[3.P] Why are there so many item creation feats?

[Endarire]

Craft Wondrous Item covers most your magic item needs. You're spending a feat for the privilege of spending gold or/and XP to make what you want.

I believe there should be no more than 2 magic item creation feats, Craft Charged Item for things with a fixed number of charges (1 for most scrolls, 50 for most wands, etc.) and Craft Continuous Item for everything else. That includes constructs.

Classes that can only create certain types of items (scrolls for Wizards, certain item types for Artificers) would still be limited to these.

There could still be artisan feats, like Extraordinary Artisan to reduce craft costs.

What say you?

[Marnath]

Where did you get the notion that wizards can only craft scrolls? Or that artificers can only make certain types of items? They both can take any item creation feat.

[Fizban]

He means that if the class can normally gets a certain crafting feat, they can only create that item. Wizards get scribe scroll for free, which creates a charged item, but that would not allow them to craft any other charged items without taking the general charged item crafting feat.

[SoC175]

Crafting Items is very powerful. You save 50% of the gp cost, thus getting far ahead of the gold by level curve. You also spend some XP, which is actually a boon, as it allows you to get even further ahead of the recommended gold by level.

E.g. in Living Greyhawk players would deliberately kill their high level PCs or craft a lot of items just to burn XP because the level loss after resurrection and the XP loss from crafting made them effectively stronger than they were supposed to be at that level.

[HunterOfJello]

Crafting items breaks the wealth by level setup of the game and allows players to multiply their wealth.


Also, since a high enough Caster Level is usually required for an item creation feat, the Tier 1 classes are the most likely candidate for item creation. Changing feats around so that Tier 1 classes become even more versatile and richer than a normal character will create even greater unbalance between the classes.

~

The wizard and artificer are bad examples to bring up when talking about magical item crafting. Artificers are a class based on crafting magical items and help establish the entire Eberron campaign setting. Wizards get the Scribe Scroll feat because their entire magic system is based on scrolls and spellbooks.

~

I do agree that some of the crafting feats could be condensed together because they are too specific on their own or didn't have enough items created for them. I love Minor Schemas as items, but I don't think they're worth the Etch Schema feat to be able to craft. Forge Ring, Bind Elemental and Craft Rune circle are also each so narrow that they don't seem like they should cost a whole feat each.

Just having 2 feats for all item creation is too few to me, but I can understand if the number was reduced from where it currently is.

[Bakkan]

What if you reduced the number of core feats from eight to four (with renaming as necessary)

Craft Magic Arms and Armor - As currently written
Craft Wondrous Item - Roll rings and rods into this (or put rings into Arms and Armor and rods into Wand if this would make Craft Wondrous Item too powerful)
Craft Wand - Have this also be used to craft staffs
Scribe Scroll - Includes brewing potions

This would allow a character to grab all of the item creation feats without having to completely forgo all other feats or get forced into classes with bonus item creation feats.

As far as the other craft feats go, some of them could probably be rolled into the four I've described here. I think Craft Construct still deserves to be its own feat, though.

[Saintheart]

In my old RHOD campaign we modded it down to three feats:

Craft Consumable Magic Item (scrolls and potions) - spellcaster could get it at level 1.
Craft Charged Magic Item (wands, rods, etc) - spellcaster could get it at level 3.
Craft Enduring Magic Item (magic arms, armour, everything else.) - spellcaster could get it at level 5.

Seemed to work out fine. Course, we were in RHOD where there wasn't much time to sit back and craft, and the wealth was pretty short. Still worked out fine! :)

[Saph]

Craft Magic Arms and Armor - As currently written
Craft Wondrous Item - Roll rings and rods into this (or put rings into Arms and Armor and rods into Wand if this would make Craft Wondrous Item too powerful)
Craft Wand - Have this also be used to craft staffs
Scribe Scroll - Includes brewing potions

I think I'd make it five:

Craft Wondrous Item (good enough that it doesn't need boosting)
Craft Arms and Armour (also leave, it does two things anyway)
Craft Wand - Include staffs (it's now 'craft spell trigger item')
Craft Rod - Include rings
Scribe Scroll - Include potions

This means that the weaker feats (Brew Potion, Forge Ring, Craft Staff) are paired up with the stronger ones (Scribe Scroll, Craft Rod, Craft Wand). Craft Wand is probably a bit weaker, but Craft Staff is a bit stronger, so it evens out.

[Psyren]

I think I'd make it five:

Craft Wondrous Item (good enough that it doesn't need boosting)
Craft Arms and Armour (also leave, it does two things anyway)
Craft Wand - Include staffs (it's now 'craft spell trigger item')
Craft Rod - Include rings
Scribe Scroll - Include potions

This means that the weaker feats (Brew Potion, Forge Ring, Craft Staff) are paired up with the stronger ones (Scribe Scroll, Craft Rod, Craft Wand). Craft Wand is probably a bit weaker, but Craft Staff is a bit stronger, so it evens out.

Hear, hear!
Oh wait, low-content post.

Along these lines, I'll supply the Psionic equivalents:

(Scribe Scroll + Brew Potion) = (Imprint Stone and Scribe Tattoo)
CWI = Craft Universal Item
CMA&A = CPA&A
(Craft Staff+Wand) = (Craft Dorje + Psicrown)
(Forge Ring + Craft Rod) = (Craft Cognizance Crystal + Craft Psionic Construct)

(seriously, Cognizance Crystals needed their own separate feat?)

[gbprime]

Crafting items breaks the wealth by level setup of the game and allows players to multiply their wealth.

Also, since a high enough Caster Level is usually required for an item creation feat, the Tier 1 classes are the most likely candidate for item creation. Changing feats around so that Tier 1 classes become even more versatile and richer than a normal character will create even greater unbalance between the classes.

It's hard to get any more unbalanced than a good T1 caster. Pop your Thought Bottle, use Embrace/Shun the Dark Chaos to trade scribe scroll or other feat out for the crafting feat you want to use, make item, Embrace/Shun to put original feat back in place (optional), chug Thought Bottle. Whole process costs only 500xp and you never need to spend a feat on crafting.

[monkey3]

I might as well make my own proposal :)

Craft Arms & armor
Craft Magic Enhancers (rod, staff, wand, potions, scroll)
Craft Wearable (rings, amulets, robes, gloves, hats, etc.) Think item slot
Craft Misc Item (all else)

[Starbuck_II]

I think I'd make it five:

Craft Wondrous Item (good enough that it doesn't need boosting)
Craft Arms and Armour (also leave, it does two things anyway)
Craft Wand - Include staffs (it's now 'craft spell trigger item')
Craft Rod - Include rings
Scribe Scroll - Include potions

This means that the weaker feats (Brew Potion, Forge Ring, Craft Staff) are paired up with the stronger ones (Scribe Scroll, Craft Rod, Craft Wand). Craft Wand is probably a bit weaker, but Craft Staff is a bit stronger, so it evens out.

I like.
Rings are very, very strong. They are like slotless magic items of any other magic item without slotless cost (but limited to 2 of them).
So With Craft Rod makes sense.

Potions and scrolls? Why not. No extra power allowing potions at 1st.

You left out Craft Construct.

[Stegyre]

What's so special about rings? They aren't slotless, so that doesn't seem to be a valid reason.

For myself, I don't see why many/most/all ring effects could be done in a wondrous item and vice versa. Why should rings be a special item, not only requiring a separate feat, but a substantially higher CL, too?

[Saph]

I like.
Rings are very, very strong. They are like slotless magic items of any other magic item without slotless cost (but limited to 2 of them).
So With Craft Rod makes sense.

There are some very good rings out there - the problem is that Forge Ring fills 2 magic item slots while Craft Wondrous Item fills 10 (and can make tools and one-shot items as well).

As for constructs, well, they're not really items. :)

[Psyren]

As for constructs, well, they're not really items. :)

Craft Construct comes up in these discussions because Magic of Eberron makes them equivalent to "Forge Ring" on the Psionic Artificer conversion table.

...which I find odd, because there are psionic rings, and they are made with CUI... I say just ditch Forge Ring and roll it into CWI.

[O_Y]

If intra-party balance is the concern, I don't see how allowing extra item creation would exacerbate the system's problems. It seems like it would, if anything, reduce the discrepancies between caster/non-caster options.

A party with no/low wealth is going to have flying, invisible game-bending casters and fighters that scurry around being ineffective.

A party with high wealth is going to have flying, invisible game-bending casters and flying, invisible fighters that scurry around being relatively useful.

Also, given the time cost of crafting, I agree with the OP. Item crafting is typically more beneficial to non-caster party members (who can gain new actions and options through new items) than to the characters who would be making the swag (who typically only get more iterations/day of abilities already at their disposal).

[Coidzor]

Craft Arms and Armour (also leave, it does two things anyway)

If you count two sides of the same coin as two things anyway.

[Saph]

Also, given the time cost of crafting, I agree with the OP. Item crafting is typically more beneficial to non-caster party members (who can gain new actions and options through new items) than to the characters who would be making the swag (who typically only get more iterations/day of abilities already at their disposal).

That's not really how it works, in my experience. It's the casters who get to make items, not the non-casters. Sure, it's possible that the casters will spend their time and XP making items for the party fighters, but it's just as possible that the casters will spend all their spell slots on buffing them directly. I've yet to see a game where increased item crafting helped anyone except the crafters (which is pretty much what you'd expect - they wouldn't be spending feats on it if it didn't give them some kind of return).

[Coidzor]

That's not really how it works, in my experience. It's the casters who get to make items, not the non-casters. Sure, it's possible that the casters will spend their time and XP making items for the party fighters, but it's just as possible that the casters will spend all their spell slots on buffing them directly. I've yet to see a game where increased item crafting helped anyone except the crafters (which is pretty much what you'd expect - they wouldn't be spending feats on it if it didn't give them some kind of return).

Weird. Either they don't know their economics or they were in too much of a time crunch (which makes sense, as, well, that's the one out of the two primary ways of keeping them from getting too out of hand). As it's actually in the best interest of the crafters to craft the items of the party in general, as it benefits themselves as well. And would benefit the rest of the party too.

Self-interest and whatnot.


As for what number I'd go with, I'd have consumables, probably with charged as separate from consumables, wondrous items, grafts, and creatures. So that's 4-5 that i can think of offhand.

And alchemical items would just be a trained only application of the craft skill rather than caster dependent.

[Psyren]

Weird. Either they don't know their economics or they were in too much of a time crunch (which makes sense, as, well, that's the one out of the two primary ways of keeping them from getting too out of hand). As it's actually in the best interest of the crafters to craft the items of the party in general, as it benefits themselves as well. And would benefit the rest of the party too.

There's a resource-problem though - namely, time. Not all campaigns are doom-free, giving the party the luxury of spending several days outfitting the group, then repeating the process in a few levels when their gear becomes obsolete. And if they aren't, you can bet I'd be crafting items for myself first, since I blew my feats on the craft chain.

[Saph]

There's a resource-problem though - namely, time. Not all campaigns are doom-free, giving the party the luxury of spending several days outfitting the group, then repeating the process in a few levels when their gear becomes obsolete. And if they aren't, you can bet I'd be crafting items for myself first, since I blew my feats on the craft chain.

*nods* Time's usually a limited resource. Crafting times aren't a problem at low levels, because you only have a couple of thousand gold to spend and you'll have used it all up in a few days. Once you get to levels 10-12, though, crafting becomes a serious time sink. If you want to make yourself a +6 stat booster, you're talking over a month of sitting around doing nothing else, and even if there's no end-of-the-world scenario on the cards, if there's any kind of plot going on you've nearly always got some sort of time pressure.

[Doug Lampert]

That's not really how it works, in my experience. It's the casters who get to make items, not the non-casters. Sure, it's possible that the casters will spend their time and XP making items for the party fighters, but it's just as possible that the casters will spend all their spell slots on buffing them directly. I've yet to see a game where increased item crafting helped anyone except the crafters (which is pretty much what you'd expect - they wouldn't be spending feats on it if it didn't give them some kind of return).

You craft for the rest of your party at 80% cost. This boosts everyone (casters most, but it's a real boost for the rest).

*nods* Time's usually a limited resource. Crafting times aren't a problem at low levels, because you only have a couple of thousand gold to spend and you'll have used it all up in a few days. Once you get to levels 10-12, though, crafting becomes a serious time sink. If you want to make yourself a +6 stat booster, you're talking over a month of sitting around doing nothing else, and even if there's no end-of-the-world scenario on the cards, if there's any kind of plot going on you've nearly always got some sort of time pressure.

IME by level 10-12 your minimum threat worth an adventure for a semi-optimized group is something that could concievably reasonably DESTROY the campaign center (home town, home kingdom, whatever) without the PCs intevention.

Which means if these happen independently much more often than once every few YEARS you've blown any possible hope of suspension of belief (how does anything survive without the PCs if city threatening foes that no one else can or will deal with shows up much more often than that?).

Say 3 years, and you can craft something in 8 hours per day, and the days need not be consecutive, so you can take time off for social stuff ANY day, and take multiple days off ANY time, and as long as you manage 36 days prior to the next real adventure that +6 item is done.

At level 2 you can easily spare the time to buy a suit of masterwork full plate (which must be custom fitted, at a cost of 2d4 * 100 GP if premade and otherwise must be manufactured to fit). That takes a master craftsman something like a YEAR to make (up to 20 weeks to just refit an existing suit). But at level 10 you can't afford 36 days?!

How's that work?

[Saph]

How's that work?

Like this.

General rule: if the DM is running a game, it's because he's prepared adventures. An adventure involves things happening. If you miss enough of the things that are happening, you miss the adventure, and most players are not all that happy about this.

Now, its true that there are some campaigns (sandbox ones, especially) where the PCs really can afford to take a season off between adventures. But they're generally the exception rather than the rule - if you look at popular modules like Red Hand of Doom there's usually some sort of time track. You can afford to lose a few days, but not a few months.

[Roderick_BR]

Why do you need to make caster EVEN MORE powerful?

[Lord Denyuar]

I remember seeing crafting broken down into 3-5 feats before somewhere (maybe it was on crystalkeep), but the crafting feats were mainly kept to about 3 feats each one allowing the crafting of magical items based on spell levels needed. For example, crafting 1 was for all magical items with needed spell level 3 or less; crafting 2 was spell level 6 or less; and crafting 3 was spell level 9 or less with each crafting feat needing the lower feat as a pre-req. Although, I think I remember those feats not covering either staffs or rings, so separate feats were needed for those (not sure why with the rings). I thought that was a viable solution to reducing crafting feats, especially if you needed low level items across the board (for say a minor wizard item crafter NPC).

[Doug Lampert]

Like this.

General rule: if the DM is running a game, it's because he's prepared adventures. An adventure involves things happening. If you miss enough of the things that are happening, you miss the adventure, and most players are not all that happy about this.

Now, its true that there are some campaigns (sandbox ones, especially) where the PCs really can afford to take a season off between adventures. But they're generally the exception rather than the rule - if you look at popular modules like Red Hand of Doom there's usually some sort of time track. You can afford to lose a few days, but not a few months.

IME most NON sandbox games you run an adventure, then you take an arbitrary amount of time off set by agreement of the players and the GM, then something happens to start the next adventure.

And few adventures advance you more than 2-3 levels.

This is ESPECIALLY true of modules.

Strangely, a pause every 2-3 levels is plenty often enough to take time off for crafting.

So I fail to see why you can't take time off at high levels for crafting just because you're running from modules rather than sandbox.

[AslanCross]

Now, its true that there are some campaigns (sandbox ones, especially) where the PCs really can afford to take a season off between adventures. But they're generally the exception rather than the rule - if you look at popular modules like Red Hand of Doom there's usually some sort of time track. You can afford to lose a few days, but not a few months.

Truth. This is why in my run of Red Hand of Doom (where my initial party included an artificer), I used the Craft Point Variant which somewhat bypasses the "you have to spend entire days working on an item and doing only that" rule. Unfortunately the artificer died before she ever got to make anything past her initial gear.

In a nutshell, the Craft Point variant gives every character a pool of Craft Points (separate from the Artificer's Craft Reserve, which is for XP) that the character can spend to boost the time it takes to make an item. Ultimately you spend the points and get to make the item in one day. It applies to both the Craft skill and magical crafting.

[Coidzor]

Now, its true that there are some campaigns (sandbox ones, especially) where the PCs really can afford to take a season off between adventures. But they're generally the exception rather than the rule - if you look at popular modules like Red Hand of Doom there's usually some sort of time track. You can afford to lose a few days, but not a few months.

...That's not between adventures, and you should know it better than most.

[Zeful]

So I fail to see why you can't take time off at high levels for crafting just because you're running from modules rather than sandbox.

It depends on the DM, I track time (down to the round if needed), and between sessions (or depending on circumstance during a session) update the world based on the time it takes PCs to do something, despite popular belief, everything has a time limit, even if it's how long someone waits before declaring you dead or whatever and hiring someone else (but again, depending on circumstance, this could be years). You could take a couple of months downtime crafting items, researching new spells/powers, devising new methods for doing things (Feats), but the world will move on without you if you do, something I will make very clear to you before hand.

As for the OP itself: I'm fine with the number of Item Creation feats, they work as a decent Feat tax to keep some of the more powerful classes from being anymore overpowered.

[Psyren]

IME most NON sandbox games you run an adventure, then you take an arbitrary amount of time off set by agreement of the players and the GM, then something happens to start the next adventure.

So your feats are only useful when you're not actually playing?
I'm not sure how this is countering the thread's premise.