D&D 5E (2024) DMG 5.5 - the return of bespoke magical items?

[pemerton]

Damage spells scale pretty decently in 1e as well, as the damage auto-increases with caster level instead of requiring an upcast or similar.

AD&D is broken in a different way: you get more and more of those spell slots!

 

[Emerikol]

I think verisimilitude weighs far heavier for me as DM than it does for others. I drop Cleric items on occasion because there are clerics in the world. I'm not bending the game around the characters. It's a world. If player in my game ran in two of my campaigns and one had a cleric and one didn't and I did what some have suggested then my game would lack verisimilitude. The player would be like, "wow we got a lot of cleric items this campaign but none dropped last campaign". I'm sure for many it wouldn't matter but I work at it.

Same argument for the idea that the PCs could not get two months of downtime, almost always. There are rare exceptions but never so consistently as to be a way of curtailing magic item creation. It would be so obvious to me and my players that I was messing with them. If you create worlds so in flux that a group never gets a rest ever, fine, but that isn't the fantasy I'm going for. I want fantasy elements but realistic behavior given those fantasy elements.

And of course this is why certain mechanics like plot coupons (hero points etc... or martial daily powers) are so onerous to me.

 

[Emerikol]

AD&D is broken in a different way: you get more and more of those spell slots!

And they scaled. At 20th level you had a 20d6 fireball. A 3rd level spell.

 

[GreyLord]

...During the story of LotR.

Obviously not in the literally 60 years BETWEEN stories (remember, Bilbo is freshly 50 in The Hobbit and turns "eleventy-one", 111, at the start of Fellowship).

For God's sake man, this is so obviously disingenuous I can't believe you're actually serious here. A 60-year timeskip for most campaigns would mean rolling fresh characters, not eagerly thinking about the items you've crafted.

But, they had the same characters in some parts...

However, even if we just go with the Fellowship, that's 17 years, and as one has pointed out above, you also have a two month stop over as well.

That's at least 50 days right there.

Then let me make crystal clear:

WHILE they are on the adventure.

Which is what would actually be happening when D&D characters do that.

No, no character will make weapons during an adventure. Do your characters only ever go on ONE adventure???

I suppose if that's how you roll.

However, if you ever have more than one adventure, there may actually be downtime between that and the next adventure.

In the course of the movie (and you didn't specify, only ONE part of the movie in your original post, so you kind of cheated there) they'd have time.

Of course, if they ONLY ever go on that ONE adventure in the movie, they won't have time, but that's never when people make magic weapons and stuff anyways.

In some campaigns people have time for alternate careers (be a blacksmith, be a bard playing in inns and taverns, etc), and many have downtime between adventures. I imagine if they ever made another movie that the characters of the D&D movie WOULD have had downtime between the films...probably MORE than enough time to make a magic weapon or two if they had that type of power.

Because, that's literally what we are talking about when the PC's are going to have the time to make these things anyways.

Which was my whole point. It's the players taking a risk (again, under the mistaken assumption that it was consecutive rather than cumulative days of work), the hope that nothing significantly distracting comes up in the next 50 days. No tempting opportunities for sweet, sweet lewts. No summons from the Crown. No orc raids on the nearby vineyards/grain fields that supply the local vintners/breweries (which would be more than motivation enough for several PCs I've known!). Etc.

As noted, I mistook the 50 day timer as consecutive rather than cumulative, which makes a major difference. But I appreciate that you recognize the core point: being in the middle of an ongoing adventure can quite easily make extended downtime difficult to justify.

I wasn't approaching it any differently. I was approaching it that you seemed to say that they would never ever be able to make any magical weapons of a certain quality because they'd never ever have the time. I disagree with that idea. Perhaps in your campaign, but in general...there are MANY campaigns which would have the time for PC's to make their stuff if they wanted to.

No. I don't have the book in front of me, just like most people right now.

It absolutely would not. Any time you're in a wagon or on horseback, you emphatically are not crafting--and if you want to make even remotely decent time while doing so, you're not going to do any crafting in the between portions either, where you'll be mostly spending your time asleep or taking care of the horses and such.


How, exactly? The kinds of "forges" you'd see on sailing vessels could not handle forging a whole sword (and certainly not a suit of armor), and you're not going to have looms, nor are you going to want to do delicate work with glass or gemcutting or the like. Even leatherwork is going to be tough because tanning hides on a constantly sloshing ship would be a nightmare. Unless you've bought purely intermediate products you're gonna have a rough time.

There's a reason you didn't see sailing ships produce finished goods while in transit. If it had been even remotely financially practical, it would've been done. It wasn't.

You're assuming they are in the forge every day creating the weapon, but that's not what the rules say they have to be doing. They could just be focusing on infusing it with power, which means they'd just need a place where they could focus. If they aren't adventuring and merely traveling (or vice versa) then they have 8 hours that perhaps they could be doing just that. Granted, it probably would be really hard to do that via horseback, but on a boat? I've been on boats before, it wouldn't be that hard.

Actually, depending on the boat, you could have a full on forge there. You could also have a full on kitchen (imagine that...sailors want to eat), a woodworker and seamstress (sails need repair, so do various other parts of the boat, which is why a merchant ship may actually have a place for metal repairs). It's dependent, once again, on the campaign and the type of boats they are on and what the DM allows.

Again: I consider this argument deeply disingenuous.

The adventure doesn't actually START until the Fellowship is formed. That's literally the "party formation" scene. Everything prior to that is us getting the backstory.

I'd consider it disingenuous that now that people have shown you in the books and movies you asked about, when it would be possible, you suddenly do NOT want to use the the actual book or movie, but only the portions you've approved, with out really saying which portion you approve of. You are adding restrictions in after the fact...

Soon, your going to say the only portion would be during the Siege of Gondor (and yet, even during the Siege they had weaponsmiths working on weaponry and repair constantly most likely), or when they are ONLY in the Mines of Moria, or some even more limiting time period than that.

It's also disingenious to ignore the other time periods the poster marked (Rivendell, Lothlorien). Of course, there are other down times they experience as well (though I'm not positive how long they were, Merry was with Theoden for a while before Gondor called for aid for example, Gandalf recovered after his battle with the Balrog and became Gandalf the White and that took a while, Denethor probably had a good long while before they even got to Gondor...etc).

I don't think anyone is saying PC's are going to make weapons in the middle of a Dungeon, or an adventure like that. They are simply saying it's going to be possible for PC's to make magical items and the restrictions are not necessarily that terrible that these items will never be made.

 

[Emerikol]

It can drop with the intention of being sold for its full gp costs, but I'm not going to act like it's treasure that means anything to the party.

What they do with it is up to them. Selling it is a good option and my groups do sell a good bit. If you find a +2 sword and you already have a +3 sword, you either sell it, or you could give it to a henchman thus building loyalty. You might also give it to a local Lord to curry some favor there. I leave the roleplaying aspects of it to the players but sure they sell plenty of items that drop.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I don't think anyone is saying PC's are going to make weapons in the middle of a Dungeon, or an adventure like that. They are simply saying it's going to be possible for PC's to make magical items and the restrictions are not necessarily that terrible that these items will never be made.

Then they aren't responding to the argument I've been making.

The idea I responded to was that it was always or effectively always possible, to the point that having even TWO events that prevented continuous (not, as I now know, cumulative) crafting work would be objective proof that the DM was being awful to their players. That essentially 100% of adventurers ALWAYS have 50+ day stretches where they're doing absolutely nothing of import that would distract them from their work.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

What they do with it is up to them. Selling it is a good option and my groups do sell a good bit. If you find a +2 sword and you already have a +3 sword, you either sell it, or you could give it to a henchman thus building loyalty. You might also give it to a local Lord to curry some favor there. I leave the roleplaying aspects of it to the players but sure they sell plenty of items that drop.

Genuine question: Do your players really keep a notepad of all the items they've gotten and make comparisons between distributions, such that they'll call you out for failing to live up to the distributions you've previously had?

Because I couldn't run a game for folks like that, even though I do very much care about world consistency. I just think world consistency is only one virtue, not THE end-all, be-all. I'd rather have a game that is exciting and fun and engaging even if it accepts some suspension of disbelief than a game that scrupulously counts every penny and second and inch and shows you all of its receipts no matter the cost to the actual experience of play.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

But, they had the same characters in some parts...

However, even if we just go with the Fellowship, that's 17 years, and as one has pointed out above, you also have a two month stop over as well.

That's at least 50 days right there.

I am constantly reminded that my games are not like most but in my experence there are ONLY 2 types of games and they are extremes... either 'we have to rush no time' and no one will have time to pen a common scroll, and 'we can take pretty much as much time as we want and will have sometimes months or even years of downtime'

One of the issues I have had since 5e came out is I run (and prefer to play 7 out of 10 times) in the 2nd... ones where we have families, have things we do, where sometimes our human characters age out of the campaign... not ones where a 2 week-2month down time would kill the game.

RIght now I am still running 2014 rules, BUT in my last campaign we had dozens of times were we took weeks off (not even counting when we skipped travel time) and had 2 MAJOR time skips of a year or more.

 

[Emerikol]

Genuine question: Do your players really keep a notepad of all the items they've gotten and make comparisons between distributions, such that they'll call you out for failing to live up to the distributions you've previously had?

Because I couldn't run a game for folks like that, even though I do very much care about world consistency. I just think world consistency is only one virtue, not THE end-all, be-all. I'd rather have a game that is exciting and fun and engaging even if it accepts some suspension of disbelief than a game that scrupulously counts every penny and second and inch and shows you all of its receipts no matter the cost to the actual experience of play.

For us, I think as soon as you lose verisimilitude for the world the game is done. At that point the players stop believing it's a living breathing working world.

And I don't think the fact that items seem to "magically" match what classes the players are playing is something that requires note keeping to discover. I'd notice it pretty quick. This goes with a lot of other classes. A fighter who likes the sword may not want an axe. Someone might rightly ask, "Wow we are in the hall of the dwarves but we haven't found a single axe yet it's been all swords and that is great as that is exactly what we want to drop."

When I design dungeons, I put treasure there that makes sense for the beings that have inhabited it over the years. Keeping verisimilitude is something I keep doing constantly. Authors do it to you all the time. They drop little side comments about things in the world to keep building that world's authenticity. For a DM, you also want to build your world's authenticity all the time.

 

[Guest 7037866]

No. I don't have the book in front of me, just like most people right now.

But you read the rules? You weren't inferring from what you had read online or heard elsewhere?

I mean, you overlooked it, it happens. Just own it, right? You seemed to here:

Oh. I thought it was consecutive, and if you were interrupted at any point at all, it had to start over.

but for some reason seem to take offense when I pointed it out... first (even if you didn't notice it then).

It absolutely would not. Any time you're in a wagon or on horseback, you emphatically are not crafting--and if you want to make even remotely decent time while doing so, you're not going to do any crafting in the between portions either, where you'll be mostly spending your time asleep or taking care of the horses and such.

No, it would work fine, and you can easily account for it in a number of ways.

If you're busy crafting a magical item (for yourself or another party member), someone else can handle the menial tasks. During your long rest you can spend 2 hours in light activity, such as cooking or tending your horse, as well.

Depending on what you're crafting, you can even eat while crafting. A lot of people grab a bite to eat nowadays while working their jobs activitely, I see no reason why PCs couldn't do the same depending on what is being crafted.

How, exactly? The kinds of "forges" you'd see on sailing vessels could not handle forging a whole sword (and certainly not a suit of armor), and you're not going to have looms, nor are you going to want to do delicate work with glass or gemcutting or the like. Even leatherwork is going to be tough because tanning hides on a constantly sloshing ship would be a nightmare. Unless you've bought purely intermediate products you're gonna have a rough time.

For most items, if you have the money to make it magical, you have the money to just buy the base item first.

While you only need smith's tools for armor like plate, you don't need a forge. In fact, there is nothing in the rules indicating the cost of a forge--even if you wanted to craft your own plate.

Depending on how you travel (like my current game the PCs are on boats), you could easily have the room needed for the things you need to craft, if you are actually making the item. IRL people made things on ship, so they can do it in a fantasy game I would think.

There's a reason you didn't see sailing ships produce finished goods while in transit. If it had been even remotely financially practical, it would've been done. It wasn't.

On a mass scale? Of course not. But we aren't talking about a mass scale, but an individual working on an item.

Regardless, these rules are crap ultimately, IMO. I'm just showing how as they are written, you don't actually need downtime to create magical items.

You'll also note the point was 24 hours = 8 hours travel + 8 hour workday + 8 hour long rest. So, you can travel, craft, and rest all in the same day--no downtime needed. (To be clear, I'm not saying it makes much sense, but RAW it's possible.)