One of my goals in the pursuit to create better crafts includes Artificing; magic item creation. After a few iterations, we created a version of Artificing that no longer can target and attack every creature in the world or change places with the gods, however I'm sure we missed something that will cause a catastrophic failure of the whole system. I would love if you would help me find the flaws in the system.


Artificing Theory & Balance:
  Beyond the initial goal of a zero-gold system, where players don't have to buy anything to create magic items, we also wanted to make a craft that was balanced for the GM. In this case we created two drawbacks for Artificing: Thaumogenesis and Gemstones.
  Each Artifice requires a Gemstone, which controls its capabilities. If GM's don't put gemstones in their player's inventory, or put very small flawed gems in their loot boxes, they won't be able to create overpowered items.
  In Thaumogenesis, each Artifice creates an Anti-Artifice, a living creature connected to the item that cannot be destroyed without also destroying the magic item. The Anti-Artifice is a reflection of it's creator, and slowly learns to hate the Artificer, eventually coming to kill him. The Player is forced to destroy the Anti-Artifice, or find a way to avoid him until the connection between him and the item is broken. With Thaumogenesis, GMs are able to threaten players who create too many or too powerful items with Nemisis-like monster, forcing them to craft cautiously.

Those are the very basic ideas. The system has a 3 page introduction, another 5 to elaborate, and 11 of actual abilities you can imbue into an item. You can find the Artificing rules here.

I'd love to get your opinion on the subject, as well as any thoughts on the system itself.

Sounds needlessly complex and way way cheap and easy to pull off.

I much prefer 5e's system with some added extra elements from Xanithar's guide. Fairly straightforward and mostly just a time and gold cost of increasing quantity depending on the item.

Hey Omega,
I definitely don't feel the system is complex, since it can mostly be explained in two pages with a third for examples. It is easy for the characters in its own way, but has its costs and drawbacks. The 11 pages are just options so players can actually make any item. I can sum Artificing up in a sentence or two. "Artificers choose the recipient, power, and method of activating the Artifice. They gather the necessary gems & Ingredients, create a spell circle (a few hours), and summon an Anti-Artifice." That's honestly about it. I've worked and reworked the first two pages to make them as streamlined and easy to read as possible, so I would really appreciate it if you gave just the introduction a read!

I mostly only hear grumblings about 5e's system, even with Xanthars guide. The complaint is generally that the rules are incomplete and designed for the GM to make up the rules for the players. Since it causes more work for GMs, and the Players don't know what they can design, i would say that 5e's current system is pretty poor. With the system i developed you know exactly what you can make and what it will cost.

Good stuff. Similar to systems I've designed for my OD&D games (but more detailed than mine). Mine were all based on my original playing of Fantasy Hero. I was lucky enough to be part of the FH1e playtest as a teen and a big part of the gameplay was artificing, aka using the Hero system to make magic items that were still balanced in gameplay. The end result wasn't satisfactory to me because it was better to have magic items than your own powers or spells.

John Out West, please walk us through an Item Creation.

Hey Spinach,

  Sure i'll walk you through, can I use the example on page three which pretty much goes through the whole process?

Example of Creating an Artifice:
For this Artifice, we're using a Ruby that is small, opaque, and uncut. The first step is to determine which Power we want to use. The Power will be of the Evocation School because the gemstone is a Ruby. For this Artifice, we're choosing the Power: Hurt.

Hurt: (Who) is dealt (Damage) (Damage Type).

Now we define the Recipient, or "Who." The power will deal damage, so the Recipient should be an enemy. For this we'll use "(Target) within (Distance)."

Hurt: (Target) within (Distance) is dealt (Damage) (Damage Type).

Now we need to define the Miscellaneous sections, including the Target and Damage Type. For this Artifice, we're going to choose "(Sensed) Creature)" for the Target. We also need to define which Sense is used. In this case, we're going to choose "Sight.' For Damage Type, we're going to choose "Piercing Damage." The Gemstone is Uncut and Tiny, so it will deal 1d6 damage at 5ft of Distance.

Hurt: Visible Creature within 5ft is dealt 1d6 Piercing damage.

Finally we need to define the Input, which will tell us what event will activate the Artifice. For this we're going to use "Gesture" where a movement or position activates the Artifice. The Artificer decides the gesture, and in this case, it will be a complicated hand sign.

With a hand sign, a visible creature within 5ft is dealt 1d6 Piercing damage.

And that's it! You've designed a magic item in about four steps. Now you need to do some of the clerical work, including drawing the circle of power, gathering mundane ingredients such as eyeballs and brains (Any creature), Choosing a base item that can fit through a 1-inch diameter ring (I suggest a wand or stiletto), and finally learning about what Anti-Artifice you will be creating. In this case i believe the Anti-Artifice is Devourer who is cruel, capable of scanning their foes equipment, is immune to piercing damage, and can cause piercing damage.

With some help from you guys I cut some of the fat from the Artificing system. You can see it here.

I did this shortening by adding in a half-page that let me remove a large chunk from every school of magic, and allow them to create their own powers. I posted the helf-page below, and I would love if you would try to see how it feels from the perspective of a player or a GM, and if you can find a way to break it I would be appreciative!


Secret Powers:
  Artificers can potentially learn, find, or create new Powers that are not on the list below. These new powers have endless possibilities and generally adhere to the following guidelines:
   (Damage) Is always used when determining the potential of damage, healing, Increases or decreases of maximum health.
  (Distance) is used to determine the distance potential of a Power, how far away, long, wide, or tall the effect it creates is.
  (Duration) is used to determine how long the effects of an impermanent Power last.
  (Attunement) is required by items that are difficult to control, give stat bonuses, resistances, or involve an artifice's user.
  (Charges) are used by taxing Powers, such as healing, changing the form of animate targets, and resurrection.
  (Feeble) is assigned to any power that could potentially defeat a healthy creature instantly under ordinary circumstances.
  Artifices use magic energy to manipulate the world, but they cannot create matter. Conjurers can bring water from here to there, and Transmuters can turn air to water, but nothing can turn energy into matter.

With respect to the balance issue, if you're satisfied that the powers constructed with a toolkit (like GURPS Supers or Hero System) are balanced, then it should be balanced in a tautological sense. It sounds like PCs have to adventure to find gems and then make them into the items they want, instead of adventuring until they find the items they want. You can make them pay for the items in a variety of resources. But it mostly comes down to XP, effectively, by using a resource tied to character advancement - you get one gem per level, or you get a chance at a gem with every treasure from an adventuring encounter, or you can buy gems at market prices in gold, or by calling in favors from NPCs earned over adventuring; or very directly, by having them channel some XP into advancement and some into creating a gem.

The pitfall I see is that if there is a balance issue in the powers available -- power X is much stronger than its cost -- then every character ends up having (or having to have) an item with power X. You could partially compensate for that with a large group of players by having costs fluctuate -- if everyone is making an item with power X, then the cost of power X increases -- but that leaves those who got in early with a substantial permanent advantage (if the item is not consumable) over later players. The Anti-Artifice could be powered up to increase the "cost" retroactively, so maybe that objection is already met. Random allocation of magic items ducks the issue of balance; two rolls on the same magic item table are balanced before the roll, even if the results come out rather differently. And random items they find present a different challenge to the players, of what to do with a weird random item, as opposed to what's the best item to create with the available resources.

Another problem is that whimsical items typically won't be created. By whimsical I mean items that are odd and usually not useful but occasionally have a major effect on play. Maybe this would also extend to items that have an odd limitation or flaw (the Robe of Eyes which makes it impossible to avoid meeting a monster's gaze weapon; a Chime of Opening that opens everything, not just the thing you want opened).

If gems can be limited to only being able to make an item with a single power (with all its parameters already specified), then finding such a gem is almost the same as finding the item.