ADEPT MAGIC ITEM CREATION - Saved from WotC Forums

[unseenmage]

ADEPT MAGIC ITEM CREATION

There have been many discussions about what magic items might be available to a party for purchase when they enter a community (whether it be a hamlet or a metropolis). The presence of magic items depends on many things. Unless there is a large population of adventurers constantly buying and selling each other’s loot, it must be assumed that these items are being manufactured. But by whom? Most PC classes are designed for adventurers and most adventurers are not spending their days putting their XP into magic items. Moreover, most NPCs of adventuring class don't spend years studying to be a wizard simply to open a magic item business and thus won’t spend feats on item creation (except, of course, that Wizards get Scribe Scroll as a 1st level bonus feat). Even if a spellcasting NPC of a PC class is available in a city, there is no guarantee that the individual has taken the needed item creation feats, has the prerequisite spells available, and is even inclined to make magic items for cash. These factors make it very difficult for a DM to determine what magic items might be available.

I submit that there is a class uniquely designed for magic item creation: Adepts. Adepts are an NPC class. They are not designed for adventuring and yet are very common. Most communities have at least one adept, and many have more. It makes perfect sense for adepts to make magic items during their spare time, in a world in which adventurers are not uncommon. There is little else productive to dedicate Feat slots to. An adept is essentially a village priest or, in a larger city, a lesser clergyman. His responsibilities are almost all skill related, requiring Knowledge (Religion), Heal, Craft, Profession, and perhaps Handle Animal. Most NPC adepts I’ve seen in game are assigned skill-boosting Feats like Negotiator or Skill Focus (Knowledge (Religion)). I think these adepts would be better suited to take Item Creation Feat and spend his off-time making items to sell to adventurers in order to increase the income of the church that he serves. This greatly reduces the effort a DM has to make to determine what magic items might be available. All one need do is look at the highest level adept in a given town and compare this to the lists below.

Of course, an adept cannot manufacture every magic item by himself, as an adept has a limited spell list. In fact, an adept cannot make any staves, constructs or arcane scrolls. (Such items would have to be commissioned through wizards and sorcerers--to make them as available as the divine scrolls Adepts can scribe, I would generally make at least one sorcerer or wizard in any community with multiple arcane casters an NPC who trades and scribes scrolls.) Moreover, an adept cannot take every item creation feat available, until 18th level. Accordingly, I have ranked the item creation feats for the order in which I believe adepts would be encouraged to learn, so as to maximize their potential income-producing ability. For instance, an adept can only make a handful of rings and rods, so those feats would be taken last. However, in a community with many adepts, they might specialize. Some might eschew Brew Potion and take Craft Wondrous Item at 3rd level. One adept might take metamagic feats and then Craft Rod at 9th level, simply to sell metamagic rods. Note that some items, particularly arms and armor, can be made without a feat:

Adept Crafter’s Feat Ladder

1st: Scribe Scroll
3rd: Brew Potion
6th: Craft Magic Arms & Armor
9th: Craft Wand
12th: Craft Wondrous Item
15th: Forge Ring
18th: Craft Rod
This list does not change if the adept is human. A human adept cannot take any magic item creation feat as a bonus feat. Based on this Feat Ladder, adventurers in a given community should expect to be able to obtain the following items within a few days, based on the highest level adept in the community. Italicized items have racial or alignment prerequisites for the item’s manufacture. Note that this also presumes that the adept does not have any bonus spells for high Wisdom. That might make some these items available at lower level. I also did not include items that require skills that are no class skills for Adepts. It is unlikely that an Adept would be able to make a ring of jumping. However, you might include an unusual Adept who has taken jump as a cross-class skill.

FIRST LEVEL ADEPT
Armor and Shields: Adamantine breastplate, Darkwood buckler, Darkwood shield, Dragonhide plate, Dwarven plate, Elven chain, Mithral heavy shield, Mithral shirt
Arms: Adamantine battleaxe, Adamantine dagger, Cold iron longsword, masterwork, Dwarven thrower, Masterwork silver dagger
Scrolls: Bless, Burning Hands, Cause Fear, Command, Comprehend Languages, Create Water, Cure Light Wounds, Cure Minor Wounds, Detect [Alignment], Detect Magic, Endure Elements, Ghost Sound, Guidance, Light, Mending, Obscuring Mist, Protection From [Alignment], Purify Food And Drink, Read Magic, Sleep, Touch Of Fatigue

THIRD LEVEL ADEPT
Potions: Cure light wounds, Endure elements, Protection from [Alignment]

FIFTH LEVEL ADEPT
Potions: Aid, Bear’s endurance, Bull’s strength, Cat’s grace, Cure moderate wounds, Darkness, Delay poison, Invisibility, Resist energy (any)
Scrolls: aid, animal trance, bear’s endurance, bull’s strength, cat’s grace, cure moderate wounds, darkness, delay poison, invisibility, mirror image, resist energy, scorching ray, see invisibility, web

SIXTH LEVEL ADEPT
Armor and Shields: Acid resistance (any), Banded mail of luck, Bashing (+1), Caster’s shield, Cold resistance (any), Electricity resistance (any), Enhancement Bonus (+1 or +2), Fire resistance (any), Rhino hide, Shadow (any), Sonic resistance (any)
Arms: Enhancement Bonus (+1 or +2), Merciful (+1), Oathbow, Sleep arrow

NINTH LEVEL ADEPT
Armor and Shields: Bashing (+2), Demon armor, Enhancement bonus (+3)
Arms: Enhancement bonus (+3), Javelin of lightning, Merciful (+2), Shock (+1 or +2), Shocking burst (+1), Sun blade
Miscellany: Armor of Arrow Attraction, Armor of Rage, Cursed Backbiter Spear, Everburning torch, Mace of Blood
Potions: Cure serious wounds, Daylight, Neutralize poison, Remove curse, Remove disease, Tongues
Scrolls: animate dead, bestow curse, contagion, continual flame, cure serious wounds, daylight, deeper darkness, lightning bolt, neutralize poison, remove curse, remove disease, tongues
Wands: Bear’s endurance, Bull’s strength, Burning hands, Cat’s grace, Contagion, Cure light wounds, Cure moderate wounds, Cure serious wounds, Darkness, Daylight, Delay poison, Detect magic, Invisibility, Light, Lightning bolt (5th through 9th), Mirror image, Neutralize poison, Web

TENTH LEVEL ADEPT
Wands: Lightning bolt (10th)

TWELFTH LEVEL ADEPT
Armor and Shields: Bashing (+3), Enhancement Bonus (+4)
Arms: Enhancement Bonus (+4), Merciful (+3), Shock (+3), Shocking burst (+2), Spell storing (+1 to +3)
Miscellany Amulet of Inescapable Location, Flask of Curses, Gauntlets of Fumbling, Helm of Opposite Alignment, Incense of Obsession, Periapt of Foul Rotting WONDROUS ITEMS: Amulet of health (any), Belt of dwarvenkind, Belt of giant Strength (any), Boots of elvenkind, Bracers of archery (any), Cloak of elvenkind, Elixir of fire breath, Elixir of hiding, Gauntlets of ogre power, Gem of brightness, Gloves of Dexterity (any), Golembane Scarab, Hand of glory, Helm of comprehend languages and read magic, Horn of fog, Incense of meditation, Ioun stones (any), Pearl of power (1st through 3rd), Periapt of health, Periapt of proof against poison, Phylactery of faithfulness, Pipes of sounding, Silversheen, Restorative ointment, Robe of bones, Unguent of timelessness

THIRTEENTH LEVEL ADEPT
Armor and Shields: Wild
Scrolls: cure critical wounds, minor creation, polymorph, restoration, stoneskin, wall of fire
Wands: Cure critical wounds, Polymorph, Restoration, Stoneskin, Wall of fire
Wondrous Items: Mantle of faith, Pearl of power (4th), Druid’s Vestment

FIFTEENTH LEVEL ADEPT
Armor and Shields: Bashing (+4), Enhancement bonus (+5) ARMS: Enhancement Bonus (+5), Merciful (+4), Shock (+4), Shocking burst (+3), Spell storing (+4)
Miscellany: Intelligent Items
Rings: Energy resistance (any), Invisibility

SEVENTEENTH LEVEL ADEPT
Arms: Disruption (+1 to +3), Seeking (+1 to +4), Shifter’s sorrow
Rings: X-ray vision
Scrolls: baleful polymorph, break enchantment, commune, heal, major creation, raise dead, true seeing, wall of stone
Wondrous Items: Feather token (any), Gem of seeing, Goggles of minute seeing, Lens of detection, Marvelous pigments, Pearl of power (5th), Periapt of wound closure

EIGHTEENTH LEVEL ADEPT
Armor and Shields: Bashing (+5)
Arms: Disruption (+4), Merciful (+5), Seeking (+5), Shock (+5), Shocking burst (+4), Spell storing (+5)
Rods: Enemy detection, Flailing, Withering, Python

Looking at the list, some things become apparent. First, healing potions are available fairly readily in any community with one third-level Adept. Basic magic weapons, shields and armor are available in pretty much any substantive town. A wand of healing is available in almost any city. These are the staple magic items for most adventurers, so it is a good sign that these are not going to be scarce. Exotic items probably have to be commissioned from wizards and clerics (or NPC brokers who specialize in finding rare magic items) if they cannot be located as salvage in an adventure.

A Note on Magic Item Shops

I am not a fan of the concept of magic item shops. Most items listed above would have to be commissioned from the adept in question. If, however, you are really hankering for a magic item shop, make the highest level adept in town a magic item proprietor and assume that the adept has the following inventory:

d3-2 of each item that could be made at the adept's level

d4-2 of each item that could be made at half the adept's level, rounded down

d6-2 of each item that could be made at one-quarter the adept's level, rounded down

d10-3 of each item that could be made at one-eighth the adept's level, rounded down

d12-3 of each item that could be made at one-sixteenth the adept's level, rounded down.

If the die roll is less than 1, none of that item is available. Be sure to have the adept hire guards and install traps in the shop that make the EL for overcoming the shop's defenses commensurate with the treasure level of the value of the shop's inventory. Otherwise, it makes no sense for the shop not to have been cleaned out by thieves long before the PCs even roll into town.

Comments are welcome!

It should be noted that this article only uses the core books. Spells and magic items from supplements are not included. However, such items would probably not have altered the analysis much because Adepts rarely gain access to non-core spells and most magic items in the supplements require spells from that supplement in item creation. This idea is also totally useless in Eberron, which has its own NPC classes dedicated to magic item creation.

- original thread by wrecan, WotC Forums, Dec 13, 2006 17:22:04 (https://web.archive.org/web/20150921125946/http://community.wizards.com/forum/previous-editions-archive/threads/1095441)

[Kelb_Panthera]

I came up with this a long time ago to explain why magic items are available up to the town GP limits described in the DMG.


I'm with the crowd saying a stockpile of highly valuable magical items all in a 'shop' doesn't make any sense.

You can get minor magic items (as in DMG table 7-27) by going to one of a number of local guilds, unions, or confederacies or even the odd noble house, depending on what exactly it is you're looking for; e.g. the mercanary companies have surplus arms and armor, usually looted from dungeons or off of targets, to supplement funding from jobs, likewise with the thieves guild for your more larcenous tools but not the loot because they have to fence that stuff asap to actually make a profit, the exploration confederacy sells items useful for travel and exploration as well as bits and bobs from the latest expedition that they haven't traded away yet, and the wizard's tower or temple of the god of commerce or artifice will have a broad selection of a bit of everything as well as the tools of the spellcasting trade and can have initiate members craft items on request. None of them will have a standing stockpile though, only a few, mostly random items that they're more likely to trade than to sell.

A +1 weapon is worth 40 trade-bars worth of gold. Nobody except money changers, trading companies, and governments traffic in that kind of cash. The above mentioned companies and guilds will -trade- you their goods for your loot and old equipment and will accept cash if you've got it, but -none- of them will give you cash for your crap unless it's something that they'll have a serious use for. They're going to immediately sell your old stuff to one or another trading company for cash for their own use.

The trading companies don't keep anything at the local office at all and don't do trade in minor items with individuals from the general public. They facilitate the exchange of those goods between the various companies and guilds and supply the governments with items in quantity immensely faster than the governments' crafters can make them. They will, however, deal with individuals for the exchange of intermediate and major magic items as brokers.

The only shops that actually keep a stockpile of magical goods are potion brewers. They don't worry about thieves because their whole stock is labeled in code, the key to which is either stored somewhere very secure after hours or only exists in the shop owner's head. There's also the factor of potions being pretty much unsellable by anyone but the guy who makes them. This is because there's no way to know if the potion you're being sold second-hand is what the seller says it is because he almost certainly didn't make it and if he stole it he might not even know what it is. If you rob a potion maker's shop the best you're going to get is a couple scrolls of spells that aren't on the shopkeeper's list, maybe a schema of a spell for a particularly popular potion, and a crap-ton of potions that you'll have to identify and can't sell. You might also get a few alchemical items, but noone cares about that.

Most worlds have been trading in magic items long enough that market saturation on the common, permanemt items (those described in the DMG) is great enough that new ones would likely only be made on commission anyway. Between that and the fact that one character with the appropriate craft feat can enable dozens of apprentices to craft without taking the feat themselves, it's not difficult to rationalize why magic items are freely available.

[unseenmage]

For my part I like the idea that this is a role Adepts can fill in non-Eberron worlds. (Perhaps in Eberron item crafting Adepts could be black marketeers unaffiliated with any House who do what needs done for those who don't have it in with the Dragonmarked Houses.)

Another reason Magic Items might constantly need crafting, even the ones that technically last almost forever, is that in the D&D world matter can be both created and destroyed. Rust Monsters, Sphere's of Annihilation, Plane Shift, that spell that makes Spheres of Annihilation, Umbral Blots... And those are just the big name methods of utterly destroying matter in the gameworld.

Market saturation and flooding the market change when piles of gold can be eaten and digested by ravenous roving monsters, or melted to nothing by "acid". Though I'm still pretty sure there is a lot more creation going on magically than equally magical unmaking-of-matter-from-reality. That said the D&D-verse is a strange strange place. All sorts of rationales could exist for Magic Item markets. And against them. I just like having them about for convenience and fun. Without them my own personal D&D-verse would be so much less interesting. :smallsmile:


Edit: Oh yeah, the original reason I was going to post. Mercanes and interplanar trade and Wish make Magic Item markets even more interesting/plausible.
For our gameworld we decided that the Mercanes buy whatever Magic Item a given patron desires from Solars or other creatures that can SLA Wish in exchange for selling to those entities enemies less. The more one side deals with the Mercane the more the other side either gets taxed or isn't traded with at all.

And all of this happens through intermediaries of varying CRs of course. With enough middlemen the Mercane find they can do business with whomever they want whenever they want, and with the reign on interplanar wealth and trade firmly in their hands they can afford as much too.
Not to mention they're Neutral and greedy enough to fascilitate surgical strikes of the aforementioned matter destroying magics against competing wealth.

So sure Jimbob the Player Character comes up with a way to make infinite wealth. Somehow they never seem to flood the world market though. WHy? Maybe the Mercane or some other extraplanar entity or organization takes it upon themselves to readjust the volume of precious metals in a given region for reasons all their own. I mean, what value has their own infinite wealth machine if gold becomes too worthless right?