Question on Miscellaneous Magic Item weight

[Duck]

Been playing a Halfling Cleric, recently acquired a type 4 bag of holding. I have a strength of 11... A type 4 bag of holding weighs 60 pounds. So it puts me over my max load.

Does anyone know if in the Core pathfinder book do Miscellaneous Magic items weight get reduced for smaller characters? Or am I going to have to just beg the dwarf to carry my bag for me.

Also another quick question. Can magic weapons and armor shrink or grow within one size category still? And does the weight change to reflect this?

Thank you in advance,
Duck

[ntin]

There is no smaller version of a Bag of Holding unfortunately nor do for the most part do items change their size for their users.

[DM_Blake]

Nope and nope.

The only thing that varies the weight by size category is armor and weapons. All other stuff, magical or otherwise, remains roughly the same size and weight no matter who or what uses it.

And magically resizing weapons and armor does not exist in Pathfinder, though I vaguely remember a 3.x property that would let armor do that, for an extra price.

Me, I'm fairly gentle with my players on this subject. I allow any old blacksmith to resize armor, magical or otherwise. It costs the full price of the base armor (not counting magical properties) to go from small to medium, double that price to go from medium to large, and half those prices to reverse those modifications. If the armor in question is magical, then the armorsmith must be able to make masterwork armor to modify the size. The time involved is exactly the same as making the base armor from scratch.

I do the same for weapons.

None of my resizing rule is core, AFAIK, though maybe I read it somewhere and forgot.

[Duck]

Thank you for the quick replies. I'll have to beg the dwarf in the party to carry the bag. And start picking up crafting feats to get my own armor and weapons made and enchanted due to the down time we have but lack of shops that we can buy stuff from. Also I think your right about the resizing being a 3.xxx WotC ability.

[cfalcon]

The bags of holding definitely wouldn't be the sort of thing to be made lighter- the weight is part of their game balance. Though it sounds stupid, if you could find a Handy Haversack you could put your Bag of Holding in the big pouch (which can hold up to 80 pounds). Note that getting anything from the Bag of Holding in combat would then require:

1- Move action to get the bag of holding out of the haversack. This would not provoke an attack of opportunity.
2- Full round action to get something out of the bag. This WOULD provoke an attack of opportunity (only a move action if whatever is in the bag would fit in an ordinary backpack, but it would still provoke).

You can't open the bag of holding while it is inside the haversack under any conditions. The haversack weighs 5 pounds, and has three compartments- two can hold up to 20 pounds, and one up to 80 (with sharp cubic feet limits as well, so you can't start shoving ladders in there, unlike with the Bag of Holding).

Haversacks are pretty cheap by the core rules, at 2000 gold.

Note that 60 pounds does not put you over your max load- all by itself. Carrying capacity for a medium (aka, not you) go as follows at Str 11:

Up to 38 pounds, light load.
Greater than 38 but less than 76, medium load.
Greater than 76 but less than 115, heavy load.

For a small (you), it's 3/4 on each:
28.5 for light
57 for medium
86.25 for heavy

Remember that mithril armor weighs half as much as non-mithril as well (though that can get expensive).

A masterwork backpack from the APG lets you treat your Strength as 1 higher for these purposes: that's an extra 15 pounds of max load, or 11.25 for small.

I think the Haversack is hands down your best option if you can get it. I assume the stuff you put in the Bag isn't the stuff you need round by round anyway.

[Oliver McShade]

You might also think about getting a Horse (pony).

They are Medium size, so can go almost anywhere those big human giants go.
They have Str 13, and have a humans carrying capacity.
If you do not load it down with stuff, you can ride it for that 40 ft speed.