 arrows is 300 gold+enchantment. Logically if each one was priced as a normal weapon it'd cost 300 gold, since that's the price for a masterwork weapon.

[Fizban]

Pricing for magic items frankly just doesn't care about the mundane cost. You don't see the price of the mundane amulet that goes into an Amulet of Heartseeking, for example. Just because you only need one arrow to enchant doesn't mean that it uses the ammunition pricing guidelines. Those are meant specifically for batches of 50 that are permanently expended when used*, and the whole point of the Raptor Arrows is that they are not expended when used. I just don't see how this is even an argument, other than trying to get a magic item at 1/50 standard cost. Argue the magnitude of the price break for alignment restriction or the added cost of relic potential, sure, but it's a permanent item which should obviously follow permanent item rules.

*Bonus commentary: magic ammo costs full permanent item price for 50 shots, while wondrous items that default to at-will or permanent are half price when made with 50 charges. Magic ammo should actually come in batches of 100.