Help price a magic item

[Vinyafod]

Hi there,

I am trying to develop a wondrous magic item and don't know exactly how to price it. Please give me a hand.

Woundrous item: Gloves of Life

Upon speaking the proper command word the wearer of these gloves activates the one of the following spells (dependant on the command word spoken) and may affect one creature touched with the activated spell.

Cure light wounds (1)
Cure moderate wounds (3)
Lesser Restoration (3)
Restoration (7)
Raise Dead (15)

Each spell uses up a number of charges (numbers given in brackets). The gloves have a maximum of 20 charges, recharging at a rate of 1 charge per two days. If the gloves are ever drained to 0 charges their magic ist lost and they are no more than mundane leather gloves.

Thats how they should work... now the math:

I have done it spell by spell as if it were singel items for each power:

CLW : use-activated, 50 charges --- 1000 GP
CMW: use-activated, 50 charges --- 6000 GP
Less. Rest.: use-activated, 50 charges -- 6000 GP
Restoration: use-activated, 50 charges --- 28000 GP + Material comps. 32000 GP total
Raise Dead: use-activated, 50 charges --- 45000 GP + Material comps. 70000 GP total

Now because we have all the powers in one single item I add 10% to each additional cost after CLW. That gives us:

CLW: 1000
CMW: 6600
LR: 6600
R: 35200
RD: 77000

As the item ist not really charged, rather gaining charges with time and therefore is somewhat unlimited, I remove the 1/2 unlimited base price for charged items and additionally raise the material comps. as if it were 100 charges.
Resulting in:
CLW: 2000
CMW: 13200
LR: 13200
R: 72600
RD: 154000

That gives us a grand total of 255000 GP if it were uncharged, unlimited usable anytime desired.

Now the item is in a way unlimted but still can't be used anytime as it still has charges which have to reload. If I raise a fallen friend I will have to wait full 20 days (10 charges reload in that time) until I could use the item in that way again, even one additional day to ensure that the item wont be drained to 0 charges.
What factor may I apply to the grand total to reflect the limited, recharging use of the item?

Thank you for any inputs.

 

[kreynolds]

Now because we have all the powers in one single item I add 10% to each additional cost after CLW.

Nope. You add 100% for each similar power after the most expensive ability. But that doesn't actually apply in this case. These gloves would be priced as a staff, meaning it would be priced like this...

Raise Dead: use-activated, 50 charges --- 45000 GP + Material comps. 70000 GP total *(priced at full)*
Restoration: use-activated, 50 charges --- 28000 GP + Material comps. 32000 GP total *(priced at 75%)*
Less. Rest.: use-activated, 50 charges -- 6000 GP *(priced at 50%)*
CMW: use-activated, 50 charges --- 6000 GP *(priced at 50%)*
CLW : use-activated, 50 charges --- 1000 GP *(priced at 50%)*

You gain an obvious benefit for having +4 to Str and Dex on a single item, but you gain no benefit for having all of these spells on a single pair of gloves. So, instead of there being a price hike, there's actually a price discount.

 

[aliensex]

With something that complex, it is probably easiest just to try and find an existing magic item that you feel is close to it in power, and then modify the price up or down from that.

 

[kreynolds]

Actually, the only wierd aspect of these gloves is the charge regeneration. Everything else is normal.

However, I do think that some of these powers use too many charges. Comparing it to a Staff of Healing, it would be a better idea to just drop the Cure Light & Moderate and replace them with Cure Serious. I think the charge useage should look something like this...

Cure light wounds (remove)
Cure moderate wounds (remove)
Cure Serious Wounds (1)
Lesser Restoration (1)
Restoration (3)
Raise Dead (4)

...just my opinion.

 

[Vinyafod]

Okido, thank you for your input so far.

I have taken your comments into account.

Replacing the small cures with cure serious and making the item to a limited 50 charges item,use activated it would cost 105250 GP. In fact it's just like a staff but with use activation and not spell-tirgger activated.

Now I want to lower that to 20 maximum charges and give it the ability to recharge itself (1 charge reload per two days). Any ideas how to factor that in?

 

[kreynolds]

I don't know. I'm just not real keen on the replenishing of charges thing. I think it's better to just limit its uses per day, like this...

Cure Serious Wounds (3/day)
Lesser Restoration (3/day)
Restoration (1/day)
Raise Dead (1/week)

I don't know. Just an idea.

Here's what the pricing would look like...

Restoration (4 x 7 x 1800gp) 50,400gp (1/day) = 10,080gp
Cure Serious Wounds (2 x 3 x 1800gp) 10,800gp (3/day) 6,480gp at 75% = 4,860gp
Lesser Restoration (2 x 3 x 1800gp) 10,800gp (3/day) 6,480gp at 50% = 3,240gp
Raise Dead (5 x 9 x 1800gp) 81,000gp (1/week) 4,050 at 50% = 2,025gp

Total cost of the gloves = 20,205 gp.

The raise dead cost is my own estimate. If a power is only useable once per day, then it only costs 20% of it's full price, so I figured once per week at about 5% would be good.

EDIT: Messed up the order. Fixed now.

 

[Vinyafod]

Hmm... well, that looks good. I think I'll take that approach. Thank you very much for your help.

The only worry I have now is... 20,205 GP seems so awfully cheap for all those spells.
Comparing it to the Staff of Life which can do less powerful spells, is limited in its charges, can only be used by persons who have the specific spells on their spell list (spelltrigger instead of command word) and it still costs 1.5 times as much as the just created gloves. That does not seem right, does it?

 

[kreynolds]

That does not seem right, does it?

Of course it seems right. The Staff of Life, as well as the Staff of Healing, have 50 charges. That means you can use the Resurrection power of your Staff of Life 50 times in a single day. Big difference there.

 

[Vinyafod]

My bad, I wrote Staff of Life but meant Staff of Healing, sorry.

Now, if i read the DMG correct, you don't include material costs for spells when creating a wondrous item. You, kreynolds, have not included it and I assume you know what you are doing when calculating things like that. That said... why would anyone want to create a Staff rather than a wondrous item?

If I created a Staff that has the same powers as the gloves it would be much more expensive because:

a) I have to include material components
b) all spells must be included at the same casterlevel so all at 9th casterlevel, boosting the cost even more

In addition to that, the Staff is limited to 50 charges.
A wondrous item is cheaper and unlimted and the fact that I could raise 50 person in one day with the Staff which I coul not with the wondrous item is irrelevant. I have until now never ever needed more than 2 or 3 at a given time and even that happens very rarely. So there isn't much of a penalty in the item.
Given the fact that the raise power can only bring back person back which are no longer dead than 9 days it could be a problem when I need 3 raises but I could put Ressurection into the item and it still would be cheaper than a Staff of equivalent spells.

So why ever create a Staff?

 

[Spatzimaus]

Now, if i read the DMG correct, you don't include material costs for spells when creating a wondrous item.

No, that's not correct, it's just phrased badly. The DMG says you don't use the material when the spell is used while making the item. Any XP and material costs are added directly into the cost of the item (DMG p.242, in that table), are paid up front, and if the item is unlimited charge you multiply that cost by 100 (50 if it's limited charges)
I.e., it's added to the overall cost of the item (which increases the creation time), instead of being something you pay each day.

Look at the Manual of (any of the six stat-increasing items). They use Wish, because they duplicate its effects. Clearly they're increasing the XP cost to reflect the number of Wishes needed. A +1 item needs 1 wish, a +2 needs 2...

The reason they put that text into there was otherwise people would say "Hmm, it takes me 28 days to make a +1 Manual, and I need Wish every day, so I pay 5000 XP each day for 28 days?"

Look at the Creating Staffs (and it should be Staves) section, DMG p.246. There, it explicitly says that you use 50 material components or XP costs no matter how many days it takes to make. Same concept.

That said... why would anyone want to create a Staff rather than a wondrous item?

Because some sorts of items shouldn't be made into Wondrous items at all?
It's a question of game balance. There aren't any Wondrous items that work the way you want. It's not appropriate for a low-level item Feat. So, I'd rule that you simply can't make it as a glove without a price hike. A glove (normal slot) is far more useful to most characters than a Staff. AND, a Staff can't be used by non-casters, while your gloves can, I'd assume.

all spells must be included at the same casterlevel so all at 9th casterlevel, boosting the cost even more

Wondrous items work the same way, you can't have a caster level 1 effect on the same item as a caster level 3 effect. The ITEM has a caster level (DMG, p. 241), and that determines its prices.