An Unseen Crafter Workshop [Archive] - Wizards Community

An Unseen Crafter Workshop [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Garula
07-31-06, 01:28 PM Is there anything stopping a character from using Unseen Crafter (RoE p. 191) to run a money-making workshop? Looking at the spell again, since it says it behaves like Unseen Servant, that could mean that it has the same DC 10 limitation, but that would make the spell utterly worthless except for repairing warforged and I'm pretty sure that's not the intent of the spell.

Anyways, for our hypothetical money-making scheme, let's take a 7th level artificer with 20 Int and 10 ranks in weaponsmithing. He can potentially cast Unseen Crafter 8 times per rest, and each unseen crafter will make a craft check of 25 if ordered to take 10. Since he casts it at a caster level of 7, they should be able to finish whatever task they've been assigned. He has 500 sets of weaponsmithing tools, which cost him 2500gp and a Ring of Sustenance which also cost him 2500gp. He also has some way of inflicting fatigue upon himself. He's managed to set up shop in a low rent warehouse or two with at least 2500 square feet of space.

Now, he should be able to make his eight unseen crafters, rest for two hours (thanks to his Ring of Sustenance), meditate for 15 minutes, and then make 8 more. He can then go right back to sleep, perhaps after hitting himself with something that inflicts fatigue. Let's go with conservative numbers and say this process takes 2.5 hours. He can go through this process 9 times per day and still have an hour and a half for an extended coffee break. Thus, on a given day he sets 72 unseen crafters to work, each on another item. That's 504 items a week if he keeps it up. I'll round it to 500 to account for on the job accidents.

Now, if he sets them all to work on greatswords with a base price of 50gp (a nice simple DC 15 item that he should have little trouble selling), bumping the DC up to 25, he can make a profit of 8.3 gp for each one (16.7 materials cost, sold for 25gp). After this workshop has been running for a week, the finished items will bring in about 597.6 gp a day, 4150gp for a week. If our manager happens to come from a Mercantile Background, and thus able to sell his wares for 75% of base, his weekly profits jump dramatically to 10,400gp.

Sure the hours might suck, but pulling in several thousand gold per week without risking life and limb seems like a pretty good deal to me. Is there any major flaw in this scheme?
shruggar
07-31-06, 02:30 PM other threads have said that Ring of Sustenence does not allow you to rest less if you are a caster. The SRD says otherwise, and it doesnt negate the scheme, but there it is.

Meanwhile:
- most people are busy adventuring and dont have that kind of free time ;)
- Towns do not have an infinite demand for greatswords.
- If you're doing this, so are all the NPC wizards, and not all of them are adventuring. That's probably why you've never run into a situation where you've wanted a greatsword and couldnt find one
- If the local economy is able to supply lots of (item), soon (item) will cost less.
- Why dont you just craft what you want to buy?
- This seems to be exactly what the spell is intended for (I havent read anything of it other than your short description).
Thane26425
07-31-06, 02:46 PM other threads have said that Ring of Sustenence does not allow you to rest less if you are a caster. The SRD says otherwise, and it doesnt negate the scheme, but there it is.

Meanwhile:
- most people are busy adventuring and dont have that kind of free time ;)
- Towns do not have an infinite demand for greatswords.
- If you're doing this, so are all the NPC wizards, and not all of them are adventuring. That's probably why you've never run into a situation where you've wanted a greatsword and couldnt find one
- If the local economy is able to supply lots of (item), soon (item) will cost less.
- Why dont you just craft what you want to buy?
- This seems to be exactly what the spell is intended for (I havent read anything of it other than your short description).

Good points here. Don't forget also that this would threaten the status quo of the economy and the local guilds would certainly raise a fuss. The local authorities would most likely side with the guilds and order the wizard to cease and desist. If the wizard didn't, well, at the very least word would spread through the guilds in other cities and the wizard might find it hard to sell his product without travelling great distances. At worst, the guilds and even the local authorities, concerned about the arcane scofflaw, could hire some to persuade them to stop or wreck up the place, or both.
risner
07-31-06, 07:48 PM Now, he should be able to make his eight unseen crafters, rest for two hours (thanks to his Ring of Sustenance), meditate for 15 minutes, and then make 8 more. He can then go right back to sleep, perhaps after hitting himself with something that inflicts fatigue. Let's go with conservative numbers and say this process takes 2.5 hours. He can go through this process 9 times per day and still have an hour and a half for an extended coffee break.

1st mistake, read the rules:
PHB p178

So in any given 24 hour period, you would be able to cast only as many times as you can prepare and cast 2nd level spells.
risner
07-31-06, 07:56 PM Sure the hours might suck, but pulling in several thousand gold per week without risking life and limb seems like a pretty good deal to me. Is there any major flaw in this scheme?

Nope, he would make 8*(25-16.7) gp per day, or 66.4 gp per day.
464.6 gp a week. If I were him, I'd go adventuring, he can make 464.6 gp a day adventuring most likely.
Thane26425
07-31-06, 08:03 PM 1st mistake, read the rules:
PHB p178

So in any given 24 hour period, you would be able to cast only as many times as you can prepare and cast 2nd level spells.

Elsewhere in the rules it does say that you can use higher level slots for lower level spells, so you could fill 3rd level slots with second level spells.
Garula
08-01-06, 04:56 AM Ah, shoot, keep forgetting about that pesky 24 hour limit. It never seems to come up in my games. Well, back to the drawing board, I suppose.
Iver Gearsham
08-03-06, 08:01 PM Unseen Crafter lasts 1 day per level or till the task is complete whichever comes first so a 7th lvl Artificer Could set 5 plus bonus spells USC's to work per day and at the end of two weeks he could have 35 items if the crafting value was met in one week and he only cast for one week.

You could keep snowballing the whole thing and earn a fine living.
This is not counting Pearls of Power giving you a boost.

You might want to make a single large item like a boat or wagon that you can task many USC's to, Pileing more and more labor onto the task as time passes.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Garula 07-31-06, 01:28 PM	Is there anything stopping a character from using Unseen Crafter (RoE p. 191) to run a money-making workshop? Looking at the spell again, since it says it behaves like Unseen Servant, that could mean that it has the same DC 10 limitation, but that would make the spell utterly worthless except for repairing warforged and I'm pretty sure that's not the intent of the spell. Anyways, for our hypothetical money-making scheme, let's take a 7th level artificer with 20 Int and 10 ranks in weaponsmithing. He can potentially cast Unseen Crafter 8 times per rest, and each unseen crafter will make a craft check of 25 if ordered to take 10. Since he casts it at a caster level of 7, they should be able to finish whatever task they've been assigned. He has 500 sets of weaponsmithing tools, which cost him 2500gp and a Ring of Sustenance which also cost him 2500gp. He also has some way of inflicting fatigue upon himself. He's managed to set up shop in a low rent warehouse or two with at least 2500 square feet of space. Now, he should be able to make his eight unseen crafters, rest for two hours (thanks to his Ring of Sustenance), meditate for 15 minutes, and then make 8 more. He can then go right back to sleep, perhaps after hitting himself with something that inflicts fatigue. Let's go with conservative numbers and say this process takes 2.5 hours. He can go through this process 9 times per day and still have an hour and a half for an extended coffee break. Thus, on a given day he sets 72 unseen crafters to work, each on another item. That's 504 items a week if he keeps it up. I'll round it to 500 to account for on the job accidents. Now, if he sets them all to work on greatswords with a base price of 50gp (a nice simple DC 15 item that he should have little trouble selling), bumping the DC up to 25, he can make a profit of 8.3 gp for each one (16.7 materials cost, sold for 25gp). After this workshop has been running for a week, the finished items will bring in about 597.6 gp a day, 4150gp for a week. If our manager happens to come from a Mercantile Background, and thus able to sell his wares for 75% of base, his weekly profits jump dramatically to 10,400gp. Sure the hours might suck, but pulling in several thousand gold per week without risking life and limb seems like a pretty good deal to me. Is there any major flaw in this scheme?
shruggar 07-31-06, 02:30 PM	other threads have said that Ring of Sustenence does not allow you to rest less if you are a caster. The SRD says otherwise, and it doesnt negate the scheme, but there it is. Meanwhile: - most people are busy adventuring and dont have that kind of free time ;) - Towns do not have an infinite demand for greatswords. - If you're doing this, so are all the NPC wizards, and not all of them are adventuring. That's probably why you've never run into a situation where you've wanted a greatsword and couldnt find one - If the local economy is able to supply lots of (item), soon (item) will cost less. - Why dont you just craft what you want to buy? - This seems to be exactly what the spell is intended for (I havent read anything of it other than your short description).
Thane26425 07-31-06, 02:46 PM	other threads have said that Ring of Sustenence does not allow you to rest less if you are a caster. The SRD says otherwise, and it doesnt negate the scheme, but there it is. Meanwhile: - most people are busy adventuring and dont have that kind of free time ;) - Towns do not have an infinite demand for greatswords. - If you're doing this, so are all the NPC wizards, and not all of them are adventuring. That's probably why you've never run into a situation where you've wanted a greatsword and couldnt find one - If the local economy is able to supply lots of (item), soon (item) will cost less. - Why dont you just craft what you want to buy? - This seems to be exactly what the spell is intended for (I havent read anything of it other than your short description). Good points here. Don't forget also that this would threaten the status quo of the economy and the local guilds would certainly raise a fuss. The local authorities would most likely side with the guilds and order the wizard to cease and desist. If the wizard didn't, well, at the very least word would spread through the guilds in other cities and the wizard might find it hard to sell his product without travelling great distances. At worst, the guilds and even the local authorities, concerned about the arcane scofflaw, could hire some to persuade them to stop or wreck up the place, or both.
risner 07-31-06, 07:48 PM	Now, he should be able to make his eight unseen crafters, rest for two hours (thanks to his Ring of Sustenance), meditate for 15 minutes, and then make 8 more. He can then go right back to sleep, perhaps after hitting himself with something that inflicts fatigue. Let's go with conservative numbers and say this process takes 2.5 hours. He can go through this process 9 times per day and still have an hour and a half for an extended coffee break. 1st mistake, read the rules: PHB p178 So in any given 24 hour period, you would be able to cast only as many times as you can prepare and cast 2nd level spells.
risner 07-31-06, 07:56 PM	Sure the hours might suck, but pulling in several thousand gold per week without risking life and limb seems like a pretty good deal to me. Is there any major flaw in this scheme? Nope, he would make 8*(25-16.7) gp per day, or 66.4 gp per day. 464.6 gp a week. If I were him, I'd go adventuring, he can make 464.6 gp a day adventuring most likely.
Thane26425 07-31-06, 08:03 PM	1st mistake, read the rules: PHB p178 So in any given 24 hour period, you would be able to cast only as many times as you can prepare and cast 2nd level spells. Elsewhere in the rules it does say that you can use higher level slots for lower level spells, so you could fill 3rd level slots with second level spells.
Garula 08-01-06, 04:56 AM	Ah, shoot, keep forgetting about that pesky 24 hour limit. It never seems to come up in my games. Well, back to the drawing board, I suppose.
Iver Gearsham 08-03-06, 08:01 PM	Unseen Crafter lasts 1 day per level or till the task is complete whichever comes first so a 7th lvl Artificer Could set 5 plus bonus spells USC's to work per day and at the end of two weeks he could have 35 items if the crafting value was met in one week and he only cast for one week. You could keep snowballing the whole thing and earn a fine living. This is not counting Pearls of Power giving you a boost. You might want to make a single large item like a boat or wagon that you can task many USC's to, Pileing more and more labor onto the task as time passes.