Item Creation at Level 1

[dextercorvia]

I just hate paying full price for scrolls on a character at level 1. In fact, I'm not even wild about buying supplies for scribing, since it is my experience, that by the time I have XP and downtime, my character has leveled. I know this isn't universal, but I would really love to spend some starting gold on crafted scrolls. Normally, DM's frown when you ask them to 'spot' you 10XP. So lets assume, Wizard1, normal starting gold, 0 XP. A 1st level scroll will cost us 25gp, or 12.5gp and 1XP.

Maybe one of the crafting feats will help. Legendary Artisan from the ECS will reduce the base XP cost by 25%, but the rounding rules kill us there. 25% of 1 is 0. So we get no reduction. Let's turn our attention to Magical Artisan from PGtF. It only applies to one type of Item Creation, but it allows us to pay 75% of the costs (both gp and XP) to make an item. Now in the real world, this would be the same, but according to the rounding rules, 75% of 1XP is 0XP. We can now create 1st level scrolls for 9.75gp and 0XP.

Is it game breaking? No. But it fixes something that always bugged me. Cheers.

[Gavinfoxx]

I'm pretty sure the rounding is such in the game that you always round up, unless otherwise specified. Sorry.

[Trekkin]

I don't think it works that way. Why not just buy a pet or something, kill it for a miniscule amount of XP, and scribe scrolls with that?

[Crow]

I don't think it works that way. Why not just buy a pet or something, kill it for a miniscule amount of XP, and scribe scrolls with that?

No challenge, no xp.

[Zonugal]

No challenge, no xp.

Start hunting cats, ignite the eternal war.

[Godskook]

An artificer can craft 1st and 2nd level scrolls at level 1, and has the equivalent of 20 xp to craft with.

[Psyren]

I'm pretty sure the rounding is such in the game that you always round up, unless otherwise specified. Sorry.

BUZZ! (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/theBasics.htm) :smalltongue:


Rounding Fractions
In general, if you wind up with a fraction, round down, even if the fraction is one-half or larger.

[dextercorvia]

An artificer can craft 1st and 2nd level scrolls at level 1, and has the equivalent of 20 xp to craft with.

Unfortunately, Artificer was printed in a setting book. I have never even seen the full write up of the class. I've only played in one or two campaigns where it would have been acceptable. I know that doesn't stop us around here much, but in this case I was quite happy to have a workaround.

[koscum]

Craft them using Ambrosia (BoED).

[NecroRick]

What really kills you is the step up from level 1 spells to level 2 spells. They're 6x more expensive.

Now, Artificers are interesting, but they have some major disadvantages:
(1) have to actually make a tough DC (20+) to craft (everyone else gets it for free)
(2) the spell completion and spell trigger items you make you can't sell (or rather, nobody else can use them without UMD. So you can make wands and pass them to your rogue buddy, but if the wizz or CaDzilla in the party want a wand they can go fish). Same with scrolls.

But they have some advantages
(A) early access to stuff (as the above gentle-being pointed out access to level 2 spells at level 1!)
(B) free feats out the wazzoo
(C) ...
(D) Profit! Oh no, wait, there is no profit because of #2 above
(E) the 'homunculus in a portable hole' trick (i.e. free time).
(F) instead of being limited to arcane or divine you have access to the whole range of spells (including pally, ranger, assassin etc)

Now look, the homunculus in a portable hole is utterly impractical at low levels. Even if you had a spare 10,000 gold you couldn't make one before level 7 (have to emulate a fifth level spell and 9-2=7). Before that you certainly don't have a spare 20k

Another way to get the free time is just to be warforged. You don't sleep so you get an extra 8 hours a day anyway, which is the max you can spend crafting.

A third way is to be a House Cannith dragon marked character. Then you get access to a level 1 infusion that can summon a homunculus for a couple of extra hours of crafting every day.

=====

So let's say you beat the time consideration. Next hurdle is XP, oh, well, we have a crafting pool for that. (20 'free' xp per level per level (e.g. 20 at level 1, 40 at level 2, 60 at level 3)) We can't roll it over when we level up, so might as well use it. That means crafting some scrolls at level 1.

As for the cost... 12.5 gp per level 1 scroll is not going to break the bank. 75gp per level 2 scroll... that's a bit more dodgy. But since gp and xp exist in a fixed ratio it actually doesn't matter. We get _more scrolls_ if we try for the level 1 scrolls rather than the level 2 scrolls, but we end up spending 12.5 x 20 either way (250gp). Now standard wealth by level at level 2 is 900gp, so unless the DM is stingy this won't _technically_ break the bank, but we will want to get some bang for our buck! Some research required.

=====

But let's say you're committed to stumping up the gold, the last hurdle is the DC.

To scribe a level 1 scroll the DC is 21 (20 + required† caster level).
You have:
4 ranks of UMD
2 masterwork artisans tools
2 (or more) from charisma (but you did remember that Int is your primary stat, right?)
2 from the skill enhancement
... and a partridge in a pear tree!

For a total of +10 to hit 21 (need an 11 or more - can't take 10, even if you could, which you can't).

In other words, a roll of 11 or higher to succeed.

That sounds bad, but it's not actually a 50:50 chance of failure. Note that is a 75% chance of success (not including action points) since you get a roll to emulate requirements once per day, but also one more on the last day. So you get two cracks at each scroll.

You might be thinking "well, that still kind of sucks... I don't want 5 of my 20 scrolls to fail!". Maybe I'll take skill focus UMD after all! That will lower the number I need to an 8... which is 35% x 35% chance of failure... which is an 87% chance of success! (Roughly one in 8 now fail instead of 1 in 5).

But it's a trap. Because things get a little better at level 2.
+1 UMD
+2 synergy from maxing out spell craft
+1 more from skill enhancement infusion

So now you need to roll 7 or more... or a 91% chance of success even without skill focus UMD. If you took the skill focus you'd have only bumped the 91% up to 97%.

At level 3 we can now cast Eagle's Splendour infusion to bump our charisma up by 4 points, knocking another 2 off the required numbers (and another 1 from more ranks in UMD) so we now Skill Focus(UMD) is only taking our chance of success from 97% to 100%. Only for one out of every 30-40 scrolls is this going to be an issue. And hey, for that one, we could blow an action point. At that point, Skill Focus (UMD) is only getting us 1 extra scroll per 60-80 scrolls we're scribing. Might as well not bother.

Of course, that only holds true for the level 1 scrolls. For higher level scrolls essentially every second level we can scribe a new higher level of spells, and the DC jumps by 2. So our ranks in UMD keep pace almost exactly. Does this mean we're always going to have a roughly 50:50 chance to make "the good stuff"? No. Because every second level our bonus from the Skil Enhancement also goes up by one. So with that and UMD alone we're going forward 3 steps for every 2 we go backwards.

At level 9 we can create items with up to 6th level effects on them, so the DC is 31. We have:
12 ranks in UMD
2 masterwork artisans tools
4 (or more) from charisma + eagle's splendour infusion
6 skill enhancement infusion
needing 7 or more to succeed.
For items at or below 1000gp price this is a 91% chance of success.
For items at or below 2000gp price this is a 97% chance of success.
For items at or below 3000gp price this is a 99% chance of success.
(We get more rolls because it is taking more days, and we get to roll each day).

Another way to get more rolls is to dip into Cleric. Make sure to pick up the Magic Domain:

"Use scrolls, wands, and other devices with spell completion or spell trigger activation as a wizard of one-half your cleric level (at least 1st level)".

But also consider the Luck domain. You get... one free reroll every day. And you make... exactly one UMD check every day that you are crafting...

In fact, by far the worst thing about the crime that is Skill Focus (UMD) is that it could have been Make Your Own Luck instead:

"You can expend one luck reroll as an immediate action to reroll a skill check, as long as you have at least 1 rank in that skill. You gain one luck reroll per day"


Still, perhaps we don't feel lucky. Isn't there anything else we can do?

Why yes, there is! There are a (small) bunch of low level spells that improve skills (the biggest concentration that I found was in the PHB2).

At level 2 we could scribe Divine Insight (+5 +caster level) for a +7 bonus... which guarantees success for our level 9 crafter.

(It actually gets better than that even, with "Guidance of the Avatar", which is a level 2 spell that grants a +20 bonus. Yikes. Put that on your scrolls and smoke it!)

I can easily imagine someone spending 75gp to guarantee that the 4500gp they're spending (making that 12,000gp item) succeeds.

So, to recap.

At level 1, might as well burn that craft pool on level 1 scrolls. Pick and choose your favourite utility spells.
At level 2, either you make lvl 1 potions/oils for other people to use, or you try making some scrolls of Divine Insight/Guidance of the Munchy-tar for use later on in your crafting career.

If you're going for a +20 theme you could make a bunch of True Strike scrolls at level 1... For the lulz of course...

By the time you hit level 3, your 60 crafting pool is not going to cut the mustard. You'll blow through that in three Healing Belts, never mind the Crown of Splendour the Sorcerer is humping your leg to make for him...

†as compared to actual caster level. So at level 1 you _can_ scribe a scroll of heat metal, the DC is 23 because you need to be third level to cast second level spells, but the actual caster level is 1, and since heat metal effects 1 target per 2 caster levels, you will have just wasted 75gp on a scroll that does nothing. Anywho...

[Larpus]

Since XP is not an actual in game thing at all, you could ask your DM for a "sacrifice" system, which is what my group was using before going Pathfinder.

It works as such:

- In any battle (or before any killing) the group/person says ooc that this is a "sacrifice", and as such, that creature/encounter's XP is saved in a special "craft XP bank" which can be used later.

- Even if the "craft bank" is empty, you can craft nearly anything (with DM approval, obviously), the only thing is that every single bit of XP the party/character gets (they discuss this among themselves) is considered "sacrifice XP" until the debt is paid.

- Profit.

It really doesn't change much about the crafting system, but at least allows lvl1 crafting and everyone to pitch in, since under normal rules the crafter gets all the beating, even if he's not crafting for himself.