[Grim Tales / Slavelords of Cydonia] Mastercraft items?

[Flynn]

Mastercraft: Feats or Talents?

Okay, guys, does the following work better as feats or as a talent tree?

Mastercraft
[Smart]
Prerequisite: Craft (appropriate) 6 ranks, Disable Device 6 ranks.
Benefit: The character selects an appropriate craft skill. Using that craft skill, the character can craft mastercraft items that provide a +1 bonus to its quality compared to an ordinary object of the same type. On average, it takes twice as long to build a mastercraft object as it does to build an ordinary object of the same type. The Craft DC to create a mastercraft item is three (3) higher than the base needed to create a normal object of the appropriate type (i.e. DC = base +3.) The character must pay for the raw materials cost for creating the item; in addition, the character must pay an XP cost equal to 0.28 times the cost of an ordinary item of the appropriate type. The exceptional quality of a mastercraft object provides the user a bonus on attack rolls, damage, Defense, or some other characteristic that improves when the object is used. A +1 mastercraft item often sells at double the market value of an ordinary item of the appropriate type.
Normal: A character can create a masterwork version of an ordinary item.
Special: This feat can be taken multiple times, but each time, it applies to a new skill.

Improved Mastercraft
[Smart]
Prerequisite: Craft (appropriate) 6 ranks, Disable Device 6 ranks, Mastercraft.
Benefit: This feat provides similar effects to the Mastercraft feat. The mastercraft items created provide a +2 bonus instead of a +1, and the character must pay an XP cost equal to 0.56 times the cost of an ordinary item of the appropriate type. The Craft DC is equal to the base +6. A +2 mastercraft item often sells at four times the market value of an ordinary item of the appropriate type.
Special: This feat can be taken multiple times, but each time, it applies to a new skill.

Superior Mastercraft
[Smart]
Prerequisite: Craft (appropriate) 6 ranks, Disable Device 6 ranks, Mastercraft, Improved Mastercraft.
Benefit: This feat provides similar effects to the Mastercraft feat. The mastercraft items created provide a +3 bonus instead of a +1, and the character must pay an XP cost equal to 1.12 times the cost of an ordinary item of the appropriate type. The Craft DC is equal to the base +9. A +3 mastercraft item often sells at eight times the market value of an ordinary item of the appropriate type.
Special: This feat can be taken multiple times, but each time, it applies to a new skill.

As Talents, they all become Advanced talents with effectively the same prereqs as the feat versions above, but could only be selected as a Smart Hero talent instead of as a general feat more widely available to other character concepts.

With Thanks,
Flynn

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

I haven't read the BC masterwork rules, so let's get that out of the way up front.

My first instinct is that this definitely shouldn't be a Talent. It's not appropriate to a Talent. Feat, maybe-- but we'll get to that.

I'd prefer a skill-only solution that simply increases the DC for 2nd, 3rd, 4th, or 5th generation masterwork items (the rules for normal masterwork items, of course, already cover +1 items).

I'd furthermore suggest that the market value (which is used to derive Crafting time as well as for buying and selling), like magic items, should be exponential to the bonus (x1, x4, x9, x16, x25).

I'd recommend that creating a +2 item require a +1 masterwork item as its raw material, +3 requires a +2, and so on. (Pretty obvious, really.) So, essentially, to make a +5 masterwork item requires 5 tasks/skill checks: Create a +1 item from raw materials, convert +1 to +2, +2 to +3, +3 to +4, +4 to +5. (It should be noted that a single Craft task can often require multiple checks for completion, if the first check is not sufficient to complete the crafting.)

Only after implementing all of the above would I even consider requiring a Feat (but never a Talent) in order to Craft higher order masterworks.

Requiring a Talent would mean that only Heroic characters could ever create a superior weapon. Miyamoto Musashi, for example, would therefore have to have been more than a simple artisan (no offense intended by the use of the term 'simple', of course); he'd have to be a Hero.

Requiring a Feat-- let alone a feat chain-- means that Ordinaries (Experts) could create masterwork items. However, the more feats required, the higher level the artisan would have to be. It would not be enough to simply have a high skill-- you'd have to also be high level.

My overwhelming preference is skill only. With enough skill and enough time (particularly if the expert can convert an xp expense to a time expense, as outlined in Grim Tales), an expert artisan should be able to Craft superior weapons-- and he'll be able to do it without also having to dedicate his time to Being An Adventurer.

The real limiter for PCs should be the time required. Please remember that Grim Tales is a story based game (for all the attention given over to the crunch that the book displays). PCs don't craft masterwork items simply because they have more important things to do with their time.

To put it another way, perhaps: Picture a cyberpunk or far future setting, say Shadowrun, or Fallout. Certainly the skill set exists in the population to manufacture very high quality weapon systems-- say, an auto-tracking, power-assisted chaingun with all the bells and whistles, like the fellas had in Aliens.

You know the one.

Now what makes more sense: Giving the PCs the skills, feats, and time necessary to craft an item like this themselves; or giving them the cash they need to buy this item and get on with shooting the bejeebus out of bad guys with it.

Pick your fun.


Wulf