Sharing Item Creation Costs: Good or Bad?

[Benben]

As a possible house rule or series of feats, I'm wondering about letting other characters, other than the character with the creation feat, to pay for the XP costs of magic item creation.

Addendum: I would only allow willing creatures to sacrifice their XP in this manner.

Is this a good idea or a bad idea? Am I missing some delicate portion of party and game balance?

And in case my question was unclear here's an example of what I want to do:

Douglas the party wizard has the Craft Arms and Armor feat. Ming the Merciful Paladin wants an enchanted lance. Normally Douglas would pay for the XP costs of item creation, but under this house rule, Ming could pay for it instead.

 

[Hatchling Dragon]

I've sort of had this rule in effect, but I'd thought I had read it in 3E somewhere before, I believe listed as a potential optional rule. I never got a chance to use it as nobody in the group ever made anyone else an item, so I can't say how balanced it is

In my version I told players that if they did wish to 'participate in the creation ritual(s)' they'd have to take time out as if they were crafting the item themself. I may decide next time around to make that half of the time the Caster's devoting, as he's got to do most of the work anyhow.

I don't see this as being unbalancing, and it can semi-logicaly be explained as well. Give it a shot and see how it works out.

Hatchling Dragon

 

[Nifft]

I say it's a good idea. Lowers the burden on the party's spellcasters, and encourages participation by other party members in the creation process.

-- N

 

[frankthedm]

BAD

EXP is one of the major limiting factors to item creation costs.The wizard using his own EXP would add magical firepower to another PC at the cost of his own and thus outfitting an entire party would cost him too dearly to be worthwhile in his individual mind. He might be one or even two levels behind after loading up the party with magical gear, creating a balance where the magic power he would of had in spells is instead worn by the party. Letting others pay the EXP bill will result in a party MUCH heavier in magical gear as the person with the feat won't be reluctant to creat items for which time is his only cost. Each party member may be a few 1000's of EXP behind [thus not even being one level behind in the fights they encounter], but this would hardly be as balancing as making sure one person [who had to pay a feat ] becomes the bottle neck through which EXP has to flow out off.

 

[pogre]

I mostly agree with frankthedm, but it depends on the level of magic in your campaign. The Xp expenditures were designed as a limit.

edit: I would expect those who want the magic item to pony up the other costs of the item.

 

[Nifft]

Ah, yes. I'm running a high-magic, high-power campaign. Thus, my answer is that it's best to eliminate the bottleneck (in the name of fairness to players).

-- N

 

[arwink]

Is someone else paying the XP cost when the fighter types come back from the dead?

In part, one of the things I noticed about the creation feats is that they balanced out the fact that the front-line fighter was being raised from the dead at least five to six times more often at higher levels, and the XP cost was slowly dragging him down.

 

[Epametheus]

It's probably a bit imbalanced, but if the PCs want to work together like that, then why not? I've played characters who could make their magic items; the XP loss actually didn't faze me, since the penalty for getting killed is so much worse. It's not having money to acquire items that your character can't make herself that I found to be more limiting.

Some items actually require a cooperative effort to make, too (like the Robe of Archmagi, if I'm remembering right).

 

[Delemental]

If you do it, I say make them split the xp cost 50/50 instead of letting Ming (to use your example) pay the whole thing. And I think that Ming should have to spend as much time on the item's creation as Douglas the wizard.

The xp cost is a limiting factor, and I don't think that casters with item creation feats should get away scot-free. But I don't see a problem with splitting between two characters.

Hatchling Dragon mentioned seeing something about this in 3E. I think he may be referring to the Cooperative Experience Point Costs variant in the Epic Level Handbook. It's an option they put in there because epic magic items cost so many xp to create that no sane caster would try it. In that option the item's creator has to pay at least a quarter of the total.

 

[S'mon]

If I allowed it by letting the wizard draw life energy from someone else to imbue the item, I would double the XP cost. I think that would be reasonably balanced. As a rat bastard DM I'd probably charge the wizard a Feat, also.