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<blockquote data-quote="wingsandsword" data-source="post: 1845564" data-attributes="member: 14159">One of my big problems with the 1e/2e item creation method of &quot;find some rare stuff and put it all together&quot; was that there was absolutely no balance on rarity.&nbsp; Yes, it had some great flavor, but it was nigh-impossible to balance and make fair, items were either insanely hard to craft and you had to wonder why anyone would go to the trouble for something so simple, or they were so easy that one wonders if there were wizards and clerics who did nothing but make them all day every day and flooded the world with them.A DM could mean to make something very hard to obtain, but the PC's get it through ingenuity much quicker than the DM imagined, or the DM underestimates the power of the potion or scroll so he gives it easy requirements.&nbsp; Also, if you made a requirement something like &quot;water taken from ice of the suchandsuch glacier&quot; or &quot;a platinum piece that has touched the lava of the suchandsuch volcano&quot; or the like, once PC's get to the dramatically appropriate location they can stock up on the components.&nbsp; If it's so insanely hard to make scrolls and potions, why were there so many of them?&nbsp;&nbsp; With by-the-book treasure even by 2e standards, we always had entire libraries of scrolls lying around by high levels.&nbsp; If mages were as rare as some DM's like to imply and scrolls as insanely hard to scribe as many DM's liked to make them, then a few people were going to herculean lengths to craft all those scrolls.&nbsp; It seems unlikely to me.Not to mention the fact that you recieved XP for creating items in 1e/2e, instead of the other way around.&nbsp; If you found an easy recipe that the DM came up with and you could fulfil without much effort, you could sit down and just level up.&nbsp; Abusive?&nbsp; Yes.&nbsp; But completely by the book by 2e's magic item creation rules.That's why I like the 3.x version of magic item creation, they have a fixed cost, they have a personal cost that cannot be circumvented even by the wealthy or lucky (XP) and they are easy enough to make (1st level spellcaster and a feat, and all Wizards can automatically do it it for scrolls and 3rd level and a feat for Potions).</blockquote>

[QUOTE="wingsandsword, post: 1845564, member: 14159"] One of my big problems with the 1e/2e item creation method of "find some rare stuff and put it all together" was that there was absolutely no balance on rarity. Yes, it had some great flavor, but it was nigh-impossible to balance and make fair, items were either insanely hard to craft and you had to wonder why anyone would go to the trouble for something so simple, or they were so easy that one wonders if there were wizards and clerics who did nothing but make them all day every day and flooded the world with them. A DM could mean to make something very hard to obtain, but the PC's get it through ingenuity much quicker than the DM imagined, or the DM underestimates the power of the potion or scroll so he gives it easy requirements. Also, if you made a requirement something like "water taken from ice of the suchandsuch glacier" or "a platinum piece that has touched the lava of the suchandsuch volcano" or the like, once PC's get to the dramatically appropriate location they can stock up on the components. If it's so insanely hard to make scrolls and potions, why were there so many of them? With by-the-book treasure even by 2e standards, we always had entire libraries of scrolls lying around by high levels. If mages were as rare as some DM's like to imply and scrolls as insanely hard to scribe as many DM's liked to make them, then a few people were going to herculean lengths to craft all those scrolls. It seems unlikely to me. Not to mention the fact that you recieved XP for creating items in 1e/2e, instead of the other way around. If you found an easy recipe that the DM came up with and you could fulfil without much effort, you could sit down and just level up. Abusive? Yes. But completely by the book by 2e's magic item creation rules. That's why I like the 3.x version of magic item creation, they have a fixed cost, they have a personal cost that cannot be circumvented even by the wealthy or lucky (XP) and they are easy enough to make (1st level spellcaster and a feat, and all Wizards can automatically do it it for scrolls and 3rd level and a feat for Potions). [/QUOTE]

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