Kesnit
2014-01-14, 12:57 PM
My wife is putting together a Skyrim-themed 3.5 game. She came up with an idea for how to use soul gems, and asked me to post her ideas here to find out issues we didn't think of.
Rather than fill soul gems by killing enemies, they are filled by destroying magic items. Filled soul gems are XP holders, and that XP is used as crafting XP, rather than make the XP come from the crafter. Petty soul gems hold enough XP to craft a +1 weapon, Lesser a +2, Common a +3, Greater a +4, and Grand a +5. (Very rare Black gems can be found that hold +6.) Only 1 item can be put into a soul gem, regardless of capacity. (So if the party has a +2 item to get rid of and only has a Common soul gem available, they can use the Common, but they can't later add another +1 item to it.) An item can be spread over multiple gems. (If they have a +2 item and only Petty gems, they can use 2 Petty gems to destroy the item.) A soul gem is destroyed when it is used for crafting, even if all the XP in the gem was not used.
If a player wishes to use the XP from a gem, they can take it to a crafter (court wizard, wizard at the College of Winterhold, or any other crafting wizard* they know) and pay the gold crafting cost (plus a small mark-up). If the party has a crafter, then the crafter can use the gem and the player getting the item pays the gold cost.
*I use the term "Wizard" because it is thematic for Skyrim. The crafter could be any class.
Rather than fill soul gems by killing enemies, they are filled by destroying magic items. Filled soul gems are XP holders, and that XP is used as crafting XP, rather than make the XP come from the crafter. Petty soul gems hold enough XP to craft a +1 weapon, Lesser a +2, Common a +3, Greater a +4, and Grand a +5. (Very rare Black gems can be found that hold +6.) Only 1 item can be put into a soul gem, regardless of capacity. (So if the party has a +2 item to get rid of and only has a Common soul gem available, they can use the Common, but they can't later add another +1 item to it.) An item can be spread over multiple gems. (If they have a +2 item and only Petty gems, they can use 2 Petty gems to destroy the item.) A soul gem is destroyed when it is used for crafting, even if all the XP in the gem was not used.
If a player wishes to use the XP from a gem, they can take it to a crafter (court wizard, wizard at the College of Winterhold, or any other crafting wizard* they know) and pay the gold crafting cost (plus a small mark-up). If the party has a crafter, then the crafter can use the gem and the player getting the item pays the gold cost.
*I use the term "Wizard" because it is thematic for Skyrim. The crafter could be any class.