Purchasing of Magic Weapons Confusion

[Viridios]

So I have a little bit of confusion on how to price magic weapons and armor, since me and a friend of mine have 3 different people telling us three different things.

Let's imagine we are purchasing a +1 weapon with Unholy (which adds a +2 bonus to cost)

The bonus cost at this point is:
+1 2,000 GP
+2 8,000 GP
+3 18,000 GP

So we have one person telling us that you have to get the +1 and then add the cost incrementally up until you get to the +3, therefore, it would cost 28,000 gold.

We have a second person telling us that you add the +2 bonus onto the base price of the magic weapon (Base: 2k, Bonus: 18k), therefore it costs 20,000 gold.

And we have a third person telling us that if you buy a +1 weapon with a +2 bonus, you just pay the price of a +3 weapon, which would make it cost 18,000 gold.

So, we would like this confusion to end the correct way, so what I would like to know is who, if any of them, are right? Any help is greatly appreciated.

[Devin O' the Dale]

The cost is not cumulative.

"And we have a third person telling us that if you buy a +1 weapon with a +2 bonus, you just pay the price of a +3 weapon, which would make it cost 18,000 gold."

Give this person ice cream and slap the others.

Although I cannot find where it says this specifically if you look at the chart it goes up to +10 but a weapon cannot have higher than a +5 bonus (nor do any abilities) Therefore if the chart was to be interpreted as your other friends think it is the chart would not need to go past 5 ...... did that make it clearer or more confusing..... :)

[Viridios]

Thank you for the quick response, what if you already have a +1 weapon and want to add Unholy to it at a later date, do you essentially have to buy a new weapon and still end up paying the 18k or is the cost reduced at all? Or adding +2 or +3 to a weapon that you already have +1'd

[bbangerter]

Viridios wrote:

Thank you for the quick response, what if you already have a +1 weapon and want to add Unholy to it at a later date, do you essentially have to buy a new weapon and still end up paying the 18k or is the cost reduced at all? Or adding +2 or +3 to a weapon that you already have +1'd

Pay the difference.

e.g, it was +1 (cost 2000gp) and will now cost 18k. The difference you need to pay is 16k to get it upgraded.

[Mokshai]

my reading of the rules would be to pay the difference between the two costs.

Therefore, you are looking at 18000 - 2000 = 16000 that you would have to pay.

[Devin O' the Dale]

You would pay for it as if it was a new weapon (+1 Unholy Wepon) then subtract what is already there (+1 weapon)

"Thus, a +1 longsword can be made into a +2 vorpal longsword, with the cost to create it being equal to that of a +2 vorpal sword minus the cost of a +1 longsword."

[Viridios]

Thank you again everybody for the timely responses. That is all the questions I needed answered.

[blahpers]

Subtract the price of the final product from the existing item. Since a +1 weapon costs 2,000 gp (plus the cost of the masterwork weapon) and a +1 unholy weapon costs 18,000 gp (plus the cost of the masterwork weapon), to upgrade from +1 to +1 unholy, the cost would be 16,000 gp.

Edit: Damn ninjas. : )

[Ben the Red]

Note that it takes time to upgrade a weapon. Use half the upgrade cost to calculate. At 1 day/1000gp (IIRC), it would take 8 days to upgrade the +1 to a +3 (or +1 unholy). Assuming the crafter doesn't have feats, uses accelerated crating (increase Spellcraft DC by +5), or something to speed up the process.