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1 year ago ::
May 07, 2012 - 12:28AM
#1
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Date Joined:
Jan 13, 2012
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Should there be detailed be detailed item crafting rules for both magical and mundane items in D&D 5e? What do you think 5e crafting / item creation should be like? For me the answer is an unequivocal yes because item creation is key for my home campaign, you see there is a house rule that has been in place for many years if you wish to level you must create something for the world. What you would create is dependent largely on your class and profession but you had to make something. So for a mage, you might create a magic item or a spell, a bard a story or a song, a fighter perhaps you would found a legacy item or forge a legendary sword. So over the last 30 years my players have been diligently building my world for me with their contributions. In the course of their career every PC at my table contributes as many as twenty items to my campaign world. I would love to see a detailed item creation system, with lots of rules and guidelines for creating just about any magical or mundane item you could come up with.
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1 year ago ::
May 07, 2012 - 12:51AM
#2
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Sure. I think they should definitely not be bothered with in the core system, as the game works just fine without them.
Some factors to consider in designing the rules for this.
What level can the characters do this? Normal adventuring level? Only after retirement? Right away?
How are the capabilities of the item determined? By a mathematical expression? A chart? DM in consultation with the player? Player whim? Unique, or systematic?
What's the procedure for creating it? Stick money or some other type of magical currency in until the item drops from the slot? Unique recipes requiring extensive questing?
What's the cost? XP, Time, Money, Ability Scores?
Pretty sure all these factors have appeared in one edition or another. Mix and match to create your own.
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1 year ago ::
May 07, 2012 - 2:10AM
#3
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Date Joined:
Sep 21, 2007
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I hope the new edition doesnt return to the horror of massive mathmatical overhead of the yesteryear. The creation of a blessed magical weapon became an excel spreadsheet where the overall effectiveness of the planned new weapon was evaluated, where gaps in rules were searched for and where the flavour of the setting gave way to more important book keeping factors.
Discussions became "well the ability to hit an incorporeal creature are not that important in the weapon as we don't often meet incorporeal things" and the following conversation became more like a chinese take away list. "I need a number 54-Good Aligned, a number 104-Cold Iron, Number 148-Can shed light as per a torch".
Certainly not the way I want to have my game run.
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1 year ago ::
May 07, 2012 - 4:16AM
#4
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I would like a system for magical item creation, namely one very close to 4th edition, which made the whole process rather quick and easy. Add into the rules a paragraph about how some items may require additional materials, actions or some other thing determined by the DM.
This allows for "put in 10k residuum and go!" just as well as "You need to travel to mount doom and gain a scale form the doomy dragon of doomness, then travel to the forest of foresty green and get green acid from the green acid spider!"-stuff.
Both can be appropriate.*
I am not a fan of rules for mundane item creation. That should be background stuff most of the time, and if a mundane item becomes important, people with the right background should be capable of making them in a reasonable amount of time. Most of this can easily be left in the hands of the players and the DM.
*) Example: The current campaign world of mine works on an economy of Residuum and it is quite normal that people of a certain power and skill can crank out a few magical items. Our Ardent/Bard Ritualist did, in the last session, craft 6 Bags of Holding to help evacuate a library and it's contents.
If you have questions about 4th Edition - don't hesitate to ask me via PMs. Join the Community Monster Manual Group and help to collect a mass of monsters which will make your life as DM easier, and your life as Player pure hell!  I am a cartographer. You can find some of my maps in my profile, free for non-commercial use. Also, if you happen to like maps or make them yourselves, join into the Cartographers Group!
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1 year ago ::
May 07, 2012 - 5:37AM
#5
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Date Joined:
Mar 28, 2004
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Personally I'd rather see magic item creation be left to NPCs. For the most part, all crafting rules did in 3e and 4e were allow players to break gold balancing and bypass magic item limitations. In organized play, crafting was a way to have super equipment on the cheap essentially breaking the gold curve per level. In home games, crafting became an exercise in finding underpriced items in the books for your whole party and since one could craft them themselves, the DM couldn't just say "You can't find that here". Realistic crafting also should entail serious downtime and a serious base of operations. Blacksmiths had their own smelters and anvils. Alchemy labs really shouldn't be portable things, heck my feel for a wizard's alchemy lab is a dangerous place where if you accidently knock something over, it might blow up!
Here's a typical scenario (seen this happen many times)...
Party discovers location of the Big Bad. It's the culmination of the chapter. So, party stocks up for final assault which translates into crafting a month and a half or more of items to get ready for the assault. Something always seems anti-climatic about this, but it happened just about every time....and don't get me started on NPC crafters and/or artificers taken with the Leadership feat. It's amazing how one Feat gets one all the crafting skills and your items are getting made while you are adventuring for cheap...
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1 year ago ::
May 07, 2012 - 6:40AM
#6
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Date Joined:
Apr 26, 2012
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As far as I'm concerned, all I need to know is how much it costs and how long it takes to make it. Apart from that, I can't imagine the rules not being superfluous. The 3e rules were fairly tedious. While I would certainly enjoy that sort of thing, my players (and the majority of players, most likely) don't really want to spend their game time converting prices to silver, figuring out the fractions for base cost, and then making multiple checks against it.
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1 year ago ::
May 07, 2012 - 7:10AM
#7
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Date Joined:
Aug 31, 2007
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Should there be detailed be detailed item crafting rules for both magical and mundane items in D&D 5e?
Crafting should probably be a module, because the degree and nature vary widely. Some campaign styles pretty much reject the idea of PCs spending time or money on anything not directly related to the campaign, while others favor characters working between adventures and building their own weapon/tools. There is also a big question on how detailed you want the crafting system to be, do you grab the required amount of gold and spend 1 day crafting an item or do you get a scavenger hunt list of exotic components you need to brew a potion?
What I would actually like is two crafting systems. A simple system, either automatic or with simple skill checks, to make mundane and minor items. Then a more complex system that requires the characters actually work at it to craft more powerful items.
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1 year ago ::
May 07, 2012 - 7:46AM
#8
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Personally I'd rather see magic item creation be left to NPCs. For the most part, all crafting rules did in 3e and 4e were allow players to break gold balancing and bypass magic item limitations.
I understand that this was pretty much a fact in 3E (which is why the Artificer became one of the most broken classes ever), but how does this ring even remotely true to 4E? You can only rarely craft items above your level (Mark of Making, hello!) and you need to put up the full price for the item in residuum or other materials.
How does this break gold balancing / magic item limitation?
Realistic crafting also should entail serious downtime and a serious base of operations. Blacksmiths had their own smelters and anvils. Alchemy labs really shouldn't be portable things, heck my feel for a wizard's alchemy lab is a dangerous place where if you accidently knock something over, it might blow up!
So, what is the realistic way to enchant a sword, then? Care to explain that to me? I haven't seen it happen in real life so I can't judge it myself.
Also, why is it suddenly the wizard again? Wizards aren't the only ones capable of crafting magical items and never should be the only ones. Think above and beyond that. Again, in my campaign, for example, enchanting an item is generally speaking as easy as knowing the 'recipe', having the reisduum and the item to enchant. That plus one hour and you got your item, bam.
If you have questions about 4th Edition - don't hesitate to ask me via PMs. Join the Community Monster Manual Group and help to collect a mass of monsters which will make your life as DM easier, and your life as Player pure hell! I am a cartographer. You can find some of my maps in my profile, free for non-commercial use. Also, if you happen to like maps or make them yourselves, join into the Cartographers Group!
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1 year ago ::
May 07, 2012 - 8:29AM
#9
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Should there be detailed be detailed item crafting rules for both magical and mundane items in D&D 5e?
What do you think 5e crafting / item creation should be like?
I think there should be a book on each of the subjects.
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1 year ago ::
May 07, 2012 - 8:32AM
#10
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- Forum Guide
- Hero Craftsman Gold Medalist
- Master Dungeon Master
Date Joined:
Jun 23, 2005
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I would prefer to see three optional systems for mundane crafting:
- Complex, ala 3e. You can train in a Craft, you can improve in the craft as you level up and your level in a craft determines what you can make, how fast you can make it, and how much it will cost you.
- Simple, ala 4e. You can train in a Craft, and it lets you make whatever you want at slightly less than it would cost you to buy.
- Hybrid. Someone trained can make mundane items ala the Simple method, and any object that affects adventuring skills (masterwork weapons, specialized armor, unique materials like silvered weapons, mithril armor, etc.), requires the Complex method.
And three optional systems for magical crafting:
- Complex, ala AD&D. You can go on a quest to make a magic item, and that's really the only way you get items other than finding them in troves.
- Simple, ala 3e/pre-Essentials 4e. You can learn a ritual or feat to make magic items appropriate to your level.
- Hybrid, ala 4e post-Essentials. You can learn a ritual to make simple items appropriate to your level (ala, +3 dagger, potions, scrolls, etc.). You need to go on a quest to make anything more complex than that (like dragonslayer swords, or carpets of flying).
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