How to make a sustainable income as a high level wizard

[Melcar]

Hey guys... A lot of brilliant stuff! I'm going to hit a few of them here!

Sell your spell slots. Check the rules for buying NPC casting, and you're pretty well set for the RAW. Less powerful than selling salt but less likely to get banhammered.

Indeed, but how many can one sell per day?

Pathfinder has some downtime rules as well: https://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemasteri...rules/downtime . I haven't really looked at them.

I'm surely going to be checking them out!

How much money do you need? and what level are you?

As a basic rule: find challenges meant for a party ten levels lower than you are, like ruins or bandits or such. Go beat them up for treasure. You should be able to trivially do so at least once a day.

Level 32, and I need millions at this point. Basically I want to build more more space. Specifically a very large vault containing a restricted library for ancient books, which I also need money for buying and traveling to get, and more magical laboratories, where I want to build forges, that gives item creation feats while working at them. And I want to create some epic items! Not only am I running a small school, which cost around 2000 gp a week, I want to expand my operations as well.

To all the people recommending selling spell slots, that would actually be covered by a profession skill. It's the same way that the DMGII business rules use the same rules for running a magic shop as anything else (it assumes only a couple of sales per year or so), because people don't just buy spell services willy nilly, and you need to spend time marketing your skills, you can't just rock up into town and expect to get clients.

The same would technically go for something like fabricating iron or salt, you can have all you like, but there's only a certain amount of demand to be met, so the majority of the time is actually spent finding clientelle rather than actually producing.

How much salt is it conceivable to sell in one or maybe two metropolises per year? A human consumes about a kilo of salt per year, and although there is a lot of magic in Faerun, there cant be that many level 7 spellcasters. Furthermore, people again without magic conservation needed salt to preserve food, so how much salt could a salt wall casting mage sell, if a wall of salt casting mage could sell salt?

And how many spell would I be able to sell per day? There are multiple academies in Silverymoon and Waterdeep, but few mages of my level (3 to be precise). How would I know how much money I can make in selling spellcasting servises per day? (including selling scrolls)

[...] if there's anything you need a significant abundance of, your best bet would be to craft an at-will fabrication machine in which you put in 100x the material component, for example, if you want lots of expensive inks and scroll scribing supplies, you can put in 1000gp into the crafting of the fabricate item worth of raw materials for inks and scroll scribing supplies, and it will be able to make 30gp worth per use. Then just have an automaton, like a homonculus, or some other cheap construct just constantly using it, to generate 432,000gp worth of inks and scroll scribing supplies per day. Congratulations, you can now scribe as many scrolls/spells into your spellbook as you like, with the only limiting factor being your xp.

You then can fix that by finding a way to generate 40 crafting xp per day, the best method being ambrosia. An at-will item of rapid spell distilled joy can make 1 ambrosia per hour from someone, that's 24 per day if there's no rest. Symbol of Pain and nippleclamps of exquisite pleasure are the go-to method for permanent, debilitating pleasure, and you only need 1 subject, and there's no mention on the subject needing to be intelligent, so you could theoretically just hook up an animal of some kind to the ambrosia machine. I'd recommend a ring of sustenance as well, so the creature in question can be left completely unattended while you just passively generate ambrosia.

What's this machine? And how does your calculations run up to 432.000gp worth of scribing materials?

That Distilled Joy spell has a casting time of 1 day, where it produces 2 exp for crafting. How do you get that to 40? Any chance you can explain that whole milking ambrosia in more detail?

So yeah, I guess, at that point, you're generating your own xp faster than you can spend it, you're generating the materials you need way faster than you can expend them, what exactly is there left that you need money for?

Epic magic items! As in i need millions of gp!


I want to thank you all for you comments. There are some great ideas, and I'll be pursuing multiple of them for sure.

In the meantime, I want to ask how you guys would go about dealing with a player like me, if I came to you as DMs and said I need a way to make millions of gp within the next few years? Would you allow me selling salt? Could I create a Wall of Platinum spell? If there is a Wall of: Iron, Stone, Force, Salt, Sand and Ice, why not Gold, Platinum, Palladium, Ruby, Diamond?

Could I circumvent the need for money in item creations, by substituting salt for gp? (I seem to remember this being done in Harry Potter and the Natural 20)

I'm really interested in how you guys would handle such a request/ need for money from a player.

Thank you in advance!

[unseenmage]

Back when I played my artificer it was suggested that infinite gp would be a +7 LA power.

For a creatively played artificer it wasnt a high enough LA.

[Crake]

How much salt is it conceivable to sell in one or maybe two metropolises per year? A human consumes about a kilo of salt per year, and although there is a lot of magic in Faerun, there cant be that many level 7 spellcasters. Furthermore, people again without magic conservation needed salt to preserve food, so how much salt could a salt wall casting mage sell, if a wall of salt casting mage could sell salt?

And how many spell would I be able to sell per day? There are multiple academies in Silverymoon and Waterdeep, but few mages of my level (3 to be precise). How would I know how much money I can make in selling spellcasting servises per day? (including selling scrolls)

For these, you need to remember that while there's a large demand, you're far from the only supplier in either case. This is why it comes down to a profession check, because as I said, it's more about marketing and getting clients, then it is about how much supply you have.

What's this machine? And how does your calculations run up to 432.000gp worth of scribing materials?

That Distilled Joy spell has a casting time of 1 day, where it produces 2 exp for crafting. How do you get that to 40? Any chance you can explain that whole milking ambrosia in more detail?

Epic magic items! As in i need millions of gp!

Fabricate turns raw materials into a final product, and the raw materials cost 1/3 of the final product. Thus, to make 30gp worth of scribing materials, you need 10gp. To create an at-will item of something that has a material component cost, you must supply 100x the material components. Thus, to create an at-will fabricate item that produces 30gp worth of scribing materials per use, you need to supply 1000gp extra into the crafting costs. You can scale this up however much you require, but in essence, if you have something using the item every round for a whole day, that's 30gp x10 rounds per minute x60 minutes per hour x24 hours per day which comes out to 432,000gp worth of scribing materials per day.

Alternatively, if you're an epic spellcaster (i hadn't realised you were THAT high level), you can just get the "ignore material components" feat, and cast fabricate to simply spontaneously create literally any mundane craftable good within the volume limits of the spell. If you wanted pure gold for example, being a mineral, you're looking at 1 cubic foot of pure gold per caster level, that's 491 lb of gold, at 50gp per pound, so 24,550gp per CL for each casting of fabricate. Alternatively, you could just make plantinum pieces, in which you could make the same volume, but at a higher density, so you'd get 1,338.9 lb of platinum per CL, or 66,945 pp per CL. Per. CL. So you're really looking at around fifteen million gp worth of platinum per cast if you're in the mid 20s. Not bad for a 5th level spell really?

Ambrosia takes 24 hours to cast, however, the rapid spell metamagic is a +1 spell level metamagic that reduces the casting time to 1 hour, so you can get 24x the casts in per day.

If you're crafting epic magic items, and I assume you have the epic magic item crafting feat, which lets you craft 10k gp per day, you'll need to scale that ambrosia production up by x10 though, since you'll be burning through 400xp per day, not 40.

[Fizban]

That Distilled Joy spell has a casting time of 1 day, where it produces 2 exp for crafting. How do you get that to 40? Any chance you can explain that whole milking ambrosia in more detail?

The presumption is a custom infinite item/trap/whatever that you use however many times you want, on however many targets you need. Of course the evil counterpart Extract Pain/Liquid Agony already has a magic item, which costs 68,000gp and extracts one dose from one person over one day.

In the meantime, I want to ask how you guys would go about dealing with a player like me, if I came to you as DMs and said I need a way to make millions of gp within the next few years? Would you allow me selling salt? Could I create a Wall of Platinum spell? If there is a Wall of: Iron, Stone, Force, Salt, Sand and Ice, why not Gold, Platinum, Palladium, Ruby, Diamond?

I would ask what it is you're trying to do. Presumably it does not relate to the current/planned adventure as I'm not likely to spread those out over years, and is thus a fluffier player goal. Thus there's no reason for me to really disallow anything I'm not already disallowing- which includes all forms of infinite wealth cheese. There's a good chance I could help you figure out how to do what you want affordably within the rules/my world, or if it requires unbounded epic or plot shenanigans, it can be noted as part of your epilogue that you go do that (with results to be determined if we ran another game in the future of the same setting). If you wanted a character with a grand ambition that might not be "physically" possible, you probably should have mentioned it before you settled on the character, so I could have told you whether it was possible or not.

[Jack_Simth]

How much salt is it conceivable to sell in one or maybe two metropolises per year? A human consumes about a kilo of salt per year, and although there is a lot of magic in Faerun, there cant be that many level 7 spellcasters. Furthermore, people again without magic conservation needed salt to preserve food, so how much salt could a salt wall casting mage sell, if a wall of salt casting mage could sell salt?

In both 3.5 and Pathfinder, salt is a trade good, valued at 5 gp/pound (same as silver).

The 3.5 text to go with that table is: "Merchants commonly exchange trade goods without using currency. As a means of comparison, some trade goods are detailed below." and a later "Trade goods are the exception to the half-price rule. A trade good, in this sense, is a valuable good that can be easily exchanged almost as if it were cash itself."
The Pathfinder text to go with that table is:

Merchants commonly exchange trade goods without using currency. Trade goods are the exception to the rule that you can sell an item for half its price; they’re valuable enough to be exchanged almost as if they were cash itself. Trade goods are usually transported and sold in larger quantities than the amount listed. A farmer may have 10- and 20-pound sacks of potatoes to sell to a large family or restaurant, and be resistant to tearing open a bag just to sell a few individual potatoes.

You don't so much sell salt as you use it to buy stuff. Sure, some of it will end up sprinkled on local folks' food and some of it will end up used to preserve local folks' food (and a few other items), but most of it will end up migrating with merchants who are going in and out of town.

Ignoring that, a D&D 3.5 Metropolis will have 40,000+ people. Going by one kilo of salt/person/year, that's 2.2 pounds of salt/person/year, or 88,000+ pounds of salt, or 440,000+ gp via trade goods tables.

[bundlesandflows]

The 3.5 text to go with that table is: "Merchants commonly exchange trade goods without using currency. As a means of comparison, some trade goods are detailed below." and a later "Trade goods are the exception to the half-price rule. A trade good, in this sense, is a valuable good that can be easily exchanged almost as if it were cash itself."
The Pathfinder text to go with that table is:
You don't so much sell salt as you use it to buy stuff. Sure, some of it will end up sprinkled on local folks' food and some of it will end up used to preserve local folks' food (and a few other items), but most of it will end up migrating with merchants who are going in and out of town.

This, by the way, is not only historically accurate, it's also technically accurate today in the sense of commodity market trading.

[Reversefigure4]

At the point where you are 32nd level, and requiring millions of gold a month, you have moved well outside of the expected economic paradigm. Spells that produce a "mere" half-million gold pieces a year aren't going to mean much to you.

Because you're so far outside the expectations of the rules, you'll need to come up with your own solutions. That's what Epic Spellcasting is for, however. Focus your attentions first on a "Summon Platinum Pieces" spell, or Walls of Mithral, or the like, and sort your economy out with magic first, then worry about using the magic for crafting and the like.

[tyckspoon]

At the point where you are 32nd level, and requiring millions of gold a month, you have moved well outside of the expected economic paradigm. Spells that produce a "mere" half-million gold pieces a year aren't going to mean much to you.

Because you're so far outside the expectations of the rules, you'll need to come up with your own solutions. That's what Epic Spellcasting is for, however. Focus your attentions first on a "Summon Platinum Pieces" spell, or Walls of Mithral, or the like, and sort your economy out with magic first, then worry about using the magic for crafting and the like.

Yeah, this is the point where you start creating something like Epic spells to Transmute Rock to Gold and create six-foot spheres of perfect pure gold or transform miscellaneous pebbles into perfectly cut gemstones or something (also the point where actual GP values have basically lost all meaning.) Or figure out how to survive in your setting's equivalent of deep space and go harvest exotic magical materials that are only useful to mages like yourself that find themselves with a need for pricelessly valuable items to make the most powerful of items with - moon-diamonds that have absorbed the unfiltered magical light of the stars and have to be carefully contained in quintessence lest they be contaminated with mere earthly magic, elementally active plasma-like matter from the exact center of balance between the four elemental Inner Planes, a live sea-worm from the deepest point of the planet's oceans that has never known light or air and lives off the very planet's magical background.. (if this sounds a lot like 'go on an adventure', well, it is. Because I'm assuming your GM will be a lot more receptive to the idea of you going on suitably magical-sounding trips like this and assigning a suitable gold value to your reagents than to you saying 'Ok so I create a literal mountain of gold, and then I transmute that into a magic item.')

[Melcar]

In both 3.5 and Pathfinder, salt is a trade good, valued at 5 gp/pound (same as silver).

The 3.5 text to go with that table is: "Merchants commonly exchange trade goods without using currency. As a means of comparison, some trade goods are detailed below." and a later "Trade goods are the exception to the half-price rule. A trade good, in this sense, is a valuable good that can be easily exchanged almost as if it were cash itself."
The Pathfinder text to go with that table is:
You don't so much sell salt as you use it to buy stuff. Sure, some of it will end up sprinkled on local folks' food and some of it will end up used to preserve local folks' food (and a few other items), but most of it will end up migrating with merchants who are going in and out of town.

Ignoring that, a D&D 3.5 Metropolis will have 40,000+ people. Going by one kilo of salt/person/year, that's 2.2 pounds of salt/person/year, or 88,000+ pounds of salt, or 440,000+ gp via trade goods tables.

So what you saying is, that I can substitute gp for salt as in 1 lbs for each 5 gp the creation cost is? As in a cloak of elven kind costs 1250 gp to make. So that would be 250 lbs of salt and I'm good?

If my calculations are correct, I produce 2133 cubic ft. of salt per casting, equaling 1.438.340.385 gp Is that really how much I can create items for per casting? (as in I use salt as a currency to exchange into the appropriate expensive crafting materials) Seems almost too easy?

At the point where you are 32nd level, and requiring millions of gold a month, you have moved well outside of the expected economic paradigm. Spells that produce a "mere" half-million gold pieces a year aren't going to mean much to you.

Because you're so far outside the expectations of the rules, you'll need to come up with your own solutions. That's what Epic Spellcasting is for, however. Focus your attentions first on a "Summon Platinum Pieces" spell, or Walls of Mithral, or the like, and sort your economy out with magic first, then worry about using the magic for crafting and the like.

I wanna stress that although we run a game at level 32, its not a high optimized game by any means. I have no epic items yet, and we basically run it as a lover level game just with higher stats... That's what we like, and well we still have a lot of smaller non-cosmic things to do. I do a lot of archeology trying to uncover lost treasures from Netheril, Crown Wars and Imaskar... The other player runs, as in is king, of a kingdom... which means doing international politics most of the time...

Yeah, this is the point where you start creating something like Epic spells to Transmute Rock to Gold and create six-foot spheres of perfect pure gold or transform miscellaneous pebbles into perfectly cut gemstones or something (also the point where actual GP values have basically lost all meaning.) Or figure out how to survive in your setting's equivalent of deep space and go harvest exotic magical materials that are only useful to mages like yourself that find themselves with a need for pricelessly valuable items to make the most powerful of items with - moon-diamonds that have absorbed the unfiltered magical light of the stars and have to be carefully contained in quintessence lest they be contaminated with mere earthly magic, elementally active plasma-like matter from the exact center of balance between the four elemental Inner Planes, a live sea-worm from the deepest point of the planet's oceans that has never known light or air and lives off the very planet's magical background.. (if this sounds a lot like 'go on an adventure', well, it is. Because I'm assuming your GM will be a lot more receptive to the idea of you going on suitably magical-sounding trips like this and assigning a suitable gold value to your reagents than to you saying 'Ok so I create a literal mountain of gold, and then I transmute that into a magic item.')

That was kind of my point when asking about, why I cant simply create a wall of Platinum or Wall of Diamond spell, when so many other versions exist!

[Crake]

So what you saying is, that I can substitute gp for salt as in 1 lbs for each 5 gp the creation cost is? As in a cloak of elven kind costs 1250 gp to make. So that would be 250 lbs of salt and I'm good?

If my calculations are correct, I produce 2133 cubic ft. of salt per casting, equaling 1.438.340.385 gp Is that really how much I can create items for per casting? (as in I use salt as a currency to exchange into the appropriate expensive crafting materials) Seems almost too easy?

It's worth noting that creating an item doesn't just use flat gold, you still need to actually source the materials by buying them, and cities have limited market values, not to mention the inflation that you'd run into by injecting that much "money" into the economy. I'd much rather recommend using ignore material components and fabricate to directly create the crafting materials you require, rather than creating "money", though fabricate can do that too, if you need to pay people for services.

That was kind of my point when asking about, why I cant simply create a wall of Platinum or Wall of Diamond spell, when so many other versions exist!

I mean, fabricate is basically "wall of X" where X is whatever you want? Hell, if you can get 13th level spell slots, you can even get fabricate as an innate spell and just cast it willy nilly to produce whatever you want at a whim.

[gogogome]

Cast fabricate on gold.

material component of fabricate: The original material worth the same as the raw materials of the finished product.
original material: gold
finished product: bar of gold worth 300gp
cost of raw materials to build bar of gold: 1/3 of what a bar of gold costs which in this case is 100gp
end result: cast fabricate on 100gp of gold to turn it into 300gp of gold

So just cast fabricate on gold to triple its amount per casting.
Bind a Rejkar which is an outsider with at-will fabricate and you can make a bajillion gold in an hour.

Of course if you tried to pull this in my games i'd slap you.

[Crichton]

It's worth noting that creating an item doesn't just use flat gold, you still need to actually source the materials by buying them

Point of technicality: Sure that would make total sense, for the sake of realism, but is that actually spelled out anywhere in the magic item creation rules?




On the SRD, the very first line in the magic item creation rules simply says: "To create magic items, spellcasters use special feats. They invest time, money, and their own personal energy (in the form of experience points) in an item’s creation. " (emphasis mine)


Yes, there are generic references to 'supplies' as in this line that comes a bit later in the rules: "Magic supplies for items are always half of the base price in gp"
But that's really just a formula for how much it costs. There's no sense of what those supplies are actually supposed to be, nor any indication you have to do anything aside from give up the gold to acquire them.


There are a few specifics given, in the various magic item creation rules. Things such as only masterwork weapons and armor being enhanced, and in each category of magic item, there's a small entry outlining the need for a heat source, or iron/wood/leatherworking tools, or parts of a ring, etc.



But there's no rules at all, nor even guidelines, that tell you you have to spend in-game time going out and buying every little piece or part or component.

It makes for some good roleplay and storytelling, but trying to use it as a way to restrict someone who's trying to make an item or prevent them from doing so isn't supported by the rules, nor is it really an act of good teamwork or fair play. They've already invested feats into being able to craft items, which is a not insignificant investment of character resources, and they're already paying the listed gold and xp prices for things.

Let them have their fun, roleplay the heck out of it to maximum story effect, but don't punish their feat choice nor their interest in pursuing this as a goal for their character and their character's story by making it harder than the rules already do.



As a side point of real-life reference, I have in real life made a ring. I used a pure silver coin to do it, and all it took in tools was a hammer, a round file, and some sandpaper and polishing compound. Nothing I had to go out of my way to procure, nor anything that would be difficult to find. Aside from that it merely took me time, and the cost of the coin. Just as an example. :)

[Melcar]

It's worth noting that creating an item doesn't just use flat gold, you still need to actually source the materials by buying them, and cities have limited market values, not to mention the inflation that you'd run into by injecting that much "money" into the economy. I'd much rather recommend using ignore material components and fabricate to directly create the crafting materials you require, rather than creating "money", though fabricate can do that too, if you need to pay people for services.



I mean, fabricate is basically "wall of X" where X is whatever you want? Hell, if you can get 13th level spell slots, you can even get fabricate as an innate spell and just cast it willy nilly to produce whatever you want at a whim.

I totally agree on going out and procuring said components, albeit non are stated as far as I can see in the rules. But I like too the roleplaying of it. At least as an off scene happening during downtime and such. But my concern was the very real cost - not only for making items, but also running my little operation. If I can use salt to pay for services/ materials etc., I'd be set for the rest of the campaign.

Cast fabricate on gold.

material component of fabricate: The original material worth the same as the raw materials of the finished product.
original material: gold
finished product: bar of gold worth 300gp
cost of raw materials to build bar of gold: 1/3 of what a bar of gold costs which in this case is 100gp
end result: cast fabricate on 100gp of gold to turn it into 300gp of gold

So just cast fabricate on gold to triple its amount per casting.
Bind a Rejkar which is an outsider with at-will fabricate and you can make a bajillion gold in an hour.

Of course if you tried to pull this in my games i'd slap you.

I did not think about this at all. I have 20k platinum pieces in my vault. Would I have to cast it on 1 coin at a time, or could I cast it on the entire pile once at end up having 60k by the end of the casting? I'm not sure I read the spell the same way you do? Is far as I can tell, the spell does no increase the value of said material. Thus a gold bar of gold valuet at 100 gp will only turn into something which is worth 100gp, like 100 gold coins...
what am I missing?

Point of technicality: Sure that would make total sense, for the sake of realism, but is that actually spelled out anywhere in the magic item creation rules?




On the SRD, the very first line in the magic item creation rules simply says: "To create magic items, spellcasters use special feats. They invest time, money, and their own personal energy (in the form of experience points) in an item’s creation. " (emphasis mine)


Yes, there are generic references to 'supplies' as in this line that comes a bit later in the rules: "Magic supplies for items are always half of the base price in gp"
But that's really just a formula for how much it costs. There's no sense of what those supplies are actually supposed to be, nor any indication you have to do anything aside from give up the gold to acquire them.


There are a few specifics given, in the various magic item creation rules. Things such as only masterwork weapons and armor being enhanced, and in each category of magic item, there's a small entry outlining the need for a heat source, or iron/wood/leatherworking tools, or parts of a ring, etc.



But there's no rules at all, nor even guidelines, that tell you you have to spend in-game time going out and buying every little piece or part or component.

It makes for some good roleplay and storytelling, but trying to use it as a way to restrict someone who's trying to make an item or prevent them from doing so isn't supported by the rules, nor is it really an act of good teamwork or fair play. They've already invested feats into being able to craft items, which is a not insignificant investment of character resources, and they're already paying the listed gold and xp prices for things.

Let them have their fun, roleplay the heck out of it to maximum story effect, but don't punish their feat choice nor their interest in pursuing this as a goal for their character and their character's story by making it harder than the rules already do.



As a side point of real-life reference, I have in real life made a ring. I used a pure silver coin to do it, and all it took in tools was a hammer, a round file, and some sandpaper and polishing compound. Nothing I had to go out of my way to procure, nor anything that would be difficult to find. Aside from that it merely took me time, and the cost of the coin. Just as an example. :)

See, that was my thoughts as well. Now I don't mind adding an element of reloplaying and lots of fun can come from that, but as you said, we usually don't go into what materiel we need - except maybe if I want to have a special material like mithral or something...

[gogogome]

I did not think about this at all. I have 20k platinum pieces in my vault. Would I have to cast it on 1 coin at a time, or could I cast it on the entire pile once at end up having 60k by the end of the casting? I'm not sure I read the spell the same way you do? Is far as I can tell, the spell does no increase the value of said material. Thus a gold bar of gold valuet at 100 gp will only turn into something which is worth 100gp, like 100 gold coins...
what am I missing?

Crafting (the skill) is a wealth tripler. In order to build a 100gp house you need to buy 33gp of raw materials. By using the craft skill you just tripled your wealth.
Fabricate turns that 33gp of raw materials into a 100gp house as well.

Read the material components section carefully.

You only need gold worth as much as the raw materials to create the final gold product.

"The original material, which costs the same amount as the raw materials required to craft the item to be created. "
original material = gold
item to be created = 100gp gold bar
raw materials requied to craft the item to be created = 33gp of "raw materials"

So the material component is gold, which costs the same amount as 1/3 of the gold bar to be created.

You can cast fabricate on the entire pile as long as its within the spell's volume limit.

[Melcar]

Crafting (the skill) is a wealth tripler. In order to build a 100gp house you need to buy 33gp of raw materials. By using the craft skill you just tripled your wealth.
Fabricate turns that 33gp of raw materials into a 100gp house as well.

Read the material components section carefully.

You only need gold worth as much as the raw materials to create the final gold product.

"The original material, which costs the same amount as the raw materials required to craft the item to be created. "
original material = gold
item to be created = 100gp gold bar
raw materials requied to craft the item to be created = 33gp of "raw materials"

So the material component is gold, which costs the same amount as 1/3 of the gold bar to be created.

You can cast fabricate on the entire pile as long as its within the spell's volume limit.

Ahh... now I think I get it. So my example is that if I want to create 60.000 platinum pieces, I only need 20.000 platinum pieces?

[Crake]

Cast fabricate on gold.

material component of fabricate: The original material worth the same as the raw materials of the finished product.
original material: gold
finished product: bar of gold worth 300gp
cost of raw materials to build bar of gold: 1/3 of what a bar of gold costs which in this case is 100gp
end result: cast fabricate on 100gp of gold to turn it into 300gp of gold

So just cast fabricate on gold to triple its amount per casting.
Bind a Rejkar which is an outsider with at-will fabricate and you can make a bajillion gold in an hour.

Of course if you tried to pull this in my games i'd slap you.

Technically, the raw material for a gold bar isn't gold, it's gold ore. If you wanted to improve the value of your gold, you would shape it into actual products like jewelry, or, I dunno, electronics.

A more interesting route to take would be coal -> diamonds, though remember for all fabricate castings, you do need to perform an appropriate craft skill, and the craft check required to turn coal into diamonds would be quite high I'd imagine.

[Crichton]

Technically, the raw material for a gold bar isn't gold, it's gold ore.

Again, that's a real life example, and would make sense, but where is the rules text that specifies gold ore's value or ore to pure gold ratio, or anything like that?

And strictly speaking, you can make a gold bar from any gold, you don't have to refine the ore into pure metal yourself. Just melt and cast it.
If you want to bring in real life processes like ore refining, you have to find the rules for it, or homebrew them yourself.


Of course, the fabricate/craft trick of turning 1/3 of something into 1 of something is silly, and a rules exploit, but it seems rules-legal, so there it is.

[Crake]

Again, that's a real life example, and would make sense, but where is the rules text that specifies gold ore's value or ore to pure gold ratio, or anything like that?

In the crafting rules, raw materials are valued at 1/3rd the price of the final product. So to make gold, you need 1/3rd the value of gold ore.

And strictly speaking, you can make a gold bar from any gold, you don't have to refine the ore into pure metal yourself. Just melt and cast it.
If you want to bring in real life processes like ore refining, you have to find the rules for it, or homebrew them yourself.

Correct, but casting regular gold into a bar doesn't add value, thus you're not turning raw materials into a final product.

Of course, the fabricate/craft trick of turning 1/3 of something into 1 of something is silly, and a rules exploit, but it seems rules-legal, so there it is.

I mean, it's not, because it turns raw materials into a finished product which is worth 3x more, by the crafting rules. If you just turn gold into gold, then you're not taking something raw and turning it into a final product, are you? You're just crudely reshaping it from coins into bars. On the other hand, turning gold into jewelry adds value because of the crafting process.

[gogogome]

Technically, the raw material for a gold bar isn't gold, it's gold ore. If you wanted to improve the value of your gold, you would shape it into actual products like jewelry, or, I dunno, electronics.

You don't need raw materials. You just need the original material worth as much as the raw materials.

Ahh... now I think I get it. So my example is that if I want to create 60.000 platinum pieces, I only need 20.000 platinum pieces?

Yes.

[Melcar]

A more interesting route to take would be coal -> diamonds, though remember for all fabricate castings, you do need to perform an appropriate craft skill, and the craft check required to turn coal into diamonds would be quite high I'd imagine.

Could this actually be done? And what about the crafting DC? One could argue, that the crafting check was not necessary if you just turned a lump of coal into a lump of ray diamond. The craft check would be needed if turned into a facet cut diamond for sure, but just a raw uncut diamond I would assume no. Thoughts?


Ok, so could I use Major Creation to summon a pile of gold, and use Fabricate to turn that pile into gold coins? Sure they last only 32 hours, but the shop keepers do not know that!

[Lvl 2 Expert]

Take the leadership feat, let those guys run a magic item workshop, or perform any of the other plans while you live the high life. Make all your followers elves and you can start calling yourself Santa Claus.

You don't need raw materials. You just need the original material worth as much as the raw materials.

I agree with the other side. Turning gold not-quite-bars into gold bars is not a significant fabrication step and won't add much value. Turning gold into jewelry, or gold ore into gold, is. Fabricate does not change the amount of material you have, therefor the increase in value has to come from the material becoming a more markettable product such as what a craftsman could turn it into.

[King of Nowhere]

In the meantime, I want to ask how you guys would go about dealing with a player like me, if I came to you as DMs and said I need a way to make millions of gp within the next few years? Would you allow me selling salt? Could I create a Wall of Platinum spell? If there is a Wall of: Iron, Stone, Force, Salt, Sand and Ice, why not Gold, Platinum, Palladium, Ruby, Diamond?

Could I circumvent the need for money in item creations, by substituting salt for gp? (I seem to remember this being done in Harry Potter and the Natural 20)

I'm really interested in how you guys would handle such a request/ need for money from a player.

Thank you in advance!

depends strongly on the dm and the campaign.
personally, i don't like all those spells that would break the economy, make infinite wealth or stuff. i don't like the kind of campaign world they tend to make, and i prefer wizards to be part of the world, but held aloof. for that reason i suggested the teleportation business, as that - along with crafting - is actually the best way to make money in my campaign world with the limitations i set.

now, if a player out of the blue told me he wanted to spend a few years downtime making money, i'd tell them we're here to play dungeons & dragons, not deals & dividends, and suggest that if he wants to play an economic simulator, he should go for a different game.
but in your case, the dm has told you you are all going to get years of downtime, so i assume he is expecting something like that. in which case, the only limit is the level of broken-ness that he considers acceptable

[gogogome]

I agree with the other side. Turning gold not-quite-bars into gold bars is not a significant fabrication step and won't add much value. Turning gold into jewelry, or gold ore into gold, is. Fabricate does not change the amount of material you have, therefor the increase in value has to come from the material becoming a more markettable product such as what a craftsman could turn it into.

This is incorrect. D&D does not use the law of preservation of energy and mass. D&D uses the law of preservation of gp value. Fabricate triples gp value. As a result you can't turn a lump of a log into a high priced art statue even with a colossal log with all all the sky high craft checks in the world but you can turn that lump of log into something 3 times its value, such as a bigger lump of log.

[Crake]

Could this actually be done? And what about the crafting DC? One could argue, that the crafting check was not necessary if you just turned a lump of coal into a lump of ray diamond. The craft check would be needed if turned into a facet cut diamond for sure, but just a raw uncut diamond I would assume no. Thoughts?

If it didn't require a check at all, then it would be possible to do with your bare hands and no training whatsoever, but I'd say that's rather definitely not the case. Processing a raw diamond into an faceted diamond though is definitely something you could do that would drastically increase the value of the diamond (read: by x3, since that's what the value of the raw vs the final product is by default in dnd ) I'm 90% sure there's a line somewhere in one of the splatbooks that says the DM can adjust this value for various crafts, and I know that poisons specifically use an adjustment on the crafting rules altogether, as outlined in complete adventurer.

Ok, so what if a use Major Creation to summon gold, and use Fabricate to turn it into gold coins? Sure they last only 32 hours, but the shop keepers do not know that!

You could skip the entire major creation step if you had a way to bypass a need for material components. Even just eschew materials, you can create just under 3gp worth of things for free with each fabricate casting, by just ignoring a 99s 99c amount of base materials. If you have access to embrace/shun the dark chaos, you can pick up the ignore material components feat which lets you literally just make whatever you want (I've mentioned this a few times, but gotten no acknowledgement on it, so I'm not sure if it's just been missed in the chatter), or as I mentioned a post or two ago, you can get the innate spell feat which makes it into an SLA you can use at will, and SLAs ignore material components.

[Crichton]

In the crafting rules, raw materials are valued at 1/3rd the price of the final product. So to make gold, you need 1/3rd the value of gold ore.



Correct, but casting regular gold into a bar doesn't add value, thus you're not turning raw materials into a final product.



I mean, it's not, because it turns raw materials into a finished product which is worth 3x more, by the crafting rules. If you just turn gold into gold, then you're not taking something raw and turning it into a final product, are you? You're just crudely reshaping it from coins into bars. On the other hand, turning gold into jewelry adds value because of the crafting process.

I was gonna do a detailed response, but largely the responses that came in before me already have it covered::

You don't need raw materials. You just need the original material worth as much as the raw materials.

Turning gold not-quite-bars into gold bars is not a significant fabrication step and won't add much value. Turning gold into jewelry, or gold ore into gold, is. Fabricate does not change the amount of material you have, therefor the increase in value has to come from the material becoming a more markettable product such as what a craftsman could turn it into.

This is incorrect. D&D does not use the law of preservation of energy and mass. D&D uses the law of preservation of gp value. Fabricate triples gp value. As a result you can't turn a lump of a log into a high priced art statue even with a colossal log with all all the sky high craft checks in the world but you can turn that lump of log into something 3 times its value, such as a bigger lump of log.

It doesn't matter that it makes no sense in real world physics. It's what the rules say about how it works. It's a game. Rules are abstractions, and yes, sometimes they break down when you try to bring real world processes in that the rules aren't meant to cover. That's just how games work.

There are no 'gold ore' rules in 3.5. You're free to make some up, but it's not a thing that has a market value listed, and it's not anywhere listed as the 'raw material' needed to fabricate gold bars or gold coins, and even if it was, the craft/fabricate rules wouldn't care, they'd still just triple the value, as gogogome has laid out a couple times here already.


All the arguments for 'it's not a value-adding significant crafting step' are arguments from how real life crafting should work, but have no bearing on how the rules say in-game crafting does work



Here, quoted directly from the Craft rules on the SRD, filled in with our example in italics:

To determine how much time and money it takes to make an item, follow these steps.

1. Find the item’s price. Put the price in silver pieces (1 gp = 10 sp). Item=One 1lb gold bar. Value 50gp=500sp
2. Find the DC from the table below. DC=unknown, lets go with the highest listed nonmagical/nonalchemical DC:20
3. Pay one-third of the item’s price for the cost of raw materials. Cost of materials is One third of 500sp=166sp and 66cp
4. Make an appropriate Craft check... This part isn't relevant to the issue of value. You either make the Craft check or don't, or via Fabricate don't even need to

So assuming to speed things up you're using Fabricate, you Craft 166sp and 66cp worth of gold into your gold bar that's worth 500sp, which is of course, 50gp. Is it slightly nonsensical? Sure, but it's also exactly how the rules say it works, so, barring houserules, it works.

It doesn't have to be a gold bar, it could be a gold anything. You could make gold coins the same way, or platinum using that instead, or whatever. Sure, jewelry is fine, but jewelry is neither a currency nor a trade good, so having something you can immediately spend or trade as currency without having to find a buyer first is far more convenient.

[Crake]

So assuming to speed things up you're using Fabricate, you Craft 166sp and 66cp worth of gold into your gold bar that's worth 500sp, which is of course, 50gp. Is it slightly nonsensical? Sure, but it's also exactly how the rules say it works, so, barring houserules, it works.

The issue here is that you're using the craft rules for something that doesn't come under the craft rules. You don't "craft" a gold bar. It doesn't require a craft check at all, it just requires melting the gold, and pouring it into a mold. No craft check = not using the craft skill rules. Now, processing ore on the other hand WOULD require skill, and thus would come under a craft check, likewise, turning gold into jewelry requires skill, thus would come under a craft check. Hell, even refining timber into wooden beams requires skill and would come under a craft check, but stamping a coin or pouring gold into bar molds? Sorry, that doesn't count. That would be the equivilent of bending a piece of metal and saying you've "crafted" something. That's where the so-called dysfunction lies here: people using rules where they don't apply.

[gogogome]

The issue here is that you're using the craft rules for something that doesn't come under the craft rules. You don't "craft" a gold bar. It doesn't require a craft check at all, it just requires melting the gold, and pouring it into a mold. No craft check = not using the craft skill rules. Now, processing ore on the other hand WOULD require skill, and thus would come under a craft check, likewise, turning gold into jewelry requires skill, thus would come under a craft check. Hell, even refining timber into wooden beams requires skill and would come under a craft check, but stamping a coin or pouring gold into bar molds? Sorry, that doesn't count. That would be the equivilent of bending a piece of metal and saying you've "crafted" something. That's where the so-called dysfunction lies here: people using rules where they don't apply.

" You convert material of one sort into a product that is of the same material. Creatures or magic items cannot be created or transmuted by the fabricate spell. The quality of items made by this spell is commensurate with the quality of material used as the basis for the new fabrication. If you work with a mineral, the target is reduced to 1 cubic foot per level instead of 10 cubic feet.

You must make an appropriate Craft check to fabricate articles requiring a high degree of craftsmanship.

Casting requires 1 round per 10 cubic feet (or 1 cubic foot) of material to be affected by the spell. "

Crafting with fabricate is optional. You can fabricate a round rock into a cube rock 3 times its value.

The spell is horrendously written and clearly betrays the obvious intent of the spell. So the right thing to do here is accept that and rule this spell as intended with house rules instead of trying to lawyer the poorly written spell into working as it should by lawyering a bunch of tertiary mechanics that are also not well written.

[Quertus]

If it didn't require a check at all, then it would be possible to do with your bare hands and no training whatsoever, but I'd say that's rather definitely not the case. Processing a raw diamond into an faceted diamond though is definitely something you could do that would drastically increase the value of the diamond (read: by x3, since that's what the value of the raw vs the final product is by default in dnd )

I think you mean "in 3e". Perhaps it's this way in 4e & 5e, too? But I'm fairly sure it wasn't like this before 3e.

[Crichton]

The issue here is that you're using the craft rules for something that doesn't come under the craft rules. You don't "craft" a gold bar. It doesn't require a craft check at all, it just requires melting the gold, and pouring it into a mold. No craft check = not using the craft skill rules.

You might be able to make that argument, but simply stating it and not backing it with rules text isn't making an argument for your side

Now, processing ore on the other hand WOULD require skill, and thus would come under a craft check,

And again I say: citation needed. Is "gold ore" ever even addressed in D&D 3.5 rules, anywhere? I couldn't think of anywhere it is, and a google search for 'd&d 3.5 "gold ore"' doesn't come up with anyone else citing any such rules, so... Are you literally just making this up and assuming it exists because that's how mining/ore processing/raw metal production works in real life?

likewise, turning gold into jewelry requires skill, thus would come under a craft check. Hell, even refining timber into wooden beams requires skill and would come under a craft check,

No argument that they wouldn't. They are examples of things that are crafted.

but stamping a coin or pouring gold into bar molds? Sorry, that doesn't count. That would be the equivilent of bending a piece of metal and saying you've "crafted" something.

Those aren't equivalent at all. Minting coins is absolutely an act of crafting, as is melting and casting metal objects. Those don't just happen by accident, or in common labor. Sure, casting might not be as intricate as fine engraving type jewelry work, but looking around the real world at the variety of products that are made of cast metal, there's zero case for saying that's not crafting. Shoot, the vast majority of cheap jewelry is exactly that: cheaply cast metal. Doesn't matter if the mold you're casting into is a gold bar mold or a basic flower-shaped pendant/necklace, the act is the same.

All of that aside, you're once again trying to impose your judgments from real-world ideas of crafting onto a system of rules that clearly outline that making a product is crafting, and that it doesn't have to be any kind of intricate, finely detailed work to count as crafting. It takes far less skill or effort to carve a 'Very simple item (wooden spoon)' from the craft DC chart than it does to mint a two-faced coin, or even a metal bar. Anyone can whittle with a pocket knife. Not everyone has the skill or setup to melt metal and handle it safely in its molten form.



If you're gonna come in and try to shoot down rules-based ideas with broad statements that those rules don't apply, or those materials aren't 'raw' enough materials, you'd better be able to back that up from actual text. Just stating your opinion doesn't change what the rules say

[Tvtyrant]

I don't know how people expect to make diamonds out of coal. For one I don't know that coal exists in D&D, it is certainly not spelled out as a material. For two atoms aren't raw and diamonds are necessarily made by compression.