one of my players have built there own greatsword and glave, but now once they built up some more money they intended to enchant it to be a flame tongue equivalent of those weapons, i know crafting these weapons from scratch would cost 2000gp and 10 work weeks to complete but what if they hired someone to enchant it for them, would it still cost the full 2000 and 10 work weeks? would it cut the cost and time in half or more due to the base weapon themselves already being made?
The DMG and Xanathar’s Guide both provide some guidelines for purchasing magic items, but it’s not easy for a character to find a specific item due to 5e’s design philosophy that magic items be quite rare and hard to come by. Commissioning a specific item from a magical craftsman (assuming they can find such a craftsman) sounds like a reasonable thing to allow though! Here are my thoughts on it:
For price, I would increase the cost by 20-50%. No one sells the stuff they create at cost. They want to earn a profit.
For time, it would depend on the size of the business. If it’s just a single craftsman, yeah, I’d have it take the whole ten weeks. However, several people can work on the item at the same time, reducing the total time required. Two people would take five weeks, three people would take three and a third, etc. Use your best judgment on how many people could reasonably work on the item at once. A ring might only be able to have one worker at a time, but plate armor could be worked on by three or four. If I were ruling that the craftsman had assistants to help reduce the waiting time, I’d definitely put the price increase closer to the 50% end. Assistants means more people who need to be paid!
That they already have the base item won’t make a significant difference in cost or time, unless the base item is super expensive like plate armor (most people rule that the “2000gp” price is only for the magic parts and that the base item need still be paid for separately; 20gp for a glaive is negligible against 2000gp and I’d ignore it, but plate armor’s 1500gp price tag should be paid attention to).
one of my players have built there own greatsword and glave, but now once they built up some more money they intended to enchant it to be a flame tongue equivalent of those weapons, i know crafting these weapons from scratch would cost 2000gp and 10 work weeks to complete but what if they hired someone to enchant it for them, would it still cost the full 2000 and 10 work weeks? would it cut the cost and time in half or more due to the base weapon themselves already being made?
Dependent on you and the NPC that they are dealing with. The cost could be offset due to quests given and completed, as a payment for any number of favors earned, because the NPC has a crush on the character, or any other reason that you think is valid. The timing would be dependent on what else the NPC was doing, how many other people may be available to help, what kind of supply chain that the NPC has available to them, whether any components are rare and require time and effort to track down, or any other reason that you think is valid to lengthen or shorten the time.
Basically, you've just been given a hook for that player to work on quests to get a pretty sweet weapon. They are invested in making it happen. Work with them to make the experience epic and it will be a story that they'll remember. Make the payoff for both the player and the NPC be something that would be worth it, which means that you'll have to flesh out the NPC and their motivations more so that you understand why they're doing what they're doing.
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hello new DM here
one of my players have built there own greatsword and glave, but now once they built up some more money they intended to enchant it to be a flame tongue equivalent of those weapons, i know crafting these weapons from scratch would cost 2000gp and 10 work weeks to complete but what if they hired someone to enchant it for them, would it still cost the full 2000 and 10 work weeks? would it cut the cost and time in half or more due to the base weapon themselves already being made?
The DMG and Xanathar’s Guide both provide some guidelines for purchasing magic items, but it’s not easy for a character to find a specific item due to 5e’s design philosophy that magic items be quite rare and hard to come by. Commissioning a specific item from a magical craftsman (assuming they can find such a craftsman) sounds like a reasonable thing to allow though! Here are my thoughts on it:
For price, I would increase the cost by 20-50%. No one sells the stuff they create at cost. They want to earn a profit.
For time, it would depend on the size of the business. If it’s just a single craftsman, yeah, I’d have it take the whole ten weeks. However, several people can work on the item at the same time, reducing the total time required. Two people would take five weeks, three people would take three and a third, etc. Use your best judgment on how many people could reasonably work on the item at once. A ring might only be able to have one worker at a time, but plate armor could be worked on by three or four. If I were ruling that the craftsman had assistants to help reduce the waiting time, I’d definitely put the price increase closer to the 50% end. Assistants means more people who need to be paid!
That they already have the base item won’t make a significant difference in cost or time, unless the base item is super expensive like plate armor (most people rule that the “2000gp” price is only for the magic parts and that the base item need still be paid for separately; 20gp for a glaive is negligible against 2000gp and I’d ignore it, but plate armor’s 1500gp price tag should be paid attention to).
Dependent on you and the NPC that they are dealing with. The cost could be offset due to quests given and completed, as a payment for any number of favors earned, because the NPC has a crush on the character, or any other reason that you think is valid. The timing would be dependent on what else the NPC was doing, how many other people may be available to help, what kind of supply chain that the NPC has available to them, whether any components are rare and require time and effort to track down, or any other reason that you think is valid to lengthen or shorten the time.
Basically, you've just been given a hook for that player to work on quests to get a pretty sweet weapon. They are invested in making it happen. Work with them to make the experience epic and it will be a story that they'll remember. Make the payoff for both the player and the NPC be something that would be worth it, which means that you'll have to flesh out the NPC and their motivations more so that you understand why they're doing what they're doing.