Artificers, or any spellcaster, and scribe spells feat

[Jack Simth]

Here's a question for you:

Can an Artificer and a Wizard collaberate to make a scroll? Artificer "provides" the spell, Wizard provides Scribe Scroll, Wizard chooses to be the creator (and pays the XP cost). What kind of scroll and spell is it then?

 

[drothgery]

Here's a question for you:

Can an Artificer and a Wizard collaberate to make a scroll? Artificer "provides" the spell, Wizard provides Scribe Scroll, Wizard chooses to be the creator (and pays the XP cost). What kind of scroll and spell is it then?

Can't be done, at least not directly. If the wizard's the creator, someone has to be able to actually cast the spell for the wizard to make it (though a scroll or a charge from a wand/staff would suffice); the artificer can get around this only when he's the creator.

 

[Jack Simth]

Ah, so in order for an Artificer to make spells for a Wizard's spellbook, he needs to craft the scroll once (or more, once the scroll gets to the point where it costs over 1,000 gp for the Wizard to Craft), and use it to collaberate with the Wizard on crafting a scroll, where the Wizard counts as the crafter?

So, let's see......

Four scrolls of 9th level spells: 15,300 gp market, 7,650 gp and 612 xp to craft.

One scroll of a 9th level spell: 3,825 gp market, 1912.5 gp and 153 xp to craft.

Total cost to pull this trick for a new 9th level spell: 9562.5 gp and 765 xp (from two people, normally). The cost to research a 9th level spell is... what, 9,000 gp? Works better with, say, 5th level scrolls.

 

[MarkB]

Ah, so in order for an Artificer to make spells for a Wizard's spellbook, he needs to craft the scroll once (or more, once the scroll gets to the point where it costs over 1,000 gp for the Wizard to Craft), and use it to collaberate with the Wizard on crafting a scroll, where the Wizard counts as the crafter?

Doesn't work. A scroll crafted by an artificer isn't an arcane scroll, it's an artificer scroll, so it's the wrong version of the spell. Just like a cleric can't supply the bull's strength spell to co-operatively craft an arcane scroll of bull's strength with a wizard.

 

[Vanye]

Someone beat me to it.

 

[Staffan]

Of course that does sound stupid. I also think it is stupid you can't a spell from your spell book. You used to be able to in AD&D and then magic became hard to understand or something in 3.5. I read somewhere that it is cause now they just notes on the spell and not the spell itself, which is even stupider. Wouldn't you want a sample of the finished spell in your book?

The way it works in D&D is that the spellbook has instructions on how to prepare a spell. Preparing a spell means that you mostly pre-cast the spell, leaving out just a few words that will finish it off. This takes quite a bit of time, but you effectively get faster with practice - preparing your whole daily complement of spells takes one hour, so preparing each single spell takes less and less time as you gain more spells per day.

You can cast a spell right out of your spellbook. However, that does not let you get around the spells/day limit. Rules-wise, what you do is that you leave a spell slot "open". Later in the day when you realize that you need e.g. a fly spell, you take 15 minutes, prepare the spell, and cast it.

 

[Staffan]

IIRC in 2nd ed if you cast a spell from your spell book the spell was consumed and vanished (just like a scroll) so you ended up with a blank page. Now this is from memory (it has been a long time and I am getting on in age so I could be misremembering). I don't have access to my 2nd ed books to check that out though.

2nd ed had no rules about using your spellbook as a scroll. At least not in the core rules, Tome of Magic, Spells & Magic, or Book of Artifacts. I am reasonably sure the 1e core rules didn't have any such rules either, though it's possible that Unearthed Arcana did.

 

[Hypersmurf]

Just like a cleric can't supply the bull's strength spell to co-operatively craft an arcane scroll of bull's strength with a wizard.

Assuming we consider Bull's Strength to be a prerequisite spell for creating a scroll of Bull's Strength, that works just fine.

The cleric supplies one prerequisite (the spell); the wizard supplies the other prerequisite (the feat). Whoever supplies the XP is 'the creator'; it is their caster level that is used where caster level is important, and it is their class that determines the divine/arcane nature of the scroll.

This can lead to some interesting situations. Let's say we have a 1st level wizard who knows Magic Missile, and a 9th level Druid with the Craft Wand feat. If we consider Magic Missile to be a prerequisite spell for creating a Wand of Magic Missile, these two can collaborate to produce a Caster Level 9 Wand of Magic Missile, as long as the Druid pays the XP.

They could also (under the prerequisite assumption) collaborate to produce an arcane scroll of Summon Nature's Ally I, as long as the Wizard pays the XP. They could not, however, produce an arcane scroll of Summon Nature's Ally II, because the Wizard's caster level is not high enough to produce a scroll with a high enough caster level to cast Summon Nature's Ally II.

-Hyp.

 

[MarkB]

Assuming we consider Bull's Strength to be a prerequisite spell for creating a scroll of Bull's Strength, that works just fine.

The cleric supplies one prerequisite (the spell); the wizard supplies the other prerequisite (the feat). Whoever supplies the XP is 'the creator'; it is their caster level that is used where caster level is important, and it is their class that determines the divine/arcane nature of the scroll.

Hmm, That means a wizard with a cleric as a friend can make arcane scrolls of any spell that appears on both the Cleric and Sor/Wiz lists, then scribe that spell into his spellbook, at a fairly low cost for low-level spells. I had thought the rules were fairly strict about not allowing that sort of thing - this being the whole reason why artificer scroll-scribing was clarified in the way it was. However, the item creation rules don't really definitively say one way or the other - the arcane/divine divide is specified in terms of using scrolls, but not creating them.

 

[irdeggman]

Hmm, That means a wizard with a cleric as a friend can make arcane scrolls of any spell that appears on both the Cleric and Sor/Wiz lists, then scribe that spell into his spellbook, at a fairly low cost for low-level spells. I had thought the rules were fairly strict about not allowing that sort of thing - this being the whole reason why artificer scroll-scribing was clarified in the way it was. However, the item creation rules don't really definitively say one way or the other - the arcane/divine divide is specified in terms of using scrolls, but not creating them.

From the SRD:

• Prerequisites: Certain requirements must be met in order for a character to create a magic item. These include feats, spells, and miscellaneous requirements such as level, alignment, and race or kind. The prerequisites for creation of an item are given immediately following the item’s caster level.

A spell prerequisite may be provided by a character who has prepared the spell (or who knows the spell, in the case of a sorcerer or bard), or through the use of a spell completion or spell trigger magic item or a spell-like ability that produces the desired spell effect. For each day that passes in the creation process, the creator must expend one spell completion item or one charge from a spell trigger item if either of those objects is used to supply a prerequisite.

It is possible for more than one character to cooperate in the creation of an item, with each participant providing one or more of the prerequisites. In some cases, cooperation may even be necessary.

If two or more characters cooperate to create an item, they must agree among themselves who will be considered the creator for the purpose of determinations where the creator’s level must be known. The character designated as the creator pays the XP required to make the item.

Typically, a list of prerequisites includes one feat and one or more spells (or some other requirement in addition to the feat).

When two spells at the end of a list are separated by “or,” one of those spells is required in addition to every other spell mentioned prior to the last two.

So yes it can work that way, although it is not "real cheap" since there is still the xp cost (not present if learning a spell from a scroll or another's spell book) - since the scroll has to be made and the xp cost is paid by the "creator". Then the normal costs for scribing a spell into a spell book still must be met.

But an artificer can't be the "creator" of a scroll that a wizard uses as a source to scribe into his spell book since as the creater he gives the scroll its arcane/divine descriptor and as an artificer it has neither.