The Rod of Seven Parts: Kauai Team OOC

[Ambrus]

He finally finds a small start-up tanner in the Gild district who offers to professionally tan whatever bits of spider Maelicent might want made into miscellaneous items, for a fee of 10 gp per spider.

There was the fur mantle I'd mentioned earlier. Ooh!... How about a pair of demonhide boots, with fur trim and chitin shin guards? Nothing says bada$$ like demonhide boots!

Math. One masterwork demonhide composite longbow should have a price of double masterwork (600 gp) plus the original weapon cost (100 gp), for a total of 700 gp. I think your math may be incorrect in that you've got each weapon costing more than that.

The entry for dragonhide armor in the DMG states: "Dragonhide armor costs double what masterwork armor of that type ordinarily costs, but takes no longer to make than ordinary armor of that type." It says nothing to the effect that only the masterwork cost is doubled. In fact the words "of that type" tell me that the base cost is likewise doubled. Otherwise why make mention of the type at all since all armor made into masterwork armor has a fixed cost? All of the math I did earlier for the value of the chitin assumes that the base and masterwork costs of the armors and weapons are doubled in full.

He's a mastercraftsman; the Craft rules are a bit convoluted in terms of silver pieces vs. time taken per item

The time taken is a matter of item cost combined with the item's crafting difficulty and the craftsman's skill. If you like I can try to help you figure it out. Say Halver, a master-craftsman, is a 5th level expert with maxed out skill ranks, 14 Int, masterwork tools and two skilled assistants then his total craft (weaponsmithing) bonus would be +16. A composite longbow cost 100 gp and has a craft check DC of 15 to make; by taking 10 he can consistently get a check result of 26 so he'd be better off purposefully increasing the check DC by +10 to go faster. Luckily demonhide armor "takes no longer to make than ordinary armor of that type; so we can simply ignore the added time to make mastercraft component of the bow. So if we multiply 26 x 25 we get 650; that's the number of copper pieces of the item's value completed in one day. Since an ordinary composite longbow costs 10,000 copper pieces then we divide 10k by 650 and we get 16 days; so just over two weeks. I don't mind going with your 1 week figure if you prefer though.

I have to admit now, that I did make a small error in my earlier calculations. I thought a craftsman had to pay half the cost of the product for raw materials but having reread the craft skill I discovered that the raw materials costs is actually only a third of the full cost. So the raw materials value of the chitin is in fact 4,386 gp rather than 6,579 gp. So selling the chitin at half price to Halver and Nickleby would net Mael 2,193 gp. Add to that the sale price of the skulls and soft tissues to the apothecary (100 gp) while subtracting the cost of the demonhide boots and mantle (20 gp), buckler and bow and the revised net profit is 1143 gp. Sound good?

One thing I want to confirm with you, are you hiring Halver to craft the items for you and you'll sell or keep them yourself? Or are you simply selling Halver the goods so he can manufacture and sell the finished product himself?

The latter. Mael has no interest in commissioning a bunch of armors and weapons he can't use simply to turn around and try selling them.

If you don't want to deal with him, let me know and Mal can go off hunting for someone else in the city. The guy's name is Sgt. Craig, and he's a human.

That's fine with Mael.

Forgot to reply to this...yes, for a flat 50 gp for each spider (or 100 gp total), Maelicent can sell the innards and soft tissues, skulls, etc, to an alchemist or an apothecary. Any of the temples would be interested in that stuff, as would the city's Tower of Xylla, the rough equivalent of the town morgue and magician's guild.

That sounds fine, though Mael would like to keep the fanged teeth from the skulls to use as studs for his helmet, bow-shaft, etc.

 

[CanadienneBacon]

Since an ordinary composite longbow costs 10,000 copper pieces then we divide 10k by 650 and we get 16 days; so just over two weeks. I don't mind going with your 1 week figure if you prefer though.

Thanks, but that was one instance where I looked at the formula to refresh my memory and said, "You know what? We're wanting to get on with the adventure, let's just call it a week." So a week it is.

I have to admit now, that I did make a small error in my earlier calculations. I thought a craftsman had to pay half the cost of the product for raw materials but having reread the craft skill I discovered that the raw materials costs is actually only a third of the full cost.

I saw that yesterday and privately decided not to mention it. I'd like to go with your earlier math where raw materials cost half. As I told Rhun yesterday in another thread, I'm doing a program through my church called 10 Brave Christians. For 30 days (and my church elected to do this during Lent), some of us are getting up daily at 5:30 am to read scripture, pray, and do some light journaling. Another part of the program calls for two hours of community service per week, one hour of fellowship and bible study per week, and one unsolicited good act per day. Yesterday I decided that for my good act for the day, every group I DM would get some DM love from me. So that's why it takes Halver only a week to make one item and he'll buy the raw materials for 1/2, not a 1/3.

Regarding whether the weapon cost is doubled, this may be a style issue, but I've always played it that only the masterwork cost is doubled and that the weapon cost is not. So that's the way I'd like to go on that, too. It'll mean you'll need to tweak your math, but you should come out the better for it, even if slightly. If you don't want to bother tweaking the math, then we can simply roll with your original computations.

 

[CanadienneBacon]

My husband is going out of town for three days next week, so I think today I'll take the day off. See you guys later.

 

[CanadienneBacon]

3 Find out about possible sources of information about the Law and Chaos conflict. Find out what it takes to access the dwarven temple library resources.

The two dwarven knights standing guard in front of the Temple of Stone's closed doors cross their halberds when it becomes clear that outsiders approach. Politely but quite firmly, one of the pair of dwarves speaks, "You may not cross the threshhold, lest you be dwarf, or a guest of Drendd." When Gamad lowers the hood of his cloak to reveal his heritage, the pair of knights both reflexively frown. One of them openly gawks but the other, the one who first spoke, is better mannered. "What manner of creature are you?" When Gamad offers an explanation, the knight shakes his head no. "You're no dwarf that I've ever seen, nor are you a guest of Drendd. Be you gone!"

4 Find places to buy and sell stuff. Will want to eventually get a 15 gp blank spellbook, and I might need to sell the short sword for 5 gp if I need to. Did the three thugs each have one?

Yes. A sap and a short sword each. And if they didn't originally, they do now. Voadam can find a spellbook to purchase down in the Rivermark. The gnome goodwife who sells it to him thinks he's a looker, so she charges only 10 gp.

5 Chat about the politics and lay of the land, if there is a map Voadam can get access to so that his knowledge geography can kick in that would be great.

Voadam can go down to the Pilots' Guildhouse's steerage down at the docks and look at their maps. Most of them are mostly related to the sand bars in the river, but there's enough of the outlying lands that Voadam can benefit from looking at them and will come away with a pretty good sense of both the city and the region.

6 Keep an eye out for others interested in the events surrounding the Rod.

No one shows up asking about or looking for the Rod.

 

[CanadienneBacon]

BRP2, you still haven't e-mailed me. I have some info to pass down to you but I don't want to use spoiler tags to do it. Pop off an e-mail to me, please.

 

[CanadienneBacon]

I've gone ahead and dropped BRP2 from the game, so we'll be forging on without Lewit. A post in the IC reflects this.

 

[Ambrus]

Regarding whether the weapon cost is doubled, this may be a style issue, but I've always played it that only the masterwork cost is doubled and that the weapon cost is not. So that's the way I'd like to go on that, too. It'll mean you'll need to tweak your math, but you should come out the better for it, even if slightly. If you don't want to bother tweaking the math, then we can simply roll with your original computations.

Whatever you decide timewise and moneywise is fine by me. I don't mind using my original numbers though if you'd prefer for me to run through them again to take into account your house-rules then I'll be happy to do so. My preference simply lies in having the calculations be correct and consistent. Just let me know your preference.

 

[CanadienneBacon]

Timewise, we're already settled on three days. Moneywise, let's roll with your original calculations.

 

[Ambrus]

Sounds good to me. Timewise, I was refering to the time it'll take the craftsmen to complete their work. Hopefully Mael will live long enough to claim the stuff.

 

[Voadam]

Sounds good to me. Timewise, I was refering to the time it'll take the craftsmen to complete their work. Hopefully Mael will live long enough to claim the stuff.

I haven't seen any signs of evil agents so we have plenty of time, I'm sure. I'll go apply for a library card while you deal with the demon bug bit leftovers.