I think one of the under-rated strengths of the artificer is the out of combat crafting abilities. I think they're overlooked because of the light crafting system of 5e in general, but still, imagine using Xanathar crafting rules being able to craft 4 portions of healing per day (crafting at a quarter of the time and cost as per UA) on like a week long travel/downtime section. Not only that but poisons, alchemists fire, utility stuff that anyone can use with no time restrictions, that's powerful.
So, the meat of my question: I've always understood that the gold requirement when crafting didn't necessarily represent gold spent buying materials from a shop but rather your character expanding resources as they experiment. But, when you're crafting in the wilderness, not a shop to be seen, shouldn't you be able to forage for materials?
I can see someone working out a system where the level of the potion you're making effects the DC to find ingredients in the wild, and foraging adding to the time it takes to craft (maybe 1 per day rather than 4), and if you wanna go deep, maybe only certain ingredients are available in certain environments depending on the world you're in (though I suppose that's more on DM prep than mechanics).
Cause it doesn't make sense to me that, out in the wilderness without a shop in sight, an alchemist finishes a potion and then just loses some gold into the void. Unless you wanna go the opposite way and say you can *only* craft when you have certain quantities of crafting supplies that you *must* purchase from a shop beforehand? But then, what makes the shopkeeper so special that they can identify ingredients and you can't?
TL;DR, I think crafters should be able to use their skills to have the option to expend resources other than gold in their crafting.
And in case that does sound too OP, I'd say as a reminder it is dependent on downtime, which not a lot of 5e campaigns have a lot of, or maybe when they do there's other stuff that needs to be done, so it's really only as OP as the DM allows it to be.
well, it also depends on if a crafting day is 8 hours. It could be 12 or maybe we are looking at it wrong and WOTC are talking about a 24 hour day when suggesting that one potion of healing takes a day to craft? It is the question I have been asking myself a lot as well.
For simple potions of healing, I could see allowing you to forage for herbs in lieu of spending gold, but I would also make you spend time doing so, such that the potions take longer to make. For stronger healing potions, or just other potions in general, I'd make you spend some money, as well as go on a miniquest to get the exotic ingredients for the non healing potions.
What does one need to brew a potion of healing? Which biomes is it present in? How much is needed/how common is it/etc. If a common magical item takes 100 gp worth of material, that's not something you're going to go out for a day and pick. Otherwise everyone would be rolling in money herb gathering rather than adventuring!
There are so many logistics when you add foraging into crafting that I can see why its avoided.
What does one need to brew a potion of healing? Which biomes is it present in? How much is needed/how common is it/etc. If a common magical item takes 100 gp worth of material, that's not something you're going to go out for a day and pick. Otherwise everyone would be rolling in money herb gathering rather than adventuring!
There are so many logistics when you add foraging into crafting that I can see why its avoided.
Yeah but as an artificer, that 100 gold is reduced to just 25, which seems to indicate that using you're superior understanding of the principals of alchemy you can use less rare ingredients, or use them more efficiently. It seems reasonable that someone with that level of know-how should be able to recognize materials in the wild, right?
In the case of a potion of healing anyone that knows how to use a herbalism kit and has 25 Gold to spare can craft 1 of them a day. So an Alchemist Artificer can craft 4 a day at 12.5 Gold each potion.
I think one of the under-rated strengths of the artificer is the out of combat crafting abilities. I think they're overlooked because of the light crafting system of 5e in general, but still, imagine using Xanathar crafting rules being able to craft 4 portions of healing per day (crafting at a quarter of the time and cost as per UA) on like a week long travel/downtime section. Not only that but poisons, alchemists fire, utility stuff that anyone can use with no time restrictions, that's powerful.
So, the meat of my question: I've always understood that the gold requirement when crafting didn't necessarily represent gold spent buying materials from a shop but rather your character expanding resources as they experiment. But, when you're crafting in the wilderness, not a shop to be seen, shouldn't you be able to forage for materials?
I can see someone working out a system where the level of the potion you're making effects the DC to find ingredients in the wild, and foraging adding to the time it takes to craft (maybe 1 per day rather than 4), and if you wanna go deep, maybe only certain ingredients are available in certain environments depending on the world you're in (though I suppose that's more on DM prep than mechanics).
Cause it doesn't make sense to me that, out in the wilderness without a shop in sight, an alchemist finishes a potion and then just loses some gold into the void. Unless you wanna go the opposite way and say you can *only* craft when you have certain quantities of crafting supplies that you *must* purchase from a shop beforehand? But then, what makes the shopkeeper so special that they can identify ingredients and you can't?
TL;DR, I think crafters should be able to use their skills to have the option to expend resources other than gold in their crafting.
And in case that does sound too OP, I'd say as a reminder it is dependent on downtime, which not a lot of 5e campaigns have a lot of, or maybe when they do there's other stuff that needs to be done, so it's really only as OP as the DM allows it to be.
well, it also depends on if a crafting day is 8 hours. It could be 12 or maybe we are looking at it wrong and WOTC are talking about a 24 hour day when suggesting that one potion of healing takes a day to craft? It is the question I have been asking myself a lot as well.
Check out Dael Kingsmill's Materia Medica, this is a really good resource for homebrew foraging.
will do!
For simple potions of healing, I could see allowing you to forage for herbs in lieu of spending gold, but I would also make you spend time doing so, such that the potions take longer to make. For stronger healing potions, or just other potions in general, I'd make you spend some money, as well as go on a miniquest to get the exotic ingredients for the non healing potions.
What does one need to brew a potion of healing? Which biomes is it present in? How much is needed/how common is it/etc. If a common magical item takes 100 gp worth of material, that's not something you're going to go out for a day and pick. Otherwise everyone would be rolling in money herb gathering rather than adventuring!
There are so many logistics when you add foraging into crafting that I can see why its avoided.
Yeah but as an artificer, that 100 gold is reduced to just 25, which seems to indicate that using you're superior understanding of the principals of alchemy you can use less rare ingredients, or use them more efficiently. It seems reasonable that someone with that level of know-how should be able to recognize materials in the wild, right?
Artificer crafting abilities only cut the cost in half.
Ah, good catch. But we're still looking at 2 potions per day of downtime, and those stack up. Point being I think that feature is severely underrated.
Even if you allow foraging at the cost of extra time, 1 potion a day of downtime is still pretty good.
It does cut the time to a quarter.
In the case of a potion of healing anyone that knows how to use a herbalism kit and has 25 Gold to spare can craft 1 of them a day. So an Alchemist Artificer can craft 4 a day at 12.5 Gold each potion.
I actually posted a fancy table within the Artificer February 2019 UA thread that details the Alchemist's cost of creating potions.