Rituals and Masterwork Armor

[Shin Okada]

Enchant Magic Item ritual says,

You touch a normal item and turn it into a magic item of your level or lower. The ritual’s component cost is equal to the price of the magic item you create.

Transfer Enchantment ritual says,

You transfer the magical qualities (properties, powers, and enhancement bonus) of an enchanted item into another object. You must maintain physical contact with both items for the duration of the ritual.

In both cases, you still need a "normal item" or "another object".

But in case of Masterwork Armors, there is that "minimum enhancement" rule and thus there is no such thing as non-magical masterwork armor.

Can those rituals turn, say, "normal" scale armor into +2 drakescale armor?

 

[Bold or Stupid]

Can those rituals turn, say, "normal" plate armor into +2 drakescale armor?

I have always allowed this to happen.

 

[Zaran]

Enchant Magic Item ritual says,


Transfer Enchantment ritual says,



In both cases, you still need a "normal item" or "another object".

But in case of Masterwork Armors, there is that "minimum enhancement" rule and thus there is no such thing as non-magical masterwork armor.

Can those rituals turn, say, "normal" plate armor into +2 drakescale armor?

I say yes. The cost of the drakescale is built into the cost of the magic item. The only reason they did it this way is to fix the discrepency of AC to enemy attacks. They needed to keep the same cost but give the armors a boost that the +1-+6 Enhancements couldn't do on their own.

You can easily just say the properties of the drakescale are embedded into the normal armor without the metal actually changing. By the way, I don't think you can have drakescale plate.

 

[Shin Okada]

By the way, I don't think you can have drakescale plate.

Ah! My bad. "normal" SCALE armor into +2 drakescale armor?

 

[Teemu]

The Inherent bonuses variant assumes non-magical masterwork armor, and when you check that box in the Character Builder, you can get them there too. They're assumed to be magical items equal to the minimum enhancement bonus normally required, so a suit of drakescale (+2) is a level 6 item.

 

[Zaran]

Ah! My bad. "normal" SCALE armor into +2 drakescale armor?

I think everyone knew what you were saying. It's no problem.

 

[ourchair]

I have always allowed this to happen.

I agree.

As far as I'm concerned, the only limitation I've understood to accept in rules regarding magic item creation is that you can't make up new magic items that don't already exist in RAW.

Kind of a bummer, but with that in mind, magic creation means yes, you can transmute a scale armor into any kind of 'magic armor' so long as it still counts as scale armor.

Which drakescale does.

Therefore scale to drakescale is perfectly fine.

 

[BobTheNob]

Base Rules are a bit artificially restrictive. A long time ago we houseruled masterwork armor out and built the required bonus's "into" the associated feats (including the passive "cloth" armor feat) at certain character levels

Mind you, the more exotic armor types arent there any more, but truth is we sorta turned our noses up at them anyway.