Recharging charged items.

[CalrinAlshaw]

Though I can envision "rechargable" items, I see no real reason that this is the way things should work.

The reason I am doing this is because I plan on putting thought and effort into the design, description, materials used (Gems, Gold, Darkwood, etc.) and I would really like to be able to RE-use the item as often as I'd wish.

Side Note - Anyone know if a wand of Divine Favor can be used on other people, or if when activating the wand, it is self-only?

Calrin Alshaw

 

[Hypersmurf]

Side Note - Anyone know if a wand of Divine Favor can be used on other people, or if when activating the wand, it is self-only?

It's a personal spell. Only on you.

If wands could be recharged they would cost more than they currently do.

Yeah - at least 25xSLxCL, like a scroll. Wands are cheaper than scrolls, per charge, because you can only buy in bulk, 50 at a time.

If I can recharge my Wand of CLW with one charge for a base price of 15gp, it makes scrolls excessively expensive...

-Hyp.

 

[CalrinAlshaw]

If I can recharge my Wand of CLW with one charge for a base price of 15gp, it makes scrolls excessively expensive...

Well, for starters, to CREATE a wand, you need to create it with 50 charges. Which, per-charge costs 7.5gp each. and 30xp each. For a first level caster with a first level spell.

Anyhow, wands tend to be far more expensive than scrolls to create, and scroll creation is MUCH more viable for a beginning spellcaster.

Another thing, like I was saying, the only real reason I want this isn't to replace standard wands. It is because I am making a staff that will be VERY expensive combined with being made using special wood and setting gems into it and such. In other words, what is the point of making a unique staff if you can't recharge it somehow?

Calrin Alshaw

 

[dcollins]

Another thing, like I was saying, the only real reason I want this isn't to replace standard wands. It is because I am making a staff that will be VERY expensive combined with being made using special wood and setting gems into it and such. In other words, what is the point of making a unique staff if you can't recharge it somehow?

If you're making a truly unique item, then you're in House-Rules territory, and your House-Rules need to address any relevant of issue of "what is the point of this". Staffs are not by their nature unique items in the D&D core rules.

 

[Hypersmurf]

Well, for starters, to CREATE a wand, you need to create it with 50 charges. Which, per-charge costs 7.5gp each. and 30xp each. For a first level caster with a first level spell.

Right. A creation cost of 7.5gp comes from a base price of 15gp.

It's cheaper than a scroll (base price 25gp for the same spell) because you can't buy them one charge at a time. You have to pay for 50.

If you allow penny-packet recharging as a house rule, it should cost at least as much as a scroll, per charge, if not slightly more.

-Hyp.

 

[Li Shenron]

If you allow penny-packet recharging as a house rule, it should cost at least as much as a scroll, per charge, if not slightly more.

I agree, since wands are slightly easier to use than scrolls. However I don't think it really changes much if the DM allows to recharge a wand before it is completely empty. He could still put some minor limitations, such as "you can only recharge it to full 50 charges" or "you can recharge it in multiples of 10 charges".

It hasn't come up in our games yet, but I would allow the latter. At least I let players "purchase" wands with 10, 20, 30, 40 or 50 charges at character creation* (like they have carried the wand for a while and already used it). I ask for multiples of 10 only for booking simplicity, but it's not so important. In general I can say no in-game reasons why wands/staves should always have exactly 50 charges.

As a minor compensation, I believe the DMG rules allows for different spells to be scribed on the same scroll, to make it more versatile although it costs double. Still scrolls can go over 4th level, which is an important point

*normally IMC it's hard to find magic on sale (you can find it, but "shops" have random items like treasure), but at character creation you can have whatever you wish

 

[Hypersmurf]

As a minor compensation, I believe the DMG rules allows for different spells to be scribed on the same scroll, to make it more versatile although it costs double.

Scrolls are slotless, so there's no need to increase the price for having more than one on the same sheet of parchment.

-Hyp.

 

[iceifur]

UA has a variant for recharging charged items (it's in one of the House Rule sidebars). IIRC, you pay 10% of the item's base price up front (in gp), and then you pay an amount of gp and XP directly proportionate to the amount of charges that have been used.

-B-

 

[ARandomGod]

Well, for starters, to CREATE a wand, you need to create it with 50 charges. Which, per-charge costs 7.5gp each. and 30xp each. For a first level caster with a first level spell.

Anyhow, wands tend to be far more expensive than scrolls to create, and scroll creation is MUCH more viable for a beginning spellcaster.

Another thing, like I was saying, the only real reason I want this isn't to replace standard wands. It is because I am making a staff that will be VERY expensive combined with being made using special wood and setting gems into it and such. In other words, what is the point of making a unique staff if you can't recharge it somehow?

Calrin Alshaw

The "game balance reason" that you can't recharge charged items is that you have to buy in bulk... as opposed to being able to buy in slots of less than 50.
And that's important because it's overall cheaper to do it that way than to make individual scrolls... if you're making 50 of them at any rate.

Now, to work around this while maintaining the original "game balance", I can envision several possibilities. The easiest and first would just be to allow you to recharge it at cost per charge. This does, however, break the intended balance, making scrolls practially obsolete.

OR you could allow recharging at the cost of making a scroll per charge. I don't see this as a viable option at all, but it's there, and would be completely fair.

My favorite off the cuff idea (just thought of it) is to allow this unique item to hold more than 50 charges originally, and allow it to be recharged in batches of 50, and 50 only, as if you were making a new staff, with the cost being that of making the staff in the first place, minus any special staff materials (IE as if you were making a normal staff with 50 charges).

Now, if there were some issue with being able to have more than 50 charges, you could do the same thing, just with the provision that you can reuse the given staff after it's already fully discharged, at the cost of making a normal staff... But I like the idea of having more than 50 charges, I'd want at least 75, so that you don't need to run completely out of charges before recharging. I see no problem with stating that you'd need to pay twice the normal cost for those last 25 charges... say add the cost of a full 50 charged normal staff to the staff you're making, and it has 75 charges. Since this is to be a unique item, that really makes a lot of sense to me...

 

[Denarr]

The way my group always handled charging items with charges was to treat the charging as if the item was being created. What ever is needed to add charges to a new item being created is the same thing that needs to be done to put charges in an item.
Essentially, you are creating a new magic item, without having to craft the item itself.
Most magic items need the materials that detemine how many charges they possess to be added to the materials of the item itself.
Such as a wand needing a certain amount of diamond dust added to molten iron per charge.
Items like this couldn't be recharged, obviously, because you would be recreating the item from scratch.
Some items are specifically made with the intention of being rechargeable, rings of spell storing, for example. These items are obviously extremely expensive to create, and there would still be the cost of recharging them.
If your character is creating a unique item, I hope the DM is paying attention to the rules for creating new spells, as well as the normal rules for crafting items.