Church & State Crafting Rules

These are the current compiled rules for crafting things in C&S. In general, these will be rules for making things that are not part of the usual process of doing your job (which is figured into downtime checks and resource levels). Most of these rules will cover things not covered in the basic rules (e.g. crafting poisons) or will re-explain the process for making things in an environment where you don’t have hundreds of GP to just blow into an economy with no concern as to the actual effects. And yes, you may have made some of these things with more ease when I was just making up systems as we went, but what is okay when you all have not much higher than a +6 crafting check is much more unbalanced when you guys are beginning to climb upwards of +25. As always, I reserve the right to change my mind if playtesting proves some of these rules flawed.

Poisons

In general, the process of crafting poisons is a bit of a sticky process. Unless you are a member of an outlawed guild, such as the assassins, you have no simple access to formulae for toxins, and just taking the venom from toxic creatures is both inadvisable and prone to more effort than it is worth (the venoms will tend to thin and evaporate and generally not be nearly as dangerous as when they were part of the animal or plant). So I will give those of you interested in poisons a certain number of formulae that you’ve already discovered. From that point, every time you make a critical success (a 20 and then success at the base create DC) you will gain the next most powerful poison in the series. If you already have that poison, critical success will only result in the normal results of a really high roll (for the purposes of this system, treat a critical success as just a roll of 20 plus modifiers).

There are two ways of making poisons: alchemy and herbalism. Alchemical poisons are made from chemicals such as arsenic, sulfides, and other mineral-based toxins, blended to proper amounts. Herbal poisons are made from toxic plants and animal venoms. The chart below is for Alchemical poisons. Herbal poisons of the same type are +4 DC to create, but also +4 DC to be detected. If you know the formula for an Alchemical poison, you do not know how to craft the Herbal poison of the same basic effects, and vice versa. You may learn the lowest level poison (the A poison) in any series of the appropriate type by spending a month on Alchemy or Herbalism, specifically in poison research (which will not count as a Resources-profiting month unless you somehow find people willing to pay big money for poison). Further growth, of course, requires critical success or knowledge from a professional. The books in the library can give you theory and suggestions, but don’t really go deep into application.

Each type of poison will be listed with an ability (or pair of abilities, or special) and a letter to indicate its strength. Thus a Dex C poison would do 1d2 Dex initial and 1d4 Dex secondary damage, while a Str/Con F poison does 1d4 Str initial damage and 1d6 Con secondary damage. You do not have to learn a different poison for higher save DCs or detect DCs, as those are considered getting an especially good batch. Further information is below the table. Note that the GP cost is very expensive, as it’s much easier to find the appropriate chemicals yourself than to buy them from those who know what you can use them for.

Poisons can be brewed with the intent of their being Contact or Ingested. Contact poisons can be used on a slashing weapon with full effect, are +2 Fort Save DC when injected via a syringe or similar tool, but are –4 Save DC when swallowed. Ingested poisons are +2 Fort Save DC normally, but are –2 DC when injected and have little to no effect when delivered via a weapon or contact. An Ingested poison may be delivered in reduced form for a corresponding reduction between Save DC and Detect DC. Each extra dose of the same type of poison given at once is +1 Fort DC and –1 Detect DC (only one dose at a time can be applied to a weapon). A person who successfully Saves against either effect of a poison is at +1 cumulative Fort bonus against any further instances of that poison type that day, and may build up an immunity in such a way over time.

After exceeding the Create DC, subtract that DC from the roll’s result and then divide by Extra Success Threshold (round down as usual in D&D). These extra successes can increase the Fort DC by +1 or the Detect DC by +2 for that batch of the poison. The Detect DC is the base DC for any scent abilities, poison tasting, or magic that can detect poison and will be modified by the context of the poison.

The listed stats are for Str and Dex-based poisons. To create a Con-affecting poison increase Create DC by +6, and to create a Int, Wis, or Cha-affecting poison increase Create DC by +2.

The listed costs are for one dose of poison. Multiple doses can be created in a batch by increasing the base time by +10% for each extra dose and by increasing the base cost by +90% for each dose. Both of these, as noted, affect the base cost every time, so adding a third dose will increase the time and cost by the same amount as adding the second dose, for example. All doses are created with the same roll, not rolled for individually.

A Critical Fumble ruins a batch of poison. A failure requires an additional +20% or the modified time and +10% of the modified cost of the poison, and indicates ruin if these can not be paid. As listed before, a Critical Success is exactly like getting 20 + modifiers with the benefit of learning the next most potent poison in the series if it is not known already.

Examples: Nalole is going to make five doses of Alchemical Strength B poison, and decides to prepare it as Contact. After a little bit under 3 hours (2 hours x 1.4) he rolls and gets a 34. Subtracting the 12 Create DC he has 22 left which divides by 2 for extra success on this particular poison. He puts 8 of these 11 successes into Save DC and puts the remaining 3 into Detect DC (for +6). He winds up with 5 doses of DC 14 poison that does 1d2 Str / 1d2 Str and has a Detect DC of 21. His final cost was 55 Alchemy/Herbalism points, or it would have cost him about 330 gp from black market sources.

Later that day, Nalole makes a batch of Herbal Constitution C poison, and decides to make another Contact poison for Sebrand’s sword. Not certain of excellent success, he makes only one dose. After 4 hours he rolls and gets a natural 20, and then easily confirms this against the DC for a critical success. In his experiment, he winds up with the recipe for Herbal Constitution D poison. Since he also has a total roll of 36 against the 24 Create DC (Con based have +6 DC), he divides the remaining 12 by 3 (the poison’s extra success divider) and has 4 points to allocate to DCs. He puts them all into Fort Save DC. He now has a dose of DC 10 poison that does 1d2 Con / 1d4 Con and has a Detect DC of 18. It cost him 14 Alchemy/Herbalism points.

Other Herbal and Alchemical Goodies

For purposes of this system Herbalism and Alchemy will be split in what they can do pretty solidly, which may realign what creations each one can do slightly. In general, assume that, as with poisons, Herbalism and Alchemy can replicate effects from the different disciplines at a +4 create DC. However, this crossover must be reasonably something that could be made of mineral chemistry or life chemistry.

In most cases, anything that gives a penalty to a roll or has another detrimental effect will be easier achieved with Alchemy, while anything that provides a bonus to a roll or has a beneficial effect will be the purview of Herbalism. Obviously, like with tindertwigs and sunrods, Alchemy doesn’t always have to be set up in such a way, but it’s a simple way of splitting questionable creations.

Each creation has a materials cost in both Alchemy points and in GP, for whichever is preferred. It has a create DC and a Base time. As with poisons, creating more than one dose of something in a batch is a good idea, as it only increases the base time by +10% and the base cost by +90% for each extra dose, since a lot of alchemy and herbalism is getting the right circumstances and equipment ready and then it’s not much harder to add extra ingredients. Each also has a success threshold like poisons and a base market value (which is about the maximum an honest character should expect to sell the chemical for). For chemical creations, figure the amount of success by subtracting the DC from the roll’s result and dividing by the success threshold, rounding down, then adding one for basic success. The successes can be split as desired to either divide the time or multiply the market value. So two successes allows a character to either take half as long or sell the dose for twice as much. Unlike with poisons, a natural 20 means that the character rerolls and adds the second die’s result to the roll total (so a +6 bonus rolling a 20 and then a 10 would have a 36 total). For most creations, increasing the value of the product is because the effects of the chemical are somehow better, which is noted in the description. When this is the case, the first listing is for the one basic success, the rest are for 2+ successes.

Keep in mind that a character probably makes a number of these creations in any month spend getting a check in Alchemy or Herbalism, but they are sold as Resources. This system should be used to make items for personal use or to sell in other cities. As with poisons, a Critical Failure ruins the batch and a regular failure means +20% of the modified time and +10% of the modified cost.

This is a list of the most commonly known creations in each area. Different chemical creations could easily be researched, and statted using these as templates.

Other Crafts

The rules in the PHB for Crafts are really dumb. Here is a replacement.

In general, the chart of different craft ideas is pretty close, intentionally, to the above chart for chemical goods. There are differences, however. First, since this is intended to represent as many crafts as possible, there is not a lot of detail. This means that I reserve the right to alter these details slightly during the game if I feel something would be easier or harder to make than what is considered the norm. Secondly, most of these crafts are not something you can mix up in a bowl, so do not have the same reduction in cost and time by being prepared together. For things that can be made more easily in groups, such as arrows, utensils, soap, etc. add +60% of the base time for each item after the first, and roll for the production as a group. Thirdly, success threshold increase multiplies the price or divides the time, as with chemistry, but this is due to masterwork considerations and such so there are not usually system benefits for the increase. Note that some things will have a minimum time or maximum value, at the limits of believability.

When there are system benefits to increased value, aside from the increased selling price, assume the following: Basic success results in an adequate creation – it is good enough, but may not be as strong, solid, well made, etc. as a better creation. An extra success spent into value makes the creation Good, which has no system benefits but has no penalties either. Two extra successes spent results in an Excellent creation, that has +1 to any applicable effects (Excellent tools give +1 to skills they’re used for). Excellent weapons do not have a +1 attack, but are generally slightly harder, lighter, stronger, etc. Three extra successes spent results in a Masterwork item, with all normal effects of that. Anything beyond Masterwork may or may not be possible, and may or may not have system effects. A critical success with value past masterwork may create a legendary component if done with enough flair.

Critical Failure wastes the materials. Failure increases time by +20% and cost by +10% as usual. Critical success allows a reroll with the second roll added, as with chemistry. For purposes of magic item creation, the Craft cost can be considered to be multiplied by the same factor as the market value. This rewards using personalized items in some part of the item process.

* Negligible – A small fraction of a craft point or a few copper at most

** A day is about 8 hours of work