Yeah they did confirm a Ebberon book in 2019 but I don’t exactly see it fitting so it may have been a mis announcement.
On the UA front I am Extremely disappointed. Whenever something is ready turned out to be just the Artificer for 7 months! I don’t understand why they wouldn’t want to hire some interns to run out some ideas and generate buzz and idea feedback from the community.
You are putting way too much emphasis on the rules as it relates to crafting. As the DM, you can adjust things to fit your campaign or how you see things. You do not need to follow everything in the PHB, DMG, or XGtE to the letter. The same goes for backgrounds. You are not locked into the skills, languages, tools, or anything else within backgrounds. You can modify them to meet your character's background or you can create your own. Nothing is stopping you from doing that except yourself.
Your spell battery is just a reworked version of the Infuse Magic feature from the 2017 Artificer UA. The problem with the your spell battery is that you are saying the spells are active when in reality they aren't. The way I see it, an active spell is a spell that has been prepared and you are sacrificing a spell slot to store into an item that anyone can use. You are just storing spells from the Artificer's spell list (after a long rest) into items. Additionally, the spells don't expire. So with your wording, an artificer could during a week of downtime store 7 cure wounds into 7 different items. There is no trade off. Additionally, the Artificer isn't using their Infused Item feature after every long rest.
Essentially, your spell battery idea is overpowered and broken. At least the Infuse Magic feature required the use of a spell slot and the spell only lasted a certain amount of time (even if I think the feature was limited and the infused spell time limit was too short).
The artificer, as a basic concept/character archetype, is The Crafty Guy. It specifically appeals to expressives and other players who are looking to inject their own ideas and personalities into the game - looking to express themselves. Johnnies, to use the old M:tG Timmy/Johnny/Spike triangle. The push from Spikes to get rid of the crafty fluff to make room for combat-centric punchy mechanical crunch goes against the core design intent of the class.
Yes, a DM can disregard the game RAW to run their game as they please (and will have to if they want to run artificers properly). Heh, doesn't mean both players and DMs more interested in the expressive than the competitive side of the game can't push back against the Spikes.
Insofar as Spell Battery being broken/bad? A'ight, cool. I threw it together off the top of my head as a quick example of doing the same thing as current SSI a different way, emphasizing single uses of many spells instead of a billion uses of one spell. Because folks seem to really, really, really want to give away all their own spellcasting to their allies, a'la Spell Conduit making the artificer unable to use their own spells for themselves. They can only put their spells into items, and only other people can use those items. That's super weird and I don't care for it, nor does it make a lot of sense to me that the artificer is not able to activate their own Conduit items.
If Battery is bad, oh well. I'm certain Wizards isn't tripping over themselves to use my ideas anywho, I'm simply discussing the basic ideas of possible re-interpretations of SSI/Infuse Magic/Conduit. Considering Infuse Magic was almost strictly a waste of spell slots the artificer didn't really have to spare, I'd honestly rather keep the current SSI than go back to Infuse Magic or give up my own abilities entirely a'la Conduit.
Suppose we'll see who's right in a couple of years. As well as how many people are going to keep the old UA version around. I mean hell, people still use the 9really, truly terrible) Revised Ranger rules; neither the 2017 nor 2019 UA Artificer is ever going to die.
You actually are right (if referring to my Spell Conduit a couple of day ago)
I used the terminology “a friendly creature within 30ft”, and I thought that included yourself. The Intent was that the Artificer could equally use the conduits, but could also pass around the items, if he had only one spell known of 3rd level would it be better to have him hold the Fireball Conduit or the Rogue the Haste Conduit.
Let me know if that changes opinion, it is RAI and always make those smaller detail mistakes.
I never said I like spell conduit. To be honest I don't care for it, as I am not thrilled in the direction that the powers at D&D took the Artificer after the 2017 UA release (even this one was extremely flawed). The Artificer is just like you said "The Crafty Guy", but instead of someone who actually craft things, their are turned into a spellcaster that can imbue items with magical properties after a long rest. I have no problems with the Artificer have the spellcasting ability, I just don't think that the extent that they expanded the spellcasting is the right direction of the class.
In regards to your spell battery and infuse magic, they are both flawed. Rework Infuse Magic to the below makes it more usable.
Spell Storing
At 3rd level, you gain the ability to channel your artificer spells into objects for later use. When you cast an Artificer spell (1st level or higher) with a casting time of 1 action, bonus action or reaction, you can increase its casting time to 1 minute. If you do and hold a nonmagical item throughout the casting, you expend a spell slot, but none of the spell’s effects occur. Instead, the spell transfers into that item for later use (if the item doesn’t already contain a spell from this feature).
Any creature holding the item thereafter can use an action, bonus action, or reaction (depending on the spell) to activate the spell (if the creature has an Intelligence score of at least 6). The spell is cast using your spellcasting ability. If the spell targets more than one creature, the creature that activates the item selects the additional targets. If the spell has an area of effect, it is centered on the item. If the spell’s range is self, it targets the creature that activates the item.
When you infuse a spell in this way, it must be used before the beginning of your next long rest. After that time, its magic fades and is wasted. You can have a limited number of infused spells at the same time. You gain additional spells stored when you reach certain levels in this class, as shown in the Spells Stored Column of the Artificer table (3rd-6th level 2 spells stored, 7th-11th 3 spells stored, 12th-16th 4 spells stored, & 17th-20th 5 spells stored).
The purpose of Spell Storing is that you can give the imbued items to other players or use it yourself. While yes you are using up a spell slot each time, but at least you can have spell ready to use without the need of components (as they were used to store the spell).
You guys have been so deprived by movies and video games where you take for granted that crafting is instantenous !
Crafting a set of full plate armor does take months ! So the real question is... Why is any of your knight having full plates ? Only kings who have both the time and the money should have it.
If anything your whole views are skewed by the fact that you want stuff now. While you completely forget that d&d as always been a simulator not a full blown instant gear fest like video games are.
Stop being stubborn about everything becoming a video game. Instead play the game for what it is... A simulator for survival.
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I am actually a fan of the Wondrous Invention feature of the 2017 Artificer UA. Text from the feature states... "When you gain a magic item from this feature, it reflects long hours of study, tinkering, and experimentation that allowed you to finally complete the item. You are assumed to work on this item in your leisure time and to finish it when you level up."
The instantaneous crafting is one of the reasons why I don't like the Infuse Item feature of the 2019 Artificer UA. There is no crafting, you just touch a nonmagical item after a long sleep and poof you have a magic item.
Marine the main iteration I want for Spell Storing is the spell slot is used when activated not when stored, whatever way that is delivered.
If used when stored you run Really high risk, you only have a very few spell slots and you are locking yourself out of them before combat, what if your Rogue got stunned and your spell never gets cast. What is a Artificer supposed to do in combat? Besides Crossbow or sit down and wait for his friends to finish the battle?
Well, since the next time we see the Artificer is likely to be in a book this is probably moot, but for the sake of throwing ideas out there:
Dedicated Crafter
When you take a short rest, you can spend your time crafting and achieve twice the amount of work you would normally accomplish; once you use this feature, you must finish a long rest before you can use it again. Additionally, whenever you take a long rest you may forgo regaining hit dice and spell slots to instead spend 2 hours of that time crafting. You cannot have any levels of exhaustion in order to make use of this feature.
Using nonmagical items, you can store an amount of spells with a cumulative number of spell slot levels equal to your Intelligence modifier; for example, if you have an Int modifier of three, you can store three 1st-level spells, one 2nd-level spell and two 1st- level spells, or one 3rd-level spell. Each item you use can only store one spell at a time, but you or your allies can use any number of these items, provided you instruct them on their use.
Yeah I like Mezzurah’s suggestion but it boils down to additional free spell slots equal to your Intelligence modifier right?
I wouldn’t mind giving an Artificer additional Spell slots above what a normal half caster gets. Maybe that is a level 5 feature for those subclasses that don’t get extra Attack, although I’d prefer it be on core as I don’t much like the magic subclasses so far. (Worst case at 2nd level the Artificer would have 5lvl1 slots, at 5th level would have 8lvl1+2lvl2 or 4lvl1+4lvl2, compared to a 4lvl1+3lvl2+2lvl3 on full caster, all of which seem fine for balance)
We can also change the fluff completely to “you create up to Int Mod items that replicates an effect from your spell list. If spent you can recharge or recraft these items on a long rest.” Just to help with the Tinkering feeling without calling it pure magic.
I am actually a fan of the Wondrous Invention feature of the 2017 Artificer UA. Text from the feature states... "When you gain a magic item from this feature, it reflects long hours of study, tinkering, and experimentation that allowed you to finally complete the item. You are assumed to work on this item in your leisure time and to finish it when you level up."
The instantaneous crafting is one of the reasons why I don't like the Infuse Item feature of the 2019 Artificer UA. There is no crafting, you just touch a nonmagical item after a long sleep and poof you have a magic item.
People are like that. They dont want to wait and have everything they need right away.
Thats an unfortunate side effect of video games where getting your best in slot gear is as simple as fighting a certain mob.
I strive for people to take downtimes.
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DM of two gaming groups. Likes to create stuff. Check out my homebrew --> Monsters --> Magical Items --> Races --> Subclasses If you like --> Upvote, If you wanna comment --> Comment
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One of the most common and pervasive DM tricks for cranking up the pressure is ensuring that characters know that every day they're not actively pursuing the plot, the BBEG is. Hell, it's hardly even a trick - it's just the DM figuring the BBEG is as interested in winning as the party is and giving them the chance to do just that if the team decides to take a year off to make armor. Time is precious. Nobody wants instant crafting, but the base rules for crafting more-or-less assume that only NPC craftsmen will do it.
One day of adventuring followed by a month of downtime is not how the game is played anymore at the vast majority of tables. If it is at your table? Awesome. Use the (incredibly rudimentary and poorly thought out) base crafting rules. Otherwise why keep carping on us over it?
Another possible way could be to tie it to progression in Artificer levels, like instead of Int modifier it could be "equal to your Artificer level divided by four"; that way, you'd end up with the same maximum number and have a very clear and strict progression to it.
I am actually a fan of the Wondrous Invention feature of the 2017 Artificer UA. Text from the feature states... "When you gain a magic item from this feature, it reflects long hours of study, tinkering, and experimentation that allowed you to finally complete the item. You are assumed to work on this item in your leisure time and to finish it when you level up."
The instantaneous crafting is one of the reasons why I don't like the Infuse Item feature of the 2019 Artificer UA. There is no crafting, you just touch a nonmagical item after a long sleep and poof you have a magic item.
I completely agree. 2017's wonderous invention, while it was limited (perhaps overly so) for balance reasons and the power of at-will selection of magic gear, was substantially better than the infusions mechanic. In fact, aside from the mechanical servant that doesn't really tie into the class at all, I had no complaints about the 2017 artificer.
One of the most common and pervasive DM tricks for cranking up the pressure is ensuring that characters know that every day they're not actively pursuing the plot, the BBEG is. Hell, it's hardly even a trick - it's just the DM figuring the BBEG is as interested in winning as the party is and giving them the chance to do just that if the team decides to take a year off to make armor. Time is precious. Nobody wants instant crafting, but the base rules for crafting more-or-less assume that only NPC craftsmen will do it.
One day of adventuring followed by a month of downtime is not how the game is played anymore at the vast majority of tables. If it is at your table? Awesome. Use the (incredibly rudimentary and poorly thought out) base crafting rules. Otherwise why keep carping on us over it?
then again, you get things like "let's just rush the BBEG castle !" where is the "he's too strong so we should go gather people to fight that guy/girl" no, players have came to the conclusion that instead of fighting "the good war" we should just wreck himdirectly and be done with it. it is that very thought that akes them stupid and doing the no downtime part. exemple... the bbeg want to start a war between two countries. do you really think it can happen in just a week. i literally have a whole time table set up. a timeline where i know where my villain will be at what time in order to make that war happen. my players diddn't start in the know of that plan, they only recently known about it. but players are afraid of being so late to the party that they literally decided to go wreck the bbeg castle and call it a day. but once they arrived their and realised the monsters there were unkillable because they dont have the right levels to do just that, they preffered to yell at me that i made something too difficult and unwinnable for them. that's the kind of players we have today. they cannot take defeat the right way nor can they understand thru story. all they want is to be the all mighty hero who wins it all.
i'm not talking about 1 group here... i'm talking about all of the group i have had in the last 20 years. and thats well over 15. because yes, i do play 3 games of D&D per week. thats 3 different groups. and that also includes adventurers league. i'll go far worse, in adventurers league you should take your time because when you are in competition in an epic, every points counts. yet everybody just strive to rush the story and try to finish it before the others, thinking thats how adventurers league works in competition. its not, the goal is to generate more points then others. and while one of my groups have finished in record time, they ended up being next to last in the competition.
the thing is... let's say you have 5 fighters in full plate in your group... would they all easily find a suitable full plate just because that's what they should be wearing ? the answer is no... your blacksmiths and workers in the NPC world, they need the downtime. so does your bbeg, he actively needs the downtime. look at LOTR, do you really think modor got to where it is a matter of days ? no it took months, years ! there is no BBEG capable of doing stuff in a day to day basis. if they want an army, they also need to equip that army and that takes months to do. that's why war is never as easy as, do me a sword in a day and i'll wage war against the other country.
also, you all forgot one single thing... blacksmiths are not alone in the their workshops. many of the blacksmiths of old were about 5 or 6. rarely did they ever work alone. in the book, they reference that by giving you, none of the complexity of having a maximum number of people working ont he project. that means you divide the time by 4 if four people works on your full plate. that's what it is. same with enchantments. say you want an enchantment, it takes a long time for that enchantment to stick to your weapons. thats why magic items are so rare. in any scenarios... you want things done right away, thats a problem, because nothing can be done right away.
exemple: you go to an enchanter, you ask him if he can make you that awesome rechargeable fireball throwing wand you want. he says he has none in stock, but it would take him about a month to do it. and it would cost you about 10,000gp worth of materials and works. do you really think its as simple as showing up there and buying whatever you want ? this is not a magical video game where everything is neatly placed for you to have what you need. it is a simulation of real world physics where your people need to actually do the work, otherwise your world suspend the belief.
that's why most of my players learns that magic items are rare and should be conserved for later purposes. this is one of the thing i hated in 3e... magic items were way too easy to get by and it was a video game festival where you would trade one magical item for another. or worse, heres 50 magical items and give me that legendary. in my games... nobody would accept such a trade, the legendary would be too much worth in the world. that was the more likely scenario. unless you want your players to be alienated by your weird ass economy who makes no sense.
i'll conclude on that last part... The Electrum is a lie !
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DM of two gaming groups. Likes to create stuff. Check out my homebrew --> Monsters --> Magical Items --> Races --> Subclasses If you like --> Upvote, If you wanna comment --> Comment
Play by Post Games --> One Shot Adventure - House of Artwood (DM) (Completed)
I agree with Paladin in this aspect, if you want to play a game where crafting is a player character mechanic you need to slow the timeline down for realism. The one change I make is I always let the party all help with any crafting if they want, the way I see it one has to own the tools and make the orders but anyone can follow the orders and help, meaning crafting time generally goes down by a factor of 5.
I think this is just one of those things that's going to be entirely at the hands of the DM. For my table, I am planning on having moments of extended downtime for the PCs (I'm having it right now that the BBEG is operating on information roughly equivalent to what the players have) but I've seen others where the DM has made it clear that the BBEG is operating nonstop, and if the players want to stop them from getting even more powerful and destroying the PC's allies, then they'd better keep up.
Yes I prefer 4-5 arcs to level 20 but usually each arc takes just a couple of days to a week, and crafting in between depending on the next BBEG.
I don’t usually have a BBEG last long unless he is a political one. Imagine if in the Avengers it took them a month to stop Loki or Ultron, instead have gaps between BBEGs.
Yeah they did confirm a Ebberon book in 2019 but I don’t exactly see it fitting so it may have been a mis announcement.
On the UA front I am Extremely disappointed. Whenever something is ready turned out to be just the Artificer for 7 months! I don’t understand why they wouldn’t want to hire some interns to run out some ideas and generate buzz and idea feedback from the community.
Eh, that's a little disappointing. I would have expected to see one last UA before putting it into a book, but eh, their call.
You are putting way too much emphasis on the rules as it relates to crafting. As the DM, you can adjust things to fit your campaign or how you see things. You do not need to follow everything in the PHB, DMG, or XGtE to the letter. The same goes for backgrounds. You are not locked into the skills, languages, tools, or anything else within backgrounds. You can modify them to meet your character's background or you can create your own. Nothing is stopping you from doing that except yourself.
Your spell battery is just a reworked version of the Infuse Magic feature from the 2017 Artificer UA. The problem with the your spell battery is that you are saying the spells are active when in reality they aren't. The way I see it, an active spell is a spell that has been prepared and you are sacrificing a spell slot to store into an item that anyone can use. You are just storing spells from the Artificer's spell list (after a long rest) into items. Additionally, the spells don't expire. So with your wording, an artificer could during a week of downtime store 7 cure wounds into 7 different items. There is no trade off. Additionally, the Artificer isn't using their Infused Item feature after every long rest.
Essentially, your spell battery idea is overpowered and broken. At least the Infuse Magic feature required the use of a spell slot and the spell only lasted a certain amount of time (even if I think the feature was limited and the infused spell time limit was too short).
The artificer, as a basic concept/character archetype, is The Crafty Guy. It specifically appeals to expressives and other players who are looking to inject their own ideas and personalities into the game - looking to express themselves. Johnnies, to use the old M:tG Timmy/Johnny/Spike triangle. The push from Spikes to get rid of the crafty fluff to make room for combat-centric punchy mechanical crunch goes against the core design intent of the class.
Yes, a DM can disregard the game RAW to run their game as they please (and will have to if they want to run artificers properly). Heh, doesn't mean both players and DMs more interested in the expressive than the competitive side of the game can't push back against the Spikes.
Insofar as Spell Battery being broken/bad? A'ight, cool. I threw it together off the top of my head as a quick example of doing the same thing as current SSI a different way, emphasizing single uses of many spells instead of a billion uses of one spell. Because folks seem to really, really, really want to give away all their own spellcasting to their allies, a'la Spell Conduit making the artificer unable to use their own spells for themselves. They can only put their spells into items, and only other people can use those items. That's super weird and I don't care for it, nor does it make a lot of sense to me that the artificer is not able to activate their own Conduit items.
If Battery is bad, oh well. I'm certain Wizards isn't tripping over themselves to use my ideas anywho, I'm simply discussing the basic ideas of possible re-interpretations of SSI/Infuse Magic/Conduit. Considering Infuse Magic was almost strictly a waste of spell slots the artificer didn't really have to spare, I'd honestly rather keep the current SSI than go back to Infuse Magic or give up my own abilities entirely a'la Conduit.
Suppose we'll see who's right in a couple of years. As well as how many people are going to keep the old UA version around. I mean hell, people still use the 9really, truly terrible) Revised Ranger rules; neither the 2017 nor 2019 UA Artificer is ever going to die.
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You actually are right (if referring to my Spell Conduit a couple of day ago)
I used the terminology “a friendly creature within 30ft”, and I thought that included yourself. The Intent was that the Artificer could equally use the conduits, but could also pass around the items, if he had only one spell known of 3rd level would it be better to have him hold the Fireball Conduit or the Rogue the Haste Conduit.
Let me know if that changes opinion, it is RAI and always make those smaller detail mistakes.
I never said I like spell conduit. To be honest I don't care for it, as I am not thrilled in the direction that the powers at D&D took the Artificer after the 2017 UA release (even this one was extremely flawed). The Artificer is just like you said "The Crafty Guy", but instead of someone who actually craft things, their are turned into a spellcaster that can imbue items with magical properties after a long rest. I have no problems with the Artificer have the spellcasting ability, I just don't think that the extent that they expanded the spellcasting is the right direction of the class.
In regards to your spell battery and infuse magic, they are both flawed. Rework Infuse Magic to the below makes it more usable.
Spell Storing
At 3rd level, you gain the ability to channel your artificer spells into objects for later use. When you cast an Artificer spell (1st level or higher) with a casting time of 1 action, bonus action or reaction, you can increase its casting time to 1 minute. If you do and hold a nonmagical item throughout the casting, you expend a spell slot, but none of the spell’s effects occur. Instead, the spell transfers into that item for later use (if the item doesn’t already contain a spell from this feature).
Any creature holding the item thereafter can use an action, bonus action, or reaction (depending on the spell) to activate the spell (if the creature has an Intelligence score of at least 6). The spell is cast using your spellcasting ability. If the spell targets more than one creature, the creature that activates the item selects the additional targets. If the spell has an area of effect, it is centered on the item. If the spell’s range is self, it targets the creature that activates the item.
When you infuse a spell in this way, it must be used before the beginning of your next long rest. After that time, its magic fades and is wasted. You can have a limited number of infused spells at the same time. You gain additional spells stored when you reach certain levels in this class, as shown in the Spells Stored Column of the Artificer table (3rd-6th level 2 spells stored, 7th-11th 3 spells stored, 12th-16th 4 spells stored, & 17th-20th 5 spells stored).
The purpose of Spell Storing is that you can give the imbued items to other players or use it yourself. While yes you are using up a spell slot each time, but at least you can have spell ready to use without the need of components (as they were used to store the spell).
You guys have been so deprived by movies and video games where you take for granted that crafting is instantenous !
Crafting a set of full plate armor does take months ! So the real question is... Why is any of your knight having full plates ? Only kings who have both the time and the money should have it.
If anything your whole views are skewed by the fact that you want stuff now. While you completely forget that d&d as always been a simulator not a full blown instant gear fest like video games are.
Stop being stubborn about everything becoming a video game. Instead play the game for what it is... A simulator for survival.
DM of two gaming groups.
Likes to create stuff.
Check out my homebrew --> Monsters --> Magical Items --> Races --> Subclasses
If you like --> Upvote, If you wanna comment --> Comment
Play by Post Games
--> One Shot Adventure - House of Artwood (DM) (Completed)
I am actually a fan of the Wondrous Invention feature of the 2017 Artificer UA. Text from the feature states... "When you gain a magic item from this feature, it reflects long hours of study, tinkering, and experimentation that allowed you to finally complete the item. You are assumed to work on this item in your leisure time and to finish it when you level up."
The instantaneous crafting is one of the reasons why I don't like the Infuse Item feature of the 2019 Artificer UA. There is no crafting, you just touch a nonmagical item after a long sleep and poof you have a magic item.
Marine the main iteration I want for Spell Storing is the spell slot is used when activated not when stored, whatever way that is delivered.
If used when stored you run Really high risk, you only have a very few spell slots and you are locking yourself out of them before combat, what if your Rogue got stunned and your spell never gets cast. What is a Artificer supposed to do in combat? Besides Crossbow or sit down and wait for his friends to finish the battle?
Well, since the next time we see the Artificer is likely to be in a book this is probably moot, but for the sake of throwing ideas out there:
Dedicated Crafter
When you take a short rest, you can spend your time crafting and achieve twice the amount of work you would normally accomplish; once you use this feature, you must finish a long rest before you can use it again. Additionally, whenever you take a long rest you may forgo regaining hit dice and spell slots to instead spend 2 hours of that time crafting. You cannot have any levels of exhaustion in order to make use of this feature.
And again, moot for the reasons discussed, but:
Spell Storing
Using nonmagical items, you can store an amount of spells with a cumulative number of spell slot levels equal to your Intelligence modifier; for example, if you have an Int modifier of three, you can store three 1st-level spells, one 2nd-level spell and two 1st- level spells, or one 3rd-level spell. Each item you use can only store one spell at a time, but you or your allies can use any number of these items, provided you instruct them on their use.
Yeah I like Mezzurah’s suggestion but it boils down to additional free spell slots equal to your Intelligence modifier right?
I wouldn’t mind giving an Artificer additional Spell slots above what a normal half caster gets. Maybe that is a level 5 feature for those subclasses that don’t get extra Attack, although I’d prefer it be on core as I don’t much like the magic subclasses so far. (Worst case at 2nd level the Artificer would have 5lvl1 slots, at 5th level would have 8lvl1+2lvl2 or 4lvl1+4lvl2, compared to a 4lvl1+3lvl2+2lvl3 on full caster, all of which seem fine for balance)
We can also change the fluff completely to “you create up to Int Mod items that replicates an effect from your spell list. If spent you can recharge or recraft these items on a long rest.” Just to help with the Tinkering feeling without calling it pure magic.
People are like that. They dont want to wait and have everything they need right away.
Thats an unfortunate side effect of video games where getting your best in slot gear is as simple as fighting a certain mob.
I strive for people to take downtimes.
DM of two gaming groups.
Likes to create stuff.
Check out my homebrew --> Monsters --> Magical Items --> Races --> Subclasses
If you like --> Upvote, If you wanna comment --> Comment
Play by Post Games
--> One Shot Adventure - House of Artwood (DM) (Completed)
Paladin.
Nobody gets downtime anymore.
One of the most common and pervasive DM tricks for cranking up the pressure is ensuring that characters know that every day they're not actively pursuing the plot, the BBEG is. Hell, it's hardly even a trick - it's just the DM figuring the BBEG is as interested in winning as the party is and giving them the chance to do just that if the team decides to take a year off to make armor. Time is precious. Nobody wants instant crafting, but the base rules for crafting more-or-less assume that only NPC craftsmen will do it.
One day of adventuring followed by a month of downtime is not how the game is played anymore at the vast majority of tables. If it is at your table? Awesome. Use the (incredibly rudimentary and poorly thought out) base crafting rules. Otherwise why keep carping on us over it?
Please do not contact or message me.
@ Arutha
Another possible way could be to tie it to progression in Artificer levels, like instead of Int modifier it could be "equal to your Artificer level divided by four"; that way, you'd end up with the same maximum number and have a very clear and strict progression to it.
I completely agree. 2017's wonderous invention, while it was limited (perhaps overly so) for balance reasons and the power of at-will selection of magic gear, was substantially better than the infusions mechanic. In fact, aside from the mechanical servant that doesn't really tie into the class at all, I had no complaints about the 2017 artificer.
then again, you get things like "let's just rush the BBEG castle !"
where is the "he's too strong so we should go gather people to fight that guy/girl"
no, players have came to the conclusion that instead of fighting "the good war" we should just wreck himdirectly and be done with it.
it is that very thought that akes them stupid and doing the no downtime part.
exemple...
the bbeg want to start a war between two countries. do you really think it can happen in just a week. i literally have a whole time table set up. a timeline where i know where my villain will be at what time in order to make that war happen. my players diddn't start in the know of that plan, they only recently known about it. but players are afraid of being so late to the party that they literally decided to go wreck the bbeg castle and call it a day. but once they arrived their and realised the monsters there were unkillable because they dont have the right levels to do just that, they preffered to yell at me that i made something too difficult and unwinnable for them. that's the kind of players we have today. they cannot take defeat the right way nor can they understand thru story. all they want is to be the all mighty hero who wins it all.
i'm not talking about 1 group here... i'm talking about all of the group i have had in the last 20 years. and thats well over 15. because yes, i do play 3 games of D&D per week. thats 3 different groups. and that also includes adventurers league. i'll go far worse, in adventurers league you should take your time because when you are in competition in an epic, every points counts. yet everybody just strive to rush the story and try to finish it before the others, thinking thats how adventurers league works in competition. its not, the goal is to generate more points then others. and while one of my groups have finished in record time, they ended up being next to last in the competition.
the thing is... let's say you have 5 fighters in full plate in your group... would they all easily find a suitable full plate just because that's what they should be wearing ?
the answer is no... your blacksmiths and workers in the NPC world, they need the downtime. so does your bbeg, he actively needs the downtime. look at LOTR, do you really think modor got to where it is a matter of days ? no it took months, years ! there is no BBEG capable of doing stuff in a day to day basis. if they want an army, they also need to equip that army and that takes months to do. that's why war is never as easy as, do me a sword in a day and i'll wage war against the other country.
also, you all forgot one single thing...
blacksmiths are not alone in the their workshops.
many of the blacksmiths of old were about 5 or 6. rarely did they ever work alone.
in the book, they reference that by giving you, none of the complexity of having a maximum number of people working ont he project.
that means you divide the time by 4 if four people works on your full plate. that's what it is. same with enchantments. say you want an enchantment, it takes a long time for that enchantment to stick to your weapons. thats why magic items are so rare. in any scenarios... you want things done right away, thats a problem, because nothing can be done right away.
exemple:
you go to an enchanter, you ask him if he can make you that awesome rechargeable fireball throwing wand you want.
he says he has none in stock, but it would take him about a month to do it. and it would cost you about 10,000gp worth of materials and works.
do you really think its as simple as showing up there and buying whatever you want ? this is not a magical video game where everything is neatly placed for you to have what you need.
it is a simulation of real world physics where your people need to actually do the work, otherwise your world suspend the belief.
that's why most of my players learns that magic items are rare and should be conserved for later purposes.
this is one of the thing i hated in 3e... magic items were way too easy to get by and it was a video game festival where you would trade one magical item for another. or worse, heres 50 magical items and give me that legendary. in my games... nobody would accept such a trade, the legendary would be too much worth in the world. that was the more likely scenario. unless you want your players to be alienated by your weird ass economy who makes no sense.
i'll conclude on that last part...
The Electrum is a lie !
DM of two gaming groups.
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I agree with Paladin in this aspect, if you want to play a game where crafting is a player character mechanic you need to slow the timeline down for realism. The one change I make is I always let the party all help with any crafting if they want, the way I see it one has to own the tools and make the orders but anyone can follow the orders and help, meaning crafting time generally goes down by a factor of 5.
I think this is just one of those things that's going to be entirely at the hands of the DM. For my table, I am planning on having moments of extended downtime for the PCs (I'm having it right now that the BBEG is operating on information roughly equivalent to what the players have) but I've seen others where the DM has made it clear that the BBEG is operating nonstop, and if the players want to stop them from getting even more powerful and destroying the PC's allies, then they'd better keep up.
Yes I prefer 4-5 arcs to level 20 but usually each arc takes just a couple of days to a week, and crafting in between depending on the next BBEG.
I don’t usually have a BBEG last long unless he is a political one. Imagine if in the Avengers it took them a month to stop Loki or Ultron, instead have gaps between BBEGs.