Doubling the cost of Magic Item creation in GP and XP

[Sundragon2012]

I am considering doubling the cost in both XP and GP when it comes to crafting any permanent or charge-based magical items in my campaign.

I am looking at implementing some rules that increase PC skills, feats and abilities at the expense of the "Character as magical item christmas tree" phenomenon. My goal is to make players say "Oh cool, this is great!" when they get a new magical item as opposed to "Oh gee, another +2 flaming sword, I wonder what I can trade this in for at Ye Olde Magic Shoppe." I want a setting where PCs rely on themselves and their own martial and magical power and not on some junk they bought off some wizard.

Just banging the ideas around at the moment.

Any thoughts?


Chris

 

[Crothian]

Iron Heroes by Malhavok is designed for this type of thing.

 

[Axegrrl]

Tread cautiously. D&D monster CR ratings assume characters will have a standard amount of gear, including magical gear. Cut down the amount of magic items the characters can get, and some encounters get significantly more difficult.

If the PCs are too familiar with the magic items in the DMG, try using items from other sources -- or make up your own -- to re-introduce the cool-magic-item factor. Sometimes, a slight change in a standard item can make a surprising difference in how the item is perceived by the players. Or, you could introduce a more drastic change in the *form* of an item, while using an already existing item as its "rules base". For example, perhaps a metallic-looking glove enables a touch attack that does 4d8+7 points of damage. Each attack causes the glove to embed shards of itself into the victim. After 50 attacks, there are no more shards, and the glove is a normal glove. It might seem like a strange and different magic item, but the glove is equivalent to a wand of inflict wounds -- just in another form.

 

[Sundragon2012]

Tread cautiously. D&D monster CR ratings assume characters will have a standard amount of gear, including magical gear. Cut down the amount of magic items the characters can get, and some encounters get significantly more difficult.

I was thinking of implementing some concepts like those found in the Midnight and Dawnforge settings where PCs benefit from interesting bloodline, ancestral, whatever traits that grant exceptional or supernatural abilities or grant extra feats and/or skills to compensate for the lack if items.


Chris

 

[danzig138]

Don't provide Ye Old Magic Shoppe for them to trade at. IMC, there are few places where characters can purchase or have magic items made. This has caused them to use much of what they find, and what they haven't used, they have managed to barter away, typically to cover the cost of bringing party members back from the dead.
If the players want to sell items, make them work to find buyers. Think about the buyer and what he might be interested in item-wise, and what he's willing to pay. A +2 flaming sword, for example, isn't cheap. Who says they will find someone willing to pay what they are asking for it?
Also, like someone said, if you just want to bring back the cool factor, grab items from other sources and change the form of some items. It seems like I read that Complete Arcane talks about items in different forms. Maybe that might help.