How do you handle time with item creation?

[Bad Paper]

temporal requirements are a good thing

It seems rather ridiculous how much time must be spent on some items. Do people actually wait around for their friend to make boots, etc? What about items that might need to be made during an adventure(scrolls, potions)?

The amount of time is not ridiculous at all. My campaign(s) use the 1000gp-worth-of-magic-items-per-day rule, which gets around the rather absurd rubber stamps of "a potion takes one day to brew," etc. Same time for cure light wounds as cure serious wounds? Bah! Make a jug of clw and be done with it!

I rather like the temporal requirements because they can sometimes add the sense of urgency. My player is currently involved in a rather famous adventure wherein the clock is ticking and they gotta win this thing fast. It makes my wizard think very carefully before wasting a couple of days on writing scrolls, and makes the cleric prioritize his potions, etc.

And while the spellcasters are manufacturing things, the nonspellcasters are either gathering information or starting fights. Let them do what they want.

The group that I am DMing just got out of a three-month vacation where the druid was almost solidly crafting weapons and armor for the others. It enabled her to load up on cash and make herself a rather nice ensemble of all +3 weapons and armor (*wild* armor, even).

The temporal requirements also mean that your adventurers will likely not be loading up on expensive Wondrous Items in the middle of a module, and that any time they take off to make stuff will obviously be used by the Bad Guys to also fortify their defenses. Even armies at war have to take time off to ramp up their power.

 

[Evilhalfling]

This is exactly what happened in a campaign I'm playing in. We're just 3 PCs, two of which have a lot invested in crafting. The DM wont give us any time to Craft items at all. So currently we're going into the City of the Spider queen ......

Yeah I would advise not to take 37 days off in the middle of this moduel to make 2 suits of celestial armor, I missed a session and came back to find we had spent 37 days waiting for our wizard to craft things. My reaction made my Sig for a while.
"you stayed in town for 37 days? what part of Save the World Quest did you not understand?"

I agree though, not having downtime sucks. Sometimes adventures get too intense and there is no time for training etc. In the case of mega adventures that take you from 12th to 18th it is bad design. Crafting time only really becomes difficulty at high levels a week off here and there can be managed it is when you are crafting but 20+ days in the middle of a quest can be a disaster.

 

[iwatt]

Yeah I would advise not to take 37 days off in the middle of this moduel to make 2 suits of celestial armor, I missed a session and came back to find we had spent 37 days waiting for our wizard to craft things. My reaction made my Sig for a while.
"you stayed in town for 37 days? what part of Save the World Quest did you not understand?"

I agree though, not having downtime sucks. Sometimes adventures get too intense and there is no time for training etc. In the case of mega adventures that take you from 12th to 18th it is bad design. Crafting time only really becomes difficulty at high levels a week off here and there can be managed it is when you are crafting but 20+ days in the middle of a quest can be a disaster.

My problem is that our party has a big proportion of crafters. A cleric can always use his feat selections for something else. A wizard as well.

I'm searching now for a plane in which time passes really fast in comparison to real time. That way we can spend time crafting while very little tim passes in the eal world. seems kinda of broken though

 

[IronWolf]

I think downtime is important in a campaign. Adventurers need time to rest, get to know the other townsfolk if they are in a new town, etc. If they are rushed from place to place there is no chance to bond with their current location or NPC's. Without that its all just dice rolling when the dragon terrorizes the city. Let the characters get to know the town, the people, etc and suddenly any threat against that town or specific people in that town mean more.

 

[Seeten]

No downtime = less fun.

 

[marune]

In my next adventure I try something related to down time, but not exactly, I officialy give them a year of game time to complete the adventure. (They are asked to "kill" 3 NPCs during this time.) The player's will have to manage the time, and I will put some side-quest that will they will have to manage to not go over the deadline.

 

[Pickaxe]

Just wondering how people handle item creation. It seems rather ridiculous how much time must be spent on some items. Do people actually wait around for their friend to make boots, etc? What about items that might need to be made during an adventure(scrolls, potions)? I was not sure what forum to post this in, so if it should be in HR, feel free to move it.

I think one important reason that these requirements exist is to emphasize that magic items are unusual, special creations that shouldn't be easier to make than a chocolate cake. I know of a number of gamers who don't take item creation feats, not because of downtime issues, but because magic items are made readily available for cash. Why waste a precious feat slot when I can buy magic items, albeit at 2x the cost to create? The fact that it takes a long time to make even a scroll helps to explain why magic items cost a lot, why not every village has a Magic Shop, and why the DM is telling you that you can't buy +5 plate right now, even though you have the cash; you have to find someone who was willing to put in a very long time to make this item.

As far as downtime goes, I've never been in a campaign that went from 1 to 20 with none, and I doubt I ever will. We usually require some downtime for leveling alone. Of course, many adventures have time constraints that minimize downtime, but that's usually on purpose, either to challenge the party to get the job done without 600 scrolls and potions, or without more advancement. ("Wow, that looks tough. We'll be back in three more levels.") In other cases, the party often has to make a choice between forging ahead or taking a break to restock, with pros and cons for both options.

When we do downtime, the DM usually just asks each character to tell him what they plan to do while so-and-so is leveling or crafting or whatever. We've never really been at a loss for things to do: item creation, training, spell research, summoning a new animal companion, ordering mighty composite bows or other items that take time to be crafted, or even just gather information. We don't have to cover every minute, and we even tend to add things in retroactively. (We are, after all, often describing three weeks of activity in ten minutes.) In short, downtime has never been tough to role play for us.

--Axe