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Are you mad?
No. Many a thread have claimed much to the contrary. I would like to propose another look at this endless complaint, yet from a different viewpoint.
Why do most people believe Craft is broken?
Simply put greed. It is the belief that a character should have the option to have it all and not rely on other people. Unfortunately, that is not true in real life and should not be true in a game loosely based on real life.
In reality, most people make a living by producing, supplying, or performing. Such a life is mundane, yet necessary for a community to function.
A player character chooses a different life. One in which he devotes his time to fame, fortune, revenge, religion, magic, etc. – otherwise known as an adventurer. And as such, this type of person does not have the time to mend his own clothing, make his own armor, or bake his own bread.
In most cases, skills like Craft are life-long positions.
Why add craft, perform, profession to an adventurer’s skill list?
Again as in real life, people take up hobbies. A computer analyst might enjoy meshing links together in his spare time. Does that mean he should be able to slap together a suit of chain armor in two days time?
Like the analyst, an adventurer might want to take up a hobby. Some classes are more apt at certain skills than others. For example, a rogue would naturally be more charismatic than a fighter, therefore perform would come more easily to the rogue…hence the addition to the class skill list.
Why is the time to craft items in game unrealistic?
It isn’t. But before we get to examples, there is one minor correction to the system that needs to be addressed. I do not feel a base amount of 150g should be added to armor to make it masterpiece. It seems to me that the harder the item is to make, the more that item should cost if you want to perfect it. So I propose adding 25g per +1 of armor protection (ex. 25g to padded, 225g to full plate). Masterpiece padded armor would cost 30g (5g base + 25g masterwork) and masterpiece full plate would cost 1725 (1500g base +225g masterwork). Scrap the 150g rule. Masterpiece padded armor should not cost 155g.
All examples, unless otherwise noted, will be based on an average, skill check roll (10.5) and a skilled laborer (expert 5) with an ability bonus of +2 in his chosen skill – or 20.5 for the total skill check. The other +3 is for Craft being a class skill. This boils down to 102.5s worth of work per week per 5 DC.
What about those examples?
The times listed are generalizations based on several suggested times from multiple sources. Nearly every source claimed that time requirements were impossible to nail down because the smithies varied due to different processes.
A game longsword will take 250s or ~ 1 week (307.5s at 15 DC). A battle ready sword with today’s technology requires approximate two days to make. Medieval times would require one to two weeks.
A game, masterwork longsword will take 3250s or ~ 2.5 months. Today a masterwork sword will take 2 weeks. A similar sword would take 6 months with the lesser technology of the past.
A game suit of full plate will take 15000s or ~ 9 months. Today, 6 months. In medieval times, the time cost was upwards of a year.
A suit of masterwork full plate takes 17250s or ~10 months. A suit of padded armor takes 50s or ~2 days. A suit of mw padded armor takes 300s or ~1.5 weeks. A suit of chain mail takes 1500g or ~1 month. A mw suit of chain mail takes 3000g or ~2 months.
All seem reasonable. If something doesn’t fit right, have the GM make a ruling…as with the example below.
With the current system I found that a simple item duplicated with a much more expensive material will require more time to make. And you said craft was not broken, didn’t you?
Yes. And I still hold to my original statement. Let’s remember that we are generalizing an enormous number of items (well all of them) into a rule set that fills a handful of pages. Did you not expect a few exceptions to the rule?
Let’s examine an exception. To create a one pound rod (simple item) requires a process to build/maintain a mold, start a fire then heat, pour, cool, file, and polish the metal.
A rod made from iron (4s) requires ~14.6s worth of work (102.5/7) or a third of a day. That same rod made from gold (500s) requires 102.5s/week or ~ five weeks. Here is where your GM should make a ruling to lower the time required for the golden rod.
The problem is that a golden rod will affect a gaming session one time out of a billion. Whereas the important items like weapons, armor, rings, etc will come into play tens of thousands of times in that billion. Sorry, a rule set will never be able to cover all cases unless a book is written on the subject and that thought is ridiculous.
Please make your responses in a respectful, constructive tone.
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Perhaps I'm just dense, but I don't see the part where you show that it isn't broken.
My understanding of why everyone (but you, I guess :)) thinks crafting is broken is not because it's unrealistic, but because it's boring and doesn't lend itself well to the adventuring lifestyle at all.
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Perhaps I'm just dense, but I don't see the part where you show that it isn't broken.
My understanding of why everyone (but you, I guess :)) thinks crafting is broken is not because it's unrealistic, but because it's boring and doesn't lend itself well to the adventuring lifestyle at all.
It is boring and does not lend itself to adventuring. Isn't that exactly what I said?
Does that mean it is broken? Nope. The current craft system gives you an understanding of how many armorers a player character must employ and for how long to outfit an army. Maybe how much time you can shave off those numbers by doing some of the work yourself.
Let's take an example from an embraced source, Making Craft Work which allows full plate to be made in 1 week's time. If you allowed 1 week instead of 9 months, you could have 38 sets versus 1 set. Does that seem reasonable?
I mean really...how do you make crafting enjoyable? If you can answer that question you will be able to sell a book.
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Perhaps I'm just dense, but I don't see the part where you show that it isn't broken.
My understanding of why everyone (but you, I guess :)) thinks crafting is broken is not because it's unrealistic, but because it's boring and doesn't lend itself well to the adventuring lifestyle at all.
Exactly. Also, most people compare it to making magic items where you can create a +10 weapon a couple of months faster than crafting an ordinary suit of full plate.
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I think it's broken in that it's a lame mechanic, I have an 8th-level character who has put a lot of resources into craft skills, but it will still take me several months to make a mere Composite longbow with a +3 strength mod.
You can have a grand master craftsman with a +47 (20 level, 13 int, 2 masterwork tools, 3 class skill, 4 two people helping him, 3 skill focus, 2 gnome)to his roll, while rolling a 20 for every craft check, increasing the DC by 10, and it would still take 2 months (67X29=1943 silver= 194.3 gold/week, 194.3X8=1554.4gp) for him to build an ordinary suit of full plate. He could take his group of friends and conquer an entire continent in that amount of time!
That suit isn't even Masterwork.
I think there should be a cubing effect or something, maybe you do an additional x10/5 ranks, something to make it actually useful to ADD-addled adventurers.
I only ever add it to to flesh out a character's background. Same with profession and perform (for the non-bards). If the character gets the opportunity to craft something, great. If not, he can at least blend in with the commoners between adventuring gigs.
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Just wanted to point out that not liking a rule system does not mean that it's broken.
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Simply put greed. It is the belief that a character should have the option to have it all and not rely on other people.
Ok, if you don't understand the complaints against craft you're not going to be able to understand why we think its busted.
First off, as to accusations of greed its completely false. If people want to be greedy they can craft magic items, and crank out 500 to 1,000 gold pieces a day.
The purpose of craft is to make things. A fighter wants to make their own sword, armor, or bow.
The amount of time required to make anything makes this iconic source of weaponry nearly impossible in most campaigns, therefore the craft mechanics are not meeting their design intent. THAT's why people say its broken.
A character can go to market and buy a Adamantite greataxe in an afternoon.
A caster can fabricate one in the time it takes to say flibbertygibert.
A caster with craft arms and armor can make it vorpal in a week.
But even a high level fighter will take A YEAR to make that axe with a hammer and anvil.
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Simply put greed. It is the belief that a character should have the option to have it all and not rely on other people.Ok, if you don't understand the complaints against craft you're not going to be able to understand why we think its busted.
First off, as to accusations of greed its completely false. If people want to be greedy they can craft magic items, and crank out 500 to 1,000 gold pieces a day.
The purpose of craft is to make things. A fighter wants to make their own sword, armor, or bow.
The amount of time required to make anything makes this iconic source of weaponry nearly impossible in most campaigns, therefore the craft mechanics are not meeting their design intent. THAT's why people say its broken.
A character can go to market and buy a Adamantite greataxe in an afternoon.
A caster can fabricate one in the time it takes to say flibbertygibert.
A caster with craft arms and armor can make it vorpal in a week.
But even a high level fighter will take A YEAR to make that axe with a hammer and anvil.
Adamantite greataxes are easily accessible in your campaign? In my campaigns it would be quite difficult to find one as an adamantite item would need to be specially ordered. After all, adamantite is not a common material. So in an afternoon...
How exactly does fabricate work and what loopholes does a caster need to go through to make it happen?
Vorpal would take almost 2.5 months not including the weapon itself.
The fastest the weapon could be made by conventional means is a little over 4 months. That amount of time seems rather short for such a powerful weapon.
Do you realize that kings would order a suit of armor and not see it for nearly a year?
Why must everything be so MMO.
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But Craft isn't a waste. It simply is not an instant gratification skill.Just wanted to point out that not liking a rule system does not mean that it's broken.I think it classifies as broken when it's widely considered a tremendous waste of resources.
I'm not saying it should be instant gratification, but that skill needs -serious- amounts of time, as in enough that a human should be concerned about getting old and dying before completing some of his projects.
Regular full-plate is calculated in months. Mithral Full-plate takes 52 weeks with the numbers I used before. That's a year. A guy with a +50 (I forgot about skill focus scaling) should be able to stare at a chunk of metal and turn it into a suit of generic non-masterwork full-plate in about an hour or so, because that is a ridiculously high score, and he should be able to create armor better than that by default, if he actually spends real amounts of time working on it.
His bonus to craft is higher than the DC of the armor, the DC for making it faster, and the DC for making it masterwork -combined-, he should honestly get something for it aside from having to spend an entire year working on it.
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Why must everything be so MMO.
Because some people love high levels of realism in game and others want to play with their new toy. You can argue all you want about Craft not being a waste of time, but in terms of an adventure or a campaign it can literally be a waste of time!
Sure, it is cool to keep some aspects of the game as real as possible (for verisimilitude and all that), but that is not always a lot of fun. Is it?
While I see you point, and kind of like keeping Craft rules pretty realistic, I can also see how needing to make arbitrary decisions to keep the entire mechanic running smoothly kind of hints at it being broken.
I agree with Kais86 above, but still I can see where a bit of "MMO" treatment might make it more fun.
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Why must everything be so MMO.
Alright, ENOUGH of that.
Enough holding your nose up and saying 'my way of doing this is the true role players way, you're all just trying to play a videogame'
Its demeaning, insulting, and absolutely, completely baseless.
Did my stated reason for wanting to change the rules sound mmo to you?
Adamantite greataxes are easily accessible in your campaign? In my campaigns it would be quite difficult to find one as an adamantite item would need to be specially ordered. After all, adamantite is not a common material. So in an afternoon...
In an afternoon you can teleport to every major market on a continent and check them all for the axe, or at least the adamantium.
How exactly does fabricate work and what loopholes does a caster need to go through to make it happen?
No loopholes. You just cast the spell.
Fabricate
School transmutation; Level sorcerer/wizard 5
Casting Time see text
Components V, S, M (the original material, which costs the same amount as the raw materials required to craft the item to be created)
Range close (25 ft. + 5 ft./2 levels)
Target up to 10 cu. ft./level; see text
Duration instantaneous
Saving Throw none; Spell Resistance no
You convert material of one sort into a product that is of the same material. Creatures or magic items cannot be created or transmuted by the fabricate spell. The quality of items made by this spell is commensurate with the quality of material used as the basis for the new fabrication. If you work with a mineral, the target is reduced to 1 cubic foot per level instead of 10 cubic feet.
You must make an appropriate Craft check to fabricate articles requiring a high degree of craftsmanship.
Casting requires 1 round per 10 cubic feet of material to be affected by the spell.
Vorpal would take almost 2.5 months not including the weapon itself.
You can add 5 to the DC and halve the time, 35 days.
Do you realize that kings would order a suit of armor and not see it for nearly a year?
Yes. Oddly enough i also realize that they weren't fighting dragons, harpies, fireball tossing wizards, and that they didn't have a player standing over them going "GOOOO!!! Goooo on the adventure already!"
I don't know if the Crafting rules are broken as far as adventuring is concerned.
They are broken(or incomplete) as far being an artisan is concerned.
An NPC class character has to gain EXP while taking feats and skills like Skill focus and craft. Where and how this EXP is earned is never mentioned.
Most of the ones presented in the Game mastery guide are Multiclass or have adventuring classes.
I've always felt that the NPC classes needed some pizzazz or needed to be eliminated.
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Let's take an example from an embraced source, Making Craft Work which allows full plate to be made in 1 week's time. If you allowed 1 week instead of 9 months, you could have 38 sets versus 1 set. Does that seem reasonable?
Define "reasonable". From Making Craft Work about full plate: "Yes, this is unrealistic. No one finishes a suit of full plate in seven days. The goal of this system, however, isn't realism, but usability."
I mean really...how do you make crafting enjoyable? If you can answer that question you will be able to sell a book.
Well, not a book, but certainly an 8-page PDF.
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Crafting is broken because the premise is broken. The base assumption and mechanics are simply wrong.
When a diamond ring and a cubic zirconia ring (or man-made diamond ring) have drastically different crafting times, because the diamond is worth more, I call shenanigans.
Excuses like "this instance can be explained away" or "it makes a decent estimate" don't cut it.
The rules implicitly combine "store value" and "crafting time" via the "craft by silvers" mechanic.
This is why crafting is broken.
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If you had a Craft DC and time that was separate from the value of the item in question, then you'd at least be approaching the subject from a logical start. After that, it's just semantics.
But the idea that something "sells for a lot" so it takes a long time to make is a fallacious starting point, and is factually why the craft system is broken.
I'm not saying it can't "suffice". I've played 2e AD&D. I can play with rules that were broken and get by. Crafting rules aren't being fixed because it's extremely niche.
The fact that you can get by with the rules as they stand (or just house rule on a case by case basis), doesn't mean that the basic premise isn't flawed, though.
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Please make your responses in a respectful, constructive tone.
Why of course fine gentleman.
Why must everything be so MMO.
Why I never ;o
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Here's another example of why it needs a serious revamp.My 2nd level Ranger wants to create a Mighty composite Longbow (+4 Strength) so he use his 18 Strength effectively. He has a total of +6 in his Craft (Bow) skill. The DC for the check is 23, so he would have to roll a 17 or better to make any progress on his weapon. Meaning he would only be successful 20% of the time. Assuming he doesnt screw up and roll a 12 or less (60% chance) and lose half his investment in materials and gold, he would complete his bow in about 50 weeks, almost a year.
Now let's add in the failure rate of 60%. Of those 50 weeks, 30 of them are 'critical' failures (i.e. failure by 5 or more) resulting in a loss of half the original raw material (83 gp, in this example). So in order for my characters to build his weapon of choice it would take him almost a year and cost him over 2600 gp's, when he could walk to town and buy it 'Off the Rack' for 500 gp's.
Too ambitious a project, you say. Perhaps but this is how I would like to roleplay my outdoorsy, woodsy, type of Ranger.
The rules implicitly combine "store value" and "crafting time" via the "craft by silvers" mechanic.
+1
It became painfully obvious that there was something wrong with the crafting system because I had to tell a player that, while a poison-making rogue would be a great concept, the rules made it unfeasible--which is putting it lightly. The amount of time and money that goes into poisons (which I don't believe have a spell to aid them, like Fabricate.) is just ridiculous. The Alchemist is the closest a player can get to a poisoner character and even he has problems! While the Craft rules do an okay job most of the time, they fail to take into account the exceptions, just going for a blanket "time = money" equation.
Seriously people need to learn the fine art of the montage. Just make an agreement that 1. between adventures your party has 1d6+2 weeks in between adventures and 2. assume that you do not want to go wandering outside in the winter (or summer or monsoon season for hot or damp climates). Taking time to decompress after having your life threatened repeatedly is a fairly normal thing to do.
If your character is more than an optimized block of numbers you will will have something to do during this time that is productive and in character. Use craft skills to make things or money, use profession or perform skills to make money, use handle animal to train your horses, scribe spells into your spellbook, craft magic items or build a party clubhouse.
My issue with crafting is the extreme time special materials take, the basic numbers for weapons and armor are generally realistic and I feel special materials should take longer to work out. I recommend just doubling the time when working with special materials, its a quick and easy fix that makes a bit more sense.
Crafting is broken because the premise is broken.
Kaisoku said it. :-D The other issue is Check Result x DC for progress. Something that is literally harder to make gets made faster.
The other thing people need to do when crafting armor is remember that in real life, you would have a team of 5-20 people working on a entire suit of armor, and use the piece mail rules when crafting so you have a team of 2-3 crafting the legs, and a team of 2-3 crafting the arms and a team of 2-3 crafting the torso and so on. This is not the modern era where you can just order a piece of sheet metal and use an auto hammer and a grinder to cut it and shape it, a blacksmith would generally start with ore or a lump of iron or broken steel goods and melt and shape them into his desired shape. There is a reason it took roughly 50 people to support one knight.
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Crafting is broken because the premise is broken. The base assumption and mechanics are simply wrong.
When a diamond ring and a cubic zirconia ring (or man-made diamond ring) have drastically different crafting times, because the diamond is worth more, I call shenanigans.
I don't bare much love for the 3.x craft system, but this conundrum is easily circumvented:
A jeweler doesn't craft a diamond ring worth 1000gp, he's crafting a 5 gp ring (going with the signet ring as a base) on which he attaches a 1000gp diamond or a 10 gp zirconium.
You are right in the sense that the craft system as RaW has no mechanics for "embellishment" other than masterwork, but the costs of the raw materials used for embellishment only shouldn't be part of the value used to determine the times it takes to craft an item. Same goes for a ruby encrusted sword: craft as a sword (or masterwork sword) and then add 500 gp for decorative gems.
Similarly, an item shouldn't take more or less time to make because for a reason or an other, market values fluctuate over a certain period of time. the base price as included in the equipment list should be used as a base. Now increase in the cost of raw material (due to some rarity) will have an effect on final market price, but not on the value used for the craft check.
IMO, the system's main flaw is that it assumes that the price of an item is only determined by the average time it takes to create it.
'findel
IMO, the system's main flaw is that it assumes that the price of an item is only determined by the average time it takes to create it.
Chicken and the egg. Either way, it's a problem that they are directly correlating these aspects at all.
Seriously people need to learn the fine art of the montage. Just make an agreement that 1. between adventures your party has 1d6+2 weeks in between adventures and 2. assume that you do not want to go wandering outside in the winter (or summer or monsoon season for hot or damp climates). Taking time to decompress after having your life threatened repeatedly is a fairly normal thing to do.
Thats fine for a open campaign but when EvilCorp is marching towards town and we only have a week or two to prepare it sucks that Marty the mage has ample time to upgrade all of his magic gear and maybe even some of the rest of our stuff but Ricky the Ranger can't get his bow that adds +1 more to his str used. Though he could get Marty to make his bow +1 in two days if he has the money and its only MW
Thats fine for a open campaign but when EvilCorp is marching towards town and we only have a week or two to prepare it sucks that Marty the mage has ample time to upgrade all of his magic gear and maybe even some of the rest of our stuff but Ricky the Ranger can't get his bow that adds +1 more to his str used. Though he could get Marty to make his bow +1 in two days if he has the money and its only MWSeriously people need to learn the fine art of the montage. Just make an agreement that 1. between adventures your party has 1d6+2 weeks in between adventures and 2. assume that you do not want to go wandering outside in the winter (or summer or monsoon season for hot or damp climates). Taking time to decompress after having your life threatened repeatedly is a fairly normal thing to do.
Comparing enchanting and crafting is apples and oranges, there is no reason to assume they are similar tasks.
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Maybe not but i perfer magic to be something mystical not Marty's Magic Mart. It bothers me that Enchanting or even making an item from scratch with magic is so much simpler.
Vial of Blood block takes at least a week at lower levels.
Cure light wounds takes 2 hours and is better.
Difference in cost about 5 gold.
Maybe not but i perfer magic to be something mystical not Marty's Magic Mart. It bothers me that Enchanting or even making an item from scratch with magic is so much simpler.
Vial of Blood block takes at least a week at lower levels.
Cure light wounds takes 2 hours and is better.Difference in cost about 5 gold.
A vial of CLW requires a hell of allot more prerequisites than the bloodblock.
you need to be a level one commoner to make bloodblock, you usually need to be a third level spellcaster to make the CLW potion (yes we are all aware of alchemists and witches).
One involves refining and shaping raw materials the other involves altering an existing item in a manner that there is not real world parallel.
The point I was trying to make is that once anyone meets the prerequisistes for making an item its not some amazing undertaking its Bippity Bobbity Boo.
The Disparity between Crafting and Magicing is so great that if in any setting a Wizard decided to he could become a monoply of items in a small regoin nationally if he gets a dozen others helping them.
That wizard can equip an army in a 100th of the time a team of craftsmen working around the clock could.
Why are their craftsmen even left in the world why don't they take their high Intelligence and go to wizards school instead of becoming blacksmiths?
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I disagree with your statement that the current craft system isn't broken. In my opinion, all systems in a game should be fun, realistic, or if at all possible, both.
Realism
To be realistic, it shouldn't take a professional bowyer five times longer to make a bow for a strong person than for an average person. It shouldn't take a thousand times longer to make an object from gold than from lead. It should take much longer to make a fine shirt of chainmail than a breastplate, not half as long. It should take more than four hours to weave a blanket or set of clothes, or to build an oil lamp, and more than a day to make a 25 pound wooden chest. And, to use an example from above, it should certainly not take months of work to make poison into poison!
It most certainly shouldn't take longer to make things the easier they are to make, which is what a lower craft DC does.
The root principle of the crafting system is that all items take an amount of time to create that is measured by multiplying the cost of the raw materials, and that's patently unrealistic.
Fun
To me, a fun craft system would be one that allows player characters to do something fun with craft skills.
For example, High level characters (level 10+), those who we're always told are very rare and make up only a tiny fraction of a percent of the population, would be able to make crafted items in a cinematic way comparable to their cinematic fighting and spellcasting. When you find a piece of special metal, you could take a week or month off from adventuring to make yourself an awesome sword, not a year.
Rogues who manage to get access to a fresh wyvern corpse should not require two years of work to make the poison in the wyvern's sting into . . . wait for it . . . wyvern poison. A day would be appropriate, given the correct tool kit.
Skill points are precious. Putting full ranks plus reasonable bonuses into a skill can make you the most amazing horseman to ever live, teach you a dozen languages, or make you so intimidating that monsters lose their nerve when you scold them. Putting skill ranks into a craft is ultimately disappointing under the current rules.
Conclusion
I don't think Pathfinder is a detailed enough game to make crafting realistic. In fact, I suspect that having to craft system at all would produce more realistic results than the one that exists now, because GM and player estimations would be better than what the craft system dictates.
The current system is broken, any system we replace it with will be at least somewhat broken, so we should have something that it fun.
The point I was trying to make is that once anyone meets the prerequisistes for making an item its not some amazing undertaking its Bippity Bobbity Boo.
The Disparity between Crafting and Magicing is so great that if in any setting a Wizard decided to he could become a monoply of items in a small regoin nationally if he gets a dozen others helping them.
That wizard can equip an army in a 100th of the time a team of craftsmen working around the clock could.
Why are their craftsmen even left in the world why don't they take their high Intelligence and go to wizards school instead of becoming blacksmiths?
not really, in order for a wizard to make a +1 klongsword he needs a masterwork longsword, someone has to build that longsword which takes time, sure there are magical workarounds but if you use them on a large scale guilds, independent craftsmen and multiple large religions are all going to be pissed off at you and hunt you down.
Besides not even one in a thousand people are wizards high enough level to cast fabricate.
Lets assume 1 in 5000 are and lets assume that their are 1 billion ppl in our fantasy world. thats still 20000 ppl even if you go with a quarter of that number thats still 5000 if 5 of them got together and decided to take over industry they will. And those same casters would be powerful enough and rich enough to easily handle what the low level peons from the guilds can send at them.
Lets assume 1 in 5000 are and lets assume that their are 1 billion ppl in our fantasy world. thats still 20000 ppl even if you go with a quarter of that number thats still 5000 if 5 of them got together and decided to take over industry they will. And those same casters would be powerful enough and rich enough to easily handle what the low level peons from the guilds can send at them.
5000 people even if driven to poverty can pony up and buy a damn good assassin, not to mention the fact that multiple religions will be after you.
5000 people even if driven to poverty can pony up and buy a damn good assassin, not to mention the fact that multiple religions will be after you.
Thats fine and I'll finish by saying the wizards can buy a better one but I'm done playing at this point you can win the I win game.
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Crafting isn't broken?
- My woodcarver can walk into a forest and with a touch of his knife he can INSTANTANEOUSLY turn a great oak into a thousand clubs. He can then walk up to another great oak and turn it into a pile of quarterstaffs.
- My jewel thief who highlights as a jeweler (and actually has some skill) takes forever and a day to forge a gold ring, but can make a copper ring in a week, even though he is using the same process and molds to make them. For some reason, if he decides to attach a diamond to either ring, it can take months or YEARS.
- It can take months or even YEARS for my poisoner to make a SINGLE dose of poison, even though a druid can just walk out into the forests and pick it up off the ground oftentimes.
- Crafting a composite bow would oftentimes be a simple matter of carving a flexible material into the right shape and perhaps dipping it into a hardening resin of some kind (or some similar strengthening process). Yet it takes my bowman months and months to do so. Why?
- In a world where fabricate exists, it's a wonder wizards don't rule over every crafts guild in the campaign world, or abolish the guild system entirely and just become rich monopolists with a handful of wizard apprentices with fabricate.
Yeah, it's totally NOT broken. *rolls eyes*
- My woodcarver can walk into a forest and with a touch of his knife he can INSTANTANEOUSLY turn a great oak into a thousand clubs. He can then walk up to another great oak and turn it into a pile of quarterstaffs.
FOOCL (Fell out of chair laughing) *ow*
Although to my shame that took a good 30 seconds to fully register the reason WHY it is INSTANTANEOUS.... then I fell out of my chair.
I would argue that cutting and shaping the gem with medieval tools is the time consuming part.Crafting isn't broken?
- My woodcarver can walk into a forest and with a touch of his knife he can INSTANTANEOUSLY turn a great oak into a thousand clubs. He can then walk up to another great oak and turn it into a pile of quarterstaffs.
- My jewel thief who highlights as a jeweler (and actually has some skill) takes forever and a day to forge a gold ring, but can make a copper ring in a week, even though he is using the same process and molds to make them. For some reason, if he decides to attach a diamond to either ring, it can take months or YEARS.
Only if you where a complete idiot when making your poisoner, a non idiot would have the master alchemist feat.
- It can take months or even YEARS for my poisoner to make a SINGLE dose of poison, even though a druid can just walk out into the forests and pick it up off the ground oftentimes.
That is not even close to the process of making a composite longbow, the real process involves layering layers of specially chosen sheets of wood and bone and gluing them with very specific glues that take weeks nor months to dry. The time spent making a composite bow is actually one of the most accurate in the game.
- Crafting a composite bow would oftentimes be a simple matter of carving a flexible material into the right shape and perhaps dipping it into a hardening resin of some kind (or some similar strengthening process). Yet it takes my bowman months and months to do so. Why?
- In a world where fabricate exists, it's a wonder wizards don't rule over every crafts guild in the campaign world, or abolish the guild system entirely and just become rich monopolists with a handful of wizard apprentices with fabricate.Yeah, it's totally NOT broken. *rolls eyes*
Like said, if you want to drive entire industries out of work with magic then prepare for those ants to run roughshod over you, not only are there multiple religions that extol the virtue of the craftsman and the artist that will consider it a crisis of the faith that some dip s+!@ has decided to put all of their souls in the poorhouse. Expect kings who suddenly have a dip in their tax revenue and thousands of rioting subjects to make dealing with you a priority, expect guilds to start pulling their favors and their "emergency d@~~~ead wizard fund" to pay assassins and merc to kill you.
Trying to steal the livelihood of several thousand people is a good way to get your spellbooks burned, your familiar stuffed and mounted and your soul trapped in a gem and dropped in an outhouse.
You know that makes me think about the cost of MW now that it comes up.
Its 1/10th of the cost of a suit of full plate but 300x the cost of a dagger.
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Only if you where a complete idiot when making your poisoner, a non idiot would have the master alchemist feat.
Please keep in mind that the crafting system was around for more than a decade before that "patch" feat came out.
What are the devs to do? Create more craft patch feats for every expensive item that takes an illogical amount of time to craft? Why not just fix/replace the current system so that it works from the start?
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Also for the Illogical Ravingdork an Iron pot is worth less than the iron to make it.
Iron is 5sp a pound
Iron pot is 8sp and weighs 4lbs or 2sp a pound.
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Crafting is not broken, per the OP's reasons, if you assume the point of the crafting system is to realistically duplicate the time needed to craft an item by an NPC. However, I feel this should be VERY far down the list of priorities of things that need to be fulfilled by a game system.
Realism is not the goal; fun is the goal, realism is the guideline you use in trying to obtain that goal. Fun should trump realism every time.
Here's a realistic game mechanic:
Player has natural AC of 10, wearing Full Plate, no other adjustments, for ac 19
Realism says every attack that misses the target ac by less than 9 misses because it is deflected by the armor. Realism further says that on every such attack, there should be a chance for both the weapon and the armor to take damage. For attacks that miss by more, it's reasonable to assume some of them are parried by the defender's weapon, so there should be a similar chance to damage both weapons.
And for every attack that hits, there should be a percentage chance of instant death. Because that's what's realistic for a swordfight.
Another problem with crafting is that it says
"1. Find the item's price in silver pieces (1 gp = 10 sp)."
How many of us have seen adventures or campaigns where the value of an item varies from location to location? Sure, we can assume that the craft skill refers to the Core Rulebook pricing, but it doesn't actually state that.
Also, it's really far more complicated than it needs to be. I read through the 8-page PDF that was mentioned earlier (I can't remember the name, sorry). It certainly makes crafting more realistic and reduces the math quite a bit. I haven't used it (and probably won't since my players aren't into crafting) but it looks like a move in a better direction.