Making Magic Items vs. Paying Points

[Zoth]

what do cost/time/skill do you suggest if you are gone allow pc to make magic items vs. paying points for them?

Z.O.T.H "Question (y/n)"

[Fitz]

That depends..... is the campaign a magic-rich environment? Does every man and his dog have a magical skillet for making burned omelettes, or are such things reserved for the super-rich?

In my own campaign, the creation of even quite trivial magic items is a hugely expensive, time-consuming affair. However, my campaign's magic is based around a backward-looking "after the golden age" milieu, in which 99.9% of magicians are users rather than innovators. New magical items, or even new copies of old items are rare, though there are quite a few old bits and pieces of thaumaturgical paraphernalia floating about.

Before you can make a reasonable judgement about the time and expenditure required for building magical stuff, you need to think about how much magicrap you're prepared to have your players have hanging about. If it's easy and/or cheap, they WILL build useful magic gadgets by the dozen, and that's inevitably going to impact on your scenario creation plans.

[Zoth]

hehe I guss I should give more info but I just want to see what others do. :D

my world is gone be high sci-fantasy so there be a far amount of magic and even technology.

I was kind trying get a feel as to how to haddle making mana gems in my world they are what you need to cast a spell and all you need as a mage is end and skill and the right type of gem so ideas on magic item creation might help me determine how I want haddle there creation

[Markdoc]

If the world is going to be relatively high magitech, then you don't actually need anything other than a "magical inventor" skill. The fact that players have to pay character points to make indpependant items will slow the flow somewhat. If you rule that the points that go into a magic item are used up whether the inventor roll was successful or not (perhaps creating a flawed or cursed item) then the extra time and extra materials will take care of itself too, as the players will naturally want a well equipped magical lab and plenty of extra time to make sure they do not lose their points by messing up the roll.

For non-independant items, if Wodgett to Obese gets his magical powers through the construction and eating of potent but extremely fattening Cookies of Power, then you shouldn't necessarily penalise him in comparison to Necros the Skinny who gets his powers by more traditional vigorous gestures and shouting.

cheers, Mark

[pawsplay]

Through Transform and Trigger, you can actually create Powers that create magic items, if you want a magic rich environment, but aren't willing to make magic items an alternative technology.

[Seenar]

Triggers and variable special effect are good for potions, and one shot or persistant devices.

One thing I had on a spell caster was taking points from somebody else to make magic items. The idea was donated XP from others would build the item. He was an NPC putting a permanent force field over a city, and the inhabitants has to put in mana to make it work.

If your mage is making magic for a another player, let the other player pay the XP cost.

[Arthur]

One idea I really like (it was in previous editions of FH somewhere) is that certain items contain their own magical power that can be easily made into an item. For example, dragon hide would come with 10 points of its own if you use it to make magic armor.

This also solves some issues with magic items v mundane items. For instance, if you enchant plate armor, why doesn't its original DEF contribute anything? If the plate armor 'donates' points equal to its original characterstics, then you pump it up from there.

[Seenar]

Originally posted by Arthur
One idea I really like (it was in previous editions of FH somewhere) is that certain items contain their own magical power that can be easily made into an item. For example, dragon hide would come with 10 points of its own if you use it to make magic armor.

This also solves some issues with magic items v mundane items. For instance, if you enchant plate armor, why doesn't its original DEF contribute anything? If the plate armor 'donates' points equal to its original characterstics, then you pump it up from there.

Now that is a cool idea. It makes there be a reason to go obtain things too.

I am adding that the FH game I am about to run.

[Yamo]

For potions, magic scrolls, and other "one shot" items, I would use Trigger and rely on rare and expensive Expendable Foci as the balancing factor.

For anything with a "permanent" enchantment, I would require Independent without exception.