Sunday, March 25, 2012

Contest Deadline and Holmesian Scroll Creation

A few quick reminders on this lazy day of our Sun Lord.

First of all the two-headed contest ends today at 17:00 CST (-6 GMT). If you have an entry (or two) drop them my way by my email or in the comments section below. The triumphant victors will be announced tomorrow.

Secondly and this is more for players in both the home game and Google Plus Hill Cantons campaign. I am posting below the scroll creation house rules. Long story short, I lean way over to Holmesian liberality allowing spellcasters a chance to pen scrolls as early as 1st level.

Scroll Creation
Scrolls are the simplest of items to make, all spell casters (except for mountebanks) can make them at first level. All scrolls take one week per spell level to make assuming full-time work.

Magic users create scrolls through arcane research and the use of a wide range of obscure ingredients particular to the make of inks for each individual spells. As such the cost of materials for scroll creation fluctuate wildly as many of the necessary inputs become plentiful or scarce. Thus a magic user making a scroll must pay 50 gp times the roll of a d4 per each spell level.

Clerics scrolls are made through sacrifice and sacramental devotion to their patron deity that cost 150 gp/per spell level. White Wizards on the other hand achieve the same means by arcane research at a cost of 75 gp/level.

Example:
The renowned scholar and mage Mandamus has just reached fifth level. To celebrate his new attainment of a vaunted new spell level he begins work on a scroll of the Fireball spell. Since Fireball is a third-level spell he rolls 3d4 for a total of 7, multiplying by 50 this gives him a total cost of 350 suns (gp) for the scroll's creation. It will take him three weeks of full-time work to complete the scroll.  

5 comments:

  1. Thats not a bad rule. It gives PC's a bit more oomph and a little downtime reward for MU's

    I am not sure it ought to take a a week but its balanced.

    I do think I'd allow other formats like glass baubles or talismans or ofuda or whatever. The game rules would be the same, just the FX would differ.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I like the other formats business, good suggestion that I will think about incorporating.

      Delete
  2. Interesting take on Holmes scroll creation. Expected cost on average is 2.5 times more per spell level though. Did you intend to increase the creation cost? I do like the injection of randomness into the prep costs. I might use something like cost of 100 plus or minus (d10 * 10), plus if the result is even, minus is the result is odd. And then times spell level. So that ends up being 10 - 200 GP times spell level. Expected value of this scheme is 105 GP per spell level.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yeah I wanted it to be costlier than in Holmes, but not prohibitive. I think the essential part is allowing spellcasters as low as first to be able to do it.

      Delete
  3. I take it that with that amount of time required to pen a scroll, that scrolls are worth an enormous amount to players and NPCs?

    ReplyDelete