ZEITGEIST Crafting Magic Items count towards Requisition limit?

[iserguy]

My players have just finished their first mission (without too many screw ups) and upon hearing there would be downtime for the characters before the next mission started talking about what to do with their downtime. One player is a Technologist and another asked him to make him a Magic Item. I want them to have some creative freedom, and I like the idea of letting them craft their own items, but I was wondering how this would fit in to the Magic Item Requisition limit, or if it would be ignored, since it is not being requisitioned. What sort of limits could I put on the players (besides financial and time)? Or should there be no limitation? Thoughts?

 

[Deathwyrm]

I have a couple characters who craft and encountered this. Since it's Pathfinder 1e as the system, the components and material costs still have to be paid through Requisition and a form filled out for what exactly is being made. Since it's being made by agents, I figured their superiors would want to make sure nothing that would endanger the agency's reputation is being built.

 

[hirou]

Which system are you running? I can attest that requisition system can be completely broken from ~level 3 in 4e, if your players are willing. Be prepared for this or, better, speak to them about it and try to work out a balance which will satisfy everyone.
Narratively... Remember that there's an audit for their illegal activity coming up in adv.3. Considering this, you can give them a chance of crafting something without filing proper paperwork) and reward/punish for staying clear/grabbing it.

 

[Andrew Moreton]

In Pathfinder the Requisition system is essentially Wealth by Level, in fact to keep down paperwork I just tell my players to upgrade their items to WBL every time they level up.
So crafted items should count towards their total spending at half cost. However keep an eye on crafting times , they are working constables so I would only allow say 2 or 3 days in 7 when they can craft (unless they are doing ring of sustenance shenanigans) as even between adventures they are still working.

From prior campaigns if you give them too much downtime then crafting can unbalance the system as they can essentially double their wealth but to do that they have to have a lot of feats in crafting so it does balance to a degree. Do not allow someone to take a Cohort wizard who just sits there crafting items that is trouble

 

[Mrpereira]

I told them that their equipment would be evaluated by its actual worth, so crafted items had the same value as requisitioned - the only difference was that you can say that you made it. They ended up deciding just to requisition items and skipped the crafting feats.

 

[iserguy]

Sorry, should have mentioned, we are playing in D&D 5e, where magic items do not have any costs associated with them.

 

[Andrew Moreton]

There are also no rules for item construction in 5E I believe so don't let anyone make them.
I have no idea how Zeitgeist is handling this as I have not read the 5E conversions, but it is one of the major retrograde features of 5E in my opinion so my commiserations on being stuck with a system that cannot handle sensible player actions or has any feature for balancing magic items on pc's

 

[iserguy]

hmm... yeah, I'll probably just home-rule something: come up with some material costs, or still have it count towards their limits as a sort of "items created while constables are still RHC property" or something along those lines.