Use Activated Magic Items

[oOReikaOo]

Ill shorten this up for you tl;dr people.

artificer creates crossbow that is use activated ray of flame = laser rifle?

Acording to "This type of item simply has to be used in order to activate it. A character has to drink a potion, swing a sword, interpose a shield to deflect a blow in combat, look through a lens, sprinkle dust, wear a ring, or don a hat."

Wouldnt this mean that pulling the trigger is activation and therefor you could do your BAB in attacks with a ray of flame shooting crossbow?

[Thomar_of_Uointer]

Those rules are guidelines.

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/creatingMagicItems.htm#otherConsiderations


Not all items adhere to these formulas directly. The reasons for this are several. First and foremost, these few formulas aren’t enough to truly gauge the exact differences between items. The price of a magic item may be modified based on its actual worth. The formulas only provide a starting point. The pricing of scrolls assumes that, whenever possible, a wizard or cleric created it. Potions and wands follow the formulas exactly. Staffs follow the formulas closely, and other items require at least some judgment calls.

There's also this clause for continuous/use-activated effects:


If a continuous item has an effect based on a spell with a duration measured in rounds, multiply the cost by 4. If the duration of the spell is 1 minute/level, multiply the cost by 2, and if the duration is 10 minutes/level, multiply the cost by 1.5. If the spell has a 24-hour duration or greater, divide the cost in half.

The best guideline for the price of a custom magic item is, "as high as the PCs are willing to pay for it". If a GM allows custom magic items in his campaign, he should be wary about setting their prices in order to preserve game balance.

Having a weapon allow touch attacks is already covered by the +4 brilliant energy enhancement, and even that won't penetrate natural armor. It also only works on melee weapons, thrown weapons, and ammunition.

You can still make a "magic ray gun", you just have to pick effects that are appropriate for the price you want. An item that requires a command word (a standard action) to activate will be much cheaper. If we go by that guideline (and I'm not saying we should), an actual "crossbow of use-activated 1d6 damage fire rays" would have a price somewhere in the range of a +5 or +6 weapon, so approximately 50,000 gp or more.

That's rather expensive, but consider the imbalance that could be caused a melee weapon that a fighter could use to Power Attack with touch attacks. It would be a no-brainer compared to a standard +5 weapon, especially since most monsters in that CR range have at least a +6 bonus to natural armor (and it's devastating against anyone wearing plate mail). Also, because it deals energy damage it can penetrate DR (though spell resistance and energy resistance are also important considerations that make such an item more situational).

The GM should use his best judgement when deciding the prices of custom magic items. For further reading, see the seven-part Making Magic Items series of articles by Skip Williams (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/arch/rg), specifically parts six (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/rg/20050111a) and seven (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/rg/20050118a).