RPG Evolution: Craft Everything

There's been a trend for a while now in video games and anime: crafting what you kill. D&D is finally catching up.

Picture courtesy of Pixabay.​

Dungeons & Dragons has always supported the concept of collecting stuff, with detailed inventory lists and encumbrance rules. Despite this, the actual act of crafting has often be relegated to side characters, with a myraid of classes in Dragon Magazine dedicated to fleshing out hirelings and henchment for that purpose. In short, D&D implied that heroes don't craft. This has gradually changed with each edition and has propagated into D&D-inspired video games and anime.

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The Virtual Forge​

The world of video games has long embraced the satisfying loop of gathering resources and crafting items. For two popular examples, look no further than Minecraft and Monster Hunter.

In Minecraft, players begin with nothing and must literally punch trees to gather wood, eventually progressing to building elaborate structures, powerful tools, and intricate machines through intuitive and interconnected crafting recipes. The game emphasizes exploration and resource management as fundamental to the crafting experience.

On the other end of the spectrum, Monster Hunter offers a deeply intricate crafting system centered around the creatures players hunt. From the scales and bones of monsters, players can forge a staggering array of weapons and armor, each with unique properties and appearances tied to the monsters they originated from. This system not only rewards skilled hunting but also provides a compelling incentive to engage with the game's monsters, turning fallen foes into powerful gear that aids future hunts. Of particular note are the Palicoes, cat-like companions who run the canteen and prepare amazing meals for hunters.

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The Culinary Artisan​

The anime and manga series Delicious in Dungeon offers a pragmatic take on crafting, primarily through the lens of cuisine. Faced with dwindling resources in a deep dungeon, the adventuring party, led by Laios, learns to identify and cook the various monsters they encounter. This act of transforming dangerous creatures into nourishing meals, similar to Minecraft and Monster Hunter, emphasizes the practical application of monster knowledge in a dangerous environment. They utilize everything from basilisk meat to slime to create surprisingly edible dishes.

This concept of utilizing the environment and its creatures extends beyond mere sustenance and aligns with the logistics aspect of D&D. While the crafting system in D&D 5th Edition (2014) had limited mechanical depth, D&D 2024 formalized crafting with the Utilize Action. As detailed on D&D Beyond, the new crafting rules allow players to engage in various crafting activities, from creating weapons and armor to brewing potions and enchanting items, with clear guidelines on required resources, time, and proficiency checks. Relevant to Delicious in Dungeon, a character proficient in Cook's Utensils can now craft rations, detect spoiled or poisoned food, and improve a food's flavor -- all skills the culinary dwarf expert Senshi demonstrates repeatedly throughout the series.

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From the meticulous assembly of components in video games to the inventive cooking of monsters in anime and the detailed creation of magic items in tabletop RPGs, crafting has a lot of appeal. It offers players a sense of ownership over their gear, rewards exploration and resourcefulness, and allows for storytelling opportunities -- after all, knowing how to craft a monster's corpse means knowing its weaknesses and vulnerabilities too. And if Delicious in Dungeon is any indication, it's an economical to "live off the land" while keeping adventurers both sated and healthy.

 

[Staffan]

The issue with crafting in TTRPGs as opposed to CRPGs is that in a CRPG, crafting can often be a satisfying side gig to the actual adventuring and with ingredients gained as a side effect from said adventuring. For example, if you're a herbalist in World of Warcraft (which is where I have the most experience with this sort of thing), you'll naturally run into herbs you can pick while out murdering monsters, and these can then be turned into potions (with the Alchemy skill) or ink used for glyphs (with the Inscription skill). It does take a little time, but it's time that's a minor diversion from what you're doing anyway, and also serves as a way to break up the normal grinding. In theory, the game can also provide different resources in different areas, although in WoW that was primarily level-based – i.e. you'd find more or less the same herbs in the cool semi-arid rolling hills of the Arathi Highlands as you would in the tropical rainforests of Northern Stranglethorn, because they're both level 25-30 regions.

Anyway, my point is that in a computer game, you can rack up crafting resources as a side effect of normal adventuring, but that's hard to implement in tabletop – at least in a way that makes it satisfying. You could just say something like "When traveling at a normal pace, roll on a table so-and-so every day to see what you can harvest", but that doesn't have the satisfaction of seeing a Mageflower plant pop up on your minimap while you're out hunting centaur in the Barrens and looking around for it and finally finding it and picking it. In addition, to make it satisfying you'd need a fairly robust crafting system – something more than "you need 45 gp worth of ingredients to make a thingamabob."

 

[GMMichael]

"When downtime existed . . ." If I recall, 5e's rules have been "revised," not removed. Or maybe Alphastream also doesn't buy that story.

Anyway, my point is that in a computer game, you can rack up crafting resources as a side effect of normal adventuring, but that's hard to implement in tabletop – at least in a way that makes it satisfying. You could just say something like "When traveling at a normal pace, roll on a table so-and-so every day to see what you can harvest", but that doesn't have the satisfaction of seeing a Mageflower plant pop up on your minimap while you're out hunting centaur in the Barrens and looking around for it and finally finding it and picking it. In addition, to make it satisfying you'd need a fairly robust crafting system – something more than "you need 45 gp worth of ingredients to make a thingamabob."

I think you're touching on the interesting crafting rules that D&D could have implemented, but didn't. The Alphastream video shows D&D's time, material, and "tool" rules. What about tables for randomly encountering ingredients in the wild? If you want to find the Mageflower, you have to go look around in the Barrens, and more importantly since it's rare, hope that the DM (GM) rolls one on the table for Barrens Flora Encounters. Each hour of searching is another chance for random encounters, wandering plot hooks, spouses getting mad at their exploring adventurers, and maybe rations/water used. Waiting for a roll to pop up is boring - it's the consequences and hooks that make it interesting.

An alternative would be the Mageflower quest, in which PCs know that it can be found (no roll necessary), but finding it already has interesting encounters built in.

 

[Micah Sweet]

There are many games related to D&D, and supplements for them and the official game, that do a more complete, detailed and IMO better job at a crafting simulation than WotC's offering, although I am happy that they've improved upon the lackluster 5.0 rules (nice to see there's something they actually improved in 5.5 from my perspective). I almost always prefer greater granularity in RPGs when practical.

 

[Distracted DM]

D&D is finally catching up.

I dislike the idea that crafting has to be inserted into everything, and that if you're not doing it you're falling behind (as per catching up). I like it in some of my video games. I like it occasionally. But it's not some customization necessity that absolutely improves everything it's added to- sometimes I don't want to faff about collecting everything just so I can craft and keep up with the game's difficulty climb. Just give me equipment choices and I'll make use with what I can out of what I find.

 

[GMMichael]

. . . sometimes I don't want to faff about collecting everything just so I can craft and keep up with the game's difficulty climb. Just give me equipment choices and I'll make use with what I can out of what I find.

Not to mention the broken skill curve. Agrar spent her whole life training to be an armorsmith, and the forge is basically everything she owns. Then a party of "adventurers" breezes into town, rents her forge for 8 gold, brings its own "tools," and crafts 2,000 gp worth of gear, and heads out to do some other amazing things like hunting gorgons.

Maybe an elf could pull off "warrior/craftsman," what with being so long-lived. But I don't see my character saying "man, hunting that gorgon was a grueling brush with death! I think I'll slave over the forge for a few weeks to cool down."

 

[Koloth]

Not to mention the broken skill curve. Agrar spent her whole life training to be an armorsmith, and the forge is basically everything she owns. Then a party of "adventurers" breezes into town, rents her forge for 8 gold, brings its own "tools," and crafts 2,000 gp worth of gear, and heads out to do some other amazing things like hunting gorgons.

Maybe an elf could pull off "warrior/craftsman," what with being so long-lived. But I don't see my character saying "man, hunting that gorgon was a grueling brush with death! I think I'll slave over the forge for a few weeks to cool down."

Also the effect on the local demand economy when those same adventurers return from their quest with the gorgon heads and a wagon full of weapons and armor looted from things they killed while hunting gorgons. Hard to sell the farmer's offspring a new freshly crafted long sword when there is a barrel of the things sitting in the weapon shop. Agrar might get a few silver for fitting a used LS to the want to be adventurer's grip but not the same income as making a new one.

As a player, I acknowledge that most RPG game economies rarely make much sense. I do like the improved crafting rules that many systems have implemented.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I dislike the idea that crafting has to be inserted into everything, and that if you're not doing it you're falling behind (as per catching up). I like it in some of my video games. I like it occasionally. But it's not some customization necessity that absolutely improves everything it's added to- sometimes I don't want to faff about collecting everything just so I can craft and keep up with the game's difficulty climb. Just give me equipment choices and I'll make use with what I can out of what I find.

No game certainly has to have crafting, but I really like it, and appreciate in any game, video or pen & paper, in which it appears.

 

[Sulicius]

The thing about crafting in many of these examples, is that it also requires gathering. Gathering materials is very satisfying in computer games. You see a tally go up and up, and you know that you can change all of those into valuable resources that improve your power in combat or whatever else you are trying to do.

I think this has to do with some prehistoric part of our brain that learned to recognize valuable harvest and bring it home. It’s survival and sometimes pleasure to find delicious, nutricious meals. Even now in our modern society, it isn’t uncommon for people to enjoy the “hunt” for bargains, or just the right thing they want as a tool or decoration.

In video games, gathering and crafting is often a solo experience. Everything you find, you can make into something you can use yourself. Baldur’s Gate 3 allows you to find a ton of herbs for making potions that you can use in the very next fight. Herbs stand out by pressing a key, collecting is also pressing a key. The herb will then wait patiently in your bags until you are in the mood to make something, and the crafting is instant. World of Warcraft, another game I have played a lot of, did add some time it takes to collect materials and craft items. Making items would increase your skill, allowing you to spend money to learn more powerful recipes. Not only that, WoW has an entire economy where you can sell what you make at a profit, and buy what you cannot craft yourself. This makes the game a fascinating economic and social system.

All of the above requires thousands of hours of work put into these systems for making sure these materials can be found, collected and turned into something else. Then the game is balanced around the improvements the crafted items make to your characters. In some cases, it might make the game almost trivial, like all but BG3’s Hardcore mode.

Now adding these to TTRPG’s is a lot of work. Designers would have to go through all the steps of writing out recipes and rewards, places to find them and advice to DM’s on how to incorporate this into a game. Then they have to balance the game around it, which IMO they don’t do in D&D for any magic item. Having PC’s who stock up on healing potions and other power increasing items can break the normal encounter math. The more control players have over what they find and make, the more they can optimise and overcome challenges.

You can do all this. It would take work. You’d have to have designers make the system and then work them into your campaign in a satisfying way. How hard will it be to find these materials? How much time does it take? Can they fail? Can herbs wither? How simulationist do we want to get?

With the right group, the right system support and the right player group, this could be a blast.

I personally think it is too hard. D&D is something we do at the table for a couple of hours every week or couple weeks. When we get together, we have princes to save, queens to slay and dungeons to delve. A LOT has to be kept track of already. Gold, health, hit dice, spell slots, feature uses and for some also rations and torches. We don’t have much that automatically keeps track of it for us, nor is there a wonderful UI that highlights what we can make with the materials we have. All of it has to be done by hand, done by our mental capacity.

I don’t want to spend the precious time we have together at the table doing things that are not heroic, move the story forward or dramatic. Crafting is a very satisfying, but uncooperative action. It focuses on mechanics, inventory management and time use. The less my players count things in their inventory, the better. I know there are others who disagree.

There are many solutions to my issues with crafting, but all of them require more time and investment. I have limited time and limited mental capacity. I prefer to spend my time on descriptions of awesome scenes, fleshing out NPC’s, developing plots in response to player desires and PC actions.

I have too many things me and my players keep track of already. I prefer to give them a potion seller every once in a while.

The Bastion system gives us an option to allow players to craft items, but with WotC doing such a terrible job at balancing magic items, a DM will have to oversee every step. Anyone remember the post of a 2024 campaign where all players had 10 rings of resistance? I see that as a failure.

Think about the time and effort more crafting in your game requires, and if that is what you and your players all (not just half the players) enjoy at the table. If it is worth it, and you rather spend time looking at crafting rules and inventory, go for it.

I rather flesh out a dungeon.

 

[Distracted DM]

I dislike the idea that crafting has to be inserted into everything, and that if you're not doing it you're falling behind (as per catching up). I like it in some of my video games. I like it occasionally. But it's not some customization necessity that absolutely improves everything it's added to- sometimes I don't want to faff about collecting everything just so I can craft and keep up with the game's difficulty climb. Just give me equipment choices and I'll make use with what I can out of what I find.

I should add that this also depends on your own preference as far as magic items (and setting magic) goes...
DnD is often post-apocalyptic, where the great days of yore are long behind and folk have lost a lot of knowledge that was once held.. that's one reason people go into dungeons in the first place, to find the valuable things lost in them. This includes magic! Can John Smith and Kevin Mage still get together and make a flametongue longsword on Friday nights? Why bother risking your life for it in a dungeon, then?

I've been a fan of folk still being able to make consumable items: potions, scrolls, etc. But the permanent magic items, those are tough to impossible to make.. and probably never by PCs because they're actively adventuring. If you want a belt of giant strength, you gotta quest for it. One of my tables just used downtime to research where one could find such a belt, and went on a whole sidequest to acquire it (getting a bunch of random sht along the way, ofc).
If those things CAN still be crafted as earlier mentioned, it's by professionals or legendary folk and they probably require some key rare ingredient.

I guess I'm against PCs crafting anything but scrolls and potions; maybe a wand since my wands have limited charges. But this objection is largely setting-based. If I were running Eberron, I'd probably allow crafting (though it takes a long time for the stuff PCs would usually wanted to get to crafting).

I guess the other part of the dislike of crafting whatever you want is based on my value for found magic:
I’ll often tailor item rolls to make sure the pcs get things that’ll be useable, but otherwise the items are what they are. I want to encourage flexible thinking, using what you have at hand. Players can get one idea stuck in their head and never want to deviate from it: “my rogue fights with a rapier and a hand crossbow.” Ok, but what if you find a really cool shortbow? I’ve had some players pass up so some things like that because they only want to fulfill that one static fantasy of their character… until someone actually points out “you know that shortbow would be/have been really useful in that fight, why isn’t the only dex-based character using it? It shoots chain lightning!”