You get one dose. Poisons have always been expensive. The DC's are what they are because failing them is really bad. You can only make other poisons by GM Fiat. As for making them stronger it can't be done unless something just came out in Ultimate Combat that allows it.
As stated it is one does of poison for the listed price in the book. And the only way to get poison by RAW is to make it with the crafting rules or to buy it.
There are a couple of things that Rogues and Alchemist can do to concentrate poison to increase the DC if I remember correctly.
Finally you are into the realm of DM house rule if you want to be able to get more uses out of a single dose of poison. Or if you want to be able to "milk" animals or other creatures you find in the wild.
We have a house rule that poison use or survival can allow you to milk a venomous creature you killed in combat to try and get some poison out of it. (Don't fumble your skill check... and yes I know most skills cannot crit or fumble normally.) Additionally we have a house rule that a "dose" of poison as listed in the book can apply to one weapon or two dagger like items or three ammo like items like arrows or bolts.)
As stated it is one does of poison for the listed price in the book. And the only way to get poison by RAW is to make it with the crafting rules or to buy it.
There are a couple of things that Rogues and Alchemist can do to concentrate poison to increase the DC if I remember correctly.
Finally you are into the realm of DM house rule if you want to be able to get more uses out of a single dose of poison. Or if you want to be able to "milk" animals or other creatures you find in the wild.
We have a house rule that poison use or survival can allow you to milk a venomous creature you killed in combat to try and get some poison out of it. (Don't fumble your skill check... and yes I know most skills cannot crit or fumble normally.) Additionally we have a house rule that a "dose" of poison as listed in the book can apply to one weapon or two dagger like items or three ammo like items like arrows or bolts.)
I like the House rules. At times (not when i really ccared though,) our DM has allowed us to "milk" dead venomous creatures after combat.
But all in all, poisons rules are lame.
I think Paizo should more thourghly write rules for (and improve on) posion use if they are going to make it a class feature.
Poison rules aren't really lame. They're very powerful at low levels and weak at high levels. Their price is the only balancing factor to them- otherwise everyone would use poisons.
I think poison rules are fine, the restrictions in place are there because it becomes fairly boring if the campaign gets dominated by poison use.
If you make a character that has poison use as a significant ability, you have to invest a fair bit in it, that balances it out.
I don't think poison should be harder to resist really, it would be more deadly than casting 9th level spells fairly quickly, which I think is a bad way to go, mundane trickery that is fairly easily accesible should not compare to the most powerful magic in existence.
Poison at the lower/more 'realistic' levels is quite potent and can have a big impact, higher levels it is more of a side effect and hindrance, which seems about right.
I'm a but confused on how many doses are made when you craft(alchemy) or when you buy it.
One dose. Its enough to work once, be it on a greatsword, a dagger, or a wine glass. Don't worry about it too much. Its probably around 1 fluid ounce if it matters.
It seems like a huge waste of actions and gold if you only get 1 dose when you buy it and it it has a low DC to save against.
Poisons are kind of weak and expensive as an option.
Also as a side note, can you make other poisons than what is in the table? Or make stronger versions of the poisons?
DM's call, default answer is no. Making stronger versions requires 2 doses of the poison and an alchemist discovery. If it was possible to do that under the rules, the alchemist wouldn't have to expend resources to do it.
Yes, poison really sucks.
You say it's fine because if you fail the effects are devestating? I'm sorry, I'm not seeing that. 1d2 or 1d3 ability damage sure, it's something but its hardly a combat ender. The only one that might be considered that would be Drow Poison, but I'm not sure if they get their first safe right away or after 1 minute (if 1 min, then it's worthless too in combat). But that's pretty much the only one.
So, ok the DCs are ok at low levels, but at that time the prices are so high you can't really afford it, not for a single use item, that only works on a single attack, and then possibly only like 50% of the time.
And by the time you can afford it, the DC is becoming trivial for any enemies it would be worth using it on, so it would still be stupid wasting your money on it.
If poison use class feature gave the ability to base poison DC on class level or something, it might be worth it, for example.
Also poison crafting? OMG, that's just a terrible joke. You'll take like a year or so to make a single dose of Black Lotus Extract. A year of non-stop crafting every day.
Yes, poison really sucks.
You say it's fine because if you fail the effects are devestating? I'm sorry, I'm not seeing that. 1d2 or 1d3 ability damage sure, it's something but its hardly a combat ender. The only one that might be considered that would be Drow Poison, but I'm not sure if they get their first safe right away or after 1 minute (if 1 min, then it's worthless too in combat). But that's pretty much the only one.So, ok the DCs are ok at low levels, but at that time the prices are so high you can't really afford it, not for a single use item, that only works on a single attack, and then possibly only like 50% of the time.
And by the time you can afford it, the DC is becoming trivial for any enemies it would be worth using it on, so it would still be stupid wasting your money on it.
If poison use class feature gave the ability to base poison DC on class level or something, it might be worth it, for example.
Also poison crafting? OMG, that's just a terrible joke. You'll take like a year or so to make a single dose of Black Lotus Extract. A year of non-stop crafting every day.
The people who are really good at making poisons, Alchemists, can make it much faster with all their bonuses and swift alchemy. The Master Alchemist feat makes it 10x faster still. Rogues have ranks to burn on it if they want to focus it. Both classes have abilities to make one dose last longer.
Where poison is really dangerous isn't in the single does, but in its stacking across multiple hits.
If my TWF alchemist puts sticky poison on both his claws and goes in for an attack, at low levels lets say he hits both, and because he is clever he targets the low fort save wizards.
Now he just hit the wizards with 2 doses of a d2 strength damage poison, and the wizard failed twice. Ordinarily the DC is 14, the damage d2, and the duration 6 rounds, but since the wizard has 2 doses in him now, the save is 16 and the duration 9 rounds. Next round I put 2 more doses in him and the save is 20 and the duration 19 rounds.
In a few rounds, the wizard (who dumped strength, because he's a wizard), can barely lift his own robes, incurring spell failure chances. He can barely move from encumbrance, and we hunt him down at our leisure.
As you go up in level, you get access to better poisons and more ways to stretch them out over multiple hits. They aren't game ending, but any ability which was game ending would be stupid.
And that's just injury poison. How about an ingestion poison with a 1 hour onset. In that 1 hour, A crafty rogue can get many, many doses into his enemy, making the save when it finally hits him stupidly high. By the time the night is done, the rogue sneaks in and puts a dagger in the unconscious, fever riddled BBEG (or his opponent in court).
And lastly, yes poisons are expensive, but they are also consumable items, which means that the DM should not consider them in WBL. If you are using lots of poisons, your DM should give you a bit more gold to compensate.
In summation, they're not an every encounter thing, and they aren't an encounter ender thing, but they are a pretty big boost if used in the right situation and against the right enemy.
(and pernicious poison can make those DCs that little bit harder and the durations that much more brutal).