Midgard Dwarf: The Superior Set Item Creator!

[Endarire]

Greetings, all!

Today I noticed that the Midgard Dwarf, an 8HD Small Outsider from Frostburn 125, has the lovely Master Smith (Ex) ability which is also gained via shapechange and certain other shapeshifting abilities, like Planar Shepherd9. You could also use planar binding, gate, and other creature calling abilities to access Midgard Dwarves.



Master Smith (Ex): Midgard dwarves gain Craft Magic Arms and Armor, Craft Wondrous Item, and Forge Ring as bonus feats. They are considered to possess the prerequisites necessary to craft any magic item of those types, even if they do not otherwise meet the requirements or have the ability to cast the necessary spells.

Note how set items like Raiment of the Four or Trappings of the Beast normally require having access to at least 1 piece of the set while crafting (Magic Item Compendium 226). For example, note the prerequisites of the Belt of the Wide Earth from Magic Item Compendium 204.


While wearing a belt of the wide earth, your carrying capacity is doubled. This is a continuous effect and requires no activation.

In addition, two times per day you can activate the belt and sacrifice a prepared spell or spell slot of 5th level or higher to
use teleport (as the spell), using your own caster level or that of the belt, whichever is higher.

Prerequisites: Craft Wondrous Item, teleport, possession of a piece of the set.

Cost to Create: 4,000 gp, 320 XP, 8 days.

Thus, I propose that any weapon, armor, shield, ring, or wondrous item that's part of a set and explicitly requires in its prerequisites section having access to at least 1 piece of the same item set can ignore this 'must have an item' prerequisite due to Master Smith.

This is likely a minor find, but I found it useful for squeezing even more value out of starting cash or crafting in general! Enjoy!

[redking]

Interesting find. The requirement for a piece of the set is indeed listed under prerequisites, and Midguard Dwarf does not have to meet the requirements of crafting it.

That said, this crafting prerequisite is an oddity and outlier, and it was likely not what the designer of Midguard Dwarf had in mind when writing up that ability. So you are solid in RAW, the RAI will likely make a DM baulk.

I've often wondered if a permissive DM would allow this Midguard Dwarf ability to extend to other item creation feats it picks up as feats. I think I would allow it.

[Troacctid]

That said, this crafting prerequisite is an oddity and outlier, and it was likely not what the designer of Midguard Dwarf had in mind when writing up that ability. So you are solid in RAW, the RAI will likely make a DM baulk.
On the other hand, after MIC, future item sets dropped the requirement to already have a piece of the set, suggesting that they changed their minds and decided the prerequisite was bad for gameplay.

[Tzardok]

On the other hand, after MIC, future item sets dropped the requirement to already have a piece of the set, suggesting that they changed their minds and decided the prerequisite was bad for gameplay.

I don't remember any other item sets published after MIC. Do you have an example?

[Saintheart]

Slight tangent and maybe already observed, but the Master Smith (Ex) ability would also seem to get around the need for specific alignment requirements to make a specific weapon too. A Midgard Dwarf seems able to churn out an Angelkiller (BoVD) and a Demondoom (BoED) weapon with equal alacrity.

[Biggus]

I don't remember any other item sets published after MIC. Do you have an example?

There are some in Complete Champion. They're listed as separate items but they are referred to as sets in the text.

[AvatarVecna]

I tried to see if Midgard Dwarf could be useful for a Villain Comp round a number of rounds back, but ended up backing off because it was a less a highlight of Midgard Dwarf, and more a highlight of item crafting in general...especially on characters who I'm reading as getting "extra gold" that the text didn't technically say they should get. Especially when the contests tend to look unfavorably on builds too reliant on items.


Treasure/Possessions: Standard plus magic items

Magic Items: All Midgard dwarves equip themselves with magic arms and armor. The dwarf described here uses a +2 chain shirt, +2 battleaxe, +1 light crossbow, and +1 ring of protection, but other dwarves may have different possessions.

Midgard dwarves are CR 5. "Standard Treasure" for CR 5 is 1600 gp worth.

+2 chain shirt, 4000 gp (+250 gp for the MW armor).
+2 battleaxe, 8000 gp (+310 gp for the MW weapon).
+1 light crossbow, 2000 gp (+335 gp for the MW weapon).
+1 ring of protection, 2000 gp.

At the time, I was kinda desperate to find a monster who could highlight crafting, so I was looking for any way to tie stuff to CR. "if you ignore the MW costs, the actual magic stuff is worth 16k, which is exactly 10 times the standard treasure for CR 5. That means Midgard Dwarf has a secret unwritten ability that it gets 5 times the normal treasure total for its CR as gold available for crafting, after reductions. So if I upgrade racial HD until I'm CR 20, that should give me 400000 gp to spend on crafting. Since I have a bunch of crafting cost reduction stuff, I'm looking at ~5.27 million gp worth of items for my dwarf."

Absolutely deranged, very desperate to just make a crafter for a contest. I don't even think it fit the theme of that one very well, in retrospect.

[Saintheart]

It makes me sad that a Midgard Dwarf isn't even close to being able to qualify for the Battlesmith Prestige Class. It has the right Craft skill, sure, it's deemed a dwarf, it has the right BAB ... but it doesn't have Endurance, or Weapon Focus (Warhammer). It has Weapon Focus ... (Battleaxe). And because it's an outsider, it doesn't have Heavy Armor Proficiency.

[loky1109]

It has exactly three feats. You are free to change Weapon Focus, PA and Cleave for what you want.

[Zanos]

Midgard Dwarves are great. You can also use them to nab any items that are normally a pain to craft but the Dwarf has covered under its ability. Items that require skill ranks are a common one, but they're also good for Relics, since they are also wondrous items or arms and armor.