One rule I choose to follow only loosely in the current edition of D&D is the magic item creation process. I agree that a spellcaster should invest a lot of energy and time into the process but I don’t like the XP cost.
Why I encourage magic item creation by players
I like to think that a character with an item creation feat will get to use it a few times. To achieve this I use a very liberal aproach - as I do with XP in general. I’m barely slowing down the leveling of characters who want to create their own magic items because:
- Leveling up is always a blast.
- I would end up giving the PCs magic items anyway.
- They get to customize their characters.
- While the items are being created the whole party settles down for a few weeks and gets to make acquaintances, add to their backstory, set personal goals.
Item creation reduces prep time
A side-effect of this downtime is to trigger “easy” games. Since I already have a nice city the character can explore and live in there is little preparation involved for an item creation interlude.
Free magic items for everyone!
To encourage characters to accept and enjoy this downtime, you could suggest that the spellcasters will not have to spend any XP if they create one magic item of equal market value for each character in the party. All the characters have to do is spend some time in one place, possibly building relationships and backstory. And no spellcaster is left behind when it’s time to level up.
What do you think?
10 Comments
1:01 am on November 4th, 2007
I like it! I’ve never used the XP for item creation rules, but if I ever play DnD 3.X again I’ll probably use this.
9:28 am on November 4th, 2007
I like to give out items that contain an XP reserve that the players can draw from to make magic items. That way, they’re still rewarded from treasure, but can customize what they get.
8:38 pm on November 4th, 2007
I allow my players to trade unwanted magic items to cover the gold piece market value requirement of magic item creation.
It works great.
3:33 am on November 5th, 2007
That I agree with. I view the gaining of XP as showing that you’ve learned something, expanded on your experiences and put them to practical use (IE leveled up).
To spend XP on making magic items seems backwards. Reducing the XP you have seems like you are loosing your life experiences, making you less competent than you used to be. The more items you make the worse you get at making them?
That seems to be the opposite of the way the real world works. As you spend time on a skill, you should get better at it rather than getting worse.
Okay, that aside, I hesitate at removing a restriction without replacing it with something else. What would you suggest spending in place of XP… something that would scale properly, in other words a formula/conversion based on the amount of XP you would have spent.
For example, if an item would have cost you 500XP, and you used the conversion of 1XP = 10 GP, the item would cost +5000 GP. But since GP cost is already covered in the process, what other factor would you consider instead?
10:16 pm on November 5th, 2007
Absolutely. Loosing XP was such a dumb idea to put into the rules. Its so counter intuitive. I would sooner see a temporary ability loss rather than loosing XP. Saying that such creation is tiring or draining is much more realistic. Maybe a constitution hit or something in line with the items attributes.
11:27 pm on November 5th, 2007
I like the temporary ability drain idea. In the game I’m currently running, I got good players so I never had to impose restrictions.
I guess I just wouldn’t allow the characters to create items too often or create too many at once.
1:53 pm on November 6th, 2007
Woohoo he said I’m good!!!
2:55 pm on November 6th, 2007
Oh crap, his ego is getting bigger and his Chosen One syndrome is back!
4:55 pm on November 6th, 2007
Woohoo Chosen one too!!!! I’m da bomb!!!
10:38 pm on November 6th, 2007
One possible solution I’ve been pondering. Add the skill Craft (Magic Item). When you are making a magic item you need to acquire a certain number of Craft Points (equal to the XP you would have had to spend). Each 8 hour day you spend working on an item, you roll your Craft (magic item) and add the check result to your total. Once you have enough craft points the item is finished… assuming you spent the money and materials required.
Each craft point total goes towards a specific magic item. For instance you are in the middle of making Item A, when you realize you need Item B as soon as possible. You stop Item A and start working on Item B. You don’t lose the points on A, they are just stored for later, after you finish B and can go back to the other one.
This system requires no new classes, no new feats, and only a tweak of the existing skill rules. I’ve not play-tested the idea and maybe some of you can point out the flaws that I may be overlooking… :)