Pathfinder Unchained: Alternate Crafting Rules

[Nexo]

I would like some help in understanding how much a tower shield or full-plate armor in mithral should cost according to the alternative crafting rules in the Pathfinder Unchained manual.

I can build the above objects by myself. However I do not understand how to calculate the price of the object and the resulting cost.

Can anyone help me?
Complete information can be found on page 72 of the Pathfinder Unchained manual.

Below is the part related to special materials:
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Crafting items requires a certain ratio of raw materials to start. Typically, these raw materials are some sort of trade good that is required to make the item. Making a suit of chainmail, for instance, requires 37 gp and 5 sp worth of steel (assuming you are using the alternate Craft skill presented above). But not all raw materials are the same—some raw materials are better suited for crafting. These are special raw materials.
Unlike normal raw materials, special raw materials have both a cost and a crafting cost. The cost of the special raw material is the amount for which it can be purchased and sold. Special raw materials are trade goods, and like all trade goods, they can be bought and sold for the same price. The crafting cost is the amount of gold they are considered to be worth for the purposes of crafting. For example, f lawless steel’s cost is 8 gp per pound, but its crafting cost per pound is 4 gp. It can be bought and sold for 8 gp per pound, but when used as the raw material for crafting items, it is considered to be worth only 4 gp per pound.
While special raw materials can be bought and sold, they work best when handed out as treasure. As the GM, if one of the PCs in your group has invested in the Craft skill, consider giving out these special trade goods in place of coin treasure every so often.
Special raw materials’ crafting costs are always half their actual cost. They also have special traits when used as the raw material for crafting in the alternate Craft skill rules presented above. A special material cannot have more than one of the following special traits.

Easily Worked Raw Materials: This type of raw material makes it
easier to craft items faster. When using this raw material, the item’s base progress per day is doubled. For example, if you are creating a suit of chainmail using easily worked steel, your base progress per day is 4 gp rather than 2 gp.

Flawless Raw Materials: This material is so f lawless that it can be used to create high-quality items with ease. When using flawless raw materials to create either masterwork or special material items, the crafting difficulty doesn’t increase. For example, if you craft a suit of masterwork chainmail using flawless steel, the difficulty of the check remains normal (DC 15) rather than becoming complex (DC 20).

Malleable Raw Materials: This type of special raw material can withstand crafting errors better than other normal materials of the same type. If you fail a Craft check by 5 or more when using malleable raw materials, you don’t lose an amount of raw material equal to the item’s base progress per day.

Pure Raw Materials: This raw material makes it easier to craft an item. When using this raw material, you roll twice when attempting your Craft check and take the better result.

[Cevah]

A Full Plate made of Mithral has a price of 10,500 gp.
A Mithral Tower Shield, has a price is 1,030 gp.

At no point are you told how much weight is Mithral and how much is not. While it is mentioned that Mithral is a wonderful material to make stuff with, it does not ay it is easier to use for crafting. Unlike Special Materials, which do have that stated. I don't think Mithral counts as a special material.

/cevah

[blahpers]

Mithral is a special material, but it is not a special raw material. Unless you happen to find some special raw mithral, in which case it's both.

[Nexo]

Forgive me, but maybe I'm just stupid, this is the table.

http://prntscr.com/jb7ydm

What you are saying is that mithral and raw mithral are two different things?

[Azothath]

perhaps Alternate Crafting Rules may be of some help. The alternative raw materials give 4 options to where you want a bonus and the price for each as opposed to the standard material(Mithral at 500gp/lb{of steel or iron normally used}).

[Azothath]

full plate armor(medium sized humanoid creature) 1,500 gp +9 +1 –6 35% 20 ft.2 15 ft.2 50 lbs.
tower shield 30 gp +4 +2 –10 50% — — 45 lbs.

mithral MW full plate price is 1500+(50*500)=26500gp by weight or 1500+9000 for heavy armor = 10500gp.
mithral MW tower shield price is 30+(45*500)=22530gp by weight or 30 + 1000 by shield, so I'll say 1030 gp. {big discrepency}
we need standard prices as crafting cost is based on that.
Special Materials

Classically the Craft DC is 10 +(armour or shield)bonus, so 19 and 14 respectively and then 20 for the masterwork(mithral) component.
Cost is 1/3rd or 3500gp and 343.34gp respectively.
SO you'll need to make DC 19 or greater for (check result)*19 to total 15000 sp, about 31.6 weeks with a Craft arms & armour +15. THEN you move onto the mithral part, DC 20 or greater for (check result)*20 to total 90000 sp... about 180 weeks for that part. LoL, so 4 years later you can start work on the shield...

Alternatively
Cost is 1/4th or 2625gp and 257.5gp respectively + 50 for MW tools (+2 crcm).
Progress is by the chart: Full Plate Heavy armor --> Complex DC20; Tower Shield --> Normal DC 15. Then +2 levels of difficulty for mithral yields;
Very intricate, DC:30, 16 gp/d; and Intricate, DC:25, 8 gp.
At a Craft of +15 progress may be at a standstill for some days, so at +20 you will make average progress (20+10.5>30) and would seem minimal for the process where DC+5 will cover the checks that don't succeed. Each day of success will accrue the gp value.
On average it will take 656.25 days for the armour, or 1.86 years. The shield will take about 77 days.

{values recalculated, I did both as I was interested in it too}

[Isaac Zephyr]

Nexo wrote:

I would like some help in understanding how much a tower shield or full-plate armor in mithral should cost according to the alternative crafting rules in the Pathfinder Unchained manual.

I can build the above objects by myself. However I do not understand how to calculate the price of the object and the resulting cost.

Can anyone help me?
Complete information can be found on page 72 of the Pathfinder Unchained manual.

Alright. Going through it all, we need the price of Mithral. Ultimate Equipment has the price of base Mithral at 500 gp/lb. However, it labels the Mithral cost specifically for armors and weapons. Light Armor 1000 gp, Medium Armor 4000 gp, Heavy Armor 9000 gp, Shields 1500gp, Other Items 500 gp/lb.

So to make a suit of Mithral Platemail costs 9000 gp+base armor cost (Full Plate 1500 gp), so to buy it would be 10500 gp. This is the cost that Crafting takes into consideration. So that value divided by 4 is the crafting cost of the item.

So 10500 gp/4=2625 gp

Now, to Unchained's Special Material Table. This is mostly a raw goods table, you will rarely (if ever) be purchasing these. However, let's assume you do.

If you wanted to purchase Malleable Mithral for your suit of armor, it is 800 gp/lb and allows each day of work to count for double. This is where I can see the confusion coming in, because it raises questions. Special Materials from Unchained have crafting cost, so your 800 gp pound of mithral only counts as 400 gp towards the crafting cost. Your crafting cost (the price in raw materials according to Unchained) for the Full Plate is that 2625 gp from earlier. So you pay essentially twice as much of an Unchained special material in order to get that benefit? If you have one pound of Malleable Mithral though, it counts as 400 gp towards the cost though, and you get the check benefits.

Now the question this raises, is how long the benefits last for an Unchained special material? Does the full thing need to be made of the special material, essentially doubling the raw material cost for a benefit to checks?

Either way, the intent seems to be that having a special raw material contibutes only half it's worth to the crafting cost, the rest is standard out of pocket, and the end result is the same. Using Malleable Mithral doesn't change the end cost of your Mithral Full Plate, only how much you're paying, and how long it will take.

[Isaac Zephyr]

Azothath wrote:

full plate armor(medium sized humanoid creature) 1,500 gp +9 +1 –6 35% 20 ft.2 15 ft.2 50 lbs.

tower shield 30 gp +4 +2 –10 50% — — 45 lbs.

mithral MW full plate price is 1500+(50*500)=26500gp
mithral MW tower shield price is 30+(45*500)=22530gp
we need standard prices as crafting cost is based on that.

That is wrong. The math is sound, but there are deliberately price points for special materials and armor in order to prevent these outrageous costs. As mentioned and quoted above, 9000 gp for heavy armor and 1500 gp for a shield. So full prices are 10500 gp and 1530 gp respectively.

Azothath wrote:

Classically the Craft DC is 10 +(armour or shield)bonus, so 19 and 14 respectively and then 20 for the masterwork(mithral) component.

Cost is 1/3rd or 8833.34 3500gp and 7510 510gp respectively.
SO you'll need to make DC 19 or greater for (check result)*19 to total 15000 sp, about 31.6 weeks with a Craft arms & armour +15. THEN you move onto the mithral part, DC 20 or greater for (check result)*20 to total 250000 30000 sp... about 500 75 weeks for that part. LoL, so 10.2 years later you can start work on the shield...

I corrected the math with the proper numbers. Still >100 weeks, which is why CRB crafting is terrible. You can accelerated craft increasing each DC by 10 for higher multipliers, but it's still 17.8 and 33.3 weeks respectively assuming you get the check exactly. Beating it doesn't improve it by much.

[Azothath]

really the alternative special materials are nice but not practical for an adventuring PC unless the campaign has significant downtime (most don't in my experience).

The increases are costs per pound thus you'd need GM assent (very likely) to prorate the discounted heavy armour and shield prices as by RAW it is not a given.

Still, it would only move the crafting time down to about 1 year on the full plate and shield which is great. It is not a good deal for NPCs as labor prices in the game are reasonable and thus super cheap compared to PC pricing. PCs suffer greatly inflated prices in the name of game balance.

The whole process shortens when Fabricate comes into play. For a GM the Alternative Crafting rules give some reasonable DCs. Craftsman 1-4 years, Wizard with Craft skills 8 rounds tops (Unseen Servant, get the MW tools, Cat Grace, Fox Int, Crafter's Fortune, Fabricate, Crafter's Fortune, Fabricate).
I'd also look into Crafter's Fortune.

[Mark Hoover 330]

As an aside, imagine back in the days of the CRB crafting rules, you're a legendary NPC armorsmith. You've labored for nearly 4 years, creating this gleaming set of armor. Along comes a PC who purchases your work of art.

Three days later it hangs used in the 2nd hand adventurer's gear shop across the street. The PC bought it, used it for a couple adventures until he gained a level. He also found a +2 set of armor that pumped his AC up just over the mithral full plate so he traded it in.

Four years of work... 4 days of use...

Anyway, you might also consider these Alternative Crafting rules from Spes Magna games. It really speeds up mundane crafting.

Finally remember that even using the Unchained rules it'll take a long time. I'd highly recommend looking into the Downtime rules which in turn can provide you with Goods and Labor Capital you can use to enhance skill checks, up to +5. These rules can also give you a Forge room that grants you a +2 MW Tools bonus, you can hire Teams of skilled Craftsfolk who have the appropriate skill to provide Aid Another bonuses, etc.

A level 3 mundane crafter with a +2 from Int and 3 ranks in their Craft skill is looking at Craft: Armor of +8. By level 3 you can likely have someone in the party casting Crafter's Fortune and Fox's Cunning on you; this pumps you up to +15.

Tack on a Room from the Downtime rules that grants +2 MW tools; you're at +17. You have a team of Craftsfolk, each providing Aid Another. There's 3 in a Team yielding +6, so now you're at +23. You also have a Manager at your business who is also an armor crafter, providing yet another Aid Another bonus of +2. You work for a couple days prior to crafting the armor, generating Labor; you spend 50 GP on 5 Earned Capital (Labor), then immediately spend that Labor for a +5 on your Crafting check.

All totaled you're at +30. You take a 10 on the crafting check, yielding a 40. If crafting mithral full plate is a Very Intricate/DC 30 item, then our 3rd level PC crafting with all this help yields 48 GP worth of progress per day. 10,500/48 = 218.75 days, or approximately 60% of a year. Now of course, that also means that you're getting spells cast on you every day, your business has to keep kicking out enough Labor to justify your +5 from Capital, and you'll have to PAY for it all... but there you go.

[Azothath]

Good thing I went back and read the Alternate Crafting rules... there's a sneaky bit of text buried in there...
Special raw materials’ crafting costs are always half their actual cost. They also have special traits when used as the raw material for crafting in the alternate Craft skill rules presented above. A special material cannot have more than one of the following special traits.
so that overrides the base 1/4 cost and doubles it for these 'special' materials. lol... I'd stick to the basics and avoid the red light specials.

Helpers can be hired (up to 10) and if they make their DC10 on Aid Another grant +2 on your craft check, so 50% at +0 or an average of +10 to Craft at a cost of 7gp per week. Not bad if you are crafting 8+gp per week or you have a low craft skill bonus.

Lastly, the rolls to cast a higher level spell are easier. Just get a scroll of Fabricate, make your roll, make a skill check, and be done.

[Isaac Zephyr]

Azothath wrote:

Good thing I went back and read the Alternate Crafting rules... there's a sneaky bit of text buried in there...

Special raw materials’ crafting costs are always half their actual cost. They also have special traits when used as the raw material for crafting in the alternate Craft skill rules presented above. A special material cannot have more than one of the following special traits.
so that overrides the base 1/4 cost and doubles it for these 'special' materials. lol... I'd stick to the basics and avoid the red light specials.

It's really what's more important to you. Most if the special materials improve crafting time, whether doubling the daily contribution, lowering the DC (and in most cases effectively doubling due to Unchained crafting rules. Every 5 you beat the DC doubles the progress for the day), or preventing horrid loss on a catastrophic failure (since you cannot take 10 on an aided check).