Creating and selling magic items

[lianightdemon]

Is it me or does the rules for selling and creating a magic item seem almost futile. Even for something simple as a scroll you pay 100 gold to create it and you only have a 20% chance to actually sell it for the same amount and only 10% for one and half times and it's a shady person.

Wouldn't you be trying to sell it for more then it cost you to make?

[Demonic Spoon]

Presumably the designers didn't want mages spending all their downtime generating infinite money via magic item creation.

[MaxWilson]

Wouldn't you be trying to sell it for more then it cost you to make?

Every time I make lasagna from scratch, it ends up costing me more than if I had simply bought Stouffer's from the store. If I were trying to sell my lasagna for money, I'd be competing with Stouffer's product with an existing market, and I'd be lucky to recoup 1/4 of my costs.

This is a way of saying that yes, you'd probably be trying to sell your Sword +2 for more than the 5000 gp it cost you to make, but you're not guaranteed to find someone who is actually going to pay you 10,000 gp: the same price as a herd of 50 elephants.

That being said, you do get your Persuasion roll as a bonus to the sell check, so it's quite possible that you can actually turn a net profit if you optimize Persuasion. (Expertise: Persuasion, Guidance as necessary, Enhance Ability (Charisma), etc.) Even if you do that, however, you're still only forging 25gp worth of magic item per day, so even if you can reliably sell it for double your cost, your net profit is only 25 gp per day.

[SharkForce]

Every time I make lasagna from scratch, it ends up costing me more than if I had simply bought Stouffer's from the store. If I were trying to sell my lasagna for money, I'd be competing with Stouffer's product with an existing market, and I'd be lucky to recoup 1/4 of my costs.

This is a way of saying that yes, you'd probably be trying to sell your Sword +2 for more than the 5000 gp it cost you to make, but you're not guaranteed to find someone who is actually going to pay you 10,000 gp: the same price as a herd of 50 elephants.

That being said, you do get your Persuasion roll as a bonus to the sell check, so it's quite possible that you can actually turn a net profit if you optimize Persuasion. (Expertise: Persuasion, Guidance as necessary, Enhance Ability (Charisma), etc.) Even if you do that, however, you're still only forging 25gp worth of magic item per day, so even if you can reliably sell it for double your cost, your net profit is only 25 gp per day.

if there's a magical version of wal-mart that sells all the scrolls, potions and enchanted items you need, that's a valid comparison.

instead, we're explicitly told that magic items are so super-duper rare that there isn't even such a thing as magic stores, by default. there is no competition, there's just you.

and besides, it's not like spellcasters selling their services to make magic items is somehow worse than, say, instantly turning a pile of scrap steel you've collected from hobgoblin armour into a suit of platemail in a few seconds using the fabricate spell or something like that.

[lianightdemon]

So I rewrote the selling a magic item table (page 130 dmg)

20 or lower: A buyer offering the base price of the item.
21-40 A buyer offering one and half times the base price of the item. A shady buyer offering double the price.
41-80 A buyer offering double the base price of the item. A shady buyer offering 2 and half times the base cost of the item.
81-90 A buyer offering 2 and half times the base cost of the item
91-100 A shady buyer offering 3 times the base cost of the item, no questions asked.

[Fwiffo86]

if there's a magical version of wal-mart that sells all the scrolls, potions and enchanted items you need, that's a valid comparison.

instead, we're explicitly told that magic items are so super-duper rare that there isn't even such a thing as magic stores, by default. there is no competition, there's just you.


The hole in this logic is that since there are not Magi*marts, no one knows how much X magic item is actually worth to a buyer. You know what it costs to make it, simply due to requiring inks, paper, etc. (ie) what the book tells you it costs. The DMG's representation is to further reinforce that since MI are decidedly rare and unsual, there is no actual market for them. Thus you are left to the whim of what someone is willing to pay. There is no established baseline.

[SharkForce]

nothing says nobody wants them, it just says there's no magic stores. there's an important difference.

rare stuff with desirable qualities not having any value is just silly. you can sell an art item or a gem for a large sum of money, and those have no real practical use. that doesn't suggest "nobody is willing to pay large sums of money for a magical item" to me.

[Edge of Dreams]

One thing I and other GMs I play with tend to do is we make it harder to actually find out what a magic item really does. None of this sit-around-for-one-hour stuff, identify costs money to cast, and it can take multiple castings of identify to learn all of an items details. Thus, buying and selling magic items is complicated by the fact that you can't easily be sure that what you think you're getting is what you're actually getting. The risk of getting a fake or cursed item or one with a hidden drawback or flaw is significant and drives down prices. The advantage of crafting, then, is that you know exactly what you're getting and have control over it. That's worth the extra time and money to many mages.

[MaxWilson]

if there's a magical version of wal-mart that sells all the scrolls, potions and enchanted items you need, that's a valid comparison.

instead, we're explicitly told that magic items are so super-duper rare that there isn't even such a thing as magic stores, by default. there is no competition, there's just you.

and besides, it's not like spellcasters selling their services to make magic items is somehow worse than, say, instantly turning a pile of scrap steel you've collected from hobgoblin armour into a suit of platemail in a few seconds using the fabricate spell or something like that.

There's no competition, but there's also no pre-existing market. How many people are really out there with the wherewithal to blow 10,000 gp (rough equivalent of $500K to $1M) on a luxury item? After all, a Longsword +2 scales in value directly in proportion of the frequency with which you use it to kill things. For your typical noble, it has no real utility, only Ferrari-like flash.

If I were a PC wizard trying to set up a magic item economy, the trick would be finding a way to cheaply create items which are nevertheless in high demand by people who have lots of money. In point of fact, the cheapest way to get rich as a wizard is to be a 14th level Transmuter and sell youthfulness via Panacaea to rich nobles. It doesn't extend their actual lifespan, just makes them look younger, but that won't stop people from paying buckets of money for it--and the best thing is that it takes you only a long rest to create.

[Baptor]

I think the DMG assumptions are bunk. (For other reasons.)

That said, here's how they reason it. Say that this afternoon whilst digging in Europe I came upon the sword of Charlemagne the Great. Now I want to sell the thing. How much is it worth? To what do we compare it to? Considering its historical significance, I could reasonably expect millions if I wait, organize an auction, promote said auction with wealthy clientele, and so on. It would take months to set it up, but i'd rake in a fortune.

But say I want to sell it right now. I call up a few wealthy people who like history and ask them what they'll give. The figure is going to substantially less than if I took the time to sell at auction.

You see this on Pawn Stars all the time. Frantic people come in with a decent artifact they found and need cash in a hurry to pay a loan shark. Some appraiser told them they could get 10 grand at auction, they say. Rick just laughs. He's going to offer you a fraction of that figure, maybe 2 grand. That's the price you pay for instant satisfaction, and that's what a player character would be looking for.

[lianightdemon]

Should I use the running a business rules then for a caster character who is opening a magic shop?

[Slipperychicken]

Is it me or does the rules for selling and creating a magic item seem almost futile. Even for something simple as a scroll you pay 100 gold to create it and you only have a 20% chance to actually sell it for the same amount and only 10% for one and half times and it's a shady person.

Wouldn't you be trying to sell it for more then it cost you to make?

You don't have to take the first offer you get. If you get offers which you don't like, just turn them down and try again until you get the right price. Just keep trying until that shady dude comes along. Also remember that you add your Charisma (Persuasion) check to the d100 roll, so your odds are a little better than that.


Still, I think the rules are absurd. The only way for magic item crafters to make a profit is by selling to shady actors who make up more than 10% of the market. Maybe that's why so many magic items wind up being used by monsters and villains.

[SharkForce]

There's no competition, but there's also no pre-existing market. How many people are really out there with the wherewithal to blow 10,000 gp (rough equivalent of $500K to $1M) on a luxury item? After all, a Longsword +2 scales in value directly in proportion of the frequency with which you use it to kill things. For your typical noble, it has no real utility, only Ferrari-like flash.

If I were a PC wizard trying to set up a magic item economy, the trick would be finding a way to cheaply create items which are nevertheless in high demand by people who have lots of money. In point of fact, the cheapest way to get rich as a wizard is to be a 14th level Transmuter and sell youthfulness via Panacaea to rich nobles. It doesn't extend their actual lifespan, just makes them look younger, but that won't stop people from paying buckets of money for it--and the best thing is that it takes you only a long rest to create.

and yet there's no rule that says once you hit a certain threshold of gem value or artistic object value etc that you suddenly have a hard time selling it, to my knowledge. if you somehow manage to find an treasure trove with multiple valuable artistic objects, you don't have a hard time converting them into cash, and yet somehow nobody is interested in buying something with actual legitimate practical use that also has a large gp value?

also, i don't need to sell +2 swords... i can sell stuff that costs 500 gp to make and yet has incredible value. something like a wand of web, which would have *amazing* value in the event of a war breaking out. since crafting time scales exactly with the cost to create, i have no need to try and sell that amazing sword, after all. i can sell something decidedly less awe-inspiring and therefore less expensive. and considering that a +1 weapon can very easily be the difference between being able to do something to defeat an enemy and not being able to do anything at all, it's not exactly a bad deal.

[Giant2005]

If you want to make money crafting and selling magic items, the trick is to craft the Robe of Useful Items. It only costs 500g to make and it produces considerably more than 500g worth of mundane items. Those mundane items don't take the same level of effort to sell that magical items do.

[Dalebert]

None of this sit-around-for-one-hour stuff, identify costs money to cast, and it can take multiple castings of identify to learn all of an items details.

Not really. There's a one-time cost of 100gp for the material component, but then it's re-usable.

[Marcelinari]

Not really. There's a one-time cost of 100gp for the material component, but then it's re-usable.

I'm pretty sure Edge of Dreams was describing a common houserule used by themself and their DMs. It's not exactly something you can correct them about.

[Dalebert]

I'm pretty sure Edge of Dreams was describing a common houserule used by themself and their DMs. It's not exactly something you can correct them about.

Ah, yeah. I kind of took that one statement out of context for some reason.