D&D 5E Alternate crafting rules

Does anyone have any recommendations for alternate crafting rulesets?

My PCs (3rd level) are thinking about brewing some healing potions, but are finding the rules for crafting so thoroughly discouraging that they're wondering whether it's worth the bother. An entire full-time work week to craft a single healing potion seems pretty steep, and artisan's tools proficiency is a mere gateway to the process (according to the downtime rules in Xanathar's), you gain no benefit for expertise, or high relevant ability scores. Also, this is a campaign where the PCs will have no fixed base of operations and will be moving around a lot, so they're not going to be able to spend a year isolated in a forge.

Has anyone run across a relatively quick and easy crafting system that makes all this a bit less painful? On one hand I don't want to run a campaign where PCs are running a healing potion production facility either and are luggin around dozens of the things, but i don't want to discourage my PCs from even trying. And I'd prefer to have a set of rules i can plunk in front of the players and say 'this is how it works' rather than winging it, because this is a relatively new group and I don't want to be too high-handed and arbitrary at this early point.

Similarly, has anyone investigated or used the concept of magic item recipes or formulae, as talked about in Xanathar's, as a way of regulating/limiting PC magic item creation? How did it go?
 

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I use an amalgamation of 3pp rules from the Hamund's Harvesting books and Heliana's Monster Hunting books, mixed with some impromptu winging it for determining what items can be crafted with their harvested components
 

Does anyone have any recommendations for alternate crafting rulesets?

My PCs (3rd level) are thinking about brewing some healing potions, but are finding the rules for crafting so thoroughly discouraging that they're wondering whether it's worth the bother. An entire full-time work week to craft a single healing potion seems pretty steep, and artisan's tools proficiency is a mere gateway to the process (according to the downtime rules in Xanathar's), you gain no benefit for expertise, or high relevant ability scores. Also, this is a campaign where the PCs will have no fixed base of operations and will be moving around a lot, so they're not going to be able to spend a year isolated in a forge.

Has anyone run across a relatively quick and easy crafting system that makes all this a bit less painful? On one hand I don't want to run a campaign where PCs are running a healing potion production facility either and are luggin around dozens of the things, but i don't want to discourage my PCs from even trying. And I'd prefer to have a set of rules i can plunk in front of the players and say 'this is how it works' rather than winging it, because this is a relatively new group and I don't want to be too high-handed and arbitrary at this early point.

Similarly, has anyone investigated or used the concept of magic item recipes or formulae, as talked about in Xanathar's, as a way of regulating/limiting PC magic item creation? How did it go?
From what I understand, the 2024 Players Handbook revamps crafting rules − and the DMs Guide will revamp magic item creation.

Wait on the new rules, and in the meantime, I would just decide on the fly what seems reasonable for magic item creation in the context of your setting.

Heh, since it is "magic" you dont really need to be consistent. Of course, the new rules will probably be consistent.
 

Does anyone have any recommendations for alternate crafting rulesets?

My PCs (3rd level) are thinking about brewing some healing potions, but are finding the rules for crafting so thoroughly discouraging that they're wondering whether it's worth the bother. An entire full-time work week to craft a single healing potion seems pretty steep, and artisan's tools proficiency is a mere gateway to the process (according to the downtime rules in Xanathar's), you gain no benefit for expertise, or high relevant ability scores. Also, this is a campaign where the PCs will have no fixed base of operations and will be moving around a lot, so they're not going to be able to spend a year isolated in a forge.

Has anyone run across a relatively quick and easy crafting system that makes all this a bit less painful? On one hand I don't want to run a campaign where PCs are running a healing potion production facility either and are luggin around dozens of the things, but i don't want to discourage my PCs from even trying. And I'd prefer to have a set of rules i can plunk in front of the players and say 'this is how it works' rather than winging it, because this is a relatively new group and I don't want to be too high-handed and arbitrary at this early point.

Similarly, has anyone investigated or used the concept of magic item recipes or formulae, as talked about in Xanathar's, as a way of regulating/limiting PC magic item creation? How did it go?
Well, although the rules in Xanathar's are lackluster, I'll point out crafting a healing potion isn't a full-time work week, it is a single day and 25 gp. For more powerful potions, yes it is longer and more expensive, but the process is (assumedly) simple enough that checks are not required, or the idea of "taking 10" is sufficient. There are special rules for healing potions on page 130 in Xanathar's.

Instead of "more time and more expensive", you could require an Intelligence (Herbalism kit) check. The DC for the power of the potion might be:

DC 10: Healing (common)
DC 15: Greater healing (uncommon)
DC 20: Superior healing (rare)
DC 25: Supreme healing (very rare)

The time element could be anything from a short rest, long rest, work day, or longer... whatever feels best and works for your campaign.

Anyway, the crafting rules in Xanathar's aren't really "painful" IMO so I'm not sure what you mean. Sure, they are very bland, uninspired, and incomplete... allowing too much "up to the DM" and winging it.

However, depending on the item, it should take time and while they might not lug around a forge themselves, they can pay a local smith to use theirs. In my current session, the PCs recovered a store of adamantine metal from some dwarven ruins. One PC has proficiency in smith's tools, but is not "skilled enough" to work with adamantine alone so during the winter months of downtime, worked with some dwarf smiths to fashion a suit of adamantine plate.

I didn't intentionally follow the crafting rules from Xanathar's, but looking back it worked out almost the same. Smith's tools, a quest, special materials, CR 5 monster (4-8 for uncommon items is the guideline). Not finding the armor, but getting to craft it instead, added value to actually having the tool proficiency.

Given your campaign, perhaps use something that is campaign-tailored/ themed? A rare, magical element which imbues items with magical properties? Make it a process more about the mysticism than the crafting? The quality of the element, perhaps it is processed, along with the amount, determines how powerful a magical item can be infused?

The element could be (occasionally) part of a quest or a reward given those helped, etc. Working the element into the item could require the appropriate tool proficiency for the crafting.

For example, a cloak of displacement is a rare item. The PCs defeat a displacer beast and want to make a cloak from its hide. As a rare item, the DC is 20.
  1. First a Wisdom (Survival) check for collecting the hide (proficiency in Leatherworker's tools grants advantage).
  2. Followed by a Dexterity (or Intelligence?) (Weaver's tools) check to craft the cloak. Thread is made from the "magical element".
  3. Finally, casting a couple spells such as blur and mirror image over the completed cloak, requiring a DC 20 spellcasting check in the process.
The tanning process might take a few days. Internet research would find a more reliable timeline. Making the cloak from the hide a day or two. The spellcasting just rounds. So, you might compress the timeframe to 1 workweek instead of the 10 that is the guidelines in Xanathar's.

The entire process can be as simple or complex as you want. FWIW, the above guidelines are something a friend of mine came up with for his games and a book on crafting items he was working on.
 

I used an alchemist follower to make potions for the party. He is paid 5gp/day and can make one potion each week. Typically it is a potion of healing, but he can make climbing, growth, and even invisibility- but this one only lasts 1d4 rounds. I thought about having a chart to roll on, but the players liked picking one. I even once allowed him to make a heroism potion as a side project to see if he was ready to level up and be able to make bigger potions, but then his pay would become 25gp/day.
 

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