Crafting, general philosophy

[Ronan]

Magical crafting has been declared to be a max of half the 'adventuring rate' of 100GP/RL hour. This means *magical* crafting would have a max gain rate of 50 GP/hr after accounting for the base costs. Profit will be 0-50GP/RL Hour (well, perhaps loss on occasion).

I think I should make one thing clear: Actual rates are up in the air. They will be constants in the system, alterable at compile-time. Just like the game:real time ratio, everything needs to adapt to the change of a single variable. If anyone writes a system that assumes a specific time ratio without referencing acr_time_i.nss's ACR_GetGameToRealTimeRatio(), I'll feed them to Zelknof. And Zelknof is hungry.

[Maeva]

Mundane crafting (even if we use half the GP/hr of magical) is so cheap that even MW Full Plate won't take long. Adventurer/Blacksmith PCs are completely doable spending IG time to pound away.

Full plate takes over 41 weeks assuming a 20 on Craft Armor skill checks. In most cases enchanting something is much quicker.

A bit of a comment. What kind of crafting will this 41 weeks or 72 hours entale?

You can make it very easy by having the PC drop 3 iron ingots on an anvil, wait 41 weeks or 72 hours (which ever you decide) and out pops a suit of platemail, if you succeed on the crafting roll.

Or you could split the time to craft into various components, each with it's own crafting roll, adding in for failures, the apparent time to craft gets longer. In otherwords, making it more difficult to script, but reaching the same goal of slowing the crafting time.

For example, a plain suit of platemal;

PC takes 1 ingot of iron and makes a sheet of iron, he needs 3 sheets of iron for one suit of platemail, has to try 4 times as 1 try could have been a failure, each attempt to make a sheet of iron consumes 4 hours of game time. (16 hours total).

PC then needs to make the various components of the platemail with a moderately high DC. PC adds one sheet of iron to make the breast plate and back plate. A second sheet of iron for the 2 pauldrons, 2 cuisse, and 2 greaves (leg parts) and the third sheet of iron for the 2 spaulders, 2 vambraces, 2 bracers, and a gorget (neck, shoulder and arms). Again there could be a failure and the PC would have to make another sheet of iron and attempt to make the missing components again. Each of the three component takes 8 hours of game time, (32 - 40 hours total with possible failures). {Note: One could further divide this up so that each individual component has to be made, instead of lumping then into three, included in that the cutting of the sheet of iron to pieces before making the smaller components.}

Once the PC has all the components, he will need to assemble and fit them, he will also need leather straps, buckles, chainmail connectors and an under doublet (or base padded armor). Here the DC could be much higher and if the PC fails to properly assemble the platemail, he losses some of the components and has to go back and make some more. This step takes 8 hours. (16 to 24 hours if you include possible failures)

The idea here is to keep the PC active, he is still reaching his goal of making a suit of platemail, but in steps and each step the PC completes, he gains a sence of accomplishment, something to brag about IC In-Game. Also it divides up the crafting time to more manageable levels, instead of tracking 72 hours, we are tracking only 4 to 8 hours.

The downside, is that more recipes have to be added and more items have to be handled.

Same could hold true for potions, instead of adding a few base ingredients to make a potion, some of those ingredients might need pre-processing; grinding a hounds tooth to dust, soaking the herbs in wine, stewing a few items together to make an essence. Then taking those proccessed components and attempting to create a potion.

[Rick7475]

I don't see this as being so detailed.

Now, we don't disappear for 8 hours when we sleep. So we don't dispear and freeze for 8 hours when we craft.

I see the time to make an items as attempts. You roll for your attempt. Then you can't roll again for a period of time. As you get better, your rolls improve.

Rolls are based on a d20 with a DC for the crafting item and a bonus with the skill (just like any other skill).

So you roll to make an ingot in a furnace. A chunk of iron ore and some water in a furnace. Then roll a d20 with a DC and a skill adjustment. You make an igot! Great! You can't make another one for an hour ( or whatever time length we decide on) game time.

You don't make an ingot.... then you can't attempt again for another two hours or so.

And then when it gets to the big stuff.

You place three sheets of imbued iron (how you get the imbued iron? Well, you haven't seen my plan yet, but you want to know now about timing ...) some water, maybe some dye, in a furnace (or ironworks, whatever the item) then you roll. Very high DC, but now you are a master armor smith, so you have a high skill set. You make the armor!! But you can't make another attempt for 20 hours game time. You fail!!! Then again, you can't make another attempt for 20 hours. And the imbued iron was damn expensive. You had to pay a wizard to embue it (maybe 1500 gold). But you can sell the +1 armor for 3k, if you make it.

As you practice, and add more skill points, you get better.

How many skill points are we talking about? For +1 armor? Perhaps 10. You would be level 6 - 10 (8 would be average) to make it. Once you get good, you can make a suit everytime, but it will cost you 1500 and take you 20 hours game time to do it. (Add to the fact you have to find a mage to imbue it, which would take him time, maybe 2 - 10 hours).

No time taken away from RP'ing with others. The actual crafting takes seconds in game time, but to do it again is where the time sink happens. You can't make another attempt for hours.

Now, what about the time sink? When no DM's are on, PC's are supposed to be doing this crafting and statics and things. The time sink involves collecting and preparing the materials, negotiating with other craftsmen (ie the mage to embue) and a lot of running around. All this running around may involve RP'ing with others.

Also, materials aren't going to be easy to come by. Just like the patrol statics on DF, they will be a catalyst to get players together to gather materials. Craftsmen may pay for help, may share profits, or convince adventurers that the caves that contain adamantine might have other treasures. Laissez-Faire DM'ing. Let the players drive the stories. That is how I see crafting.

We don't need to bog down on mundane items. MW items are usually purchased by level 2 - 3 PC's. We concentrate on creating MW items. An orc can make a mundane sword. Ever hear of bog iron? Peasants used to find oxidized deposits in the swamps, and took it to make hinges and plating and other things on the their peasant crofts in the middle ages. Peasants!!!! Everyday lowlife peasants could smith minor mundane items. No real skill required, just a little knowledge. Some peasants even made rudimentry daggers. We are not going to be concentrating on huge quantities of mundane objects that tie up processing time. Cooking and alchemy were well known in little village taverns, so we don't need mundane brewing and alchemy. We are talking adventurers here, the cream of the crop. They will spend as much time in their careers making mundane crap as they do in level 1 - 3. Then the MW stuff starts, and at level 5 - 6 the magic stuff is attempted. By level 8 I hope they are making magic stuff and making some cash. Not a lot, but enough for a thriving business.

I think this will be a great benefit to ALFA.

[Fionn]

Essentially the same as my plan Rick - you're talking a day's crafting with a roll when a PC clicks, I'm talking an hour's crafting. The main difference is that my plan you only get an two hour's progress if you walk in, click, log out (and a second hour when you log in). Yours you get to do a full day per check (at least I think).

In any case, this is how mundane crafting works in PnP. Magical crafting is set up to simply fulfill the requirements (time, gold, Feat, spell) and make the thing. Are we discussing changing magical crafting to require skill checks?

[AlmightyTDawg]

They will spend as much time in their careers making mundane crap as they do in level 1 - 3. Then the MW stuff starts, and at level 5 - 6 the magic stuff is attempted. By level 8 I hope they are making magic stuff and making some cash. Not a lot, but enough for a thriving business.

I think you'll probably want to immediately do away with the idea of a non-casting crafter creating magic items. The idea of a static system allowing the repeatable crafting of +1 armor is exactly the last thing we want. Even with possibility for failure, when you talk about the quantization of value that high, a simple d20 system isn't going to cut it sadly.

What I think there is sufficient room for, though, is the development of "mundane" and masterwork crafting systems that actually effectively complement and balance a magical crafting system. Start with the idea of wondrous items requiring masterwork items. A lot of that tends to get presumed. What if, instead, you actually start with the development of certain magic items requiring masterwork (nonmagical) artistry of a sufficient quality. Now crafting requires the components of both a mundane and a magical crafter. Either position of course can be fulfilled by NPCs - to a certain extent. But if you want to generate the player economy portion of things, giving say a rogue or a fighter a way to generate their own niche I think would be better suited to focus on this.

It would be either a shift or an expansion of the magical crafting ethos/rules, depending on your perspective. But I think you absolutely want to avoid a system that blurs the lines between them. While blessed or quasi-magic materials can be necessary in the construction, the actual construction technique (barring certain higher-level magic) is dominantly an issue of artistry.

Other things which you can do to broaden a crafting system without necessarily adding obscene value to it would be a supplementary system regarding working with special materials. Bringing back some of the stuff from Magic of Faerun (possibly reprice it for 3.5e in a couple of cases), and have working such materials to be a unique/developed skill on the part of a crafter that comes with experience/training/etc. can also add some milestones for advancement/customization. Imagine one of a few "formulas" for an electricity resistant ring requires someone with an artistry/craft function related to rings and requires the person to have an "intermediate" knowledge of how to handle darksteel, for example.

The major thing to watch for, and I think people have touched on the problems, is juxtaposing a PnPish crafting system with ALFA's slow advancement and desire for wealth balance. Magical crafting in any non-regulated system (if you can build it, you own it) is DOA. Don't even waste your knuckles typing about it. Then you start adding regulations, and they seem kind of OOC. Then you realize that regulations will just prevent people from going past some high point, and all crafting becomes at that point is a way to push your wealth envelope to the top. Or, go back to even simple magical crafting, where the CTC proposal says someone earns 500gp/day doing essentially nothing. The equivalent of about 200 - 400 XP worth of wealth for most characters, on top of what they gain just for playing. It's real difficult to make it work.

I think if you want to make crafting work, you have to take a fair lot of care with your resource model system and your crafting mechanisms, and I think you're well advised to make objects above a certain value require DM intervention both in the components and the crafting. I think the basics of a crafting /system/ however, can give DMs the idea of the sorts of resources and ideas valuable in creating an off-the-cuff craft recipe for a random item. And I think if you establish a greater dependency between the masterwork and the magical crafting, you can create your player economy and bunches of little "soft" advancement points perfect for the standards (perform service for dwarves to go from basic -> intermediate in knowledge of crafting mithral and living metal).

Of course all that sounds fabulously complicated and not worth anyone's time. Just a thought for a template that works on "soft" character growth mechanisms, looks to keep magical crafting a little bit under control, and watches out for the wealth system as a whole.

[Rick7475]

They will spend as much time in their careers making mundane crap as they do in level 1 - 3. Then the MW stuff starts, and at level 5 - 6 the magic stuff is attempted. By level 8 I hope they are making magic stuff and making some cash. Not a lot, but enough for a thriving business.

I think you'll probably want to immediately do away with the idea of a non-casting crafter creating magic items. The idea of a static system allowing the repeatable crafting of +1 armor is exactly the last thing we want. Even with possibility for failure, when you talk about the quantization of value that high, a simple d20 system isn't going to cut it sadly.

Well, that is rather silly. Why do we have famous blacksmiths throughout Faerun creating +1 armor? Every TSR mod has em. I'm sorry, that does not make sense as to why I even made a Derval Ironeater master smith in DF in the first place. He sells +1 magic stuff and it is right in the mod. We as DM's have the smiths make magic weapons and armor. So should the non-casting players. They can contract a mage to embue the metal that they have prepared and then build it into a +1 item.

But I also have to disagree with your view on the D20 system. It works for casting spells, skill checks, and every other thing we do in 3.5. Why can't it work for crafting items? In fact, if we are going to use crafting as close as possible to the 3.5 ruleset I don't see any other way except to put for skillpoints and checks.

And, as for mundane items, historically speaking, mundane items were not always made by tradesmen or craftsmen. Yoemen in England made their own longbows in the middle ages, and peasants and farmers crafted their own tools. Not specialists. There were village smiths and craftsmen, but not the sort of crafting trades we are talking about in the fantasy world here. Building mundane items should be a short term period, in a sense building on what knowledge the average commoner would have in creating their own items and practicing for the bigger better master work items.

[AlmightyTDawg]

Well, that is rather silly. Why do we have famous blacksmiths throughout Faerun creating +1 armor? Every TSR mod has em. I'm sorry, that does not make sense as to why I even made a Derval Ironeater master smith in DF in the first place. He sells +1 magic stuff and it is right in the mod. We as DM's have the smiths make magic weapons and armor. So should the non-casting players. They can contract a mage to embue the metal that they have prepared and then build it into a +1 item.

You don't have famous smiths throughout Faerun creating +1 armor. If you want to be technical about it, to have +1 armor, they have to create an item of masterwork quality and then have a mage enchant it. If they have no mages with the Craft Magic Arms & Armor feat, they sell masterwork quality and the hapless chap walks the armor to someone who can get it enchanted. Now we go ahead and take shortcuts in terms of building mods - or, well, some folks do. But mechanically what's happening is just that. Given the choice of two alternatives, I believe more appropriate is removing magic weapons from your merchants rather than using that to justify giving players the ability. The "Phase I" standards on towns and such were really just pulled from the Arms & Equipment Guide, which are genericized systems for handling a random off-the-cuff town. It happens to be applicable to ALFA in limiting the value of static merchants to keep stupidly powerful things from being sold. But more to the point, if you live in a place where no one knows magic and the Standards numbers say 3000gp max, you suddenly don't create +1 items because of the max. The +1 items follow from the magical crafter.

You don't imbue the metal, though you could argue certain blessings and what not during forging could be important depending on the item (say Vestments of Faith, for example). You imbue a completed item of masterwork quality.

Incidentally, that connection was the basis of my recommendation, applied in the other direction, though. Crafters are presumed to just find rings, brooches, belts, and cloaks of masterwork quality as part of their crafting effort. The idea was to actually flesh out a system of value of artistry related to total value of crafted component, and require someone doing magical crafting to find an item of sufficient quality - making them dependent on "mundane" crafters just like a master smith is dependent on a mage.

But I also have to disagree with your view on the D20 system. It works for casting spells, skill checks, and every other thing we do in 3.5. Why can't it work for crafting items? In fact, if we are going to use crafting as close as possible to the 3.5 ruleset I don't see any other way except to put for skillpoints and checks.

Because it's mind-numbingly simple statistics, really. Actually, we do have some issues with it here in ALFA, largely based on the premise of "slow levling" causing a higher number of encounters per level, and hence creating a higher likelihood of "fluke" encounters offing PCs. The most general balance of the d20 system for the things you mention, though, is that the most important stuff tends to be fundamentally opposed. Which is to say the same d20 attack you're rolling, the same reflex roll you just rolled, the guy you're fighting is rolling. There's inherent symmetry.

If you apply it to crafting magical armor, and your example was wasted ingot versus completed item, sold at some predetermined ratio, it doesn't take terribly long for someone to realize the statistical "break even" point and work in that way. Then, all you've created is not a system with depth, but a statistical moneymaker. And the moment crafting becomes that, it gets axed.

And, as for mundane items, historically speaking, mundane items were not always made by tradesmen or craftsmen. Yoemen in England made their own longbows in the middle ages, and peasants and farmers crafted their own tools. Not specialists. There were village smiths and craftsmen, but not the sort of crafting trades we are talking about in the fantasy world here. Building mundane items should be a short term period, in a sense building on what knowledge the average commoner would have in creating their own items and practicing for the bigger better master work items.

Again, it's the difference in what D&D crafting is. The simple premise is you can't enchant something that is not masterwork quality to begin with. I've got no problem with a rank, or even untrained rolls generating some crud longbow that may or may not shoot without an attack penalty. What I'm talking about is defining a system that relates to the specs we're under.

They aren't just the specs of PnP systems, but also the long term playbalance/wealth ramifications of the system. As earlier posts on crafting rates indicate, that's real, real tough in ALFA"s slow-leveling, persistent world. In PnP, crafting exists on an island, something that can be done largely at DM-determined intervals and can be shut down at any moment the DM says "w-t-f mate, you're already richer than gawd." A lot more complicated down to the nitty gritty in ALFA.

And in truth, I'm actually talking about fleshing out "mundane" crafting to a pretty sizeable extent - enough that magical crafters would now become reliant upon the mundane crafters in their area. My more complex thoughts involved ideas of different "recipes" for different abilities to be added to items, with certain mundane crafstmanship secrets being less costly than a "go it alone" or alchemical or pure arcane sort of route and other such complications. But I doubt anyone will go that direction.

[Spider Jones]

Taerom "Thunderhammer" Fuiruim is a burly giant. His chestnut hair andmutton-chop whiskers are now shot through with gray and white, but his huge hands remain strong and deft. He is a master armorer, and his warmongery equals the best in Faerûn. On several occasions he's made items for Thalantyr to enspell, and even dwarf smiths admire his work.

Taerom is one of the better armorsmiths on the entire Sword Coast, and he even has to rely on Thalantyr to enchant items.

The only canonish exception to this is dwarven smiths, who use other means to create magical arms and armor in various stories and lorebooks.

There is actually a PrC that exists in 3rd edition that makes this possible. The Battlesmith PrC from Races of Stone. Requirements are

Race: Dwarf, Base Attack Bonus: +5, Craft (armorsmithing) or Craft (weaponsmithing) 10 ranks, Feats: Armor Proficiency (Heavy), Endurance, Weapon Focus (warhammer), Special: The character must have created a dwarvencraft weapon and used it in battle.

Now, while this thing would likely be rare, it's no more rare than master alchemist PrCs that can produce potions about 3rd level, and as it stands in ALFA currently, there are certainly those floating around.

[Rick7475]

If we follow the path that only casters (specifically wizards) can enchant magic items and thus produce +1 armor, then we effectively bottleneck the whole process to the few PC mages that we have, and defeat the whole crafting idea save for a few wizards (beyond the MW level).

I believe we need some flexibility, embuing or enchanting pieces of armor that can then be smithed together to form a suit of plate armor is the best solution. After all, most plate armor is made of sections and parts. Where do we draw the line between what parts become enchanted and not? Is it the whole suit? How can it be if it taken off piece by piece, greaves, pauldrons, gauntlets .... what if you switch the +1 greaves for a pair of normal ones? If we allow the smith to craft the pieces together after being embued by a mage, then it can become a +1 suit.

As for the d20 system, we all know that it isn't perfect. We all know the randomizer in the engine sucks producing strings of lows and highs. We may have some wealth imbalances, but with DM's and the human factor we will anyway. We have an omega wand that checks the wealth level. So, it is the same argument about wealth standards. Some PC's will get wealthy, but many do anyway, in their towers and thieving guilds that go more unchecked than crafting might.

We build the system and tweak it, and fully test it so that wealth issues are minimized.

[Ronan]

Rick, I think for reasons of effeciency, it would be best if we assumed the use of 3.5's rules and only discussed departures from them. Time required to craft is one departure, and letting mundane crafters produce something magical is another. But keep something in mind: we can raise the DC required to work with special materials. Adamantine is supposed to be a bitch to work with, so an increase in skill DC for this armor would be consistant with the lore, though not the possibly-incomplete ruleset.

In 3.5, mundane materials are no longer "nice" to have, they are needed to bypass the DR of many creatures. Suddenly mundane crafting is required, another link in the chain just like anything else. So for these reasons I don't think its required that we have varying skill DCs for varying levels of quality or magic, though we still could. But I see the support of the MANY different special materials more important.

Possible special materials:

• Adamantine
• Darkwood
• Dragonhides
• Cold Iron
• Mithral
• Alchemical Silver
• Baatorian Green Steel (A&EG)
• Gehennan Morghoth Iron (A&EG)
• Solanian True Steel (A&EG)
• Arandur (MoF)
• Copper (MoF)
• Darksteel (MoF)
• Dlarun (MoF)
• Duskwood (MoF)
• Fever Iron (MoF)
• Gold (MoF)
• Living Metal (MoF)
• Hizagkuur (MoF)
• Platinum (MoF)
• Silver (MoF)
• Zalantar (MoF)

I am of course willing to accept departures from 3.5's rules with good reason. As TA, just adding features is only one of the things I try to do. I've also got to make sure the features added represent the lore of the Forgotten Realms.

So, if I am understanding you correctly, you want a change to be made where the metal (or whatever) is enchanted prior to crafting, and this increases the skill check DC required to make the item? This seems like something we could consider, but I'm not willing to let mundane crafters make anything magical on their own. Even still I'm strongly leaning towards using the special materials as the ace in a mundane crafter's sleave, since its more consistant with the lore and the ruleset. Plus it encourages more RP and character interaction, as mundane crafters would be dependant on magical ones to enchant their gear.

So, my list of possible departures from 3.5 would be:

• Differing skill check DCs for different materials (I definiately want this).
• Differing skill check DCs for different levels of enchantment (I'm more iffy on this).
• Lore required to know how to create a magic item (again, I definitely want this).
• Lore required to know how to work a certain material (ATD's idea, I'm more iffy on this since we already have skills of varying levels, compared to boolean feats for magical crafting).
• Possible experience gain for crafting, instead of a loss. We could maybe even preserve ATD's precious XP/GP relationship with this

As for the time-sink of requiring some time to craft, I do think something is necissary. We don't want people crafting without any hindrance to other activities at all. So I'm going to insist we have some sort of framework to require and track time spent crafting. We may turn it off, or adjust it up or down, but it will be there. I think it would be very ignorant to assume this system won't require some tweaking. And the more we can tweak it, the less likely it is to get pulled or cause any sort of quake.

[Fionn]

*eep*

Sorry Rick, I thought you were talking about daily checks for *masterwork* gear. If we're adding magical enchantements, we either need to allow time sinks to make it unpopular, or control supply of rare components completely (e.g. DM placed only).

Wizards may have the most bonus feats (if they wish to bypass all the metamagic, focus, penetration, and other combat feats), but they are not the only crafters. Clerics, Sorcs, Druids, even Bards & Pali's can make magic items. From an immersion PoV, I can't imagine allowing a Barb5 to be pounding out a +1 Frost Axe. Bruenor may have made a magic warhammer, but this was *clearly* a Divinely inspired crafting.

From a balance perspective, I'm seriously worried about the concept of allowing every PC that wishes to put skill points into crafting to make magic items (of any power). This is especially worrisome for protective gear when you consider the affect of 5 +1 items at low level. I tried Swordcoast for a bit, but being handed a 'spare set' of Banded with +1 AC and 5/- Bludgening the second day I met one of their crafters was a bit of a shock.

******************

I still feel we need to granularily identify the purpose of a crafting system in ALFA before we try to define what it does.

[Ronan]

No way are we allowing mundane crafters to make something magical on their own. If we distinguish between varying levels of quality for the purposes of determining what level of enchantment an item can support, thats one thing. Though that does add more complexity, especially if these varying quality levels have different sorts of masterwork bonuses.

[AlmightyTDawg]

If we follow the path that only casters (specifically wizards) can enchant magic items and thus produce +1 armor, then we effectively bottleneck the whole process to the few PC mages that we have, and defeat the whole crafting idea save for a few wizards (beyond the MW level).
...
If we allow the smith to craft the pieces together after being embued by a mage, then it can become a +1 suit.

Note you've still got the bottleneck there, the only difference of course being where you put it. Imbuing an item with magic requires Feat expenditures (8+ total craft feats), and the feats themselves are delineated in such a way that it's very clear you don't imbue raw materials, as the same iron could become a weapon, armor, a helm, a ring, boots, and so on. Further, the concept of taking crafting feats makes a class notably weaker on the combat/adventuring front - how the items balance that is an individual question. But a system based primarily on skill points, outside of the "Skill Focus" or skill-boosting feats to support it, doesn't necessarily cut much into a player's adventuring acumen. You can survive as an 8 INT fighter, so correspondingly you should be able to surive as a 10 INT fighter with the other skill point dedicated to crafting.

I think what we're talking about is extending the bottleneck in both directions. Rather than rely on the generic binary mundane/masterwork distinction, we're now expanding the canon system to say that it's "artistry" rather than merely functionality which is important in magic item crafting. An example that came to mind is Inigo Montoya's sword from the Princess Bride. It gets us around the difficulties of that masterwork distinction, though we could potentially draw some quality level distinctions there too (weapons, for example can be +1 dam, +1 attack, or both).

As for the d20 system, we all know that it isn't perfect. We all know the randomizer in the engine sucks producing strings of lows and highs. We may have some wealth imbalances, but with DM's and the human factor we will anyway. We have an omega wand that checks the wealth level. So, it is the same argument about wealth standards. Some PC's will get wealthy, but many do anyway, in their towers and thieving guilds that go more unchecked than crafting might.

The reason I make my comment and distinction is largely between the quantized value of the activity and the need to control it. If someone nominally spends 10x - 50x as long in a given level, activities with bust the system become problematic. That has always been the knock on magical crafting most of all, which is why it has defied attempts to automate it. What kind of gatekeeper are you going to try to put in, and how comfortable are you with the OOC limitations of that gatekeeper?

Probably the main tool you have in tweaking an automated system are OOC limits, or cutting into the margin of the activity. Take the whole 50 gp/hr concept. Man does that suck when it's applied to someone making a 40k freedom of movement cloak. The scaleability is awful there - so you can try an asymptotic curve or something like that. OOC limits (omg yer at yer high end you greedy bastage) not only look silly from an IC perspective, but they operate on the idea that "average" is no longer average but "average" is high-end wealth. And it begs the question why would we invest time and energy in a system with the obvious endpoint being that.

People always say "well just punish the exploiters" but some systems practically plead "exploit me!" And in the creation of the system, you've gotta watch for those things, because by putting in a system, you do make implicit statements. Crafting is bunk if it's not meant to really be used. And if it is meant to be used, how does that jive with everything else?

I not only don't see a particular reason to move away from the magic crafting prototype (Races of Stone PrCs notwithstanding, my opinion on BBBM expansions is already well known), I think you can use what's there to expand mundane crafting to a point where you can cut into some of that monopoly of the magic users. That's the direction I'd personally go.

[Rick7475]

I can go with more mundane stuff. Just need a lot of imagination. Maybe if jewels were added yopu could make fancier more vaulable swords.

Also, just a thought, there is a difference betwen historical toldeo steel swords and other swords. Perhaps MW can have a few more distinctions. MW armors is generally at a slight weight reductions. That's one flavor of MW armor, but I am sure we can come up with more. Here is another question, is adding a +1 skill magical? Say a MW armor had +1 parry? Or +1 fort save? Can we consider that MW? (Naturally armor wouldn't have will or reflex, but possibly fort due to the protection factor), Just throwing out some thoughts for variety.

But about the enchanting of items. I still think we should bridge the inconsistency. If dwarves can produce enchanted items, why can't master or grand master smiths? I'll go with whatever makes everyone happy. But is enchanting a crafting skill for mages?

[fluffmonster]

a +1 skill bonus can be had through mundane means, so would be akin to masterwork crafting I would think. Save bonuses not included.

We should require that an enchanted item requires an enchanter. I don't know how to respond to the suggestion that mundane crafting allow for enchanted items, other that to say that presumes an availability of magical gear that is outside the norms and expectations of ALFA. If consistency is to be an argument at all, then the application is no exceptions to spellcasters required for magical item creation.

Really, mundane crafting of magical items is an idea with no merit, not here.