A small dispute popped up in our group recently regarding Crafting, and more specifically when it must be paid. The rules state that the character must spend the gold at the beginning of the construction process. I also presumed this to mean the cost for the item as a whole, but one of my friends is of the opinion that this simply means you pay the cost for that instance of crafting.
For example he thinks that if you're making an item that costs 10,000 GP, you spend 1000GP separately for each 8 hours of crafting (but spend it at the beginning of that crafting period) as opposed to spending the full 10,000 GP at the moment you start making the item.
The relevant section of the rules is as follows,
Rules wrote: The creator also needs a fairly quiet, comfortable, and well-lit place in which to work. Any place suitable for preparing spells is suitable for making items. Creating an item requires 8 hours of work per 1,000 gp in the item’s base price (or fraction thereof), with a minimum of at least 8 hours. Potions and scrolls are an exception to this rule; they can take as little as 2 hours to create (if their base price is 250 gp or less). Scrolls and potions whose base price is more than 250 gp, but less than 1,000 gp, take 8 hours to create, just like any other magic item. The character must spend the gold at the beginning of the construction process. Regardless of the time needed for construction, a caster can create no more than one magic item per day. This process can be accelerated to 4 hours of work per 1,000 gp in the item’s base price (or fraction thereof) by increasing the DC to create the item by 5. Not really a big deal, but would nice to get confirmation on this from someone!
Sorry for the hassle and thanks for taking the time to read!
You need to buy/spend the Material cost of the item being Crafted equal to 1/2 the listed price of the item you're making up front. You cannot technically begin the work at ALL until you have 100% of those materials assembled AFIK.
The time spent notation there is only in place to denote that an item of X cost (Final cost NOT how much you've spent on materials) will take Y days to craft.
You don't spend 1000k per crafting day, you spend ALL of it up front as you begin the crafting process- that's my interpretation but YMMV. If you're the GM this is my advice, if not, ask the GM how they'd adjudicate it, as your game may have good reasons for why you'd want each day of crafting to consume a portion of the total materials but that's all up to GM fiat.
I don't think it matters much. If he's low on cash, there's no real problem with going on an "installment" plan that I'm aware of. Then he can start on the crafting, put it on pause for a bit, make some more money and pay the next installment.
Bill Dunn wrote: I don't think it matters much. If he's low on cash, there's no real problem with going on an "installment" plan that I'm aware of. Then he can start on the crafting, put it on pause for a bit, make some more money and pay the next installment.
The reason it's a little more relevant (when normally I wouldn't worry) is he's planning to go the souldrinker prestige class. Which has this little tidbit...
"A souldrinker can expend points from her soul pool to provide energy for the creation of magic items. Each point expended provides 500 gp worth of raw materials for the item."
So if he can split the cost over multiple days... that ability mitigates a lot more cost than it would otherwise. Hence the sudden questionning of the way we've done it so far (and the request to find a solid ruling/outside opinion) I expect :p
@TheMetricSystem Thanks! That's the way I thought it was done, but good to have some outside clarification.
TheCriticalFail wrote: Bill Dunn wrote: I don't think it matters much. If he's low on cash, there's no real problem with going on an "installment" plan that I'm aware of. Then he can start on the crafting, put it on pause for a bit, make some more money and pay the next installment.
The reason it's a little more relevant (when normally I wouldn't worry) is he's planning to go the souldrinker prestige class. Which has this little tidbit...
"A souldrinker can expend points from her soul pool to provide energy for the creation of magic items. Each point expended provides 500 gp worth of raw materials for the item."
So if he can split the cost over multiple days... that ability mitigates a lot more cost than it would otherwise. Hence the sudden questionning of the way we've done it so far (and the request to find a solid ruling/outside opinion) I expect :p. Ah, I see. Honestly, the player should be happy getting any discount without milking it beyond reasonability.
500 gp a day, the exact amount of raw materials consumed in a full day of magic item crafting, seems like an extreme coincidence unless the intent was to be able to directly support crafting costs from this ability. Yes, it’s an unbalanced ability, but ruling that it doesn’t work as intended doesn’t help much: player can craft 10 1K items, sell them, and buy materials for a single $10K item.
There really isn't any room to interpret "The character must spend the gold at the beginning of the construction process." When you begin crafting an item you pay for the whole thing up front. That is the process they are talking about, crafting an item.
It seems like the souldrinker ought to be able to generate raw materials before beginning construction on the item. At least it's kinda weird if they can't. This could potentially double the time devoted to the item (spend N days accumulating materials, begin construction, spend N days crafting) but they wouldn't have to spend any real money. Assuming they can get as many soul points as they like, of course.
EDIT: Oh, I misread, they can spend more than one soul point per day. Then the accumulation only takes N/X days, where X = number of soul points gained/spent each day.
It is somewhat assumed that the caster buys all of his materials up front and then spends all of his working time crafting. There is an option for stopping and adventuring.
There is the possibility that the crafter can't cast the spell and is relying on another caster to do the spell. If the second caster isn't available then to make progress the primary caster has the choice of raising the DC by 5 or stopping for the day making no progress (an adventure hold).
Really beyond that you are in GM territory. It's not unusual to go there for crafting which quickly gets into more detail than offered in RAW. Consider that crafting in RAW starts off with a GM review of the magic item design and crafting costs, so we're there at the start.
IMO as soon as a player asks technical questions - the GM should say, "that's a skill check" -or- "that's a good topic for spell research *cha-ching*". If it's common knowledge like, "owls perched on the eave foretells disease in the dwelling", then it is something most characters in the game world know.
There are a few abilities/spells that can affect wealth by level(WBL). Some GMs are more stringent about monitoring that (such as in PFS).
Fuzzy-Wuzzy wrote: It seems like the souldrinker ought to be able to generate raw materials before beginning construction on the item. At least it's kinda weird if they can't. This could potentially double the time devoted to the item (spend N days accumulating materials, begin construction, spend N days crafting) but they wouldn't have to spend any real money. Assuming they can get as many soul points as they like, of course.
EDIT: Oh, I misread, they can spend more than one soul point per day. Then the accumulation only takes N/X days, where X = number of soul points gained/spent each day.
The Souldrinker can cut the crafting cost of a spell by (Stat Mod + [Chraracter Level/2]) x 100gp if they just came back from level draining something that is a challenge. Around level 12 that would be 1200gp. They also have a bound Cacodaemon that can create a Soul Gem every 24 hours, plus the ability to summon more Daemons that can create even more soul gems. Most sentient creatures that a level 12 character is going to fight would be worth 500gp. Bosses as such would be worth something in the 1,000-5,000gp range.
Considering the ability the Souldrinker has to stock up on Soul Gems via their familiar plus summoned Daemons, I don't see any need to let them stock up from their class ability. When it comes to magic item creation they have a huge (exploit) advantage already. Why do you need to squeeze more out of it?
Souldrinker Prestige Class align:NE, be at least 7th level, and cast 1st and 2nd level spells of the necromancy school, and must have died or cast magic jar, and other trivial requirements before taking up the prestige class. *whew*
This seems to fall into the NPC category of prestige classes. Ohh, CstrLvl Chk to be raised, lol.
Soulpool is at best CL, or for crafting 500*CL in available "value". "Every time a souldrinker inflicts a negative level on a creature other than herself, she gains 1 soul point. A souldrinker can expend soul points for the following..."
From a home game practical perspective(thematics) it is going to be obvious that souls or the sacrifice of souls powers the magic item if a significant portion of the cost is covered by soulpool points. I don't know many GMs that would let the item appear to be totally normal as it wasn't crafted that way.
So lets say you're an 8th level character with 1 level of Souldrinker. You don't even have a Soulpool yet. But you have a Cacodaemon familiar. And of course, you are evil. You use your familiar plus summon cacodaemon (4 times a day) to create soul gems out of any sentient enemies you run into while adventuring. Each adventuring day that is going to add up to 5 - 500gp souls for mid level adventurer grade souls. Two days worth of this and you've got the 4,500gp needed to create a wand to summon cacodaemons that will generate between 100gp-5,000gp per charge. If all you do is terrorize farmers and bandits you'll still make a profit at 100gp per charge. Being able to use the wand you should be able to capture every sentient creature you run into.
Compared to this, the soul pool is chump change.
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