Fairly basic question.
I am curious as to whether or not anyone on the forums has created an item and/or system that has equipment etched with sockets into it, and any objects to put into the sockets, such as gems, runes, etc. that grant special properties, and the pricing/rules and such regarding this. (Or is something like this just unnecessary and overcomplicating things?)
For example, a random loot is a +1 Full Plate with a single Socket, and a socketed find is a Rune of Tarvos, which grants +2 to Fortitude Saves. The +1 Full Plate is 2,500 gold, and the Rune is an additional 750 gold, socketed into the item with the proper Crafting check or a Spellcraft check DC 20, adding the price of the Rune to the price of the Armor.
Wayfinder. Has a socket for an Ion Stone.
|
The Magic Item Compendium had quite a few examples of this, though if I remember correctly their Augmentation Gems (I think they called them) could fit onto any equipment (i.e. there was no need for "sockets").
I've seen a few different homebrewed ideas ripping off the Materia system from the Final Fantasy games, which is essentially the whole socket/gem deal. I'd Google "Materia D&D" or "Materia Pathfinder" and see what you get.
Honestly? Just reflavour enchantments as sockets. A piece of equipment starts out with no sockets (just a simple piece of armour) and when you take it to the smith, he reforges a part of it so that it has a socket inlayed into it. He then sets the purple amethyst of fortitude into the armour and it now grants that armour fortification. Should work quite well, and if you really wanted to, just have them "identify" what the gem is (where they then chose what kind of enhancement they want) and vola they got an onyx of shadow!
I take it that you got the idea of sockets from games like Diablo? In reality, it is incredibly easy to create a socket in an item (unless it was indestructible or something). It is mostly a hole with a few barbs to hold the gem in place and soldered/welded/what have you in place.
Btw, 2 cracked amber spindle ioun stones would cost 6,800 for +2 to fortitude saves. Might want to up that 750 gold cost eh ;)
Wayfinder. Has a socket for an Ion Stone.
That would be kinda interesting, adding sockets to armor and some weapons and such for Ioun Stones.
It's only kinda interesting, because I think that even if you only restricted yourself to using the ioun stones that gave stat bonuses, I don't think the stat boosts would stack, regardless of if they're permanent or temporary.
I like the idea, maybe the equipment in general has to be masterwork to start with, and there can be different types of sockets, maybe size related? Each size has only so many types of "stones" or items that be added to it. IE Dragon Blood stones are powerful and there for cannot be set into anything but large sockets? I will add this to the list of things to toy with.... (damn it's getting long)
It's merely an example for socket usage.
By WBL, allowing sockets for characters to utilize on their equipment and using Ioun Stones (or customized Runes of some sort) does not change much; the level still has a set amount that they are restricted to, and thusly shouldn't be an issue.
But there will be those sessions where WBL may be variant (or in a completely separate manner), and including something such as Socketed Equipment for Ioun Stones or Custom Runes could be severely hazardous to the entire session.
I believe having something such as this proposed as an optional rule would be quite interesting for Paizo to introduce.