I agree that there will never be a good "one-size-fit-all" option, because it depends heavily on the group. I agreed with your view of gold as a power limiting mechanism until 3.5 where WBL was a thing. In 5e, there is very few advice on how to distribute gold, and I don't think it's necessarily scarce in every campaign, unless one sticks to the random treasure table by challenge level and assure the heroes never get paid for their work, which leads to other problems.
D&D (2024) Uncommon items - actually common?
- Thread starter Ancalagon
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I agree that there will never be a good "one-size-fit-all" option, because it depends heavily on the group. I agreed with your view of gold as a power limiting mechanism until 3.5 where WBL was a thing. In 5e, there is very few advice on how to distribute gold, and I don't think it's necessarily scarce in every campaign, unless one sticks to the random treasure table by challenge level and assure the heroes never get paid for their work, which leads to other problems.
One tool proficiency is standard. Monks get one more and Artificers get two more.
Skilled is pretty much essential if you really want to be a crafter, crafting lots of different stuff. I agree some PCs will do that, but not many I don't think since it means giving up another feat like Alert, Musician, Magic Initiate or Tough.
Agreed, but the PC still needs the required proficiencies.
Micah Sweet
Level Up & OSR Enthusiast
I get it, but in this case logic trumps ease of use for me.
Micah Sweet
Level Up & OSR Enthusiast
Keep saying that. You use a fixed amount per spell, and provide a going rate for different commodities, modified by various factors so it isn't always the same in every community. It can and has been done in a D&D-style game. The designers just have to put a little effort into it.
Crimson Longinus
Legend
What logic? What is illogical about this?
jmartkdr2
Hero
And then list the price of those components on another table, adding an extra step and no decision points.
I just disagree. Could they come up with some sort of system? Not really, not one that would work for every campaign. For an RPG with a lot of strict built in assumptions? I guess. But D&D can be any technology from ancient Greece to noir magi-tech early 20th century and everything in between.
Telling me as a DM that you need 10 ounces of ruby dust for continual flame is completely meaningless. I have no idea how much that should cost in the real world much less in my bespoke campaign world that only bears a passing resemblance to early Renaissance technology.
Kinematics
Hero
Mostly agree. I do think the crafting rules are fairly generous, but only once you get past the barrier of the skills (and to a certain extent, time) needed. And that skills barrier is definitely troublesome.
I put together a party of characters to play around with how the new system worked. I'm running them through a campaign I've played before, just to see how things compare.
One thing I wanted to try was the crafting. What I encountered:
Characters
Rogue (human): Had to pick up the Skilled origin feat in order to get Arcana and a couple crafting tools. I was only really OK with this because the rogue was human, and thus got a second origin feat. I could have also gotten Arcana from the free human skill, but that by itself wouldn't have been enough for the tool proficiencies. Though Arcana (free) + Crafter origin feat would probably have been better, but would have sacrificed one more normal skill proficiency.
Barbarian (aasimar): Didn't get Skilled, so had no way to get either Arcana or any useful crafting tools. So the barbarian doesn't get to craft anything.
Monk (dragonborn): The designated crafter, taking the free tool proficiency from the class, plus the Artisan background for the Crafter origin feat, ending up with 5 crafting tool proficiencies. I think I got Arcana by customizing the Artisan background a bit, so that's slightly non-standard. Normally Arcana would not have been available, and this would have been a complete non-starter.
Sorcerer (tiefling): Got Arcana as a normal skill pick, but had no tool proficiencies. Ended up fudging the background to grab Tinker's Tools because I was already getting frustrated with the limitations.
Druid (elf): Got Arcana as a normal skill pick, even though I normally would not have taken that. Got Calligrapher's Tools from the background, and Herbalism Kit from the class itself. Mostly used to craft healing potions.
Backgrounds
On the default backgrounds, other than Artisan, the only crafting tools that are available are Calligrapher's Tools and Herbalism Kit, for scrolls and potions, respectively. No other background provides a tool proficiency for crafting weapons/armor/magic items/etc, aside from Carpenter's Tools which can make a club, greatclub, or quarterstaff (and Carpenter's Tools aren't listed as a viable tool for crafting magic items).
Essentially, if you don't get the Artisan background with its Crafter origin feat (or get the feat via being human), you aren't intended to be crafting anything other than consumables (scrolls or potions).
Crafting
For actual crafting, you quickly hit limitations on what you can make. For all the wrangling I did, only one character can make weapons and armor, and no character can make enspelled items. The monk can craft the weapons and armor, but can't prepare spells, and if you can't prepare the spell, you can't craft an enspelled item. The casters can prepare spells, but are not as easily set up as crafters, at least as non-human races.
And of course, coöperating in order to reduce crafting time is difficult, since multiple characters have to choose the same skills in order to do so. I happen to have two characters with Tinker's Tools, so can make Wondrous Items in half the time, but anything else will require the full crafting time, and that starts running into downtime issues.
If the game is not designed for downtime, you're not going to be crafting much regardless. An occasional week or two of downtime for a bit of crafting is not too hard to work in, but the DM definitely has to be on the same page. It's very easy for purchased adventures to have no real downtime assumed at all, because they're designed with the purpose of keeping the players in an ongoing adventure.
Having multiple characters with the same crafting tool proficiencies requires cooperation in the original character creation, and a deliberate sacrificing of versatility, simply for the sake of making crafting viable with more limited downtime.
Training Tool Proficiencies
Xanathar's provides a means of training tool proficiencies, and I'm working on that for the characters that don't get crafting options, but it's definitely slow going. A character needs 10 weeks of downtime (-1 week per +1 Int mod, which isn't a thing for most non-wizard characters), and that's going to be a long time. For the game I'm running through, even with extra downtime added in, they'll likely be in the level 8 to 10 range before they get their first crafting tool proficiencies.
Now, that's honestly not horrible compared to the non-existent crafting we had before, but it's definitely frustrating for characters to be left out of the system entirely for so long. Plus, if you get a Bastion, there are several facilities that can just automatically craft common and uncommon magic items starting at level 9. Since you have 4 special facilities at level 9, being able to craft your own custom items definitely feels like it has a lot more limited value by that point. And you need months' worth of downtime to make anything above uncommon rarity.
Homebrew Changes
Changes that I would consider (and I haven't tested, so caveat emptor) would be:
1) Be able to assist in crafting if you have some tool proficiency that's at least somewhat similar to the main crafter's. The main purpose would be to allow almost anyone to at least participate in attempts to craft, rather than be left out because they didn't specifically build for such a purpose.
| Main craft | Assist crafts |
|---|---|
| Alchemist's Supplies | Alchemist's Supplies, Herbalism Kit, Cook's Utensils |
| Calligrapher's Supplies | Calligrapher's Supplies, Painter's Supplies |
| Herbalism Kit | Herbalism Kit, Alchemist's Supplies, Cook's Utensils |
| Jeweler's Tools | Jeweler's Tools, Tinker's Tools, Glassblower's Tools |
| Leatherworker's Tools | Leatherworker's Tools, Weaver's Tools, Cobbler's Tools |
| Smith's Tools | Smith's Tools, Mason's Tools, Woodcarver's Tools, Carpenter's Tools |
| Tinker's Tools | Tinker's Tools, Jeweler's Tools, Glassblower's Tools |
| Weaver's Tools | Leatherworker's Tools, Weaver's Tools, Cobbler's Tools, Calligrapher's Supplies |
| Woodcarver's Tools | Woodcarver's Tools, Carpenter's Tools, Smith's Tools, Mason's Tools |
2) Rather than only Arcana, allow any of Arcana, Religion, or Nature to be a prerequisite for crafting magic items. They'd represent an understanding of Arcane, Divine, or Primal magics. That would mean any class would be able to choose such a skill if they desired.
3) Allow a reduction in the crafting time by 10% per +1 Int mod for the main crafter. I'd probably only consider this one in games where I knew that the amount of downtime would be low. If there's a lot of downtime, it's not really necessary. Still, it would be a nice side benefit for an otherwise mostly unused stat.
Micah Sweet
Level Up & OSR Enthusiast
The price of, say, diamond dust is not going to be the same from place to place or from time to time. Therefore, logic suggests that current market value should not be used to determine quantity of a special component needed.
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