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How were technological items created? As written technological weapons appear a little weak, but from my understanding, they were converted from spells.
So, has anyone "reverse engineered" these items?
I noticed that some of the Veemod strips match wondrous items, but not all Veemods have a match.
Veemod goggles 1,000 gp require a color-coded Veemod strip to function. The goggles can use only one Veemod at a time.
Brown Veemod 200 gp gives Flash protection = Sunglasses, not in rulebook but similar to Smoked Googles 10 gp.
Black Veemod 400 gp gives +2 to Perception.
White Veemod 2,500 gp gives +5 to Perception = Eyes of the Eagle 2,500 gp.
Gray Veemod 6,000 gp gives low-light vision = Eyes of the Owl 4,000 gp.
Green Veemod 10,000 gp gives +10 to Perception.
Red Veemod 12,000 gp gives 60-ft. darkvision = Goggles of Night 12,000 gp.
Blue Veemod 20,000 gp gives all-around vision = Arachnid Goggles 15,000 gp.
Orange Veemod 30,000 gp gives sight in any darkness.
Prismatic Veemod 50,000 gp gives X-ray vision up to 10 feet of stone.
I noticed that some of the Veemod strips match wondrous items, but not all Veemods have a match.
Veemod goggles 1,000 gp require a color-coded Veemod strip to function. The goggles can use only one Veemod at a time.
Brown Veemod 200 gp gives Flash protection = Sunglasses, not in rulebook but similar to Smoked Googles 10 gp.
Black Veemod 400 gp gives +2 to Perception.
White Veemod 2,500 gp gives +5 to Perception = Eyes of the Eagle 2,500 gp.
Gray Veemod 6,000 gp gives low-light vision = Eyes of the Owl 4,000 gp.
Green Veemod 10,000 gp gives +10 to Perception.
Red Veemod 12,000 gp gives 60-ft. darkvision = Goggles of Night 12,000 gp.
Blue Veemod 20,000 gp gives all-around vision = Arachnid Goggles 15,000 gp.
Orange Veemod 30,000 gp gives sight in any darkness.
Prismatic Veemod 50,000 gp gives X-ray vision up to 10 feet of stone.
And, in your example, some of the technological items are more expensive then their magical counterparts - sometimes significantly more.
Technological items have the advantage of not taking up magic item slots. CyberFiber muscles that give +6 to str cost 72 000 plus you have to probably pay for someone to implant them. But then you can use your belt slot for something else. I would not let a character to use veemods and eyeslot magic items at the same time, however.
Still, tech items are ridiculously overpriced imo. Lock coder is a prime example. For the low price of 200 000 you can now reprogram any color coded access cards or doors. Yay. To add insult to injury it is not even automatic, you have to roll a pretty high DC disable device check to succesfully encode a key card.
Nanite hypoguns are bit overpriced but can be really handy, as you do not need UMD or other skills to use them. They pack hp healing and status removal in the same package.
Still, tech items are ridiculously overpriced imo. Lock coder is a prime example. For the low price of 200 000 you can now reprogram any color coded access cards or doors. Yay. To add insult to injury it is not even automatic, you have to roll a pretty high DC disable device check to succesfully encode a key card.
I agree. Let’s look at the most basic of all technological weapons, the laser pistol (page 25 of the Technology Guide)
cost 10,000 gp.
type one-handed ranged
proficiency exotic (firearms)
damage S 1d6 fire/M 1d8 fire
critical 20/x2
range 50
capacity 10
usage 1 charge –
special semi-automatic, touch –
weight 2 lbs.
Now let’s compare that to the Revolver (page 138 of Ultimate Combat)
cost 4,000 gp.
type one-handed ranged
proficiency exotic (firearms)
damage S 1d6 B and P/M 1d8 B and P
critical 20/x4
range 20
misfire 1 –
capacity 6
usage 1 cartridge –
special touch –
weight 4 lbs.
Comparing the two weapons,
- the Revolver has a much better critical multiplier and can get around most Damage Reduction.
- the Laser Pistol has a better range increment, free double shot feat, and never misfires.
As one can see the two weapons are fairly equivalent. While the laser does have a “slight” edge, I doubt that it is a 6,000gp edge.
James Jacobs seems to feel that the prices for Technological items (such as the aforementioned Laser Pistol) are fine.
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Are the prices in the Technology Guide artificially inflated?
For example, comparing a Revolver (4,000gp from Ultimate Equipment) to a laser pistol (10,000gp from the Technology Guide) would indicate that the laser weapon's price is double what it should be.
Are other technological equipment prices likewise inflated?
They are not. The prices in the tech guide use the basic magic item design rules to price them. For something like a laser pistol, it costs more than a revolver because it does fire damage and has better range and fires faster and so on; it's much better than a gun in a LOT of ways, and is more like a wand of scorching ray (sort of) than a pistol.
The prices are correct and are not "artificially inflated."
A wand of Scorching Ray costs 4500 gp, contains 50 charges that cannot be recharged, has a range of 30 feet, deals 4d6 fire damage against touch AC, and can attack only as a standard action requiring either an arcane class or a Use Magic Device check. The wand could also be made at 7th level for two rays per standard action (10,500 gp and range 40 feet) or 11th level for three rays (16,500 gp and range 50 feet).
1d8 averages 4.5 damage and 4d6 averages 14 damage, roughly three times as much. Three times as much damage means that the laser gun wielder would have to make 3 attacks per turn to match its damage, which would require a full attack action and impose penalties for both semi-automatic mode and iterated attacks (-2, -2, -7). The wand is definitely superior in dealing damage.
The 30-foot limit on the Scorching Ray wand is a significant penalty. A melee fighter could close that gap and attack in a single turn. That would be a major problem for a wizard. On the other hand, bloodragers also have Scorching Ray on their spell list, and a bloodrager would laugh at that problem.
The requirements for using the wand are troublesome, but maintaining a technological device properly is best done with a technological class such as Techslinger archetype for gunslinger, so the requirements are in the same ballpark.
Finally, we have the 50-charge lifetime limit on the wand. In most games, that wand would be obsolete by the time the 50 charges were consumed, as the character upgrades to a wand with a heavier spell. The charge limit is large enough to not matter.
In theory, the wand is superior and half the price.
In practice, let's look at my Iron Gods party, who have access to both wands (the party skald is a wand-maker) and technological firearms. The party's technological items are found items, beginning at 7th level, so their price did not matter except for resale.
- The gunslinger/rogue Boffin Freddert carried a laser pistol at 7th level, but she prefers her blunderbuss, autograpnel, and sonic pistols.
- The magus Elric Jones regularly uses a 5th-level wand of Snowball and has no interest in firearms. A 5th-level wand of Snowball is better and cheaper than a 3rd-level wand of Scorching Ray: 35-foot range, 5d6 cold damage, 3750 gp.
- The strix skald Kirii prefers aerial attacks with her adamantine lucrene hammer rather than ranged attacks. Nevertheless, at 11th level she took Exotic Weapon Proficiency(heavy weaponry) to wield a Plasmathrower (4d6 fire and electricity damage, 30,000 gp) that the party found. She uses wands of Cure Light Wounds for healing. The trauma pack plus that Boffin carries gathers dust.
- The fighter Kheld prefers grenades, much to the chagrin of the rest of the party.
- The bloodrager NPC Val Baine carries a pistol, dragon pistol, and laser pistol, but she usually charges in with her adamantine sword. She has a class ability from a homebrew archetype that lets her load her pistol with Scorching Ray attached to her bullet, so she uses Scorching Ray far more often than her laser pistol. She would not bother with a wand.
The NPC Val Baine was meant to wield a pistol at 3rd level like her best friend Boffin, but until I adjusted her archetype to favor pistols more, she would rather wield a bow than a pistol. Early firearms are junk. The big difference with non-timeworn technological firearms is that they are not junk, they are comparable to the alternatives, such as bows and wands.
If a technological weapon is priced at only twice its true value, then the party gains no advantage from selling it to buy its alternative. No-one in my party, expect for Boffin, purchased technological items. She purchased a memory facet from Kronsieg Drund and cybertech dermal plating from Doc Hellbroth (to keep Hellbroth occupied in surgery while the party completed the Red Reaver mission).
Are the prices in the Technology Guide artificially inflated?
For example, comparing a Revolver (4,000gp from Ultimate Equipment) to a laser pistol (10,000gp from the Technology Guide) would indicate that the laser weapon's price is double what it should be.
Are other technological equipment prices likewise inflated?
They are not. The prices in the tech guide use the basic magic item design rules to price them. For something like a laser pistol, it costs more than a revolver because it does fire damage and has better range and fires faster and so on; it's much better than a gun in a LOT of ways, and is more like a wand of scorching ray (sort of) than a pistol.
The prices are correct and are not "artificially inflated."
A wand of Scorching Ray costs 4500 gp, contains 50 charges that cannot be recharged, has a range of 30 feet, deals 4d6 fire damage against touch AC, and can attack only as a standard action requiring either an arcane class or a Use Magic Device check. The wand could also be made at 7th level for two rays per standard action (10,500 gp and range 40 feet) or 11th level for three rays (16,500 gp and range 50 feet).
1d8 averages 4.5 damage and 4d6 averages 14 damage, roughly three times as much. Three times as much damage means that the laser gun wielder would have to make 3 attacks per turn to match its damage, which would require a full attack action and impose penalties for both semi-automatic mode and iterated attacks (-2, -2, -7). The wand is definitely superior in dealing damage.
The 30-foot limit on the Scorching Ray wand is a significant penalty. A melee fighter could close that gap and attack in a single turn. That would be a major problem for a wizard. On the other hand, bloodragers also have Scorching Ray on their spell list, and a bloodrager would laugh at that problem.
The requirements for using the wand are troublesome, but maintaining a technological device properly is best done with a technological...
You're driving at something, but I may be too dense to see it.
Can you spell it out?
You're driving at something, but I may be too dense to see it.
Can you spell it out?
My thoughts probably need another day to become fully coherent. In the above post, I was gathering facts and crunching numbers to create a foundation for ideas. Since James Jacob said that a laser pistol is sort of like a wand of Scorching Ray, I wanted to see exactly how much it was like a wand of Scorching Ray.
I did put down two ideas:
1) For the eye slot items we discussed on Sept 20, 2016, the technological items had a markup from 0% to 33%. For laser pistols compared to wands of Scorching Ray, the markup is more like 100%.
2) A bad price does not matter much for found items.
Let me crunch more numbers. Wands don't require proficiency to use: no one gets a -4 penalty to hit because they don't have Weapon Proficiencey(wand). But a non-caster requires a Use Magic Device bonus of +19 to be 100% reliable at activating a wand. A 10th-level character could put 10 ranks into UMD and take Skill Focus(UMD) for a +16 bonus, ignoring the Charisma modifier. Alchemist, Arcanist, Bard, Investigator, Kineticist, Magus, Medium, Mesmerist, Occultist, Rogue, Skald, Sorcerer, Spiritualist, Summoner, and Witch have UMD as a class skill for another +3 to reach +19. Therefore, arbitrary wands are available to many 10th-level characters for the cost of a feat and 10 skill points, very similar to a character taking Weapon Proficiency(firearm) for a firearm.
Some more ideas that could be derived from the data are:
3) Spellcasting classes don't use their wands in place of powerful spells. Wands are for minor spells that are convenient to use frequently in low-level form, such as Snowball and Cure Light Wounds. If they attack with a spell, they cast it for the bonus from the higher caster level. The technologial weapons in my party seem to have fallen into the same niche: they are secondary weapons rather than primary weapons. The exception is the autograpnel. Boffin is a battlefield-control gunslinger rather than a high-damage gunslinger. Part of her battlefield control is from the Targetting deed, but another part is from the autograpnel that allows a pull combat maneuver at distance.
4) By accident, my NPC Val Baine is an ideal test case for wand versus technological pistol. As a gunslinging bloodrager she can use both, and as a spellcaster with very few spells she would have a reason to use one or the other. Yet she uses neither. Her sword is better.
Acid Arrow would have been a better comparison.
I think that my point is, and what you were getting at, is that James Jacobs is flat out wrong. It is almost bad enough to re-work the entire tech system.
Acid Arrow would have been a better comparison.
Yes, but I understand James Jacob jumping to an example spell with the same energy type rather than a spell with the same range and total damage.
I think that my point is, and what you were getting at, is that James Jacobs is flat out wrong. It is almost bad enough to re-work the entire tech system.
Back in March 2017, I posted Going Wild with Technology to share my houserules for re-working the tech system. I referenced this thread in it. Garrett Guillotte shared a link to Fantastic Technology, his own published re-working.
However, I would not declare James Jacob flat out wrong. The rules for custom magic items impose a penalty for breaking the usual rules of magic. Though wands don't have an existing rule for adding the feature "Can be used by characters without the spell on their spell list and without a UMD check," I would guess that that feature would call for a 100% markup.
And as WagnerSika pointed out above, "Technological items have the advantage of not taking up magic item slots." According to Magic Item Gold Piece Values that is also usually a 100% markup, so the veemods are cheap at only a 40% markup (I forgot to add in the cost of the veemod goggles themselves when I said "0% to 33%" above).
However, both those cases apply magic item penalties to non-magic items. James Jacob was wrong to think that treating technological items as if they were magic items that broke the rules would lead to uninflated prices. That is like trying to price a shoe as if it were a bicycle. That design shortcut inflated the prices and left a shortage of small everyday technological items, like a toaster oven or a wristwatch. The Technology Guide's handheld electronics are ridiculously expensive compared to American prices: camera 3,000 gp and commset 6,000 gp.
Lord Fyre's original question was, "How were technological items created? As written technological weapons appear a little weak, but from my understanding, they were converted from spells. So, has anyone "reverse engineered" these items?" The answer seems to be:
1) Start with an item from science fiction, such as a laser pistol or magboots.
2) Describe its operation in a single paragraph using Pathfinder rules. Thus, it will operate a lot like a potion, magic item, or medieval weapon.
3) Construct a magic item that does the same thing. Apply a 40% to 100% penalty to the item's cost for not using a magic item slot or not requiring the spell on a spell list. The price of that magic item is the price of the technological item.
4) Apply the disadvantages of Androffan technology: it is either single use or requires charges from batteries.
For example, my party is currently repairing the Divinity and I had to invent new technological tools for them. They entered the Divinity not by fighting their way in, but by bluffing that they were a repair crew trained by Casandalee. So Unity put them to work.
They are fixing a hole in the hull using glaucite bar stock and four technological tools: a glaucite cutter, a glaucite fuser, a glaucite manipulator, and a glaucite shaper. Since the tools are on loan from Unity, I have not needed to calculate their price, but let me do so now.
The glaucite shaper can bend glaucite into new shapes with a focussed magnetic field. It works only on glaucite, so it is much like the Stone Shape and Wood Shape spells. The glaucite shaper has some differences: it works only on one cubic foot at a time, it can do precision work, and it required training to use. Still, let us treat it as a wand of Wood Shape, a 2nd-level spell like Scorching Ray. Since a laser pistol matched to a wand of Scorching Ray (or Acid Arrow) costs 10,000 gp, the glaucite shaper costs 10,000 gp.
The glaucite manipulator is a magnetic gripper, so it is like a cross between grippers from the Technology Guide, 100 gp, and a wand of Mage Hand, 375 gp. The 40% markup on a wand of Mage Hand would be 525 gp, so let me price the glaucite manipulator at 500 gp. The other two tools are between the glaucite manipulator and the glaucite shaper in sophistication, so let me make them 5,000 gp each.