So, under the crafting rules, you must spend at least 4 days crafting an item of your level, with a day less for every level you exceed the item's level.
IF you want to finish the item right away after those days, you need to spend the remaining half of the item's market price; making crafting it cost the SAME as buying it! (which kinda makes this option suck)
OR you can spend additional days crafting, reducing the remaining price by an SP value equal to what a character of your level and proficiency can do in a day. BUT... That means you're reducing a cost frequently measured in GP by SP, you know, 1/10th the value you're trying to reduce. Mind you that consumables don't quite have this issue, since they're usually priced in SP anyway.
BUT... If you're crafting pretty much anything over 100gp and you're level 15 or less, you'll be working on it for a while. Making it really undesirable to do this.
Particularly in the case of most of the formerly "Wondrous Items" which cost 1000s of gp, you've basically retired that character. What started as a simple crafting project has now become a doctorate degree level life's work (if you're trying to actually save any money by crafting).
Again, I feel the need to point out that many of these formerly "Wondrous Items" need a high LV to even be able to craft them, but aren't particularly useful by that point, let alone enticing to wait that long for them.
Yes, a 15th level character can make a 4000gp item in a month or less (if their craft proficiency is high), but does a 15th level character even need what they made by then? Meanwhile a 7th level character spends nearly a whole year making even a 1000gp item! And forget about doing anything so ambitious before lv7.
Again, you could just spend the remaining money to finish right away, but that really completely ruins the whole point of crafting if you're just going to end up paying market price anyway.
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So, under the crafting rules, you must spend at least 4 days crafting an item of your level, with a day less for every level you exceed the item's level.
IF you want to finish the item right away after those days, you need to spend the remaining half of the item's market price; making crafting it cost the SAME as buying it! (which kinda makes this option suck)
OR you can spend additional days crafting, reducing the remaining price by an SP value equal to what a character of your level and proficiency can do in a day. BUT... That means you're reducing a cost frequently measured in GP by SP, you know, 1/10th the value you're trying to reduce. Mind you that consumables don't quite have this issue, since they're usually priced in SP anyway.
BUT... If you're crafting pretty much anything over 100gp and you're level 15 or less, you'll be working on it for a while. Making it really undesirable to do this.
Particularly in the case of most of the formerly "Wondrous Items" which cost 1000s of gp, you've basically retired that character. What started as a simple crafting project has now become a doctorate degree level life's work (if you're trying to actually save any money by crafting).
Again, I feel the need to point out that many of these formerly "Wondrous Items" need a high LV to even be able to craft them, but aren't particularly useful by that point, let alone enticing to wait that long for them.
Yes, a 15th level character can make a 4000gp item in a month or less (if their craft proficiency is high), but does a 15th level character even need what they made by then? Meanwhile a 7th level character spends nearly a whole year making even a 1000gp item! And forget about doing anything so ambitious before lv7.
Again, you could just spend the remaining money to finish right away, but that really completely ruins the whole point of crafting if you're just going to end up paying market price anyway.
Is 1000gp project appropriate for a lvl 7 character though? Also the point of paying the same for an item to craft is to get an item not found at the marketplace. All seems to be in order to me.
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"The point" of crafting in PF1 was usually to get items cheaper than market value. PF2 seems to be more careful about breaking WBL, so crafting looks like it's more about ensuring access to items you want that might not be available in the market than getting you items significantly cheaper.
This looks like less of a problem with the game, and more like the purpose of a mechanic changing between editions.
"Oh but Crafting is now to gain access to it when the market doesn't have it"
Err, don't we get into the problem of the market having the materials to make the item in question but also not being able to make it?
Now this does make sense to me to a degree but also doesn't depending on the item and town in question.
You mean to tell me the town sells all the materials to make a shield, has enough magic to supply the ingredients for the magical side of the effect, and seems to have proper means of making the magic shield you want.... but no one thought of it till now? And no one else but you can make it?
That seems a tad strange to me.
Edit: Also wowy wow, does that make it stink to be an Alchemist that actually WANTED to Craft stuff to keep as back ups rather than cheat them in with their Dailies. It's going to take me HOW LONG to make some Mutagens?
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You mean to tell me the town sells all the materials to make a shield, has enough magic to supply the ingredients for the magical side of the effect, and seems to have proper means of making the magic shield you want.... but no one thought of it till now? And no one else but you can make it?
You mean the local grocery store sells all these separate ingredients, but no one thought to make banana cream pies?
You mean the local hardware store sells all this lumber, tools, and fasteners, but no one thought to make a table that's the exact size, shape, style, and color I wanted?
Anyway, like Brew Bird said, the purpose of the mechanic has changed pretty substantially. The modeling of the opportunity cost of your downtime creating a discount doesn't kick in until it's competing with your other options for earning money during downtime (which is what the discount is balanced against). It does, however, add the hassle of needing the formula for the item, which ... I dunno. It seems worth it if you're going to have a good amount of downtime and want a bunch of some specific items.
You mean to tell me the town sells all the materials to make a shield, has enough magic to supply the ingredients for the magical side of the effect, and seems to have proper means of making the magic shield you want.... but no one thought of it till now? And no one else but you can make it?You mean the local grocery store sells all these separate ingredients, but no one thought to make banana cream pies?
You mean the local hardware store sells all this lumber, tools, and fasteners, but no one thought to make a table that's the exact size, shape, style, and color I wanted?
Anyway, like Brew Bird said, the purpose of the mechanic has changed pretty substantially. The modeling of the opportunity cost of your downtime creating a discount doesn't kick in until it's competing with your other options for earning money during downtime (which is what the discount is balanced against). It does, however, add the hassle of needing the formula for the item, which ... I dunno. It seems worth it if you're going to have a good amount of downtime and want a bunch of some specific items.
If you want to continue that.
What do you mean the Pie Maker never thought to make Banana Cream Pie even though the local grocery store sells all the ingredients? That's a bit strange considering Banana Cream Pie is a common item.
What do you mean the local carpenter can't make me the table I want even though he knows how to work wood, make tables and I can supply the wood and paint? But he can make a chair out of some drift wood he pulled up? Huh...,
"Good amount of downtime" is never something to be counted on. I'm sorry, I don't want to spend 2 weeks on just 1 Mutagen. And I doubt the team will be willing to let me get away with taking that time from them unless they also have their own projects.
I can accept I could but steel in a town where I couldn't find someone who knows how to fold it to forge a katana, yeah. I definitely wouldn't expect the people at my local chemist or garden centre to know how to make bombs, certainly not reliably or safely.