Remember that those items have a production cost and no one like to have that "scroll of explosive runes" or "illusionary wall2 gathering dust on one shelf for years for the off chance of selling them one day.The same can be said of:
Swords, shields, armor, lantern oil, rope, clothing, milk, cheese, horses, guard dogs, etc.
What's more those take longer to make and what's worse the last four items have expiration dates too!
As far as the scrolls, swords, shields, and other objects are concerned, you also have to bear in mind that these blacksmiths and wizards will have apprentices and journeyman under them learning the trade, and in many circumstances, the item won't be made primarily to sell, but rather as part of a lesson, sometimes made by the master, sometimes made by the student, with the idea that someday it might sell and recoup the cost a secondary concern.
I have always allowed players to purchase items at Ye Olde Magic Shop usually at the larger cities.
But understanding the RAW and the limitations of purchasing magic items, doesn't it force parties to invest in a Wizard or Cleric to make magic items for the group? Do you DMs see their players doing this?
I have always allowed players to purchase items at Ye Olde Magic Shop usually at the larger cities.
But understanding the RAW and the limitations of purchasing magic items, doesn't it force parties to invest in a Wizard or Cleric to make magic items for the group? Do you DMs see their players doing this?
This is why I don't rely on die rolls unless I really just want to have a random chance. I do my best to apply my understanding of the local economy, local skills, local NPCs, etc. As the GM I have complete control of all of that. Iif the village has a local hedge witch, that witch likely makes potions to supplement her income. If the village has a local blacksmith, that blacksmith might have the ability to craft magic weapons and armor. Etc for other things.
The most likely magic items these folks make would be the ones they feel are most likely to sell. A frontier town that sees lots of adventuring groups passing through would likely sell enough potions and +1 swords, daggers and armor that the group could find some. Odd requests or specialized weapons or special materials might be more difficult to find.
Telling the party they have to wait a week or more to buy some CLW potions adds nothing to the story, does nothing to improve immersion and does nothing to add fun to the player's time at the table.
My job as a GM is to provide the players with a fun and challenging adventure. Role playing the group sitting around in a tavern for a week is a significant enough story element that if I put my players through that, it will be because there is a plot reason behind it, not because I happened to roll a 1 on a d4 when they asked if a CLW wand is for sale in the magic shop.
@Chobe, perhaps my approach to running a campaign is completely different than your approach. In my worlds the adventuring party is interacting with other events and dealing with NPCs with plans of their own. Taking a week of "downtime" does not mean the rest of the world takes the week off too. Sometimes the events in the world won't advance meaningfully in a week. Usually they do.
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Remember that those items have a production cost and no one like to have that "scroll of explosive runes" or "illusionary wall2 gathering dust on one shelf for years for the off chance of selling them one day.The same can be said of:
Swords, shields, armor, lantern oil, rope, clothing, milk, cheese, horses, guard dogs, etc.
What's more those take longer to make and what's worse the last four items have expiration dates too!
And your production rate is based on the perceived size of the market, up to your maximum production capacity.
Even a low skill blacksmith can make spears, but most of them spent the largest part of their time making horseshoes and pots as the demand is larger.Similarly a wizard making scrolls would be producing what he know will sell, not spent 170+ gp to make a scroll of a rarely used spell that would sell in a few years.
In a port city he would be making plenty of water breathing scrolls and if he hasn't one at hand is because he has just sold them.
On the other hand finding a water breathing scroll in a desert city would be difficult and probably you had to order it.
Generally I use the maximum spellcasting ability available in a city as a indication of what can be ordered. In Absalon you can find people willing to cast level 8th spells for you so you can find people with CL 15 willing to sell their skills and make magic items for you.
I usually roll some dice to see how long is the production queue as that kind of crafter will probably have more request than time to satisfy them (and as he would be rich he would work at his leisure, not 7 days a week and always using the fast crafting option).
So a really complex project (let's say a 200K sword) could require a 150K gp advanced payment and well upward of a year of waiting.
Paying more or through interaction with the NPC (using diplomacy, political clout, king support, your position in the pathfinders and so on) you could it done sooner.
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This store is worth robbing, too. Probably not worth opening, though. Especially w/ the robbing part..
For the RAW of the rules in a village (up to 200 habitants) you have a 75% chance of finding what you want if it cost less than 500 gp.
to me is seem decidedly favourable to the PC as, if I was creating my NPC stock based only on a market magic, there are scrolls I would never make or keep in stock.
For some other not finding them would be sign of troubles with the supply side of the store, as there are scrolls that would be re-ordered as soon as there are less than ten in stock.
2nd edition I had a player hiring an alchemist and opening a magic item shop (scrolls and potions, essentially). He forgot the security part.
After a time a guy with charm person and suggestion did come:
"Dear friend (charm person I wish to purchase your stock."
"Yes, wonderful. (suggestion) I will buy all of this stuff, but I need to be sure it is good. I have a laboratory to test it in my home. I will take it there for testing, then I would return and pay my bill. Agreed?"
Naturally he never returned :P
It was a minor loss as the characters and his friend co-owners were level 14+, but it burned his pride.
After that he did instituted a good security system (you can't charm a helmet horror).
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The best way to control magic item availability is to take a realistic view of 'average campaign' demographics.
If you look at the following;
1. Population of a town/city/area
2. % of population of classes capable of casting spells
3. Level range of spellcasters
4. % of those who would take the Craft feats
5. % of those who would 'set up shop'Once you have done this you find the availability of magical items 'off the rack' is FAR smaller than advertised in the rules - even in a magic-rich game.
Additionally, the availability would be further be reduced as 'pre-ordering' and monopolisation of services by the local nobility etc. would mean less was available.
Yes - this may be too anal an exercise to go through, but once you have done it it becomes clear why making things yourself or plundering dungeons etc. is a quicker route to becoming a Christmas Tree.
Actually it's completely inaccurate too (especially since it ignores the recommended standards of the CRB):
Especially steps 4 and 5 since anyone can take crafting -- and you forget that crafted magical items tend to last a nigh infinite amount of time.
Considering that 66% of classes including NPC classes can cast spells, and the Paizo given average level ranges from 2~9 easily with 'mover and shakers' going from 9~12 and the really 'high profile' going all the way up to 16th level.
Just counting the mover and shakers and lower you have plenty of room for magical items to be made.
66% of PC classes, 20% of NPC classes maybe - NOT 66% of the population!
A massive percentage of the population will be commoners unless your world is DAMN strange.
Also your level ranges are wrong too - by far the largest % of the population should be level 1-3.
Your arguement is entirely flawed I think.
As for the comment that 'everyone can take crafting'. Well - interesting logic here. I guess in your gameworld all the agrarian peasantry have one craft feat and the one which allows crafting magical items without spellcasting ability.
I am sure the nobility are happy for them to waive learning things like 'skill focus farming' or other things clearly useless to a 'magicmart' world.
Also if EVERYONE can make magical items (presumably mainly food creating items due to the poor output of farmers....) the prices would be in the toilet - unless of course 'magicmart' world also ignores even the basics of economics and trade.
Just because something is in a rulebook - does NOT mean a GM should switch their brain off and not consider how it fits into a campaign, nor does it give 'carte blanche' to players to demand their cake, icing and cherry on top whenever they put their hands out.
A lot of the debates on these forums boil down to 'it's in the rules but it's a problem for my camopaign/I should have it when I want - what do I do' threads.
GM'ing skills and roleplay (not rollplay) looks frequently like dying arts in d20.
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With magical weapons as easy to create as they've become in Pathfinder (a commoner with a couple of feats can create them), the trait "Heirloom Weapon" doesn't really make sense. A sword that's merely a masterwork sword isn't something that you pass on as an heirloom...it's something you buy on the cheap from the swordsmith's reject pile. After all, he didn't even really bother to finish it. And non-masterwork weapons? They're essentially from the reject pile of the swordsmith's brand new apprentice.
I guess this does explain the overabundance of ogre hooks +1. :P
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Honestly even during the 'depths' of the dark ages people tend to over estimate how bad things were. It's because they want to take all the events from the fall of Rome to the discovery of the Americas and shove it together in the same 100 years.
In reality the time period was much longer than that and the major factor in the depopulation and slow down of Europe was the plagues which happened later.
There is a big difference in what you use as your reference too.
We are speaking of England middle ages, where they did forget how to make good pottery and roof tiles?
Italy, where there where the first university was founded in 1088?
Russia where, in some regions, the farmers were living like during the worst part of the middle ages at the start of the XX century?
The oldest know examples of the double-entry bookkeeping system are from the 13th century and that speak of a very developed economy.
The big difference is always who is the owner of the land and who get the profits.
If the farmer is the owner of the land or the feudal lord is the owner and the farmer had to pay his tithe only to the feudal lord or he was only a serf forced who kept only a small percentage of the land products make a big difference.
Mountains, hills or plains? Rights to wood and acorn gathering or not?
Abraham referenced a reasonably free rural community, something that probably is fairly common in the Inner Sea region of Golarion.
Making a guess in Cheliax that kind of community was the norm before the death of Adoren but now is becoming more and more impoverished as the nobles and church requests would be on the increase (LE), in Taldor large estates owned by nobles will be the most common situation, so again the average peasant will poorer (but the nobles will be richer). In nations like Andoran or even Varisia the average village will be very similar to Abraham example.
So I think his example is reasonably precise.
@chobe: "consequence free goodies" LOL. Believe me chobe, there are plenty of things my players want that aren't available. Especially specific spells, potions or wondrous items that make no sense to be in a remote village.
I am talking about having the most common items available without resorting to rolling dice to see if a +1 dagger is available in a decent sized town. If you want a scroll of raise dead? Different story. Or even a +1 dwarven battleaxe? If there aren't any dwarves nearby, why would the blacksmith be making them?
This assumption or accusation that by not bringing the game to a screeching halt over an arbitrary bad roll of the dice on the availability of CLW potions I am somehow providing "consequence free goodies" to the party is hilarious. We just don't see things the same way.
I guess we don't, since you seem oddly defensive and parsing, leaning toward what strike me as possibly deliberate mischaraterizations of what I've been saying.
Have a good one!
I suppose the accusation of providing my players with "consequence free goodies" came across to me as being something that deserved a defense chobe. Not to mention demonstrating a lack of understanding of my own point.
Still you've provided some very good points in this discussion so I have no desire to get crosswise with you. I just felt you either misunderstood or mischaracterized my position with the "goodies" comment. That's all.
Furthermore, the spellcasting classes are not 80 % of all classes.Let's see...
Fighter
Rogue
Monk
Barbarianvs.
Bard
Cleric
Druid
Wizard
Sorcerer
Ranger
PaladinYou're right, it's more like 65%. 75% if you factor in APG/UM/UC classes.
Well to expand:
Non-casters:
Cavalier
GunslingerCasters:
Alchemist
Inquisitor
Magus
Oracle
Summoner
WitchSo we have 5 to 13, or 72% -- factor in NPC classes and it ends up 7 to 14 or 66%.
All of which can make magical items.
Which means they will? Paladins and rangers going into crafting magic items? Even bards? I would like to see the backstory of those characters.
I used to be a great and mighty ranger, a hunter of my enemies, a tracker, a rough frontiersman. Then, one day, I got heavily into the production and selling of magic items and the haggling of their worth amongst the city-folk. Being a merchant and magic item creator, why, it is really who I was really meant to be, it all led up to this point.
Which takes me back to a game, an adventurer cleric tried to get into the magic item trade, and pit his skills against the merchants--those for whom trade was their profession, their focus, their specialty. The cleric got caned in the exchange, didn't pass the haggling checks, or the profession: merchant checks. There are obstacles to just anyone really prospering in that type of trade. As with the cleric operating in his own interests and for his own profits, I could see a ranger or paladin having some real trouble.
What does the paladin do if the starts to come into conflict with merchant guilds and existing store owners? He starts to produce lower priced goods for philanthropic reasons and threatens the livelihoods of the crafters, or, the services of the churches already in existence. Because problems would be caused by selling lower, and if you don't go lower, then you are just another provider when there are already providers with their customer bases.
If it were my rules system, casting costs would never be based off the spell levels of partial casters.
And that is, in fact, how I generally rule in my campaigns. So there is no way to exploit the paladin or ranger spell list to get a third level cleric spell as a first level wand or scroll.
To me this is clearly an exploit, and I don't really care for exploits. The reason partial casters get some of those spells at lower caster level is because they get spells at higher class levels.
I have considered pricing all potions, wands, etc. based on lowest possible CHARACTER level, instead of caster level, just to get around this exploit.
Exploits can be pretty seedy. The good news is, as a dm you can just say, ha! The rangers in this region do not craft magic items, some fletch and engage in other ranger-related skills, but they are typically out and about being rangers, on patrol, killing dangerous monsters and not interacting much with economies, except to sell on some monsters/fur pelts and get general supplies.
Ah rangers, you can say, staring off into the distance, they can be so heroic.