I'm considering taking the Material Mastery discovery for purposes of magic item crafting with my alchemist (ftr I'm getting around the whole 'caster level' problem by also taking Spell Knowledge, which is well-debated elsewhere on the forum so no need to address that). Text reads:
"By expending an extract of the same school and level as a spell prerequisite when crafting a magic item, you take only a –2 penalty for ignoring that requirement, instead of –5."
My question is: what if the spell requirement school is 'universal' (such as in the case of Permanency)? Does this allow me to use literally any extract from any school? Or do I have to find an extract that itself is listed as universal (which upon cursory look, there don't appear to be any of)?
If you cannot fulfill the prerequisite, then you get no effect. If you need an universal school effect and can't provide one, the discovery does nothing.
The universal spells are Arcane Mark, Ascension, Limited Wish, Permanency, Prestidigitation and Wish, none of which are on the alchemist list.
The thing is, 'universal' isn't exactly a school in itself as I see it -- it's more the lack of any specific school, the default for wizards who choose not to specialize. So I could see an argument being made there that any spell technically falls in the 'universal' school.
