I agree with @Davavor, it could be just as easy as adding new magical potions that fill in the list of what was lost between the 2017 and 2019 Artificer and use the already implemented rules on magical item creation.

Grizzlebub... So a rock cannot be used as a hammer. A chair is still a chair and cannot be used as a shield... Two wires linked to a power source like a bunch of batteries isnt making a soldering gun... You really need to stop thinking as strict ruling man otherwise the game is way too limiting... Even with rules as written... Ill show the one rule you seem not to understand or simply ignore...

improvised weapons

Sometimes characters don't have their weapons and have to attack with whatever is at hand. An improvised weapon includes any object you can wield in one or two hands, such as broken glass, a table leg, a frying pan, a wagon wheel, or a dead goblin.

Often, an improvised weapon is similar to an actual weapon and can be treated as such. For example, a table leg is akin to a club. At the DM's option, a character proficient with a weapon can use a similar object as if it were that weapon and use his or her proficiency bonus.

An object that bears no resemblance to a weapon deals 1d4 damage (the DM assigns a damage type appropriate to the object). If a character uses a ranged weapon to make a melee attack, or throws a melee weapon that does not have the thrown property, it also deals 1d4 damage. An improvised thrown weapon has a normal range of 20 feet and a long range of 60 feet.

Oh right the word weapons in there stops you from doing anything else then hit someone on the head with that broken chair leg. Lets be honest... I really dont think it is far fetched for your artillery or your alchemist to use whatever he finds as suitable improvised equipment.

If you really dont understand how to improvise stuff then i dont see what else i can say to you. Ill just tell you good luck with your problem...

To me the item thing is not a bad thing it forces that class to think otherwise. As for losing everything... I beg you to reread the artificer cause i still see 2 or 3 things you can do even without your tools.

@DnDPaladin, please keep this cordial and polite. Your verbage is antagonistic and condescending. While I have merely explained my situation and how my GM and I interpret the rules you seem to only present house rules and what would be acceptable at your table.

You have your views on the rules and you are more than willing (and encouraged) to interpret them how your table sees fit.

And yes, that rule is for improvised weapons, not improvised artisan tools. I can definitely see how you could be allowed to use improvised artisan tools, and with enough roleplay I might even allow it at my table, but again, that is all house rules.

And I would encourage you to read my posts. You seem to only scan them. I understand at higher levels you get class features that aren't locked by requiring artisan tools, I have even said as much. My entire discussion has been about my current *at level 1* scenario, which at level one with no artisan tools an Artificer *has nothing* that doesn't require them. 

I think the main thing to course correct this conversation is the point that while this is still in draft mode, we should make effort to look at the details from many angles not only from the way you play @DnDPaladin.

For example @Grizzlebub carefully never said whether he or his DM really are rules lawyers, maybe his DM is encouraging the Improvised RAI crafting. But his situation still points out a circumstance that Some other rules lawyer may find themselves in and I do think it is our job as playtesters to just point this out to WoTC.

My suggestion reading over this latest part of the thread would be to add to Tools of the Trade, you need Tools for any spellcasting but can use improvised tools for anything not requiring consumables. With a one short rest crafting time.

sense we are on the topic i would like to point out that arcane armament has a similar restriction. "Starting at 5th level, you can attack twice, rather than once, whenever you take the Attack action on your turn, but one of the attacks must be made with a magic weapon, the magic of which you use to propel the attack.". i dont recall if it was brought up before and seems close to topic but if your in a campaign where a magic sword isn't readily available by lvl 5 it could be an issue.

that being said yes we do get an infusion for a magic weapon but not everyone may be cool with burning one for it. alternatively some gms may not like the +1 infusions and dis allow it but that's more speculative. a simple solution would be a common magic weapon like you see in i be-leave xanathars guide to everything

I think the intention with Arcane Armament was to reflavor more common features like Extra Attack to make them feel more unique and see how the community responds to that.  Personally, I don't like it, all it does is make a slightly worse version of the feature that only pretends to add flavor without really doing anything.  Maybe that's harsh, but *shrug*.

to me it feels like the kind of thing that will ether be ignored or a real if possibly temporary thorn. the scenario where you lose your equipment now goes as followed you have no tools you magic is gone. and you have lost your magic weapon and lose your extra attack.  your power in a situation where your captured or imprisoned is very limited; even if you got a sword you may not have time to infuse it in your situation.

i personally would be fine with it IF there was a benefit to actually running the risk of losing your extra attack. like maybe the magical attack could be made at a range (yes i know ranged build its already given)

--------here for posterity but evidently false----------------

BUT (just had a thought) maybe thats the secret of the extra attack could  arcane armament's line " the magic of which you use to propel the attack" be interpreted to imply it bypasses the loading property? it sounds more like its launching a burst of magic and not actually striking with the weapon in question(in my opinion). there fore being made of magic and not a physical projectile it bypasses the feat requirement for running crossbows or guns. thoughts?

This has already been discussed by Jeremy Crawford, Arcane Armament does not ignore the properties of a weapon, if it did then it would say so. Basically that section you bolded is fluff.

Quote from Grizzlebub >>

This has already been discussed by Jeremy Crawford, Arcane Armament does not ignore the properties of a weapon, if it did then it would say so. Basically that section you bolded is fluff.

 ah shame i thought i was onto something there

While I love the over idea of the artificer neither of these really fit the ultimate artisan archetype that I want to play when making an Artificer. Except for their two very limited boosts from archetypes they don't actually make anything better than anyone else in the game. While the Tool Expertise is nice I haven't really seen anywhere it would come into play, except for thieve's tools. Check's aren't required for making things so it's completely wasted for most of them. Interestingly I think Artificer's are suddenly the best Sailors and Teamsters in the game since vehicle proficiency is listed as a tool currently. :)

I'd also like to see a more MacGyver like archetype who specializes in making mundane temporary items on the fly using improvised tools and supplies. I know that's what their spells are supposed to be like but the limited list and number of castings really hinders their ability to pull this off.

What I'd like to see implemented into the base of the class is something like this.

Crafting Montage (1st Level)
As part of a short or long rest the Artificer can make as much progress crafting mundane gear and items as most normal artisans can in a week. If the artificer has access to their tools, materials to be crafted equal in GP value to craft the item, and a work space suitable to the work they can roll a Tool kit check and make progress toward the finished product in GP value equal to their roll.

This would give their tool expertise an actual use beyond the rare check for role playing quality of work. It also allows them a chance to use their crafting skills more in games with little to no downtime.

Reverse Engineer Item (5th, 10th, 15th, 20th)
During a long rest by experimenting with and taking apart or otherwise doing an in depth examination of a magical item the Artificer has a chance to learn the crafting formula for that item. The resulting formula can be added to the artificer's repertoire for free but due to the personal nature of the notations and diagrams it is only usable by the artificer who discovered it. This comes with a certain amount of risk as the experimentation can permanently destroy the item being examined.

I'd suggest a set of Toolkit DC's based on the rarity of the item that would have to be passed to learn the formula. Pass or fail the destruction chance for the item would be 5th level:100%, 10th level: 50%, 15th level: 25%, and 20th level: 0%. The artificer can attempt to use their Infusion Items as a source to learn a more permanent formula at a DC one step higher than the normal item due to the experimental and unstable nature of them.

Again this would let the artificer get a use out of their Tool Expertise and give them a unique ability to learn how to make magical items at the risk of the cost in existing magical items. This reduces the current DM fiat required to learn item formulas and lowers the exponential GP cost of purchasing them as their rarity increases. I'd still suggest that Legendary Items can't be learned using this technique.

Arcane Manipulation (10th level)
The Artificer learns how to emulate the spell requirements of crafting a magical item. Doing so requires a special material component worth (100 GP?) per level of each spell being emulated added to the normal costs of creating a magical item. This also adds to the time required to craft the magical item. 

This would let them eventually craft any item without the aid of other casters. The extra cost would have to be balanced vs the rarity and usefulness of the item.

Personally I'm a big fan of not requiring rolls for crafting. I've been a part of sessions in 3.5e and Pathfinder where a majority of the party sits around and watch a player roll for each work day / week and then proceed to do math calculations to see how much "golds worth" of progress was completed. It is not fun.

Whenever I GM a game, I always ask myself "is a roll necessary in this situation?" If I deem that it is not, I don't ask for a roll. For me, rolls are not necessary for crafting (mundane or magical) items under normal situations, and definitely not on a short or long rest basis. 

Aruba... Im not condescending at all. You read it as such. Such is called interpretation.

But if we follow the rules as written not as intended which is what i follow... Then most of what he said he did or didnt do, do not work at all... As for him not being rules lawyer.... Isnt he the one saying the rules forbid him for doing simple stuff ? Following his reasoning then it means no civilisation can ever grow without proper tools because without tools they cant create tools. Which is non sense. If he wants to play non sense because it make sense to him fine by me. But dont say a class should have something when its clearly his dms fault and his that the class do not work.

And by the way... Improvised weapons does say you can improvise tools... But apparently because of one single word he cant use it.

As for alchemical stuff. I do agree with it all. But i have to wonder... Isnt a transmutation wizard already an alchemist and they can have humonculus as a familiar with the familiar spell.

This is why i dont really like the alchemist to begin with. Hes too much like the wizard.

For people interested in some of the design choices jeremytalks more about the higher level abilities here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9gbHCQHWk0

Interesting things to note:

Looks like arcane armementis going to be moved to a subclass.

Spell storing if enough people request it he says they will be able to move it to lower level 

The reason for not giving more attument slots before 20th is because of the spell infusions giving more attunement equivalent items without needing an attuenment slot.

Quote from DnDPaladin >>

But if we follow the rules as written not as intended which is what i follow... Then most of what he said he did or didnt do, do not work at all... As for him not being rules lawyer.... Isnt he the one saying the rules forbid him for doing simple stuff ? 

Antagonism aside, I'm not sure where your comment on "most of what he said he did or didn't do, does not work at all" comes from.

Further, I am not sure your definition of what a Rules Lawyer is aligns with mine. Specifically if you are implying that merely following the rules of the game is a Rules Lawyer. Would you say that a player or GM that only lets their character sneaks attack once a turn is a Rules Lawyer? Or what about a Wizard that didn't cast a spell because they lacked the Consumable Material Components required to cast said spell?

It is up to the GM to choose which rules they enforce and there are guidelines, but in this discussion we are Theory Crafting. And when discussing a class it kind of requires us to discuss said rules that affect said class. None of us are GMs during this conversation, and as such, we cannot choose which rules to currently enforce, we can merely discuss the rules as they are written and intended.

We can always preface what we would allow at our tables, but that is separate from what is written within the rules themselves. 

Quote from DnDPaladin >>

Following his reasoning then it means no civilisation can ever grow without proper tools because without tools they cant create tools. Which is non sense. If he wants to play non sense because it make sense to him fine by me. But dont say a class should have something when its clearly his dms fault and his that the class do not work.

And by the way... Improvised weapons does say you can improvise tools... But apparently because of one single word he cant use it.

 
Me stating that as written an Artificer requires Artisan Tools (at level 1) to cast spells and utilize Magical Tinkering is not a debate, it is in the rules. Now at level two what an artisan can use as a spell focus for the Spellcasting class feature does expand to include infused magical items. It expands even further at level 3 for the Artillerist to include Magical Rods, Staves and Wands. But this discussion originated for a very specific scenario that occurs at level 1.

Again, me stating that to craft artisan tools you need a set of artisan tools is again, not a debate, it is in the rules. For the second time in this thread, however: Would I allow someone to craft artisan tools using improvised tools. Yes. But again, you choose to ignore that and instead insult me, my GM and anyone who disagrees with you. 
 
It isn't about using "one single word". Rules that apply to specific set of objects (Improvised Weapons) do not apply to a different set of objects (Improvised Artisan Tools). And I've read that section of rules that you threw at me, did you? No where does it say in the improvised weapons that you can improvise tools. 

That being said, which I assume you continuously ignore, if a GM allows someone to use improvise tools, then that is their prerogative (and I would more than likely allow it). However, when play testing a class we should view it from a non-homebrew mentality.

Notice

This will be the last time I comment on one of your posts, I already asked for you to please keep this cordial and polite and it is obvious that you are incapable of such discourse. If DnDBeyond allowed for me to block people you would be blocked.

The longer threads like these go on the farther away from being critiques they become. The people happy with the class are out playing it having a blast and not motivated to write paragraphs on why that is. Meanwhile, a few people unhappy with the class are writing response after response and spitballing ideas, many of which are based on a singular and subjective wish; their ideal experience (which they could do better with ‘x’ class.) 

Here’s my ‘love the class’ take on the Artificer Alchemist:

Flavor! So much flavor to add! I’ll write in my personal flavor additions, but they only scratch the surface. Each person could take spellcasting in a different direction based on interest or aesthetic. If you’ve played D&D for awhile now you are probably getting tired of seeing the same spells being cast in the same way, now you can change that: Revivify becomes Defibrillator, Arcane Lock becomes Mechno-seal, or Glyph of Warding becomes a Trip Function Indicator. 

With magical tinkering you can take your support role further. Personally, I chose a bandolier of bio-mimic’d tinker toys as my ‘mundane objects’ but really you have thousands of iterations here. Imagine sending a swimming minnow tinker toy around the edge of a deep pool to see what is beneath, or marching a mechanical spider into a room to relay a message to the bad guys before a surprise attack from the back door. Imagination is the limit this, as well as many Artificer abilities, and that’s what irks me about the droning negativity from two or three frequent posters... if that spark isn’t there for you with this class, even a little, it’s not a class issue.

Infusions... to be stingy or giving? I’m at this crossroads now. I’m in a solid adventuring party but i’m just now learning everyone’s style and mechanics. Do I keep two infusions on my weapon or hand them out? For now I’m sticking with stingy. For the third infusion we are getting mileage out of the Many-Handed Pouch. Maybe in the future I’ll stick to a purely support role, but right now I’m doing well with a hand x-bow (arcane weapon and two infusions). I could probably set someone up the same way and sit back and watch them deal slightly more damage with my help... but my stingy streak is big.

My alchemical homunculus (AH) is probably liked more than myself in the party. I tend to buff a bit with her as I can and use the ‘help’ mechanic as much as possible. Just last session the little lady untied some prisoners and led them to escape while we distracted their captors. There is a lot of fun to be had with a tiny minion that has more than 1hp. I’ve made sure to customize my AH so that each salve and even its attack are separate acts (even more flavor!)

I’ve discussed with my DM on how we are going to handle potion making and with each week of downtime and some coin, I bring a better haul than a shopping trip around town. We are working on more rare potions now and it’s more flavor and more fun! You can take old potions and reskin them or work with your DM to make something your own. My health potions are just normal health potions, except they taste like the imbiber’s personal comfort food. You get the idea.

As for weapons I jumped onboard hard into crossbows with Crossbow Expert and Sharpshooter. I’ve flavored up the weapon (go figure) to be a repeating hand crossbow, making the crossbow expert feat make sense finally. My load time is during short rest when I add more bolts to the ammo belt. Arcane Armament plus the Crossbow Expert BA attack makes for good damage for a support, and having a better damage option for BA is great when you’re just grinding an enemy’s HP down. 

That’s it. I’m spent just writing this much down in defense of a subclass that shouldn’t need defending. This is a class/subclass that begs for you to work your imagination. If you NEED to be told what to do with the class, maybe it isn’t for you. I’ve only talked about my ideas here but I hope I pointed it out enough that this class, especially the subclass Alchemist, can be made totally different with just flavor. 

(Rider: I’ve earlier spoken out about possible changes to the Artillerist, but I have to admit that my opinion could easily change if I played that class. Example: Wands could be flavored into any number of things, right?)

@Porphy agreed, and I wanted to clarify that I am actually quiet happy with the current iteration of the Artificer, much more than 2017 version. Most of my discussions are use cases I have personally encountered and discussing alternatives.

Personally I don't think requiring a roll would be disruptive in this case, since it's the same time everyone else is rolling their Hit Dice healing anyway. I tend to play in groups that just allows us to do that ourselves without involving the other players or DM when we state we're taking a rest. Usually while everyone is refilling snacks or doing bio breaks.

I hadn't intended the Mundane Montage rolls to determine success or failure, just how much progress is made. This was to keep it flowing and give the Artificer a use for their Tool Expertise without completely overshadowing the Forge Cleric's ability to transmute completed items. We could instead give them an option to use a passive Tool Kit check, 10 + 2xProf + Int, to give them a fixed number for their progress. That way they could craft playing it safe for a certain amount, or they could roll to rush the process further and perhaps get more progress complete.

Anyone else have thoughts?

@porphy, the problem is not that we want our old experience to be back as is.. on the contrary we want the class to evolve get to something of its own.

i'm liking this iteration much better then the last and i truly dont want the class to be exactly what 3e was. it wouldn't work in the framework of the 5e. but playing the class and just shutting it isn't working either when you consider this was beta testing and beta testing requires actual feedback.

may i be the only one or not that thinks the alchmist right now, looks like the wizard transmuter, the point is, pretty much everything you said in your post could also be done by any class with either a feat (magic initiate taking find familiar), ritual casting (taking find familiar) or just be a wizard, sorcerer or warlock and take the find familiar spell. so whats the point of having a humonculi if all you are doing with it, is taking the help action which all familiars can do and using it has a half cover by interposing it between you and the shooter.

the only point of what we are expressing is for the class to be different from other classes.
to me, at this point, the class itself is much beter but it seems to have a hard time finding sub classes that aren't just iterations of other sub classes. like alchemist being only another kind of wizard transmutation. the artificer to me seem much more legit right now, but that said, the sub class seems to be split in between two themes and that is irking me.

all in all this new class seems unfocused right now.
that's what im saying.

Perhaps the replacement that Jeremy was discussing for Arcane Armament would be allow up to two infusions on a single item?