Potions

[Alcamtar]

I want potions to be cheap enough to be somewhat common, but not so cheap they're sold in stores, and I want the ability to control/limit availability.

 

I'm debating between

(A) Trigger with OAF: expensive/rare components,

or

( Independent with ~250 continuing charges

 

Trigger without rare components seems like a giveaway with no real limit on production. I could see a group whipping up three dozen potions for an expedition, or selling them to solve all their money problems.

 

Independent is expensive, but with lots of continuing charges makes the cost-per-dose vanishingly small.

 

Anyone else have alternatives you're using?

 

Mike

[McCoy]

My suggestion is that potion making is an NPC art. Not only rare ingredients, but bulky, immobile and fragile foci, and lots of extra time. Think of making wine. Ingredients are available a few weeks a year, you need fermentation vats and conditions must be constantly monitored. Brandy or wiskey present aditional problems, the fermented raw product must be further processed, distilled (fragile mechanism) over a fire that is hot enough yet not too hot, then aged.

 

1 to 5 years extra time would be reasonable to make a potion, and put it comfortably in NPC hands.

 

PC's might cultivate the friendship of an alchemist. He has a small stock of whatever potions the GM wants to introduce in his campagine, and will supply them to the PC's at reasonable prices as long as they agree to a lunatic scavenger hunt for said rare ingredients (which sets up plot hooks).

[badger3k]

Re: Potions

 

Originally posted by Alcamtar

I want potions to be cheap enough to be somewhat common, but not so cheap they're sold in stores, and I want the ability to control/limit availability.

 

I'm debating between

(A) Trigger with OAF: expensive/rare components,

or

( Independent with ~250 continuing charges

 

Trigger without rare components seems like a giveaway with no real limit on production. I could see a group whipping up three dozen potions for an expedition, or selling them to solve all their money problems.

 

Independent is expensive, but with lots of continuing charges makes the cost-per-dose vanishingly small.

 

Anyone else have alternatives you're using?

 

Mike

 

A lot of continuing charges will probably make the potion more expensive. [edit - missed the cost per dose specification] Plus you'd basically have a large potion bottle or one that you need only sip the potion to be affected. For multiple people to use the same potion, you'd need usable by others (simultaneously), along with trigger (drink potion) or gestures (depends on how you want to construct/rationalize it).

 

I use potions with OAF, Independent, 1 non-recoverable charge as the base, Depending on what the potion does and costs in AP, the bulky (alchemists lab), expendable, costly/difficult to acquire mods for foci are used, as well as incantations, gestures, extra-time (1 day or week min), and required skill roll. I haven't worked up more than a couple for my campaig, but those are the ground rules I set up.

[Blue Jogger]

You might want to consider a side effects for potions. This side effect occurs when you attempt all those seemly clever tricks:

 

1) Large batches - The ingredients need to mix in very exacting amounts. Trying to make a huge vat of potions is asking for, at best, poor quality, at worse, a big explosion. Simple processes, like preserving a large fresh kill (for later use) should not have this problem.

 

2) For the next week, I churn out some potions - The process for making potions should be a long time, but mages love to make shortcuts or they are rushed. Let them fix up a batch and add a side effect, to tell them it's the thought that counts. (A strength potion that makes user monsterous, maybe even give extra arms or a tail!)

 

3) Experimentation - Sometimes its difficult to do things exactly as you did the last 58 times in row. The urge to create and experiment (or just get distracted, bored, etc) becomes too great and something new gets added.

 

In general, roll on the side effect (at creation time), on a critical success, the researcher learns something new, on a normal success, it's ok, and if it fails, remember, we all learn best from our mistakes.

 

With optional rules simular to this, you should have no problem controling/limiting availability.

[tiger]

I would assign

 

Indepentant,

4 charges last X time

OAF potion vile, frigle expendable with the varying degrees of replacements

Gesture through out- Drinking

 

As far as brewing and how many in the FH Grimore it lists number of potion = to char INT. This seemed a bit high to me so I use INT/3 number of potion and then each potion gets the 4 charges listed above

 

You gcould then go in and add all the limitations that apply to the brewing into the cost of the potion as well.

 

To be honest if it's a potion chracter finds I only worry about the list limits and that's about it