[3.5] Cold Iron Prices and Druid Wands

[Cardea]

Two questions, hopefully with easy answers.

How does the pricing for Cold Iron items go? Given an example of a +1 [1st Ability] [2nd Ability] [Weapon], would it charge per ability and the +1, or just the abilities?

And second, whats a good 1st-level or 2nd-level Druid spell for wands?

[Allanimal]

Two questions, hopefully with easy answers.



And second, whats a good 1st-level or 2nd-level Druid spell for wands?

entangle is always good
as is faerie fire.
I like spore field as well
lessor vigor is also a 1st level staple wand.

[erikun]

How does the pricing for Cold Iron items go? Given an example of a +1 [1st Ability] [2nd Ability] [Weapon], would it charge per ability and the +1, or just the abilities?
It might be worth asking in the Simple Q&A D&D 3.5 (by RAW) sticky thread at the top of the forum. I don't know right off hand if it's priced by enhancement or just a one-time charge of 2,000 gp, but someone is likely to have an answer through a FAQ or something.


And second, whats a good 1st-level or 2nd-level Druid spell for wands?
Anything that doesn't have a saving throw related to it and doesn't rely on damage/level will be a good idea, if it's still useful. Entangle slows opponents down to half speed, Faerie Fire eliminated invisibility and most miss chances, Lesser Vigor is great for patching allies up over several minutes, Fog Cloud is handy when you need some concealment, Spider Climb is useful for getting around (less so if you have Wildshape), and Warp Wood is always fun.

[Fax Celestis]

Big fan of winged watcher. Swift action, turn into a bird for 1 rd/lev. As a swift, you can cast it, use the mobility to move 80', land, dismiss as free, then use your standard to do your action.

[Allanimal]

Big fan of winged watcher. Swift action, turn into a bird for 1 rd/lev. As a swift, you can cast it, use the mobility to move 80', land, dismiss as free, then use your standard to do your action.

wait, isn't it normally a standard action to dismiss a spell? or is the duration concentration? (away from books so can't look it up...)

[Fax Celestis]

wait, isn't it normally a standard action to dismiss a spell? or is the duration concentration? (away from books so can't look it up...)

It's...weird. The SRD contradicts itself in the same paragraph.


(D) Dismissible
If the Duration line ends with "(D)," you can dismiss the spell at will. You must be within range of the spell’s effect and must speak words of dismissal, which are usually a modified form of the spell’s verbal component. If the spell has no verbal component, you can dismiss the effect with a gesture. Dismissing a spell is a standard action that does not provoke attacks of opportunity.

A spell that depends on concentration is dismissible by its very nature, and dismissing it does not take an action, since all you have to do to end the spell is to stop concentrating on your turn.

My table generally says dismissing a spell is a free action, and I usually forget that dismissing one isn't normally that way because of that.

[Chronos]

There's no contradiction there. It's a standard action that you can take at will. "At will" doesn't mean it's a free action; it just means that there are no special conditions that need to be met to do it. You wouldn't argue that a warlock's Eldritch Blast is a free action, would you?

On the cold iron question, I would rule that it's only once for the item, for two reasons. First, you can give a weapon a bunch of abilities all at once with a single session of magic-item-making, or you can give them one at a time, and it seems silly that the price of the sword would depend on the history of how it was made. Second, it makes it more consistent with other special materials, which all add a flat amount to the cost of a weapon no matter how powerful it is.

[Fax Celestis]

There's no contradiction there. It's a standard action that you can take at will. "At will" doesn't mean it's a free action; it just means that there are no special conditions that need to be met to do it. You wouldn't argue that a warlock's Eldritch Blast is a free action, would you?

Good point. I dunno, we play with dismiss-as-free at my tables and it works out fine.

[Allanimal]

Good point. I dunno, we play with dismiss-as-free at my tables and it works out fine.

It would be nice. I always get yelled at by the party mounted combat spirited charge ride-by attack fighter when I entangle the herd of enemies. A free action dismiss would help. As it is, I can think of better uses for a standard action than dismissing that entangle, that's slowing down the bad guys and thwarting their ranged attacks.

[holywhippet]

Interesting, I was trying to do the math for enchanting a cold iron weapon based on the holy avenger which is cold iron. It costs 120,630 according to the SRD. The thing is, you can cast greater dispel magic with it once per round (assuming you are a paladin). According to the magical crafting rules, from what I can see, the cost of that is caster level X spell level X 2000. Which would be:

11 X 6 X 2000 = 132,000 which is already more than the sword is worth.

[Cardea]

Interesting, I was trying to do the math for enchanting a cold iron weapon based on the holy avenger which is cold iron. It costs 120,630 according to the SRD. The thing is, you can cast greater dispel magic with it once per round (assuming you are a paladin). According to the magical crafting rules, from what I can see, the cost of that is caster level X spell level X 2000. Which would be:

11 X 6 X 2000 = 132,000 which is already more than the sword is worth.
I actually have begun to distrust the magic item pricings in the various books based on the crafting rules.

Run the numbers for some of the staffs.

[Allanimal]

Interesting, I was trying to do the math for enchanting a cold iron weapon based on the holy avenger which is cold iron. It costs 120,630 according to the SRD. The thing is, you can cast greater dispel magic with it once per round (assuming you are a paladin). According to the magical crafting rules, from what I can see, the cost of that is caster level X spell level X 2000. Which would be:

11 X 6 X 2000 = 132,000 which is already more than the sword is worth.

since that feature requires a paladin, maybe it gets the 30% price discount for Class/alignment restrictions?

[Cardea]

since that feature requires a paladin, maybe it gets the 30% price discount for Class/alignment restrictions?
But you can still buy the weapon even without taking Paladin levels, so I'd say no. Its just wotc being weird.

[holywhippet]

since that feature requires a paladin, maybe it gets the 30% price discount for Class/alignment restrictions?

Maybe, but that wouldn't be enough. The sword is +2 or +5 for paladins and gives spell resistance.

[Allanimal]

But you can still buy the weapon even without taking Paladin levels, so I'd say no. Its just wotc being weird.

Price Reduction for restrictions doesn't limit who can buy it, just who can use it. Or in this case, that subset of it.

[Agent 451]

It's best not to think about or try to reconcile the prices for a lot of the magic items. Doing so can only ever lead to frustration. And the increasing possibility that you astral project into the Far Realms, only to have your soul devoured by Cthulhu or some other ghastly cosmic horror.