Question to DMs: Magic item materials?

[Jon_Dahl]

Craft Magic Arms And Armor [Item Creation]


...you must use up raw materials costing one-half of this total price.

Longsword +2 requires material worth 4000 gp (+mw cost).

If your player asks you what these materials are, what do you say?

I was thinking about going through the easy way:
You need certain kind of gems in order to create magicals items. No gem is ever worth more than 1000 gp. Therefore the crafting process will consume maximum of one gem per day.
Different magical items need different sorts of gems, so no one can stop people from making magical items simply by destroying certain types of gems from the world (through a Wish or some divine intervention).

 

[RUMBLETiGER]

First off, you're answer sounds reasonable enough to me.

I'm actually dealing with this problem now.

If you're in a large city, the answer is, "It doesn't matter. Spend an afternoon going through the marketplace and you'll find the necessary items."

I've got a character who's in the middle of the wilderness and desires to craft, without access to materials. I've refered to things such as oils, glass, stone, metal... various raw elements as necessary material components. As well as a workspace including a forge/oven of some kind, a water source, and a work surface.

I know the game keeps these details intentionally vague, so you can fill in the blanks with whatever makes sense.

 

[cjosephs1s]

Gems work.

You can also just say they are various different components of the spell used for casting the magic item. So for you +2 longsword example the spell needed is probably Greater Magic Weapon. Its material components are powdered lime and carbon and a divine focus. So you could easily say that it require Pure powdered lime and carbon and these are very expensive and that could the cost of it.

Like Rumble said..its left vague so that you can basically DM fiat it to fit your campaign needs.

 

[Greenfield]

I usually say that it's rare oils and incense used during the crafting ritual, as well as things like diamond dust and certain exotic elements specific to the enchantment.

Some end up[ as part of the item, others are consumed in the ritual.

Our group used to say that you needed to "dig a hole in the ground, pour in money, bleed in some EXP, then sit around for a few days". They even went so far as to buy my crafting wizard a master worked shovel, to dig the holes with.

 

[nijineko]

i've always allowed innovative players to substitute valuable parts and pieces of magical creatures for material components and gp cost of magic items, if the biological specimen in question makes sense. eye of a beholder for any of the effects a beholder can pull off, claws of something with natural improved crit on the claws for sharpness or general +x enhancements on edged weapons, dragon gizzards for flaming or other energy effects, and so on. saves me having to stat out the treasure in terms of loot and the like. and is a fun and nice reward for the players and characters.

 

[the Jester]

My favorite system ever for magic item materials was in 2e- I want to say in either Book of Artifacts or Players Option: Spells and Magic- where depending on the power of the item, it had a cost to create plus a number of components that, depending on rarity, could be a simple normal item or could be something impossible, like innocence.

 

[nijineko]

the fun part is making the characters play fetch.

 

[Dandu]

Dragon dung.

 

[billd91]

Longsword +2 requires material worth 4000 gp (+mw cost).

If your player asks you what these materials are, what do you say?

I would say that it depends on the nature of the magic item being created. There may be reagents and other materials that will be used to treat a blade, special materials that may need to be assembled to make a staff (there was a really good diagram of a staff under assembly in the 3x DMG), and so on. Ultimately, the specifics don't really matter as far as the rules go - all that matters is the ultimate cost of the investment.
But if you are interested in more detail, it can be great fun to have PCs tracking down rare components rather than simply spending cash.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

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