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So one of my player's would very much like to make a continuous magic item that will give him bonuses to his rogue's trapfinding. However, the spell in question is confusing for how you'd normally do it up via the rules.
So, the spell in question is called
Trapfinder’s Focus
School divination; Level alchemist 2, bard 2, sorcerer/wizard 2
CASTING
Casting Time 1 standard action
Components V, S, F (masterwork thieves’ tools worth 100 gp)
EFFECT
Range personal
Target you
Duration 1 minute/level (D)
DESCRIPTION
If you don’t have the trapfinding class ability, this spell grants you the trapfinding ability of a rogue of half your character level.
If you have the trapfinding ability granted by class levels, however, this spell grants you a +5 competence bonus on all Disable Device checks made to disarm mechanical (but not magical) traps. While under the effects of this spell, whenever you trigger a trap by rolling poorly on a Disable Device check, you may roll a second Disable Device check. This new roll uses the same modifiers as the first roll. If your second roll is high enough to avoid accidentally springing the trap, you avoid setting it off, but still fail to disarm it. Each time you take advantage of this feature, the remaining duration of the spell is reduced by 1 minute—if less than a minute’s worth of duration remains, the spell ends as soon as you reroll your Disable Device check.
The first part is easy. It's the second part, where it says "each time you take advantage of this feature, the remaining duration of the spell is reduced by 1 minute". How do you "reduce" a continuous spell? You can't.
I'm thinking a +40% increase just because you can't do such a thing.
That being said, is this one of those items that will just never be able to be continuous, but charges/day is more than doable?
It would be less of a headache if you decided it wasn't continuous. Otherwise you'd have to figure a fudge.
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Charges/day works. Another option is to change the "reduce duration" to a 1/day limitation for the reroll (the skill bonus part is continuous, but the reroll is limited in uses). So the magic item description would be:
If you don’t have the trapfinding class ability, you gain the trapfinding ability of a rogue of half your character level.
If you have the trapfinding ability granted by class levels, however, you gain a +5 competence bonus on all Disable Device checks made to disarm mechanical (but not magical) traps. Once per day, when you trigger a trap by rolling poorly on a Disable Device check, you may roll a second Disable Device check. This new roll uses the same modifiers as the first roll. If your second roll is high enough to avoid accidentally springing the trap, you avoid setting it off, but still fail to disarm it.
That seems similar enough in power to the spell while still making sense on a continuous item. You could also give a 3/day use (since at CL 3 the item lasts 3 minutes allowing at most 3 rerolls).
Weirdo has a great idea, but I'd go 3/day, just because the Caster Level is a minimum of 3 and at 3rd level, someone could use the reroll ability of the actual spell 3 times, if they really hurry.
Usually a +5 skill bonus costs 5,000 gp for a continuous effect and takes up a slot, I'd recommend gloves or goggles for this item, but that's really not important. It costs more if the item requires no slot, like enchanted thieves tools or an ioun stone. Pricing that reroll ability is tough. I think doubling the price of the base item might be fair, after all, how many failed attempts will they make with the +5 bonus but they still fail by at least 5 (enough to set off the trap)?
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DM_Blake, As per CRB p550 the pricing for a slotted skill bonus is bonus squared*100. Thus, for +5 that is 5*5*100 = 2,500gp.
Kevin_Video, unless your player is really attached to the spell effect the item your player probably wants is the Goggles of Minute Seeing on CRB p515.
- Gauss
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DM_Blake, As per CRB p550 the pricing for a slotted skill bonus is bonus squared*100. Thus, for +5 that is 5*5*100 = 2,500gp.
Kevin_Video, unless your player is really attached to the spell effect the item your player probably wants is the Goggles of Minute Seeing on CRB p515.
- Gauss
I'll bring it up. He just like the bonus for getting the wrong check.
Kevin_Video, frankly, that reroll will probably never be used.
At level 6 (a reasonable level to devote money to a skill boosting non-combat item) the player should have about a +18 bonus (+6 ranks, +3 class, +4 dex, +3 trapfinding, +2 masterwork tools).
Most mechanical traps (the spell does not help with magical traps) have a Disable DC of 25 or less. The moment he adds in the +5 from Goggles of Minute Seeing he has a +23 bonus and so cannot fail by 5 or more on most mechanical traps. Thus, the spell qualifier never comes into play.
Heck, he can take 10 on those traps and anything with a DC of 33 or less is automatically defeated.
On magical traps the Goggles of Minute Seeing are better since the spell Trapfinder's Focus does not help with magical traps.
In short, the 'bonus for getting the wrong check' will not ever happen to a dedicated trapfinder.
- Gauss
Goggles of minute seeing for Disable Device; eyes of the eagle for Perception. Both 2,500 gp.
There's not a magic item that deals specifically with Trapfinding, but it probably wouldn't be terrible if you made an item that gives you +5 Perception and Disable Device only against traps.
An item that gives you bonuses only against traps is almost as effective as a full Disable Device item -- but an item that only gives you Perception bonuses against traps is far, far less effective than a full +Perception item. My instincts say to price it at around 3,750 gp.
The ring of maniacal devices works similarly to this, combining different skills on the same item (though not with limited scope). It grants a +5 bonus to Craft (traps) and Disable Device for a mere 5,000 gp, and you can even use both skills untrained to boot.
The gloves of climbing and swimming seem to disagree with this, however. They grant a bonus to both Climb and Swim, but are priced at 6,250 gp (perhaps a price increase for adding multiple effects onto the same item).
On an unrelated note, I just noticed that the ring of jumping grants +5 on Acrobatics checks for high jumps or long jumps, yet the boots of elvenkind grant +5 on (all) Acrobatics checks. Both are 2,500. I should think that one Price should be increased, or the other dropped.
Troubleshooter, combining the Goggles of Minute Seeing and the Eyes of the Eagle is also viable (and not a custom item like what is being asked here is, per CRB p553 Adding New Abilities). The price would be 2500+2500*1.5 = 6250gp
Alternately, if the GM is unwilling to allow the rule for Adding New Abilities the player can grab Eyes of the Eagle normally and then get Trapspringer's Gloves (UEq p239). Its 250gp more expensive then the combo above and takes up the hands slot but it comes with a saving throw luck bonus against traps in addition to the +5 bonus to Disarm Device.
- Gauss
I agree with that. My post is trying to get the desired effect more specifically. Trapfinding grants a Disable Device and Perception bonus, but only against traps. Thus, my advice is geared towards creating a magic item that does the same.
Granted, my advice might be a lost cause, since many rogues would just opt for a ring that's effective on all checks of either type for that small of a price difference.
I think this is a case where the player wanted the 'reroll' ability without realizing what it actually entailed. It'll probably never come into play and cost way too much.
- Gauss
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Trapfinder’s Focusn is a personal range spell. My personal opinion is that is generally a bad idea to create a magical item, in particular a wondrous item, that mimic a personal use spell as those spells are balanced around the idea that the spellcaster is casting it for himself (or that someone is using UMD on a wand9scroll to get it).
Making it available to everyone through a constant/use day magic item can create problems.
Troubleshooter and Gauss gave very good suggestion on how to handle the player request, I would suggest to follow them.
If the player is set on the idea of getting the reroll on failed attempts, don't try make an object based on this spell. Try to find if there is a already priced object that allow a reroll and base the price on it (adjusting the price for the limited usefulness of rerolling only disable device rolls).
Pricing New Items
The correct way to price an item is by comparing its abilities to similar items in the Core Rulebook (see Magic Item Gold Piece Values on page 549 of the Core Rulebook), and only if there are no similar items should you use the pricing formulas to determine an approximate price for the item. If you discover a loophole that allows an item to have an ability for a much lower price than is given for a comparable item in the Core Rulebook, the GM should require using the price of the Core Rulebook item, as that is the standard cost for such an effect. Most of these loopholes stem from trying to get unlimited uses per day of a spell effect from the “command word” or “use activated or continuous” lines of Table 15–29 on page 550 of Core Rulebook.
The rules already give a clear price for a item that increase a skill:
Skill bonus (competence) Bonus squared × 100 gpso you only need to find something on which you can base the price of the reroll part.
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True Strike is a personal spell.
Personal Spells are usually strong, but balanced through action economy, and unavailability in magic item form.
Walk carefully with custom magic items, and personal spells.
Remember, that those are guidelines, and you have complete veto power, and price control.
Best bet is to compare with similar items to judge price.
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Most personal spells are about half a level more powerful that an equivalent spell that can be used upon other characters. A common example is shield. So making them in magic item that can be used by anyone can be a problem.
Longstride don't share that problem simply because the part that make it better than other spells of the same level is its duration, but making it a permanent magic item don't make a big difference in that regard.
I think most GM wouldn't bat an eye to a first level spell that would give a +10 foot enhancement bonus to your base speed for 10 minutes/level to a touched person. And that would be a non-personal version of longstider.
Compare it with expeditious retreat. An item based on it would be way more powerful and, by rules, it would cost 4.000 gp vs a longstrider item whose price would be 2.000 gp.
Your item seem to be in the "longstrider" class of items, as long as you limit the reroll ability.
I personally did the calculation, although the precise result elude me. Assuming my math was rigt, rolling a d20 twice and taking the better roll leaves you with an average of something like 12.7 or 13.3.
I don't think something that lets you get re-rolls over and over on disabling a trap would make it through something like RPG Superstar. That many chances to avoid triggering the trap makes adventuring a lot safer.
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If you can reroll an unlimited number of times to avoid the consequence of failures in disabling a trap taking 20 would become the norm.
Then the time you fail the reroll the consequences could become disastrous as the players could have become complacent in their ability to avoid the consequences of traps and disregard taking even basic precautions.