Another question about Item Familiars and crafting in general

[skunk3]

So I am aware that if you have the item familiar feat you can improve the item by spending gold or gold + xp and you don't need the appropriate crafting skill to do this, which is kinda weird but whatever.

My question pertains to lesser powers, greater powers, and dedicated powers. I see the prices listed for them. Are these prices a flat cost or can I pay gold + xp for them? In other words, do I HAVE TO pay the full listed price or can I make it cheaper by spending some XP?

Furthermore - my item familiar (currently) is a ring of feather fall. I have invested life energy into it for the XP bonus and I've also invested skill ranks for the bonus points. I may eventually also invest a spell slot because it doesn't seem like there's any major downside to doing this UNLESS you lose your item... in this case my ring. My next question is more to do with crafting in general but it also does apply to Item Familiars specifically in a way. Let's say that I eventually add a lesser power to my item familiar. This will cost the amount of gold indicated (or gold + xp if people agree that I can do that) but what if I want to add other properties to the item? Say I want to add the property of a Freedom of Movement ring. I know that normally the cost of making a custom magic item is the full cost of the most expensive thing to be on the item, plus 1.5x the cost of the next most expensive thing, so since a ring of Feather Fall is 2,000 GP, I am assuming that to add continuous Freedom of Movement to it, it would cost me 41,000 GP. Is this correct? Also, since the powers that can be added to item familiars are flat cost, they aren't multiplied, right?

I am also confused as to what does and doesn't incur the extra 1.5x cost increase. I don't have the MIC open in front of me but I seem to recall it saying something about having to pay that cost for 'similar properties' or something like that.

So basically what I need to know:

1. Can the lesser/greater/dedicated powers be bought for gold + xp, or just gold?

2. Since the powers are a flat cost, they aren't multiplied in price, right?

3. What does and doesn't incur the 1.5x cost if I wanted to add other stuff to the ring as a custom item? (Freedom of Movement, Evasion, etc... just examples.)

[skunk3]

Anyone? :D

[Asmotherion]

So I am aware that if you have the item familiar feat you can improve the item by spending gold or gold + xp and you don't need the appropriate crafting skill to do this, which is kinda weird but whatever.

My question pertains to lesser powers, greater powers, and dedicated powers. I see the prices listed for them. Are these prices a flat cost or can I pay gold + xp for them? In other words, do I HAVE TO pay the full listed price or can I make it cheaper by spending some XP?

Furthermore - my item familiar (currently) is a ring of feather fall. I have invested life energy into it for the XP bonus and I've also invested skill ranks for the bonus points. I may eventually also invest a spell slot because it doesn't seem like there's any major downside to doing this UNLESS you lose your item... in this case my ring. My next question is more to do with crafting in general but it also does apply to Item Familiars specifically in a way. Let's say that I eventually add a lesser power to my item familiar. This will cost the amount of gold indicated (or gold + xp if people agree that I can do that) but what if I want to add other properties to the item? Say I want to add the property of a Freedom of Movement ring. I know that normally the cost of making a custom magic item is the full cost of the most expensive thing to be on the item, plus 1.5x the cost of the next most expensive thing, so since a ring of Feather Fall is 2,000 GP, I am assuming that to add continuous Freedom of Movement to it, it would cost me 41,000 GP. Is this correct? Also, since the powers that can be added to item familiars are flat cost, they aren't multiplied, right?

I am also confused as to what does and doesn't incur the extra 1.5x cost increase. I don't have the MIC open in front of me but I seem to recall it saying something about having to pay that cost for 'similar properties' or something like that.

So basically what I need to know:

1. Can the lesser/greater/dedicated powers be bought for gold + xp, or just gold?

2. Since the powers are a flat cost, they aren't multiplied in price, right?

3. What does and doesn't incur the 1.5x cost if I wanted to add other stuff to the ring as a custom item? (Freedom of Movement, Evasion, etc... just examples.)

1. The Improvements you get by Selecting Lesser/Greater/Dedicated Power can be bought for just gold. You can however Further Improve your Item Familiar Reguardless of this Powers, by using the Regular Improvement Formula (Gold+XP as per the rules).

2. No. At least I don't think so. Otherwise it would be no big deal to gain it as a power instead of regular Improvement (Well, I guess the Time Matters too, if you don't have a ton of Dawntime).

3. Everything Similar has a 50percent increase in price, witch is cumulative. Thus, adding more spells (as in your Example) would end up with 1.5x price for the Second Spell, a 2.0x price for the third spell etc.

[Segev]

3. Everything Similar has a 50percent increase in price, witch is cumulative. Thus, adding more spells (as in your Example) would end up with 1.5x price for the Second Spell, a 2.0x price for the third spell etc.

Unless this is unique to item familiars, the 1.5x isn’t cumulative. Or I’m very much not understanding what you’re talking about.

Stacking additional powers on a slotted item makes all but the most expensive power cost 1.5x what they otherwise would. This is applied individually to each power.

[skunk3]

So the flat GP cost improvements are truly a flat cost, meaning that I cannot get them for 1/2 price + XP. Got it. I didn't think that the powers went up in price as you have more of them but I just wanted to double check. As far as the last bit goes, I'm a bit confused. I've never heard of things going from 1.5x to 2x and so on. The way I understand crafting rules is as follows:

You have your base item, which let's say costs 5,000 gp. You then want to add the magical properties of another item of the same type to your base item. If the property(ies) to be added are worth less than the value of the currently existing base item, you pay 1.5x for cost of the item that you want to 'add' to the current one. If the property(ies) to be added are more expensive, you pay the amount of the item whose properties you want to add plus 1/2 of the value of the base item.

What I do not understand, however, is what exactly incurs the 1.5x cost increase. Just combining the properties of items of the same slot, or what? Table 6-11 in the MIC has a list of "common item effects" for adding to existing items. What I do not understand is if the 1.5x price multiplier comes into play if I wanted to add such an effect to an existing piece of gear. For example, let's say I have Boots of Striding and Springing and I want to add a +4 DEX bonus to them. Since the +4 DEX bonus costs more than the boots, would I have to pay the cost that +4 DEX normally be plus 1/2 of the value of the boots, or is it just a fixed price to add such enhancements? I understand that if I want to 'combine two items of the same slot into one item the 1.5x price rule comes into play, but what about "common item effects?" Also, where did you get the 2x price increase from? Aren't the crafting rules in the MIC the most up-to-date?

[Segev]

You have your base item, which let's say costs 5,000 gp. You then want to add the magical properties of another item of the same type to your base item. If the property(ies) to be added are worth less than the value of the currently existing base item, you pay 1.5x for cost of the item that you want to 'add' to the current one. If the property(ies) to be added are more expensive, you pay the amount of the item whose properties you want to add plus 1/2 of the value of the base item. This is exactly right.


What I do not understand, however, is what exactly incurs the 1.5x cost increase. Just combining the properties of items of the same slot, or what? Table 6-11 in the MIC has a list of "common item effects" for adding to existing items. What I do not understand is if the 1.5x price multiplier comes into play if I wanted to add such an effect to an existing piece of gear. For example, let's say I have Boots of Striding and Springing and I want to add a +4 DEX bonus to them. Since the +4 DEX bonus costs more than the boots, would I have to pay the cost that +4 DEX normally be plus 1/2 of the value of the boots, or is it just a fixed price to add such enhancements? I understand that if I want to 'combine two items of the same slot into one item the 1.5x price rule comes into play, but what about "common item effects?" Also, where did you get the 2x price increase from? Aren't the crafting rules in the MIC the most up-to-date?

MIC introduced new rules that were exceptions to the combining items rules. These made it cheaper if the DM agreed that the items to be combined were similar enough, and/or they fell under "common item effects."

The general principle was that combining two slotted items into one bypassed slot restrictions, enabling greater combined power than otherwise would be available. Thus, the 1.5x cost increase, since being able to have Bracers of Archery and Bracers of Armor both at the same time was normally impossible, and thus worth more than both of them put together.

MIC determined that some effects combining together shouldn't be that expensive, so made it cheaper.