Creating Mundane Items

[Bladesong]

I could be mistaken, but it seems to me the mechanics for these things ARE in the new system. Wasn't there some mention of anything you wanted/needed to do only required an ability check that included a bonus equal to 1/2 your level? So if you want to dig a moat and you are 8th level it could be a DC 10 INT check and if you had a 12 INT your modifier would be +4 for level and +1 for INT for a total of +5. It wouldn't be a pretty moat, but it would probably get the job done. If it needed to look good the DC could be 15, or was reinforced DC 20+.

This should work for just about anything: craft, knowledge, etc. If someone wanted to become an "expert" at something, they could just take a feat that gives them that coveted +5 bonus for being trained.

As far as "time to make" tables you could use the existing times listed from any number of sources, even in 3.5.

I would probably require that it was somewhere in their background that they apprenticed with a smith or armorer, or went to some school, etc. and perhaps limit them to 1 "skill" per point of INT or some such to prevent them from being able to do every craft or have all knowledge under the sun.

I do not even intend on switching to 4ed, but I have to concede that this is fairly good idea on their part.

 

[FadedC]

I am entirely comfortable making things up on the fly. The problem is when they make that the entirety of an entire subset of the rules WHY SHOULD I PAY THEM TO TELL ME TO DO THE WORK. Those sort of questions can be important, how long does it take the armorers to equip that army the PCs have set in motion? Can the bard sing a song so beautiful it makes the goddess of love weep and give them a vital artifact? They may not be combat tasks but they still impact the setting and campaign.

Hmm....I'm not sure I'd necesarily want to buy a rulebook that tried to answer every theoretical question that came up like that.....that's how you ended up with things like the random prostitute table in the 1e DMG (and no I'm not making that up). The armorer thing is more a question for a book of medieval history then a game book (If you really care I'm sure there is some book that descrobes the process and time involved in making armor). And I don't think I'd WANT rules that forces gods in my campaign to cry and give up major artifacts.

 

[Hella_Tellah]

I am entirely comfortable making things up on the fly. The problem is when they make that the entirety of an entire subset of the rules WHY SHOULD I PAY THEM TO TELL ME TO DO THE WORK. Those sort of questions can be important, how long does it take the armorers to equip that army the PCs have set in motion? Can the bard sing a song so beautiful it makes the goddess of love weep and give them a vital artifact? They may not be combat tasks but they still impact the setting and campaign.

Well, if you want a game that has rules that determine how long it takes a crew of armorers to equip an army, play a game that has rules for it. 3rd edition sort of does, if you want to roll 100d20 and add up numbers, but I'd say that most DMs would just wing it, anyway.

You write as though your game needs an entire subsystem for these things, and maybe your game does. Mine doesn't, though, and I'd wager that most games don't. For me, I'm satisfied with having a player roll a Dexterity check to repair a clock, perhaps with modifiers for special tools or a convincingly relevant back story. That kind of on-the-fly ruling doesn't require a whole lot of work on my part, but I don't need a system that has me rolling d20+modifier each day to determine progress in silver pieces. Maybe you do, though, and maybe D&D 4th Edition just isn't the game for you.

Look at it another way: a small number of players wants rules for pregnancy, sexually transmitted infections, foreplay, and inter-species breeding. Another group wants rules for playing as gods, angels, and demons. Yet another wants rules for managing a financial enterprise in a coastal trading port. How many of these subsystems deserve a place in the core rulebook? To me, rules to govern mundane crafting are just as unnecessary as rules for piloting a magical spaceship through the Astral Sea at relativistic speeds. And yet somewhere out there is a die-hard Spelljammer fan who will see red when 4th Edition lacks rules for doing so.

The core books should have just enough rules for doing what D&D does best: swords and sorcery. Leave the rest to supplementary material.

 

[Zaruthustran]

Background is important; I didn’t say it wasn’t. All I’m saying is that the D&D PHB rules don’t need to codify non-adventuring skills, or balance those skills against adventuring skills. We’ve already seen complaints that the current set of choices--race, class, powers, skills, and feats--is too confusing/too many. Adding yet another system (call it “background” , “profession”, or “hobby”) is--strictly speaking--unnecessary to the core D&D experience of killing monsters and taking their stuff. I’d venture to say that the majority of players are fine with just roleplaying it out, without a hard set ruleset. You want your character to have a nice voice? Great. Maybe he whittles in his spare time? Cool; nice detail. Just make that stuff up, just as you would make up the length of your character's hair, or whether or not he or she is attractive.

I am entirely comfortable making things up on the fly. The problem is when they make that the entirety of an entire subset of the rules WHY SHOULD I PAY THEM TO TELL ME TO DO THE WORK. Those sort of questions can be important, how long does it take the armorers to equip that army the PCs have set in motion? Can the bard sing a song so beautiful it makes the goddess of love weep and give them a vital artifact? They may not be combat tasks but they still impact the setting and campaign.

This is pure speculation, but I’d bet that crafting and other such skills are addressed in the DMG. I’m not talking about a full subsystem, but rather some advice on how to handle the issue should it ever come up.

 

[Andor]

What if the university of Morgrave wants to hire someone to map out a ruin in Xan'drik? What if the party needs to make a gantry and a pulley system to lift the Altar of Plotdevice up a cliff? Use knowledge of celestial navigation to figure out where that botched teleport dropped them?

Without Profession: Cartographer or Sailor or Use Rope it's purely up to the GM what he will allow, and poor ones will allow nothing that doesn't match the plot in thier own head.

If a character wants to attach a bottle of holy water to an arrow does he posses the skills or not? Even in 3e the rules don't cover that, but if he has Craft: Bowmaking or even rope use, the gm can at least know he has some relevant skill set.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

I am entirely comfortable making things up on the fly. The problem is when they make that the entirety of an entire subset of the rules WHY SHOULD I PAY THEM TO TELL ME TO DO THE WORK. Those sort of questions can be important, how long does it take the armorers to equip that army the PCs have set in motion? Can the bard sing a song so beautiful it makes the goddess of love weep and give them a vital artifact? They may not be combat tasks but they still impact the setting and campaign.

Did your campaigns seriously deal with these situations on a regular basis? They just aren't things that are common to the average D&D game.

I know that I've never had to use a craft skill...ever in 3e. I've taken skill points in them, but I've never rolled them. I don't roll them when NPCs make stuff. I just make up a time based on what I think is reasonable.

Can a bard sing a song so beautiful it makes the goddess of love weep? I don't know. Even in 3.5e I didn't know. Is it DC 25? 35? 45? It comes down to me making up a number and someone rolling a skill roll. Although does it matter? If making the goddess of love cry is somehow going to further the plot of the story, then its important. Otherwise, it's just fluff. If you want the PCs to be renown everywhere for their great task then you allow it. If not, you don't. Or you simply use Diplomacy.

 

[Hella_Tellah]

What if the university of Morgrave wants to hire someone to map out a ruin in Xan'drik? What if the party needs to make a gantry and a pulley system to lift the Altar of Plotdevice up a cliff? Use knowledge of celestial navigation to figure out where that botched teleport dropped them?

Without Profession: Cartographer or Sailor or Use Rope it's purely up to the GM what he will allow, and poor ones will allow nothing that doesn't match the plot in thier own head.

If the PCs are hired to map out a ruin in Xen'Drik on their own, then they're either competent enough to map out the ruin, or they'll need some sort of mook to come with them to help them map it out. In 3.5, you might require that the PCs have ranks in Profession: Cartographer or they have to defend a defenseless academic as they wander through a hostile environment. Thing is, though, that the DM should (ideally) know whether his PCs have ranks in Profession: Cartographer or not. If they do, then he designs an adventure around that, allowing them to use that skill, and if they don't, he has a defenseless mook that follows them and requires protection, or he makes the adventure revolve around some other skills the PCs have. It was still an act of DM fiat, though, and it always will be as long as DMs are still designing their own adventures.

Now, for my games, I don't give a tojanida's tentacle about the DC required to map out a cavern, or navigate by the stars, or what have you. If the story is better, the game more fun, when the PC succeeds at something, the PC succeeds. If there ought to be an element of chance--if there's some doubt that the PC could reasonably achieve the action, or if the story will be fun and exciting whether he fails or succeeds--then the player rolls to see if his character can do it. There's already a versatile system of ability checks in place to allow PCs to do things that aren't explicitly on their character sheets. I use it. Map stuff with an Intelligence check. Design a pulley system with an Intelligence check, and build it with Dexterity. Find your way around the ocean with a Wisdom check. There's a system already there, and for my games, I don't need more. Maybe you do.

And that's fine. But I don't think we need the core rulebooks bogged down with DCs and skills for a whole host of activities that won't come up in 90% of games being played; we need a set of core rules designed to do what D&D does best, without flipping through page after page of Random Harlot Encounter Tables and Weather Effects by Climate and Biome. If your games require a core rulebook that's much heavier on subsystems for a wider array of activities, maybe D&D 4th Edition isn't for you. White Wolf's Storytelling system is very flexible, although an awful lot less simulationist than D&D 3.5. Gurps has rules for anything and everything. The core of D&D, though, should be a streamlined system for adventuring in a fantasy environment. Everything else belongs in a supplement, or in another game entirely.

 

[HeavenShallBurn]

You can have 4e, I'm not interested in it. My point is that there HAS been a change in the design philosophy and it leaves a hole in the rules for groups that prefer a more simulationist bent. I've tried Storyteller and simply put it doesn't do what I want and can't be made to, it's far too narrativist. GURPS can do a D&D setting but no matter how hard you try can't produce the D&D feel or playstyle because of fundamental system differences.

The main difference between us is that both you and AndorMajoru constantly refer to story, you intend a story and work to maintain the thread of the story. I don't tell a story, I provide a world for the players to poke around in and via the PCs do neat stuff. The story comes from what the PCs do in the setting, not some overarching plot. Just to let you know I LIKE the 1e DMG and find its tables useful even now.

 

[Zaruthustran]

What if the university of Morgrave wants to hire someone to map out a ruin in Xan'drik? What if the party needs to make a gantry and a pulley system to lift the Altar of Plotdevice up a cliff? Use knowledge of celestial navigation to figure out where that botched teleport dropped them?

Without Profession: Cartographer or Sailor or Use Rope it's purely up to the GM what he will allow, and poor ones will allow nothing that doesn't match the plot in thier own head.

If a character wants to attach a bottle of holy water to an arrow does he posses the skills or not? Even in 3e the rules don't cover that, but if he has Craft: Bowmaking or even rope use, the gm can at least know he has some relevant skill set.

Okay, let's use those examples, and imagine 4E had a subsystem for craft skills, and skills like Use Rope and Navigation. You have, say, the ability to choose 2 such skills from a list of 10.

So what if, in the Pulley example, no one happened to take the right skill? Plot grinds to a halt? I think it would. By adding increasing granularity and specificity, you wind up being able to do *less*. Sure you could just use DM fiat, but such a thing would be (technically) cheating.

If 4E didn't have a specific system to cover such skills, then the players and DMs could just decide together if the party could pull off the challenge. DM fiat is just fiat--it's not breaking the rules if there are no rules to break! "Oh, didn't you say Bob used to be a sailor before taking up Wizardry? Sure, he could probably figure something out. Make an Int check." Or, "Wasn't Johan a carpenter? He could maybe lash something together."

Look at it from the publisher's point of view. Does D&D need a system on such skills? Are such skills part of the fundamental D&D experience? Or are they of niche interest, and better suited to a later supplement or web article?

For me it boils down to keeping the focus on the fun. Focus on the reason why my friends and I get together at the D&D table: to create interesting characters, go on amazing adventures, kill horrible monsters, and take their wondrous treasures. If one of us wants his character to be good at something (be it armorsmithing, or singing, or whatever) then sure, he's good at it. Done. We're all friends, and reasonable people, but even if someone were to get a little cheesy and start claiming that his character is a master in 10 different disciplines the rest of us would just say "come on man, that's cheesy... just settle on one or two hobbies" and that'd be it.

But that situation wouldn't come up. After all, we don't get together to bother with rules on how well Sir Jaradai, Knight of the Shining Citadel, can weave baskets.

 

[Hella_Tellah]

You can have 4e, I'm not interested in it. My point is that there HAS been a change in the design philosophy and it leaves a hole in the rules for groups that prefer a more simulationist bent.

I agree! There has been a change in the design philosophy, and I like it. If I never again have to open the book and roll on a table, it'll be too soon. I think I'm in the majority on this one--if I'm not, then WotC has a big surprise coming to them this June.

Just to let you know I LIKE the 1e DMG and find its table useful even now.

Awesome, keep playing with it. You can have the 1e DMG, I'm not interested in it. Really though, you've got thirty years' worth of quality gaming products that you enjoy playing with. Keep it up. But don't decry a narrativist/gamist system for lacking simulation. Don't be mad at White Wolf if Mage: The Awakening doesn't have a table for random weather effects or a mechanic for balancing a business' ledger at the end of a fiscal period. Don't be mad at Excel for not including Photoshop's layers and brushes. Don't be mad at 4th Edition for excising the simulationist elements. That's what it was built for.