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Thread: custom magic item cost?
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2008-06-10, 01:06 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Oct 2007
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custom magic item cost?
I'm hoping that some experienced DMs can weigh in with number crunching and personal opinions, here. I've been looking at the SRD's rules for magic item pricing, and am getting stumped midway through.
What I'm looking for is the cost of a glove allowing the Death Knell spell to be used at range. Spell level and caster level are fine, but there doesn't seem to be a cost multiplier for "instantaneous" spells, nor a prohibition on turning such into items.
Further complicating this, there's the "game balance" hidden multiplier, and I don't know how that should be figured in this case. I have little experience with custom items, having stuck to pre-gen toys previously.
Any thoughts, folks?
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2008-06-10, 01:21 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: custom magic item cost?
Well if 30ft is enough of range then you could treat it as 4th level spell, since Reach Spell ups spell level by two. So just go with a 4th level spell guidelines - 7*4*2000*(No of uses/5) - I think formula is something like that.
As for balance factor: If the item is inbalanced, that's the problem with spell, not the item pricing (considering that all scrolls/wands of same level cost the same).
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2008-06-10, 06:23 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: custom magic item cost?
Good thought, thanks!
There's still the issue of the duration's adjustment to the cost, though. CAN instantaneous spells be enchanted this way and, if so, what should the multiplier be? The table shows durations as short as "measured in rounds," which multiplies the cost by four. Nothing is said about instantaneous effects, but it can't be the case that there's simply no adjustment, can it?
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2008-06-10, 07:44 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Feb 2007
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Re: custom magic item cost?
Duration adjustment is only for continuous or use activated items. If I understood your OP correctly you would like to use it a couple of times per day, so if that is the case you don't have to worry about it.
Oh, and I forgot to tell you: if you are not DM, first check it with him, since it is up to him to decide on cost of the item if it is allowed. If you are DM then I believe this should be reasonable price.
I made a mistake in my first post, the price should be: 4(spell level)*7(CL)* 1800(price)*(No of uses per day/5), so 10080 per daily use.
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2008-06-10, 09:18 PM (ISO 8601)
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- May 2006
Re: custom magic item cost?
That's not entirely true. A handful of things become useful out of proportion with what they do when they can be spammed indefinitely (which can't be done from spell slots in 3.5).
Guidelines, an infinite-use command-word widget of Cure Minor Wounds (a cantrip) costs 900 gp (1/2 (spell level of an Osiron for calculation purposes) * 1800 (infinite use command-word base)=900 gp) - but that one little item that you can afford at around 2nd or 3rd level replaces all the wands of Cure Light Wounds that you'd ever buy.
Cure Minor Wounds is not, in and of itself, a broken spell. Applying guidelines so that it's at-will breaks game balance at low levels (it makes Fighters, Rogues, Barbarians, and other classes where their most important resource is HP really, really strong characters).Of course, by the time I finish this post, it will already be obsolete. C'est la vie.
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2008-06-10, 09:56 PM (ISO 8601)
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