[3.5] Craft Reserve of Artificers Created at High Levels

[balistafreak]

As a change from my normal Vow of Poverty characters, I'm now trying to pimp out an Artificer. However, when deciding what items to start with, I ran into a question.

When you start an Artificer out at a level other than 1st, how do you deal with the Craft Reserve?

Assuming the character came fresh into that level, his Craft Reserve would be full for that level: a 6th level Artificer would wander in with 150 points in his Craft Reserve. As much of this as wanted can be spent before the adventure begins.

However, how do you deal with the points that would have been used in earlier levels? How much of it can be reasonably expected to remain from the previous level? In standard adventuring, chances are you'd splurge all the remaining points from the previous level into some utility wands or scrolls or something before leveling, but when creating a character at a higher level, it's a bit fuzzy. Getting ALL the cumulative points is preposterous (how did the character even make it to his current level without using any of his craft reserve, much less on items that are still relevant at his current level?) but deciding how much is left over from the previous level is not.

Perhaps it was an "easy" level, and nearly all the Craft Reserve is left for use on items; perhaps it was a "hard" level and none is left at all.

Personally, I'm going to go in the middle leaning towards "hard"; something along the lines of half to a quarter of the previous level's Craft Reserve can be used on items still in the character's possession - with the caveat that these items were crafted at, well, the previous level. So a 6th level Artificer's remainder scroll of Fireball would be made at 5th level for a 5d6 Fireball. (Never mind that this is a complete waste. )

However, that still doesn't answer the question of using Craft Reserve on permanent items that remain useful, like Eternal Wands. This is yet another question that needs answering.

Are there any official opinions on this? What rules have been widely established/preferred by your group?

[sonofzeal]

Honestly, you can junk the whole xp-for-crafting thing entirely and not affect game balance much. XP calculations are such that, once you spend a full session as a level below the rest of the party, you often end up slingshotting past them and ending up with more total xp. I found it literally impossible to get more than a single session behind in level, no matter how much I crafted. So, I say just junk it and don't look back.

[Irreverent Fool]

Craft Reserve: An artificer receives a pool of points he can spend instead of experience points...If the points are not spent, they are lost.

No need to worry about how many you "have left". You don't get to keep any unused reserve between levels. What I would do is go through WBL and spend it along with any of the reserve you might have had at that level for lower-level items you might still want (and had the abilities to craft). Then just take the total of what you spent in gp and subtract it from your current WBL.

If you aren't ditching the XP costs for item crafting, I would not allow any accumulation between levels for artificers. They have it good enough as it is.

As far as disposable items you may have used go, I wouldn't worry about it. Just as a high level fighter probably isn't spending the gold for potions he might have wanted ten levels ago, you shouldn't worry about spending craft reserve on items you might have wanted but no longer do. That's one of the perks of rolling up at high level, along with builds that would not have been very good until you take the last couple of feats.

obnoxious
sig

[term1nally s1ck]

Hm.

Looking at the treasure/encounter values at various CRs, and the WBL, you seem to be expected to keep 3/7 of the treasure you earn, assuming you sold it all and bought your stuff with the proceeds.

If you kept it all, you'd only keep 3/14 to have WBL, so, as an average, (assuming half the treasure you find is usable), you keep 9/28 of the treasure you earn.

For simplicity, use 1/3.

[Fizban]

There's a sidebar where they do a side by side comparison. You're expected to spend 10% of your treasure on consumables, which with average treasure should leave you at standard WBL. So the fact that you used a few potions when you were lower level is already accounted for.

[term1nally s1ck]

Oh, hang on...4 people in a party lol.

90% should be correct.