Magic items at a reasonable cost

dhasenan · 05-24-2016, 07:39 PM

There's a bit of an issue I'm having with GURPS magic item crafting.

I can create cheap items in minutes. If I've only spent on magery and spells, I can grab a friend and we can churn out one powerstone a day. With another modification or two, we can make one per hour. But as soon as the cost exceeds what a small handful of people can contribute in fatigue, it switches to days per energy point. It's like a factor of 800 difference.

Eight hundred. That's as many as eight hundreds. And that's terrible.

(Or rather, that's appropriate for a world where there are tons of magic items, but people still work on farms. It's not working for the story I want to tell; I just can't see powerful magic items being invented, much less in common use, with this arrangement.)

As DM, I can simply slash that by a factor of fifty, so it takes you three weeks and change to create a Basket of Endless Rations instead of 3.5 years.

There are suggested rules that contribute rare and magical ingredients toward item creation.

I've considered consuming powerstones to speed up slow-and-sure enchantment. Even if you only got one point per stone, it would speed things up considerably (a factor of eight wouldn't be unheard of). This also lets you spread out the work more, producing more of a magic item economy and less of a cottage industry.

I've also considered using Magery in excess of 1 as a divisor for the number of days you have to spend, so a person with Magery 3 would spend a third as much time as someone with Magery 0 or Magery 1 to create the same magic item.

Are there any other interesting methods of making magic items more accessible that you've thought or heard of?

khorboth · 05-24-2016, 08:28 PM

Are you trying to make them affordable to purchase with money or to make with mana?

For purchase with money, I have increased the default quick-and-dirty enchanting limit and enacted second-hand prices. The prices as listed are based upon a mage working full-time for first-run sales. If the PCs don't mind a second-hand sword or a used robe with not-quite the right power set, I usually start around half list price and modify for skills from there. It's kinda like a used car. Rich folks get them new and custom-made. Sensible folk get them after the first owner is done.

For mana cost... I haven't looked into it. Enchanting really shouldn't be a hobby for an adventurer. In most settings.

PTTG · 05-24-2016, 08:29 PM

I think I might go with the "rare resources" approach, or some variation thereof.

For instance, if there are "founts" of mana that may be easily channeled to create items, then there's a reasonable way to speed up enchanting without making it easy enough so that everybody eats off magical refilling plates, drinks only essential water, and have no reasons to go adventuring.

These founts would presumably be the places where magical work is done and high-power enchantments invented. They would also, presumably, be politically and economically unstable.

Culture20 · 05-24-2016, 10:01 PM

An ER, enchantment only, fixed location, and slow recharge (but still faster than a mana stone) could be really useful for turning medium cost items into quick and dirty castings.

Culture20 · 05-24-2016, 10:12 PM

For my Ultima campaign, I greatly broke magic, but it fit with the source material as Sosaria has ridiculously cheap magic: I said that spells (cast via rune symbols) base cost in mana the *lower* of either their current base cost or their prerequisite count from the back of GURPS Magic. This had the side effect of turning an enchantment of a bundle of arrows into an ordinary pastime like whitling, and the creation of more powerful magic items into a pursuit where one might begin to misplace even powerful objects just because one has too many.

Tallor · 05-24-2016, 10:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Culture20

An ER, enchantment only, fixed location, and slow recharge (but still faster than a mana stone) could be really useful for turning medium cost items into quick and dirty castings.

"I have Create Gold (Limited Location: Banana Stand)"

On a more serious note, I'd like to add that having a system of harnessing magic through through traditional means of harnessing energy (i.e. a mana-generating windmill) would allow a lot of neat magictech to be justified. :)

Culture20 · 05-25-2016, 09:32 AM

"There's always money in the banana stand." *wink*
I don't have my books with me, but doesn't the technology spell to tap power sources work with non-electric sources?

Fred Brackin · 05-25-2016, 10:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Culture20

An ER, enchantment only, fixed location, and slow recharge (but still faster than a mana stone) could be really useful for turning medium cost items into quick and dirty castings.

It's a terminology issue but "manastones" never recharge. However, there's enough possible aids to Enchanting that some precision is necessary.

In other issues.

It should never be possible to create an actual Enchantment in less than 1 hour. That's an unavoidable minimum for Q&D.

On the other hand it should never take 2 mages with average FP more than an hour to Enchant a Powerstone with Q&D. Even if using the "non-valuable stone" option it takes 80 pts instead of 20 but it could still be done in an hour if you had the pts.

Q&D is not limited to caster's FP only. Each participant can use a Powerstone (or Manastone if they flunked Economics). They can each drink up to 6 x ST in Paut to boost their available energy too. With 6 Enchanters of 10 ST and 10 FP with 10 to 15 pt Powerstones and a lot of Paut you can Q&D a 500pt item in 5 hours.

With a lead Enchanter of Skill-25 instead of 20 you could push up to 1000. That Skill can sometimes be boosted by Aspected Mana or really esoteric things such as Sacred Architecture as well.

Then there's Draw Power for High Tech Enchanters.

Multiple options in Thauamtology and Magical Styles too.

I'm just skimming the highlights too. This is an old (more than 25 years) subject with a big history of being discussed. There are a lot of things you can do even before you get to wholesale House ruling.

hal · 05-25-2016, 08:22 PM

Some things to consider :

1) magic items never really expire. A character can create a magic item that potentially will last to the end of time. Over time, those items begin to accumulate.

2) the rules for quirking are pretty nebulous. No two TWO GMs will administer those rules the same way

3) the cost value for gemstones is TOTOLLY bogus.

4) listen to the advice to create one college power stones - if any Mage can steal and use the gem, they will. For added security, place a limit on the stone so it can only be tapped by someone wearing a specific ring.

5) use the same variation I use for getting benefits out of the level of Margery, to wit: if higher Margery permits you to learn spells more quickly, then the bonus to learning the spell more quickly is equal to Margery of the student minus the requisite Margery to cast the spell. Mages who need Margery three to learn a spell, should not learn it 30 percent faster. A Margery 3 Mage studying a Margery 2 spell learns it 10 percent faster than someone with only Margery 2. Likewise, a Margery 2 Mage has a 1:1 rate of enchantment because enchantment requires Margery 2. Margery 3 mages might take 1/2 the time, and Margery 4 might take a third of the time.

hal · 05-25-2016, 08:36 PM

I also permit divination to aid in quick and dirty enchantments. It wasn't against first printing rules of second edition GURPS MAGIC until I brought it up in an Alaconius lecture on the gurpsnet mailing list back in the day. By the second printing of GURPS MAGIC 2nd edition, they outlawed it. I was told "for reasons of balance, mages shouldn't have access to that much freely available energy."

These days, ceremonial magic provides far more energy to spell casters than inquirked power stones ever did. A power stone at best, recharges 1 energy per day in normal mana. Ceremonial magic recharges 1 energy per spectator per 10 minutes!

One thing that hasn't been examined to the best of my knowledge...

In earlier editions of GURPS MAGIC, a skill 12 Mage could spend twice as long enchanting an item and trade time for energy/skill. What if reducing your skill by faster enchantment worked in your campaign as well?

Something to consider.

05-24-2016, 07:39 PM	#1
dhasenan Join Date: May 2016	Magic items at a reasonable cost There's a bit of an issue I'm having with GURPS magic item crafting. I can create cheap items in minutes. If I've only spent on magery and spells, I can grab a friend and we can churn out one powerstone a day. With another modification or two, we can make one per hour. But as soon as the cost exceeds what a small handful of people can contribute in fatigue, it switches to days per energy point. It's like a factor of 800 difference. Eight hundred. That's as many as eight hundreds. And that's terrible. (Or rather, that's appropriate for a world where there are tons of magic items, but people still work on farms. It's not working for the story I want to tell; I just can't see powerful magic items being invented, much less in common use, with this arrangement.) As DM, I can simply slash that by a factor of fifty, so it takes you three weeks and change to create a Basket of Endless Rations instead of 3.5 years. There are suggested rules that contribute rare and magical ingredients toward item creation. I've considered consuming powerstones to speed up slow-and-sure enchantment. Even if you only got one point per stone, it would speed things up considerably (a factor of eight wouldn't be unheard of). This also lets you spread out the work more, producing more of a magic item economy and less of a cottage industry. I've also considered using Magery in excess of 1 as a divisor for the number of days you have to spend, so a person with Magery 3 would spend a third as much time as someone with Magery 0 or Magery 1 to create the same magic item. Are there any other interesting methods of making magic items more accessible that you've thought or heard of?

05-24-2016, 08:28 PM	#2
khorboth Join Date: Aug 2007 Location: Denver, CO	Re: Magic items at a reasonable cost Are you trying to make them affordable to purchase with money or to make with mana? For purchase with money, I have increased the default quick-and-dirty enchanting limit and enacted second-hand prices. The prices as listed are based upon a mage working full-time for first-run sales. If the PCs don't mind a second-hand sword or a used robe with not-quite the right power set, I usually start around half list price and modify for skills from there. It's kinda like a used car. Rich folks get them new and custom-made. Sensible folk get them after the first owner is done. For mana cost... I haven't looked into it. Enchanting really shouldn't be a hobby for an adventurer. In most settings.

05-24-2016, 08:29 PM	#3
PTTG Join Date: Feb 2011	Re: Magic items at a reasonable cost I think I might go with the "rare resources" approach, or some variation thereof. For instance, if there are "founts" of mana that may be easily channeled to create items, then there's a reasonable way to speed up enchanting without making it easy enough so that everybody eats off magical refilling plates, drinks only essential water, and have no reasons to go adventuring. These founts would presumably be the places where magical work is done and high-power enchantments invented. They would also, presumably, be politically and economically unstable.

05-24-2016, 10:01 PM	#4
Culture20 Join Date: Feb 2014	Re: Magic items at a reasonable cost An ER, enchantment only, fixed location, and slow recharge (but still faster than a mana stone) could be really useful for turning medium cost items into quick and dirty castings.

05-24-2016, 10:12 PM	#5
Culture20 Join Date: Feb 2014	Re: Magic items at a reasonable cost For my Ultima campaign, I greatly broke magic, but it fit with the source material as Sosaria has ridiculously cheap magic: I said that spells (cast via rune symbols) base cost in mana the lower of either their current base cost or their prerequisite count from the back of GURPS Magic. This had the side effect of turning an enchantment of a bundle of arrows into an ordinary pastime like whitling, and the creation of more powerful magic items into a pursuit where one might begin to misplace even powerful objects just because one has too many.

05-25-2016, 09:32 AM	#7
Culture20 Join Date: Feb 2014	Re: Magic items at a reasonable cost "There's always money in the banana stand." wink I don't have my books with me, but doesn't the technology spell to tap power sources work with non-electric sources?

05-25-2016, 08:22 PM	#9
hal Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: Buffalo, New York	Re: Magic items at a reasonable cost Some things to consider : 1) magic items never really expire. A character can create a magic item that potentially will last to the end of time. Over time, those items begin to accumulate. 2) the rules for quirking are pretty nebulous. No two TWO GMs will administer those rules the same way 3) the cost value for gemstones is TOTOLLY bogus. 4) listen to the advice to create one college power stones - if any Mage can steal and use the gem, they will. For added security, place a limit on the stone so it can only be tapped by someone wearing a specific ring. 5) use the same variation I use for getting benefits out of the level of Margery, to wit: if higher Margery permits you to learn spells more quickly, then the bonus to learning the spell more quickly is equal to Margery of the student minus the requisite Margery to cast the spell. Mages who need Margery three to learn a spell, should not learn it 30 percent faster. A Margery 3 Mage studying a Margery 2 spell learns it 10 percent faster than someone with only Margery 2. Likewise, a Margery 2 Mage has a 1:1 rate of enchantment because enchantment requires Margery 2. Margery 3 mages might take 1/2 the time, and Margery 4 might take a third of the time.

05-25-2016, 08:36 PM	#10
hal Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: Buffalo, New York	Re: Magic items at a reasonable cost I also permit divination to aid in quick and dirty enchantments. It wasn't against first printing rules of second edition GURPS MAGIC until I brought it up in an Alaconius lecture on the gurpsnet mailing list back in the day. By the second printing of GURPS MAGIC 2nd edition, they outlawed it. I was told "for reasons of balance, mages shouldn't have access to that much freely available energy." These days, ceremonial magic provides far more energy to spell casters than inquirked power stones ever did. A power stone at best, recharges 1 energy per day in normal mana. Ceremonial magic recharges 1 energy per spectator per 10 minutes! One thing that hasn't been examined to the best of my knowledge... In earlier editions of GURPS MAGIC, a skill 12 Mage could spend twice as long enchanting an item and trade time for energy/skill. What if reducing your skill by faster enchantment worked in your campaign as well? Something to consider.