Harvesting Raw Materials

[Vlos]

I was wondering if anyone had any house rules on harvesting raw materials. That is a character is trying to find valuables in the wild which is often more luck than skill. Though skill in knowing where to look for things would come in very useful. This could be anything from mining or panning for gold, to finding rare herbs, or diving for pearls.


Reason for asking:
In a break from our recent high activities, I decided I wanted to start to make a new magic item. Being a shaman type with great shape changing abilities, I wanted to search for a Giant Pearl as the base for the item.

Note: This assumes that giant pearls CAN be found. Also note that it should matter, but we are EPIC characters.

So how long would it take to find/harvest a giant pearl? As a shapechanger I can change into a sea creature or magical creature that can breath under water for at least 8 hours a day (more like 20 hours).

What related skills should be used?
Knowledge(Nature)?
Survival?

How do you determine the value/cost of such an item.


Obviously, if its too easy I could just go into pearl collecting and make a fortune, but trying to use crafting rules * a skill DC seems way too long, even for a basic pearl.


What I initially came up with was a Knowledge(Nature) check to see if I can locate environments for such a creature. Making it even a really tough question would give it a 30 DC. Now being an Epic toon, I have a base of 30 for the knowledge and lets say I roll a 10 for a total of 40 DC check. Now using crafting skills I multiple the resultant DC against the target DC and that is the amount of SilverPieces "made" for the week. So a pearl, lets assume regular has value of 1,000gp, will take 8 weeks to find?

Now lets assume a giant pearl is worth 10,000gp, so it will take 80 weeks to find one? This is where it breaks down, because there is no luck? Since finding things is often luck based? Obviously if its luck involved each time I find one, the chances of finding another should be reduced as they would be getting rarer/harder to find the next.


Is there any other factors?


Also what about magical means for locating such item. What spells other than Locate Object/Creature? I could cast Miracle, but I think my Patron would be a little peturbed with me for such an abuse.

 

[Fredrik Svanberg]

I was wondering if anyone had any house rules on harvesting raw materials. That is a character is trying to find valuables in the wild which is often more luck than skill. Though skill in knowing where to look for things would come in very useful. This could be anything from mining or panning for gold, to finding rare herbs, or diving for pearls.

Profession (pearldiver), Profession (goldminer), Profession (prospector), Profession (herbalist)...

So how long would it take to find/harvest a giant pearl? As a shapechanger I can change into a sea creature or magical creature that can breath under water for at least 8 hours a day (more like 20 hours).

Estimate the value of the pearl you want in gold pennies. Make profession (pearldiver) checks, one per week, until you roll equal to or higher than the value of your pearl. This is a highly abstract version of doing it though.

What related skills should be used?
Knowledge(Nature)?
Survival?

None.

How do you determine the value/cost of such an item.

You could do it the other way around: make profession (pearldiver) checks until you find a pearl of the value you want. In reality you would find many small pearls which together made up your wages for the week but let's ignore that and just say that your character keeps looking for that single most valuable pearl.

Obviously, if its too easy I could just go into pearl collecting and make a fortune, but trying to use crafting rules * a skill DC seems way too long, even for a basic pearl.

Especially since pearls aren't crafted.

What I initially came up with was a Knowledge(Nature) check to see if I can locate environments for such a creature. Making it even a really tough question would give it a 30 DC. Now being an Epic toon, I have a base of 30 for the knowledge and lets say I roll a 10 for a total of 40 DC check. Now using crafting skills I multiple the resultant DC against the target DC and that is the amount of SilverPieces "made" for the week. So a pearl, lets assume regular has value of 1,000gp, will take 8 weeks to find?

Now lets assume a giant pearl is worth 10,000gp, so it will take 80 weeks to find one? This is where it breaks down, because there is no luck? Since finding things is often luck based? Obviously if its luck involved each time I find one, the chances of finding another should be reduced as they would be getting rarer/harder to find the next.

Those numbers are insane. Pearls are probably worth just a few gp each, perhaps as much as a few 100 gp for truly exceptional specimen. What makes them valuable when used for jewelry is the uniformity of quality and size of a whole lot of pearls put together. I suppose you could go look for gigantic magic mutant oysters - the kind that bites back when you try to dig the pearls out of them - but then you would be adventuring and not spending downtime to look for something.

Is there any other factors?

Also what about magical means for locating such item. What spells other than Locate Object/Creature? I could cast Miracle, but I think my Patron would be a little peturbed with me for such an abuse.

Polymorph Any Object seems like the obvious choice. Oops, that can't create anything of great intrinsic value. Personally I don't see why you couldn't use Miracle, but I suppose a simple Divination could at least help point you in the right direction.

 

[Vlos]

Ok, yeah, I searched the books and found Pearls in the Forgotten Realms Source book under the Gems of the Realm. It has Pearls (Pink, White, Silver) at 100gp and Black Pearl at 500gp.

So I guess I was way off on the price of a normal pearl.

- Thanks

 

[Stalker0]

Did you say your epic characters?

In that case, I'd say a day tops. If you can't find it you should know someone who could get it for you. Unless the thing has strong magical properities, it should be cake to find.

 

[Tonguez]

Assuming a giant pearl is 500gp I'd use Survival (for the art of locating the right type of mollusc) and figure the DC as

value/rarity/time (weeks)/labour => 500/2/5/1 = DC 50 (1 person spends 5 weeks searching for the rare giant pearl worth 500gp)

for every 5 rolled above DC I'd reduce by 1 week (ie on a roll of 55 it only takes 4 weeks to succeed (so a roll of 75 would mean a lucky instant find)

Rarity: 1 Very Rare 2 Rare 3 Uncommon 4 Common 5 Very Common 6 Unbiquitous

 

[Vlos]

Thanks for the feedback guys. I sort of like your idea Tonguez.

Side question, which Tonguez sort of hit on, how much would a White Pearl the size of a softball be worth. Don't forget there are Giant size creatures which could make such an item, thus its not unique in the world.

Tonguez you think about 500gp, but I feel that may be a little low.