does anyone else think that compared to other item creation feat this one is way overpowered? i mean the amount of items u can make with this feat compared to others, i would like to see a craft staff wands rods, bunching the craft feats together to make them easier to get, really how many wizards can take 2 or 3 item creation feats.
I'd be 100% behind consolidating a few - wand and staff makes sense together, and so does potion and scroll. The biggest problem for me though is rods and rings - both categories are too vague as to what makes them different from a wondrous item. Without a better definition, they should be folded into the already broad Craft Wondrous Item feat.
That being said, I would love if Pathfinder re-defines them in some clever new way that gives new life to those categories, similar to how Staves have been changed.
I am thinking seriously about House Rule consolidations of these feats. I believe, however, that it needs to be functionally-based rather than form-based.
I currently have the following easily defined:
Potion - Single-use items that are Use Activated
Scroll - Single-use items that are Completion Activated
Wand - Items that are Spell Trigger Activated and have fixed Charges.
Wondrous Item - Permanent items that are Use or Command Activated.
The following go away:
Arms & Armor - Becomes a Wondrous Item.
Ring - Becomes a Wondrous Item.
Staff - Becomes a Wand
I am considering but will probably not use the following:
Rod - Items that if held, grasped, worn or otherwise utilized, channel or enhance another power, feat or ability used by the wielder. Really, this also describes Wondrous Items for the most part, hence the reason I'm iffy on this.
I am convinced that I am missing a fifth basic type of item, but nothing yet springs to mind.
Note that because items are function-based rather than form-based, it is possible now to have a magic sword of lighting bolt that is crafted as a Wand or a suit of clothing that is functionally a wand of protection from arrows.
I do allow the creation of Tokens, which I describe as Single-use and Command/Use Activated. This encompasses things similar to Quaal's Feather Tokens, but a character might instead carry a relatively inexpensive one-shot token of featherfalling rather than fork over for an expensive ring. They are similar to Potions but more durable, and so twice the cost, but functionally they are like Wondrous Items yet they are Charged like Wands. I really don't want them to be their own Feat, but by my system maybe they should be.
I do allow limitations on use (e.g. one-daily, thrice weekly, use or command-activated but limited total charges) in order to cost-down construction. Other variations are possible as well, such as lowering the Caster Level below normal minimums. Imagine a CL 1st wand of fireballs for example.
Of course, it should also be possible to "cost-up" items to give them greater functionality. Just like a token is 4x the cost of a scroll, it's tempting to make a command-activated wand that anyone can activate 4x the cost of a spell trigger activated wand that only a caster can use. Similarly, a sword given a +2 enhancement bonus and the keen quality with craft wondrous item would pay them as "similar" qualities in a wondrous item. It could then have added flaming as a "different" quality at 2x the normal cost. Finally, upgrading it with the functionality of a wand of magic missiles is likewise a "different function", and hence 4x the cost (once each 2x for quality and function), and if made useable by anyone would be another 4x the cost (so either 8x or 16x the cost of a normal wand of magic missiles depending on whether you stack 2x + 2x + 4x or multiply 2x * 2x * 4x).
I run a low-economy, mid-magic world, so getting the cost down to the point PCs can afford to make (forget buy) their own, unique and personal magic items is a key factor, but also giving them the greatest flexibility to make whatever cool, multi-function item they want, so long as they can afford it. I'm not doing this with overall Core RAW balance in mind.
FWIW,
Rez
I'd like to see the item crafting mechanic be a skill, rather than a collection of feats. No, really! In 3.0, characters had more skill points than feats; feats were a greater expenditure of resources. Wizards got bonus feats to make them better item crafters. In Pathfinder rules, people get a lot more feats, but wizards and sorcerers still get only 2 skill points/level -- but the wizard gets extra skills due to high Int, and thus can still be a better item crafter. I'd set DCs for making items (after all the time and gold, you might fail), translate the level requirements to # of ranks requirements, and keep all the item prerequisites (including caster level).
In a thread duplicate ...
Kalyth wrote: Steven Hume wrote: does anyone else think that compared to other item creation feat this one is way overpowered? i mean the amount of items u can make with this feat compared to others, i would like to see a craft staff wands rods, bunching the craft feats together to make them easier to get, really how many wizards can take 2 or 3 item creation feats. Personally I would prefer there to be only three craft item feats.
Craft Token: Used to make single use activated items (Potions, magic holy wafers, oils you rub on your skin, scrolls, candles you burn once.)
Craft Talisman: Used to make Charged items/multi use/spell trigger items. (Wands, staves, charged misc magic items. A cloak with 4 charges of invisibility.)
Craft Permanent Enchantment: Permanent magic items. (Anything from weapons, to armor, to cloaks with 3 daily uses of invisibility.)
Have Craft Permanent Enchantment require either one or both of the other two as a prereq.
This to me makes more sense and is far more balanced.
In a thread duplicate ...
doctor_d wrote: Steven Hume wrote: does anyone else think that compared to other item creation feat this one is way overpowered? i mean the amount of items u can make with this feat compared to others, i would like to see a craft staff wands rods, bunching the craft feats together to make them easier to get, really how many wizards can take 2 or 3 item creation feats. Check out Spell Slot system. I use it for my current campaign, and the players like it.
Here is a direct link to the pdf.
In a thread duplicate ...
awp832 wrote: Kind of depends I guess. I feel that all the item creation feats have their place. Yes, wonderous item is great, and if I could only pick one item creation feat, that would probably be it. Statboosters are just too darn useful... That's mainly the only reason for it, statboosters. Secondarily, cloaks of resistance, and then whatever else random that is fun and cool in wonderous items.
However, magic arms and armor is nearly equally good... though it just so happens that if the wizard wants to craft stuff for himself, this is almost entirely useless. Will make you lots of friends in the party though. Also great for "Beat-Down" clerics who can up their armor quickly and get a badass weapon.
Craft Rod is very decent at high levels because metamagic rods are both amazing and super expensive. Once you hit CL 16 or so, picking up craft rod is almost a must. Before that its almost useless.
Craft Wand isn't too bad, here's something that benifited from the removal of XP costs from items. Great for low-level utility spells (knock?), or whatever you want really. Great stuff you can do with nigh ulimited 1st and 2nd level spells, and if you want to pay more.. then go ahead. All in all though, not as good as the previous ones IMO.
Craft Staff is a feat I always felt was a little misplaced. Halfway between a wand and a wonderous item, nobody really knows what to do with a staff. Most popular use for the staff that I've seen? The Heal Stick. Sad really. But maybe the new rechargable staves will help that a bit.
Forge Ring is another unfortunate feat. There is very little divide between what is a ring and what is a wonderous item except the game designers said 'that gets to be a ring'. Perfect example: Ring of Protection (ring) vs. Amulet of Natural Armor (wonderous item). Mechanically they are almost identical. There is no reason they should not both be the same thing. Also, it seems that the rings are a bit pricey for what they do a lot of the time, and you're ususally better off going with a wonderous item if it can fill the same role... which it usually can.
Brew Potion is... eh, it's ok. Better than Forge Ring probably, because its useful to deal out a few potions of Remove Blindness/Deafness, remove Fear, remove Curse, lesser restoration, or low level cure spells amongst the party. Potions of Fly are infinitely useful to the party as well.
That was long winded. I guess I was just trying to say that the main thing is that Craft Wonderous just happens to be very useful to everyone, where all the others are generally useful only to a few classes. Maybe they should dump wands/staves/potions all into one category and throw in rings with wonderous items.
In a thread duplicate ... JoelF847 wrote: I just had a thought about Forge Rings - what if it was re-done similar to Craft Staff was so that Rings are to Wondrous Items as Staves are to Wands. If rings allowed you to use your character level and charisma to determine saving throw DCs isntead of having a static DC or something like that.
There are some rings that wouldn't really be changed by that, such as rings of protection, but maybe the answer is that rings that just sit there and provide a bonus can be made with Craft Wondrous Item, but rings (and existing wondrous items that could be made into a ring slot) that needed to be activated and allowed a saving throw could be made with the Forge Ring feat and allowed for a level based saving throw DC.
Elsewhere, I posted:
I would definitely reassess the required levels on item creation feats. Forge Ring is only ridiculously high (I assume) because of the Tolkien-esque flavour and Craft Staffs is really high too for some reason. Better still, since wands are staffs are essentially the same item of two different power categories, why not simply make it the same item creation feat?
More radically, why not get rename Forge Ring as Forge Jewellery, reduce its caster level and redefine the feat as imbuing all magical jewellery (removing that function from CWI, which is easily the most useful feat.) If you really want to be streamlined, merge Scrolls and Potions into one Craft Consumable feat.
Definitely don't roll weapons/armour into Wondrous Item - that feat is already broad enough!
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