What would be the ramifications of this?

[frankthedm]

It seems reasonably on the face of it, but I've hesitated before saying yes. I'm assuming there's a good reason it's set up like it is, and I want to explore the ramifications of the change before doing anything.

The only thing I can thin of is that if the Wizard has to pay all the XP himself, it probably reduces the number of items being made. Are there any other factors I may be missing?

You were right on the money. The XP costs come from the creator to balance out the fact the party has more magical potency. The wizard who kits his party out and lags behind a level has not made his party any weaker, the weight the wizard with the missing level can no longer pull is now being carried by the person who is wearing the items he made. Plus the 3.5 XP system allows him to catch up faster.

The XP costs ensure he does not go overboard and also balances out the item creation feats since any given creator will only be willing to spend so much XP. If you allow others to pay the costs, you have quadrupled [or more] how much the item creation feats will be used.

I could see allowing character driven reasons for occasionally allowing this, like a fighter’s ancestral weapon, but I’d recommend not allowing it otherwise or at least making the XP costs 4 for 1 if not worse.

I don’t think there is an option to split the costs when casters collaborate. Whoever is the creator pays from the way this looks.

Creating Magic Items
To create magic items, spellcasters use special feats. They invest time, money, and their own personal energy (in the form of experience points) in an item’s creation.
Note that all items have prerequisites in their descriptions. These prerequisites must be met for the item to be created. Most of the time, they take the form of spells that must be known by the item’s creator (although access through another magic item or spellcaster is allowed).
While item creation costs are handled in detail below, note that normally the two primary factors are the caster level of the creator and the level of the spell or spells put into the item. A creator can create an item at a lower caster level than her own, but never lower than the minimum level needed to cast the needed spell. Using metamagic feats, a caster can place spells in items at a higher level than normal.
Magic supplies for items are always half of the base price in gp and 1/25 of the base price in XP. For many items, the market price equals the base price.
Armor, shields, weapons, and items with a value independent of their magically enhanced properties add their item cost to the market price. The item cost does not influence the base price (which determines the cost of magic supplies and the experience point cost), but it does increase the final market price.
In addition, some items cast or replicate spells with costly material components or with XP components. For these items, the market price equals the base price plus an extra price for the spell component costs. Each XP in the component costs adds 5 gp to the market price. The cost to create these items is the magic supplies cost and the base XP cost (both determined by the base price) plus the costs for the components. Descriptions of these items include an entry that gives the total cost of creating the item.
The creator also needs a fairly quiet, comfortable, and well-lit place in which to work. Any place suitable for preparing spells is suitable for making items. Creating an item requires one day per 1,000 gp in the item’s base price, with a minimum of at least one day. Potions are an exception to this rule; they always take just one day to brew. The character must spend the gold and XP at the beginning of the construction process.
The caster works for 8 hours each day. He cannot rush the process by working longer each day. But the days need not be consecutive, and the caster can use the rest of his time as he sees fit.
A character can work on only one item at a time. If a character starts work on a new item, all materials used and XP spent on the under-construction item are wasted.
The secrets of creating artifacts are long lost.

 

[Old Drew Id]

Also, as long as you are allowing this, there's no sense in limiting it to "willing" donors. It seems like this provides an easy explanation for why evil wizards need to kidnap village maidens and such. They need the victim to donate XP for magic items that they are crafting.

Of course, this should probably be noted as an [evil] act, so the PC's don't get any bright ideas about what to do with captured kobolds...

 

[EyeontheMountain]

Overall I would say the allowing otehrs to contribute xp on a 2:1 basis is probably fair, though it is necessary to decide how and when they do so. At the beginning is best for the donator, and a bit each day is worst, as they have to wait around.

Another consideration is the amount of crafting that will take place. If there is a low amount of crafting, say less than 1% of the xp of the characters involved) then it is not really a big concern any way it is handled. In otehr wiords, if the cleric or mage makes a wand or such every couple of levels, the xp cost will not affect the game at all. Except on those rare occasions where the 1% drop leaves the wizard a lower level for an encounter or two.

But if the characters are addicted to crafting, and the wizard could easily end up 1-2 levels behind the rest of the party, then something needs to be done, in my opinion, and allowing others to pay the xp cost is a good idea (especially if the wizard is missing out on adventuring time as well, which puts him/her further behind.) In this case I wuld probably ahve the other person pay at a 2:1 ratio to reflect that there are advantages to a wizard doing it, and the process of leeching xp is flawed. As for tiem, I would probably suggest the end of the process. If they don't get back in time, the item is ruined. That should limit adventuring while the items are being constructed.

Of course when I say wizard above it means any item-creating character.

 

[EyeontheMountain]

Boots of spider-climb are just an item.
Boots of spider-climb, usable by good-aligned elf rangers only, is an item with a story behind it. (In this case, they were pirate boots designed for the party pirate, useful for scrambling around the rigging of a ship without fear of falling.)

This is one of my arguments against allowing others to use xp for crafting. Personalized items that are seen as cheaper just because they are personalized, especially with alignment, class and race descriptors.

Just out of curiosity, how much of a price break did the above character get? 30% more?

To me, the restrictions should actually raise the price of an item, especially alignment ones, as it prevents most player's enemies from gaining use of the items, if captured, or sold.

Racial and class is a bit more allowable, to my way of thinking, if the item is very very closely linked to the race and class. In the above example, it would not be, IMC.

 

[Shellman]

Donating XP

If I remember correctly, I believe there a couple alternate systems for magic item creation.

I don't remember the specific books, but I think they are all published by WoTC. Anyways, I think the alternate systems are:

Craft Points: all characters earn a specific number of craft points at each level to apply during item creation. It requires more characters to place skill points into a craft skill. There are other requirements but I don't recall the book.

XP poole: I heard there was a system for all party members to donate a specific amount of XP. Something like 10% of all party members XP is set aside into a XP poole for item creation.

 

[geosapient]

If I remember correctly, I believe there a couple alternate systems for magic item creation.

I don't remember the specific books, but I think they are all published by WoTC. Anyways, I think the alternate systems are:

Craft Points: all characters earn a specific number of craft points at each level to apply during item creation. It requires more characters to place skill points into a craft skill. There are other requirements but I don't recall the book.

XP poole: I heard there was a system for all party members to donate a specific amount of XP. Something like 10% of all party members XP is set aside into a XP poole for item creation.

Craft points is either Complete Adventurer or Unearthed Arcana. Most likely Unearthed as our DM doesn't like to use that book anymore.