Magic Item Availabilty / Creation Rule Question


Rules Questions


Is there any rule that would enable a character to place an order with a merchant/crafter, say a blacksmith to get +1 full plate made, therefore enabling them to bypass the chance the item is randomly not available in town. Obviously there would be a waiting period involved with this...

So again, is there an official rule that says you can or cannot do this? Or would this come down to DM discretion.

*If there is an official rule, could you please include a link to it's source?

Thanks for the help!


I'm assuming that Said Blacksmith would be able to make such a thing. Most of them wont. i think "availability" also has to do with being able to find people who can also make the items. Of course if they can make one thing they can probably make other things.


Right that was just an example, in real-world terms it might be a partnership between two crafters who make a magical item because maybe the blacksmith has no ability to magically enchant an item...

My point is this, in RL I could walk into a tailor-shop (using the front door) and request an amazing suit to be custom made for myself. Why couldn't a character walk into a shop and say "hey, I need a Headband of Alluring Charisma +2 made for me. Do you have the time? Great, here's a down-payment, and I'd like to pick it up in 7 days time." You know... Roleplaying...


Phergas wrote:

Right that was just an example, in real-world terms it might be a partnership between two crafters who make a magical item because maybe the blacksmith has no ability to magically enchant an item...

My point is this, in RL I could walk into a tailor-shop (using the front door) and request an amazing suit to be custom made for myself. Why couldn't a character walk into a shop and say "hey, I need a Headband of Alluring Charisma +2 made for me. Do you have the time? Great, here's a down-payment, and I'd like to pick it up in 7 days time." You know... Roleplaying...

You Can ask that of anyone. A shopkeep is more likely than most to know of someone that can even if that's someone else. Perhaps you give him a coin for his trouble.


Right... But what I'm wondering if there is some rule that says you can or cannot have a magic item made for you upon request...

Let me clarify my motives... As it stands, the DM has to apparently roll on his own to determine what items are available, or at the very least I think roll a percentile dice for each item we are looking for. It is my hope that by asking a merchant/crafter to make the item (if it's not available) I can bypass the percentile roll, or the chance that it's simply not available in town.

I'm looking for a rule, something official, that says players can do this from a roleplaying standpoint and actually get the items they are looking for once the appropriate costs and time has been taken into consideration.


Phergas wrote:

Right... But what I'm wondering if there is some rule that says you can or cannot have a magic item made for you upon request...

Let me clarify my motives... As it stands, the DM has to apparently roll on his own to determine what items are available, or at the very least I think roll a percentile dice for each item we are looking for. It is my hope that by asking a merchant/crafter to make the item (if it's not available) I can bypass the percentile roll, or the chance that it's simply not available in town.

I'm looking for a rule, something official, that says players can do this from a roleplaying standpoint and actually get the items they are looking for once the appropriate costs and time has been taken into consideration.

You can roleplay anything but not to bypass availability. Using your original example, IIRC plate armor has to be custom fitted anyway and not everyone can do it. Almost no small town would have a blacksmith capable of doing the job. Someone good at that would go to a larger city where they would find a market for their skill. So if I were the DM I'd just have the shopkeeper say, "Nope, no one around here can do that sort of thing, you'll have to go to Gotham for that."

Liberty's Edge

Totally GM territory.

I allow that, but generally the shopkeeper isn't the crafter, so he will spend some time relaying the order to the crafter than then will say if he can make the item or not. I decide the crafter probable level on the basis of available spellcasting service in the location and consider what crafting feat is involved to see if he has it or not; people with Craft golem is rare. If he can make the item he give the estimate of the production cost to the shopkeeper, plus his fee for the work.
At this point the shopkeeper contact the client and give him the item price (generally the official item price from the different books).
If the client agree the shopkeeper has for an 50% advance payment, non refundable.
Then there is a waiting list, usually a few days long, but sometime the crafter can have a long project in progress. Generally, the more powerful is the item and so the crafter involved, the longest is the waiting list.

Naturally most of this stuff is off stage. It is explained to the player the first time, then it is subsumed in a die roll to see how long before the project start.

Waiting time is very variable, at most a couple of day for a potion or scroll, unless you want one with a specific, high caster level, to several weeks for a powerful rod or staff.

NPC crafter never work at double speed (or at least never admit doing that) and take the seventh day off, so high cost items require a long time. And if you want an item of yours enhanced you have to hand it in at the start of the process and see it back at the end.

Sovereign Court

There's no rule. However, the situation is not hopeless.

It makes sense that most salesmen of serious magic items are aware of who else is in the bussiness. After all, magic item dealing is like heavy arms dealing. The bigshots all know each other.

So these are fairly connected people. If you need something specific, even if they don't have it, they are the best people to ask where else to try to buy it.

And by now you can smell where this is going: sidequest. They'll find your item, if you do this little thing for them...

It's almost like this was made for GMs as a convenient hook to drop in sidequests.

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