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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 9324601" data-attributes="member: 4937">It adds up more than you might think.  I've had players from other tables complain that the magic mart was essential because without it, Wizards would have to burn so much XP that they would be a level behind the other classes at some point.  I'm not sympathetic.  Being able to choose your equipment is such a massive advantage that a party that has that advantage is effectively a level higher than one without it.It makes for very interesting world building if professional item crafters have figured out ways to reduce XP costs - doing your work under auspices astronomical signs, on certain special days on the calendar, in front of pious worshipers, stealing life and blood from others, making sacrifices, and so forth.Absolutely.  The penalty in AD&D was so great that it made no sense under the given rules why any swords +1 existed in the game universe.  At least in 3e there is some reason to think that if you offered a craft enough money, they'd be willing to make one for you.I think that the price itself is a strong indicator that the ingredients are hard to find.  These are implied to be rare metals, gemstones, arcane reagents, rare spices and incense, and so forth.  Maybe, but we did get an example recipe for a scroll of protection from petrification:1 oz giant squid sepia (standard ingredient in all spell scrolls!)1 basilisk eye (special ingredient)3 cockatrice features (special ingredient)1 scruple of venom from a medusa's snakes (special ingredient)1 large peridot (commodity)1 medium topaz (commodity)2 drams of holy water (commodity)6 pumpkin seeds (commodity)The commodity ingredients are not that different from the sort of things you'd expect to be material spell components, and these seemed to be wildly agreed to be available for purchase from the dealers in such things in larger towns.  The special ingredients imply a vigorous trade in monster parts could be engaged in by adventurers, and so you as an adventuring spellcaster or would be adventuring entrepreneur had good reasons to sample and store bits and pieces of any monster you killed in the hopes it would be useful later.  It's not hard to imagine that the same sort of places selling live spiders to wizards, bits of cobweb, Sulphur and bat dung, can also supply pumpkin seeds and perhaps cockatrice feathers, lion's hearts, sweat from a fire giant, or troll's blood or that if you brought in a load of cockatrice features, gargoyle horns, or vials of ogre magi blood that someone would be willing to buy them.  A description of the basic formula for concocting a potion on page 116 of the 1e DMG should look familiar to any 3rd player, and the purpose of "the special ingredient" seems to be to allow the DM to cap and adjust which potions can be manufactured, but would otherwise be included in the formula for cost and time to manufacture.  The above recipe is implied by the text to be exceptionally complex, as other text suggests it's normal to just have one or two special ingredients.Yes and no.  The actual enchanting process can be done anywhere you can prepare and cast spells, but each enchanted item requires a masterwork version of the item be specially prepared and that requires a workshop and suitable tools if you are to do the work yourself for most craft skills.  Additionally, the different feats add additional restrictions.  For example, Craft Magical Armor also requires a character have "a heat source and some iron, wood, or leatherworking tools" and Brew Potion requires "a level working surface and at least a few containers in which to mix liquids, as well as a source of heat to boil the brew".   In both cases a small workshop is implied by the text, though 3e generally leaves this up to the GM and does go the opposite direction of the 1e text in encouraging would be crafters rather than discouraging them.  But the point I'm making here is that as I read the 3e text I read rules that actually support the world as described by 1e AD&D play, which is not the world described by the 1e AD&D rules.  What I don't read is a world that has magic marts in it either by necessity or inevitable logic.  And I do think both worlds end up with dealers in magical goods being more likely to have a jar of cockatrice feathers or a vial of troll's blood on hand than they are to have a Quiver of Ehlonna or a Girdle of Giant's strength for sale.  Again, under both rules, I see a world where it's much more likely that the ingredients to casting spells or making magic items are commoditized than the magic items themselves.  And that's how I've always played D&D from pretty much the day I read the 1e DMG.</blockquote>

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