Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Nethicus 10-30-06, 01:15 PM	I have a Dwarf Runecaster in my campaign who wanted to enchant some tools to work at the forge while he's away. He came up with the idea of crafting magic tools that never need sleep and can work tirelessly 24 hours, provided the raw materials are present. My dilemma is trying to figure out the crafting cost. These don't impact the game directly, but there's potential here for misuse, so I don't want to make them too cheap. Here's what I was thinking: Donal's Tireless Tools Min CL 9th, needs spell fabricate and unseen servant. 2000 for use-activated item CL 9 Spell level 5 Skill: +15 (22500) Total: 112500 Non-slot item: x2 Passive item (no direct character benefit, but cash supply item): 20% real cost. Final Cost: 45000 gp / 22500 gp to craft, 1800 XP Ideas?
obrysii 10-30-06, 01:25 PM	Uh. What? What does the item do?
anton1066 10-30-06, 01:35 PM	I wouldn't worry about the PC using this so much. I cant think of any ways to break the item. Making mundane stuff is not that big of a deal once you reach this level. What i would worry about is the effect on the in game economy. Does every lord now have a couple of sets of these? If so you going to see a lot of ****** of crafters who are out of the job. Since the items dont sleep or take breaks, they are crafting at 3 times normal speed.
unusualsuspect 10-30-06, 02:03 PM	Don't the homuculi in Eberron already do this sort of thing? One could just check the stats for those guys... (Basic idea: Small, non-combat constructs that can finish off a magic item after the initial creation process is begun by a character)
ninja1 10-30-06, 03:44 PM	wow, this sounds a heck of a lot more expensive than my casting Animate Dead, followed by Awaken Undead... and then handing my minion a set of tools and telling it to "Get to work you Lazy bag of bones!!!"... ...errr, I mean, how about reducing the cost to say around 25 gp for 7 ranks in craft (whatever) ... (to equate to a 1 HD skeleton with max ranks in craft and skill focus in that same craft)... ...then increase the gp cost by 25 gp for every 1 rank above 7 that you want... and the bonus is that the material components don't even have to be in Onyx!! If you absolutely must have some type of xp cost, then do the usual divide by 25 bit... (edit: oops, I forgot to factor in the cost for Awaken Undead... which is mitigated however, by the fact that it can be spread across as many skeletons that you can stack up within it's radius... which equates to a whole heck of a lot. If you are absolutely concerned about getting away with this too cheaply, then I whole-heartedly recommend tripling the estimates I made above) :)
tarkin 10-30-06, 03:57 PM	Your estimates are way off. You also forgot about the cost to TRAIN the undead. And the time to give them that training. Basic undead, even after being awakened would have no skills. They are good for untrained labor only, not trained stuff.
Thane26425 10-30-06, 06:25 PM	There are some spells like that have appeared in Dragon and in some First Ed. books. Normally the effect was to replicate a crew of workers, that is unskilled laborers. The spells would allow a set of tools to do things like dig ditches, tunnels and the like. Some of the more advanced versions allowed the "crew" to assist living workers in things like carpentry. You could also build weak automatons and give them a skill bonus in a given skill, which would allow them to do some kinds of work on their own or assist living workers. I've had a wizard do this to create house cleaning staff, gardeners and such.
Branto 10-30-06, 10:11 PM	Fabricate? .. Unseen Servant? Well, I guess the XP cost you listed is less than simply Permanently Animating the tools.. (I'm assuming that any animated tool should know how to use itself. Maybe having a bonus to the appropriate skill check equal to the animator's caster level?) Though, wasn't there a metamagic that worked like Extend Spell, but with a much bigger increase in duration? Just use Animate Object with that metamagic applied, and cast again every day or so.
risner 10-30-06, 11:18 PM	Base it on a Lyre of Building. Require the player to make the craft checks and each failure results in the week wait. So 1/week provides 75 days worth of work (you supply raw materials) at the end of the first hour of using, you make a craft check at the DC required to make the items. If you make the check, you have the items and can try another hour for 75 more days until you fail a check. 13,000 gp
Nethicus 10-31-06, 10:39 AM	Base it on a Lyre of Building. Require the player to make the craft checks and each failure results in the week wait. So 1/week provides 75 days worth of work (you supply raw materials) at the end of the first hour of using, you make a craft check at the DC required to make the items. If you make the check, you have the items and can try another hour for 75 more days until you fail a check. 13,000 gp I had considered using the lyre of building, but the two items have different intrinsic properties. The lyre must be used continuously and for a short time, and it replicates the use of unskilled labor. The animated tools replicate the craftsmanship of a laborer with a +15 to skill. The guy got the idea while watching "Handy Manny" with his kids. He thought that having a set of animated tools would really be cool. The general idea was that the tools could work, take 10 for a weeks worth, and generate a skill check of 25 to whatever needed to be made. So long as the raw materials were available, the tools would keep working off of a preset list of items the character wanted made. Skeletons are great for cheap labor. But they're mindless, and tend to screw up even the simplest of craft items. As for animate items-- that spell was designed to animate items for attack. These aren't attack items. And alternative idea would be to use a specifically-designed construct with a built-in +15 Craft skill. But he won't have his animated hammer "Pat" at that case.
ninja1 10-31-06, 10:57 AM	Your estimates are way off.I agree, but perhaps for different reasons. My estimates were also meant to be silly and joking about the disparity between the cost of constructs vs. undead in general. Maybe I should have added a :D in there as well... ;) Also, I forgot to add in any cost for the actual (masterwork) tools/workshop used. I appologize to the OP for a bit O' off topic, but I would also like to say I disagree about omiting any time and cost to train the undead. I see the cost as included in the spell Awaken Undead and the time needed being as long as it takes to cast the spell. Basic undead, even after being awakened, become intelligent undead and would have skills as appropriate for the Undead Type. Skill points equal to (4 + Int modifier, minimum 1) per Hit Die, with quadruple skill points for the first Hit Die, if the undead creature has an Intelligence score. However, many undead are mindless and gain no skill points or feats.
Branto 10-31-06, 09:49 PM	IAs for animate items-- that spell was designed to animate items for attack. These aren't attack items. Naw, that's just the most obvious and un-creative use of it. ;) If they could ONLY attack it would make having the spell permanize-able quite useless, seeing as it took 3,000 xp to permanize the spell's affect... and about one round to break a chair. I love using the spell to create transportation, myself. An animated carriage never gets tired or requires food and has a very impressive land speed, you know. :D