Crafting Magic Items

[mhossom]

I have been using Hero Lab for a little over a year now and can't imagine running my games without it. However, there is an aspect of Pathfinder that could benefit from some manner of automation. That is calculating the DC for crafting magic items as well as the cost. It may just be me, but I find these to be confusing and would love to just define the item in Hero Lab and have it tell me what the crafting cost is as well as the DC for creating it.

[Silveras]

The problem with that is the rules in Pathfinder are not a complete system (just as they were not in D&D 3.x).

Weapons have a robust system, as do Armor and Shields, but beyond that, there are only guidelines. The basic formulae can't be used without GM supervision, otherwise players will easily able to craft Rings of +20 attack (permanent True Strike) as one example.

As long as the system relies on a GM to over-rule things that are "too good for the price", it really can't be automated.

[mhossom]

Silveras - That certainly makes sense and I agree that there is no way of automating out the judgement of the GM. However, it would be nice to be able to quickly see what the RAW say the "Ring of +20 attack" costs and what the DC would be to create it.

There have been many instances where I, as GM, countered what the rules say and went with a ruling that was more fitting to the situation and better added to the "epicness" (is that a word) of the story.

[Mathias]

Silveras - he's not asking for the complete magic item creation from scratch system. He's only asking for a calculation of the craft DCs on the existing items, and that's just CL + 5.

[mhossom]

Mathias - It would also be cool if it adjusted the DC with +5's for any pre-reqs that are not met or greyed out those that you are unable to craft because you don't have the creation feat.

[Silveras]

Sorry, I misunderstood, it appears... but even so, it is not as simple as that.

The items pre-defined in HeroLab now (ex. Braces of Armor +1) have their cost input as part of the entry.

The caster level on an item is the "typical" caster level of a randomly-found item. It can be lower if the creator wishes (ex. Pearl of Power is typically CL 17... but can be as low as 1. See Core Rulebook FAQs, Pearl of Power: What is the caster level required to create this item?).

[ShadowChemosh]

On top of what Silveras Pre-Req especially for spells can come from other casters, other character with Spell-like ability, and or even a scroll or wand. How would HL know about those other outside affects?

[mhossom]

Thank you all for the responses. Hero Lab has just helped so much in clearing up mechanics questions I've had in other areas of Pathfinder, I was hoping it could help with this one.