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Old 05-11-2020, 10:37 PM   #1
larsdangly
 
Join Date: Dec 2017
Default Laboratories and enchanting items

The ITL rules provide a single unambiguous statement about the importance of laboratories for enchanting items: you need to use one to make any kind of magic item (p. 142, middle of the left column).

How seriously do you follow this? Do you enforce it for magic items that are created by their own unique spells (staffs; exploding gems)? How about weapon/armor enchantment?

Does an enchanter have to build and run his or her own lab? Or can you beg, borrow or steal time in one built by another person? If you track the economics of enchantments, how much should that cost?
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Old 05-12-2020, 12:22 AM   #2
Skarg
 
Join Date: May 2015
Default Re: Laboratories and enchanting items

I think it's clear that both Staffs and Explosive Gems do not require a lab. The spell descriptions describe that it's just a matter of casting the spell - a one-turn ritual just requiring ST and materials.

Similarly, Weapon/Armor Enchantment also clearly does require a lab.

The only part of that I might want to house-rule (one way or another) is Explosive Gems, because they're a bit on the evil side, especially for how easy they are to create.

In our TFT campaigns, there were some labs available in major wizard guild chapters, sometimes, but it was a limited resource that could get booked up, and it meant your work was visible to various people there at the guild, which might contain spies from various powerful factions. Some wizards had their own labs, but we didn't have any PC wizards get into enchanting, though they did have NPC allies and patrons and opponents who did.

If there's a large and well-supplied wizard's guild chapter where the wizard is, and the wizard is in good standing with the guild, then I'd tend to expect them to be able to get the materials and/or craftsmen to assemble a lab if they had the money to pay for it. However, the majority of our campaign time tended to feature many distractions and obstacles, such as local authorities interfering with wizard work and magic resources, local laws, lack of available apprentices, and all the various campaign circumstances that tend to keep both PCs and powerful NPC wizards unavailable for long-term in-town projects.

ITL 142 mentions attuning a shared lab to multiple wizards.

Last edited by Skarg; 05-12-2020 at 12:31 AM.
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Old 05-12-2020, 03:12 AM   #3
hcobb
 
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Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Pacheco, California
Default Re: Laboratories and enchanting items

Explosive Gems have a built in failsafe against abuse.

Take a wizard with sling and a stack of explosive gems, she has a 1.85% chance of dropping each and every gem at her own feet.
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Old 05-13-2020, 03:04 AM   #4
Steve Plambeck
 
Join Date: Jun 2019
Default Re: Laboratories and enchanting items

The rules allow for replacing a Staff during combat if it gets broken, so no lab can be required for that one.

Never allowed PC's to make enchanted items in my original campaign world. I'm sorta planning to in future though, but I just don't feel weapon/armor enchantment should be as easy as it is. My new house rules to deter too much of that will be (1) finished weapons and armor cannot be enchanted -- the magic must be folded in as the item is made, so (2) enchanted arms require the wizard to either have Master Armorer or work side by side collaborating with one as the item is made, and therefore (3) a forge is required along with the wizard's lab. And to boot (4) I'm going to make the process take much longer, so a PC can't make anything between closely spaced adventures. The latter will apply to other enchanted items as well.

I like the idea of forcing the wizard and the armorer to be stuck working together in a hot, sweaty lab/forge for a few weeks. Probably be saving rolls not to kill each other. (Just kidding about that! :)
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Old 05-13-2020, 07:40 AM   #5
hcobb
 
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Location: Pacheco, California
Default Re: Laboratories and enchanting items

  1. Make creation of all magic weapons other than wizard staves too difficult
  2. Run the players up against monsters that can only be hurt with magic weapons
  3. Complain that the players avoid muggles like cliches
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