D&D 5E Making Poison and Health Potions

[SilverBulletKY]

I made it up. Because you plainly state what the actual rules are.

You just don't like it.

The crafting rules are there to normalize the profit per day of downtime crafting.

It's not that I don't like it, I really don't have an opinion. I'm trying to get a clear view of what they're talking about and I don't think they are talking about potions and poisons in the crafting section - it specifically mentions art and armor. And I'm not talking about this for profit, I'm talking about a rogue that I'm DM'ing that wants to use poison and is proficient in the poisoner's kit.

 

[zoroaster100]

So I guess the way to fix this for your campaign without breaking the profit making guideline for downtime activities is to make the cost of the components more than 50% of retail, and decrease the crafting time. So for example, poison might cost 75 gp in rare ingredients to make, but only takes ten days. Or it costs 90 gp in ingredients, and takes four days to make (but you are only saving 10 gp in those 4 days compared to buying it at full price). It may still be worthwhile if you are in a city where the ingredients for poison are available, but fully crafted poison is illegal. By the standard rule, the player can only add 2.5 gp value per day spent on the activity, or else the character would be able to generate more revenue than the default 2.5 gp value added per day. Now if you think a character only adding 2.5 gp value per day is too little, you can also adjust that as a house rule. I can imagine, for example, that it would make sense that as your proficiency bonus gets higher at higher levels (at which point I imagine producing a bit of gold in downtime is also less of an issue), it would make sense to increase the rate at which added value is created per day of crafting.

 

[SilverBulletKY]

Also maybe getting multiple uses out of a single vial would work. I'm sure they'll be something about this in the DM Guide.

 

[jodyjohnson]

... I really don't have an opinion. ... I don't think they are talking about potions and poisons in the crafting section - it specifically mentions art and armor.

You can craft nonmagical objects, including adventuring equipment and works of art.

Page 150: Adventuring Gear, Poison, basic; Potion of Healing.

I like Zoroaster's suggestion better - how long should it take x 2.5gp in price reduction from retail. But that circumvents the simple 5gp/day formula.

 

[Capricia]

The obvious solution is to just be a wizard, who can cast Fabricate and create a whole vat of poison from a pile of raw materials.

 

[jodyjohnson]

The obvious solution is to just be a wizard, who can cast Fabricate and create a whole vat of poison from a pile of raw materials.

I would definately apply the time used = savings gained formula here. 10 minutes ~ 5 copper saved per time. You may craft 100 vials of poison with 9999.95 gp of raw materials if you have Poisoner's tools proficiency with Fabricate.

But that's just me. I have a strong bias against using the game rules as world physics to enable engineered solutions to heroic concerns such as: "How do I make my character rich without actually adventuring?".

Of course, no one here would actually want to do that. But I've already had a player present his get-rich-quick scheme, and we're only 5 days in. So it's a sore point.

 

[Robert1503]

Page 150: Adventuring Gear, Poison, basic; Potion of Healing.

I like Zoroaster's suggestion better - how long should it take x 2.5gp in price reduction from retail. But that circumvents the simple 5gp/day formula.

Maybe you can look at it in a different way. You can cook up a potion on a campfire, however regulating temperatures and keeping everything clean to make a proper potion can be difficult. If you have access to a laboratory or a fancy laboratory with assistants that can help you, it will be much easier to create the same potion (probably also a lot quicker)

Also for making wine or spirits, that need fragmentation, you can easily lookup instructions how to make this stuff in real life, and figure out how long the process takes. It may take a long time but if you make large quantities it is more profitable and time well spend. Also keep in mind you need a place (building) to keep the stuff stored and to work in.