Item creation help

[Natamanchuk]

I will be the first to admit that I am not an expert in item creation. I am currently DMing a group in which the players are approaching the level where they will be able to craft magical weapons and armor. I can see the storm on the horizon. I have several questions that I hope you all can help me with.

One of the players in particular is very big into item creation and will come up with all kinds of stuff. Often I find his potential items to be troublesome. I feel like he is often trying to bend the rules to suite his particular idea at one time or another. While I know as the DM I can just reject anything, I would prefer to have reason and rules to support by choice.

Several of his recent ideas revolve around wanting to put damage spell on weapons. He has brought forward dagger of shocking grasp, arrow of burning hands, etc. I don’t see how having a dagger which does 5d6 electrical damage is ok. Based on the calculation he showed for the item it will cost him 5 000 gp to make this dagger. That is equivalent to a +2 dagger. For now I can prevent this by setting up the rewards in such a way to prevent him from getting the gp amount needed to make the item. However eventually he will be able to do this. Does this seems legit?

Another item he makes in nearly every campaign is a ring of spellcraft. Wearing it gives him a bonus to spellcraft which makes creating items easier in the future. I know the only reason he makes it is so he can make more item easier.

Lastly nearly every single item creation feat has at one point or another a line stating that a caster much of the spell they would like to use currently prepared or in the case of bards and sorcerers known. Once the item is made the spell is expended. How does this work with using spells from another source such as a scroll, or another spell caster? How does this work with taking an additional +5 on the final spell craft check and know even knowing the spell or the possibility of knowing the spell or having the caster level needed?

[Addicted2Fail]

Just tell them that they can only create items listed in the core rulebook etc. If he wasnt shocking grasp, cast it.

No way a weapon would be +5d6 and only cost 5000gp, thats rediculous. A Flaming weapon is 1d6 (or whatever it is).

Expending just mean its used as if u cast it, so scroll dissapears etc. There is a feat i believe which allows u to create items without having the spell, but increases the spellcraft (i believe, this is from memory sorry if this is wrong).

Ultimately, if you think soemthing sounds too good to be true. Then it probably is. In the end you are the DM and you can alter things to your every whim, and if they wanna make new items and ur ok with that. Just look at items of similar power and ability, and look at their costs.

Hope this helps

[Karuth]

The rules say you that if something similar exists you have to use it and can't try to bend the rules to make something similar or better for less money (such as calculating caster + spell level from a different class that gets the spell earlier).

From the magic item creation section of the PRD:
Many factors must be considered when determining the price of new magic items. The easiest way to come up with a price is to compare the new item to an item that is already priced, using that price as a guide. Otherwise, use the guidelines summarized on Table: Estimating Magic Item Gold Piece Values.

If he wants spells on weapons he has to use a spell storing weapon that already does this.
If he wants to deal 5d6 elemental damage he has to orient himself on the the flaming, corrosive, shocking etc... abilities already described.
In this case a +1 weapon that deals 5d6 elemental damage (if you could stack the same 1d6 enchantment) would be a +6 weapon and thus cost around 72000 GP. You can add a 50% increase in cost for unusual stacking. If you wanna be generous allow it to be crafted for 100000 gold.

[LazarX]

Just allow core rulebook items and don't allow any discussion on it,until you've read, and acheived a good comfort level with the relevant chapters in GameMastery and Ultimate Magic. Magic Item Creation is as much an art as a science. And the best way is to just stick to book items at the beginning.

If he protests, simply put your GM foot down. If possible diplomatically explain that you are simply not comfortable with custom items and end the discussion at that point.

[Karuth]

After reading about the rules for item creation I reach the following calculation (if you really wanna go by the book):

A weapon that creates a caster level 5 "Burning Hands" effect upon striking is a use activated item.

Thus the base price is 1x5x2000 = 10000 Gold (Making it yourself is 5000 Gold as you mentioned)

Now the little foot note says any spell used whose duration is measured in rounds (can't get much shorter than instantaneous) is to multiplied by 4.

Thus we get 40000 Gold (20000 Gold to make)

Now we have the problem that Burning Hands has no duration at all. Typically spells like that are used via charges and not as continuous items.

So this weapon or object could have 5 charges per day for 40 000 Gold.

Now for unlimited uses the notes says: "Calculate as if it had 100 charges."

Which would make the real value strictly by the book 800 000 Gold.

This is the absolute minimum and you would be a very generous GM if you allow it :3

[Natamanchuk]

Thanks for the quick reply.

Karuth I like the way you think. If he wants to make a weapon like this it would have to be done through the spell storing weapon ability. The thought of charges per day or instantaneous duration versus use activated are good ideas as well

I will have to take this one item at a time. I think this advice should be able to nip most o this munchkin crap in the but.

[Karuth]

Glad to help. I added a little extra I overlooked in my comments.

The weapon he wants to create costs 800 000 gold total :3

[Natamanchuk]

Ha, i like that.

They should make a DM's Corner on the boards here.

[Hayato Ken]

Having too many magic items and too powerfull ones will unbalance the game. Play the creation out, you set the DC´s and look at the downtime to craft the items, then let him roll the dice.

There is an example for waht he wants to do in

[url=http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items#TOC-Magic-Item-Creation wrote:

Magic Item Creation Rules[/url]]

(Effect)Use-activated or continuous
(Base Price)Spell level x caster level x 2,000 gp2
(Example)Lantern of revealing

2 If a continuous item has an effect based on a spell with a duration measured in rounds, multiply the cost by 4. If the duration of the spell is 1 minute/level, multiply the cost by 2, and if the duration is 10 minutes/level, multiply the cost by 1.5. If the spell has a 24-hour duration or greater, divide the cost in half.

Note the 2 behind gp there, which i added.

Shocking Grasp withis a spell with constantenious duration, which is not written there. That´s where it ends actually, because there are no magic item creation rules for that case, so there are no such items.

Let´s pretend it would be for one round:
Shocking Grasp 5d6 has a caster level of 5.
So that would make 1 (spell level)*5(caster level)*2.000=10.000
Because it´s measured in rounds, it´s *4=40.000

This would treat the item like a wondrous item, since it´s a weapon though, it must be enchanted before, adding weapon cost, masterwork cost and for +1 2000gp.

And then this comes into play:

Magic item creation wrote:

Multiple Different Abilities: Abilities such as an attack roll bonus or saving throw bonus and a spell-like function are not similar, and their values are simply added together to determine the cost. For items that take up a space on a character's body, each additional power not only has no discount but instead has a 50% increase in price.

So after the inital 2302 gp, 60.000gp for 5d6 shocking grasp are added.

Creation price would then be 30151 gp, the crafting DC would be 10 (5 + caster level) and it would take 31 days of 8 hours work to do it.

Since it´s duration is not measured in rounds, but instantanious, i would even raise it to *8.
But by RAW it´s not possible to create that item, because of 2 reasons: 1. no items with instantenious as duration; 2. similar to an existing weapon ability, which is to prefer.

[Midnight_Angel]

Karuth: Unfortunately, the '100 charges' rule comes into play when using costly components only...

Actually, I am of the schools of thinking that would simply disallow a 'continuous or use based' item for instant spells, period.

Want to make the thingy command word activated? Sure thing: 1800 x 5 x 1 = 9000 GP, and it's yours. Now you have a weapon that can deliver Shocking Grasps. Just use a Standard Action to activate, plus a Standard Action to hit, all in the same turn... oops you cannot? Too bad, tee hee hee. You can, however, alternate between charging and attacking on subsequent turns. Please note that if you are doing only touch attacks (to transfer the spell), you will only get the spell's effects. If you want to do weapon damage as well, it's full AC for you.

Now, a Quickened Shocking Grasp might do the trick, but alas, now we are looking at a minimum of 5 (Spell level) x 9 (lowest possible cster level) x 1800, for a total of 81,000 GP... and that thingy will still require you to spend your swift action.

(Note: I am aware that a Touch attack is part of casting a Touch spell, but since you are not actually casting the spell, I am more than ready to ignore that part).

And all this does not even begin to reflect the fact that weapons being enchanteded as Wondrous Items are... not quite covered by the rules to begin with.

[Karuth]

Hm... I must have overlooked that. And I also am not sure anymore if, when I use charges that I multiply by 4.

Then lets say you make it with 50 charges a day (which should cover most battles) the price would then be 100 000 gold (50k to make) still quite a lot.

Oh would allow enchanting weapons, but not with stuff that helps directly in battle. There are so many cool/creative things you could do that are not that broken.

♦ A tiny bag of holding in the hilt for emergency heal potion.
♦ Illusion on the weapon to make it look rusty and old (so people don't wanna steal it)
♦ Ghost sound on a Kris dagger (Those wavy snake like daggers) to make the blade hiss angrily whenever you swing it. I bet it could give +2 circumstance bonus on intimidate. ^^

Its not the dice of damage that make the weapon interesting.

[ryric]

Had a long post written, forums ate it. Here's the condensed version:

The ability he wants steals a class ability from the magus. You could simply disallow the item on those grounds. Same thing with the arrow and arcane archer.

If you choose to allow it, I'd price it as a "+" type bonus. This ability makes the weapon better at being a weapon so it should be a plus. +3 sounds decent to me - the ability is clearly better than shocking burst but not better than speed. Remember that this effect is subject to SR, but will also give him a to-hit bonus against metal armor.

The Spellcraft bonus item isn't really that big a deal. The skill check really isn't a barrier to item creation even without it. If he wants to make a ring he'll need Forge Ring though.

If you choose to allow any custom items, remember that the table in the magic item section is your last resort. Use it only if there are no ther similar items to compare to. The custom items rules are there for the GM to design neat new things for his or her campaign, not there so players can use it to break the world in half. You are well wihin your rights to restrict players to just book items.