Brewing Potions and Poisons, what are the RAI?

[Lvl 2 Expert]

The crafting rules are one of those areas in 5e that are notoriously vague, and what there is is often seen as unworkable or not powerful enough. Several people have published fixes and ways to expand the system, on this board and outside it. This is not one of those fixes. This is an attempt to figure out what the rules as intended (RAI, I'm also using RAW for rules as written below) actually are, as to have an idea of how unworkable the rules actually are, to know which parts of the rules you can use right now in your games and as a point of comparison for fixes and expansions. I've looked at the rules surrounding crafting potions and poisons using the alchemist's supplies, herbalism kit and poisoner's kit.

In the spoiler below is what I know so far summarized in an image of a spreadsheet. These are the rules as written with only minimal interpretations by me. I have based this overview on Xanathar's Guide to Everything where I could, because that seems to be the most recent and complete treatment of these systems at least until Tasha's Cauldron comes out a month from now. The actual potions and poisons listed are mostly from the Dungeon Master's Guide and part of the SRD (but the rules for crafting them are not fully part of that). The spoilering is done to take people with different monitor sizes and resolutions into account, a larger version is for the same reasons available by clicking on the image.

Spoiler: The Image

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Notes that go with this image:
- The GP prices listed are the costs of crafting materials/the standard price for which you can sell the object to a store. The standard price for buying these items is twice the number stated.
- It's entirely unclear to me which tool or tools can be used for the creation of most potions. I've indicated this with question marks.
- The potion of poison is a poison disguised as a healing potion. This one is even unclearer than the other potions, but my suggestion would be that it can be brewed using at least either the herbalism kit normally used for healing potions or the poisoner's kit normally used for creating poisons.
- As far as I can see no ability checks are needed for the creation of potions or poisons, so the tools do not need to have a standard attribute assigned to them. If there was a DC for crafting I would assume the herbalism kit is used with Wis, the alchemist's supplies are used with Int and the poisoner's kit is probably used with Int, but Dex or Cha could be an option. But as stated, this is not actually a problem that needs an answer in the context of RAW/RAI for item creation.
- For the creation of all magical items a recipe and a special ingredient obtained through a quest are needed. This ingredient is indicated in only some of the descriptions, but for instance for a potion of giant strength the ingredient is a sliver of a fingernail from the appropriate type of giant. It is unclear whether an ingredient is used up upon crafting. My suggestion would be that for all consumables including potions these ingredients are treated like spell components that are not consumed. Only a tiny amount is used, or the ingredient is used as a catalyst.
- It is unclear whether poisons require a recipe and/or a special ingredient, but it seems to me like they are in essence treated as non-magical creations (like a regular weapon or suit of armor), for which this is not a requirement. Seems kind of weird, that you need a recipe to brew a potion of heroism but not to create the secret poison of the drow from the underdeep. One suggestion for DM's looking for a middle ground would be to enforce needing a recipe but not a special ingredient, but RAW seems to be that any poisoner can create any poison except for those that need to be harvested.
- I have found no clear indication that you need a poisoner's kit to harvest poisons from poisonous creatures, but I assumed this would by RAI be a requirement, or at the very least that it would be a requirement in order to not risk exposing yourself to the poison while harvesting it. I also assumed this doesn't cost a significant amount of time or money (hence the GP's being between brackets).
- The potions of giant strength have several weird things about them. One is that the strongest version is by far the most expensive potion or poison in the game. A strength of 29 for an hour is powerful and can be a game winning enchantment, but 50.000 gold and half a year of work? Using that same time and money you could raise a small army. Another curiosity is that the potions based on frost, stone and fire giants have the same rarity and thus the same cost and brewing time, while the fire giant potion is stronger. So it wouldn't be weird for a fix to lower the GP and time investments of frost and stone giant potions a bit to somewhere between the uncommon and rare levels. The third oddity is that it isn't specified if the recipe is any different for the potions based on different giant, but the special ingredient is some nail clippings from the right type of giant, so that definitely differs.
- Yes, I noticed that I have weird selection marks and such in the image. I fixed several things about the image already at this point, I'm fine with a few marks.
- I am probably still missing a bunch of things, any additions would be greatly appreciated.


I would like to invite everyone to contribute things I've missed and give their opinion on how to fill in the blanks. Which tool can be used to create which item? Should harvesting a poison take the same amount of time as crafting the equivalent? How many doses can you gain by harvesting? Should the herbalism kit and poisoner's kit have long rest uses like the alchemist's supplies do? Should the prices for consumables be lower, as they're by RAW only half as cheap as permanent items of the same rarity? Are there important rules I've missed? Are there important books you would recommend for expanding the list of possible creations? (I see some hints towards Explorer's Guide to Wildemount, including some non-magical potions, and to Infernal Machine Rebuild, including some extra poisons.) Any other reactions? Do you think I'm stupid? Are you a spambot that wants to sell something? Feel welcome to react! (Except in that last case, spambots will be reported.)

[elyktsorb]

If that Poisoner feat becomes official then it's going to completely ruin how Poison's are presented right now anyway so I would wait.

Since that feat, if taken at first lvl, would allow a person to make 2 doses of a poison that's more than 2x effective than basic poison for half the gold.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

If that Poisoner feat becomes official then it's going to completely ruin how Poison's are presented right now anyway so I would wait.

Since that feat, if taken at first lvl, would allow a person to make 2 doses of a poison that's more than 2x effective than basic poison for half the gold.

Ooh, thanks for drawing my attention to that. That's a serious feat, at least compared to any other use of these three tools. As currently worded it also helps with other poisons (you can coat a weapon in poison as a bonus action, although realistically you are never going to use any other poisons if you can make several doses of this one every short rest) and particularly with certain spells like say the poison spray cantrip (when you make a damage roll, you ignore resistance to poison damage). I am indeed curious now if that will become official. (Also it will wreck ingame economics. "So you're saying you'll take this basic poison off my hands for 50GP, but you'll only pay 25GP for this better poison, and that number goes down further when I reach level 5?")

[elyktsorb]

Ooh, thanks for drawing my attention to that. That's a serious feat, at least compared to any other use of these three tools. As currently worded it also helps with other poisons (you can coat a weapon in poison as a bonus action, although realistically you are never going to use any other poisons if you can make several doses of this one every short rest) and particularly with certain spells like say the poison spray cantrip (when you make a damage roll, you ignore resistance to poison damage). I am indeed curious now if that will become official. (Also it will wreck ingame economics. "So you're saying you'll take this basic poison off my hands for 50GP, but you'll only pay 25GP for this better poison, and that number goes down further when I reach level 5?")

The resistance is a bit pointless as well considering about 15 creatures have resistance to poison, while about 190+ have immunity to it. But at first level that would give a character a better rider than a 4th lvl rogues sneak attack.

[Unoriginal]

- It's entirely unclear to me which tool or tools can be used for the creation of most potions. I've indicated this with question marks.

The Xanathar's Guide says that a magic item can be crafted by anyone with a relevant proficiency provided they have the formula, so to me all magic potions can be crafted by someone who has either proficiency in alchemist's supplies or in herbalist's kit. Except the healing potion which doesn't require a formula and can be crafted just with proficiency in herbalist's kit.

- The potion of poison is a poison disguised as a healing potion. This one is even unclearer than the other potions, but my suggestion would be that it can be brewed using at least either the herbalism kit normally used for healing potions or the poisoner's kit normally used for creating poisons.

Arguably both + alchemist's supplies work, yes.

- As far as I can see no ability checks are needed for the creation of potions or poisons, so the tools do not need to have a standard attribute assigned to them. If there was a DC for crafting I would assume the herbalism kit is used with Wis, the alchemist's supplies are used with Int and the poisoner's kit is probably used with Int, but Dex or Cha could be an option. But as stated, this is not actually a problem that needs an answer in the context of RAW/RAI for item creation.

I mean there is no DC for creating items at all, in general.

- For the creation of all magical items a recipe and a special ingredient obtained through a quest are needed. This ingredient is indicated in only some of the descriptions, but for instance for a potion of giant strength the ingredient is a sliver of a fingernail from the appropriate type of giant. It is unclear whether an ingredient is used up upon crafting. My suggestion would be that for all consumables including potions these ingredients are treated like spell components that are not consumed. Only a tiny amount is used, or the ingredient is used as a catalyst.

1) The ingredient is actually never indicated. A Potion of Giant Strength being described as containing the fingernail of a giant does not mean it's the ingredient you have to quest for.

2) The point of the ingredient is that a quest for the ingredient is needed *each and every time* the item is crafted. You can't do the quest once and then do a thousand items out of it.

That being said there is still a realm of reasonableness we have to consider. If you want to make an Uncommon potion and the DM indicates the special ingredient is a fragment of dragon's bone, and that you bring back the skeleton of a whole Ancient Dragon, you're going to have the ingredients for a lot more than one potion. Since the quest's difficulty was much more than what the prerequist for an Uncommon potion is. This actually happens in on of the modules (well, with the issue that this particular formula didn't mention the potion had secondary effects...).

- It is unclear whether poisons require a recipe and/or a special ingredient, but it seems to me like they are in essence treated as non-magical creations (like a regular weapon or suit of armor), for which this is not a requirement. Seems kind of weird, that you need a recipe to brew a potion of heroism but not to create the secret poison of the drow from the underdeep. One suggestion for DM's looking for a middle ground would be to enforce needing a recipe but not a special ingredient, but RAW seems to be that any poisoner can create any poison except for those that need to be harvested.

Nothing weird about it, there is a difference between a magic formula and a regular recipe. Non-magical poison doesn't require questing for special ingredients.

- I have found no clear indication that you need a poisoner's kit to harvest poisons from poisonous creatures, but I assumed this would by RAI be a requirement, or at the very least that it would be a requirement in order to not risk exposing yourself to the poison while harvesting it. I also assumed this doesn't cost a significant amount of time or money (hence the GP's being between brackets).

"A character can instead attempt to harvest poison from a poisonous creature, such as a snake, wyvern, or carrion crawler. The creature must be incapacitated or dead, and the harvesting requires 1d6 minutes followed by a DC 20 Intelligence (Nature) check. (Proficiency with the poisoner's kit applies to this check if the character doesn't have proficiency in Nature.) On a successful check, the character harvests enough poison for a single dose. On a failed check, the character is unable to extract any poison. If the character fails the check by 5 or more, the character is subjected to the creature's poison"

And yes, harvesting poison requires no special time or money spending. Just to have the venomous creature in a position where you can do the job.

- The potions of giant strength have several weird things about them. One is that the strongest version is by far the most expensive potion or poison in the game. A strength of 29 for an hour is powerful and can be a game winning enchantment, but 50.000 gold and half a year of work? Using that same time and money you could raise a small army.

Nothing weird about that. Magic items are expensive and rare for a reason. Do note that you can speed the time by having multiple people work on the potion.

Another curiosity is that the potions based on frost, stone and fire giants have the same rarity and thus the same cost and brewing time, while the fire giant potion is stronger. So it wouldn't be weird for a fix to lower the GP and time investments of frost and stone giant potions a bit to somewhere between the uncommon and rare levels.

Eh, a rarity is a spectrum, not all items of the same rarity are as powerful. I wouldn't say that the difference in power between those change anything for how rare they are.

The third oddity is that it isn't specified if the recipe is any different for the potions based on different giant, but the special ingredient is some nail clippings from the right type of giant, so that definitely differs.

Once again, the nail isn't necessarily the special ingredient, and since they're different potions you'll need different formulas for each.

That being said there can be several different formulas for the same potion, I'd say. It's not because the Yuan-ti have found a way to craft a Potion of Flying 500 years ago that Isoltem the Alchemist who lives down the street has found the same method.

[Tanarii]

Might be best to treat the Potion of Poison as the result if a failed check to create the item.

Except ... I don't think there are any checks in 5 crafting XGTE rules?

[Lvl 2 Expert]

Thanks for all the replies, good stuff!

"A character can instead attempt to harvest poison from a poisonous creature, such as a snake, wyvern, or carrion crawler. The creature must be incapacitated or dead, and the harvesting requires 1d6 minutes followed by a DC 20 Intelligence (Nature) check. (Proficiency with the poisoner's kit applies to this check if the character doesn't have proficiency in Nature.) On a successful check, the character harvests enough poison for a single dose. On a failed check, the character is unable to extract any poison. If the character fails the check by 5 or more, the character is subjected to the creature's poison"

And yes, harvesting poison requires no special time or money spending. Just to have the venomous creature in a position where you can do the job.

Thanks, I completely missed that.

Might be best to treat the Potion of Poison as the result if a failed check to create the item.

Except ... I don't think there are any checks in 5 crafting XGTE rules?

There are not, as far as I've found. (The venom collecting above is kind of a semi-exception.)

In 3.5 crafting DC's were already about getting your bonuses high enough to take 10, because nobody wants to spend 2 weeks on a failed attempt to make something. So I personally don't really mind that they took DC's out for 5e. (Although a way to have higher level characters work faster might have been nice.)

[Unoriginal]

Rime of the Frostmaiden does include a couple of checks to complete an unfinished magic item, one of them being needed to craft the missing piece properly, but that's most likely because a) the PCs don't have the formula and have to improvise a design based on what can be observed and their own training b) unlike regular crafting, this event does fit the "only ask for a check if the consequences are meaningful" principle of 5e c) unlike regular crafting, it's a "game time" activity that is completed quickly and not a downtime one.