On potions brewing…
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….will have his first/second circle spells depleted for the duration of a rest cycle.....
Interestingly, the "recipe" search and the brewing sessions become one the fundament of the other..... To the extreme,that means that a brewer will exist and quest only (mainly) to be able to brew....I don't see that one leads to the other. Influence, yes, but not more so that wanting a buy a potion leads to questing to get gold to buy it.
Further, you could always tell people one of:
1. You'll have it tomorrow, and do your brewing at end of session
2. Have a stock on hand that you do at a time convienent for you. -
The DMs see Brew Potion much like we do Skill Focus: Appraise–its meant to save you money. It isn't meant to be your adventurer's career.
So why the need of recipes that can be found only on quests for the common potions (i.e. Blur)?
I can understand it for particular potions but the most common should be brewable (is this even a verb?) by anyone willing to buy the recipe from your NPC merchant.
….will have his first/second circle spells depleted for the duration of a rest cycle.....
Interestingly, the "recipe" search and the brewing sessions become one the fundament of the other..... To the extreme,that means that a brewer will exist and quest only (mainly) to be able to brew....I don't see that one leads to the other. Influence, yes, but not more so that wanting a buy a potion leads to questing to get gold to buy it.
I was referring to the potion brewer not to the potion purchaser. And, yes, for the rest I agree with you, should one have lots of time to play he could either brew at the end of a session or use some "spare time" to brew a reserve. But when you receive an order for 15 or 20 bottles at a time it means it will take you 4/5 days RL in order to complete it. That means 1 client per week.
= Wands win again. -
But when you receive an order for 15 or 20 bottles at a time it means it will take you 4/5 days RL in order to complete it. That means 1 client per week.
You do know its 5 per rest cycle, not 24 RL hours? This means you can have that order done in two hours. Besides, if you just always go off to brew all the potions you can with the leftover spells from each single adventure/quest, you will build up a decent stock quite rapidly. I know, for I do this from time to time.
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I feel like potions, scrolls, and wands should be used to supplement the spellcasting of your character during adventures and not be used to generate revenue. In my opinion, making something fantastic like magic into something boring like commodities cheapens the fantasy setting. I like the idea of minimizing the role of the PC merchant. I like the idea of limiting the affordability and availability of potions. Bards, clerics, mages, and other spellcasters should benefit from an awesome increase to their mystique when characters who cannot cast spells no longer carry boxes and boxes of bottled spellcasters. That, to me, is worth having to pay NPC merchant prices for their magical goods.
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But when you receive an order for 15 or 20 bottles at a time it means it will take you 4/5 days RL in order to complete it. That means 1 client per week.
You do know its 5 per rest cycle, not 24 RL hours? This means you can have that order done in two hours. Besides, if you just always go off to brew all the potions you can with the leftover spells from each single adventure/quest, you will build up a decent stock quite rapidly. I know, for I do this from time to time.
As I said, if you play for 2 hrs a night and you use only one "rest cycle" per playing time it will take you 4/5 days to complete the order.
If you devote 2 hrs RL to brewing yes, you will be able to fulfill the order in just one night of play but you will be "hampered" in your questing ability.As per using the unused spells, it really depends on your spell selection. I rarely end up with a spare shield spell (I don't use it since I have a few spare potions on me), invisibility (same reason, I rarely use a spell slot to study invisibility if I have potions) or blur (which can only be brewed if you have the non-purchasable recipe).
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As I said, if you play for 2 hrs a night and you use only one "rest cycle" per playing time it will take you 4/5 days to complete the order.
If you devote 2 hrs RL to brewing yes, you will be able to fulfill the order in just one night of play but you will be "hampered" in your questing ability.As per using the unused spells, it really depends on your spell selection. I rarely end up with a spare shield spell (I don't use it since I have a few spare potions on me), invisibility (same reason, I rarely use a spell slot to study invisibility if I have potions) or blur (which can only be brewed if you have the non-purchasable recipe).
Now, personally, I have a lot of time on my hands, from a combination of summer break and my college deciding not to hire student workers in my department over the summer. Now, I'm sure that if I sat down and made a spellcaster, I could probably squeeze out a small profit should I decide to sell potions, but only because I have absolutely nothing better to do with my time. However, someone who doesn't have loads of time to devote to sitting in a chair playing Arabel, such as yourself, probably should not be devoting so much time and effort into making potion brewing profitable on such a large sale.
To me, the message I'm getting is that you'd like to see potion brewing become more accessible to people who don't have obnoxious amounts of time on their hands. Given what's been said, though, your most likely alternatives are either to start crafting wands, or stop trying to make potion brewing profitable for yourself.
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To me, the message I'm getting is that you'd like to see potion brewing become more accessible to people who don't have obnoxious amounts of time on their hands.
Given what's been said, though, your most likely alternatives are either to start crafting wands, or stop trying to make potion brewing profitable for yourself.
I cannot remember why we came to discuss the time thing… ah, yes. It was recipe related and was not a main issue.
Other points:
1. Wands are not accessible to pure class characters (i.e. fighters/barbarians)2. No one complains about the level of prices of a PC potion-brewer (they are sensibly cheaper than the normal ones) who will still make a profit. I.e. for a bunch of 5 shield potions, sold at 250 lions the bunch, I make about 60 lions, if you buty the same amount of potions from an NPC you spend about 660 lions. (for comparison a wand is 20 lions a charge) So I fail to see how renouncing to profitability will solve the issue of time.
3. If i drop potion brewing what about poor Yardsale who's been spending lots of time to work on the new features???
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2. No one complains about the level of prices of a PC potion-brewer (they are sensibly cheaper than the normal ones) who will still make a profit. I.e. for a bunch of 5 shield potions, sold at 250 lions the bunch, I make about 60 lions, if you buty the same amount of potions from an NPC you spend about 660 lions. (for comparison a wand is 20 lions a charge) So I fail to see how renouncing to profitability will solve the issue of time.
You're cutting out 400 gold from NPC prices, to make 60 gold on a batch of 5 potions. You're making 12 gold a potion. Why not increase the price of those potions? Make yourself 30 to 50 gold per potion.
This isn't a personal attack, but why limit yourself to 12 gold profit per potion brewed? That sounds completely asinine to me. Alternatively, why not brew potions as your able. Offer them for sale when you have them. Either through sendings when you have stock. I understand you have to cover the cost yourself, but it's an option.
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2. No one complains about the level of prices of a PC potion-brewer (they are sensibly cheaper than the normal ones) who will still make a profit. I.e. for a bunch of 5 shield potions, sold at 250 lions the bunch, I make about 60 lions, if you buty the same amount of potions from an NPC you spend about 660 lions. (for comparison a wand is 20 lions a charge) So I fail to see how renouncing to profitability will solve the issue of time.
You're cutting out 400 gold from NPC prices, to make 60 gold on a batch of 5 potions. You're making 12 gold a potion. Why not increase the price of those potions? Make yourself 30 to 50 gold per potion.
This isn't a personal attack, but why limit yourself to 12 gold profit per potion brewed? That sounds completely asinine to me. Alternatively, why not brew potions as your able. Offer them for sale when you have them. Either through sendings when you have stock. I understand you have to cover the cost yourself, but it's an option.
It's because of the elasticity of the demand.
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2. No one complains about the level of prices of a PC potion-brewer (they are sensibly cheaper than the normal ones) who will still make a profit. I.e. for a bunch of 5 shield potions, sold at 250 lions the bunch, I make about 60 lions, if you buty the same amount of potions from an NPC you spend about 660 lions. (for comparison a wand is 20 lions a charge) So I fail to see how renouncing to profitability will solve the issue of time.
You're cutting out 400 gold from NPC prices, to make 60 gold on a batch of 5 potions. You're making 12 gold a potion. Why not increase the price of those potions? Make yourself 30 to 50 gold per potion.
This isn't a personal attack, but why limit yourself to 12 gold profit per potion brewed? That sounds completely asinine to me. Alternatively, why not brew potions as your able. Offer them for sale when you have them. Either through sendings when you have stock. I understand you have to cover the cost yourself, but it's an option.
No offence taken.
My price choice is driven by the elasticity of the demand.
So far I am finding a nice equilibrium about the pain of brewing and its rewards (not complaining about the money I make on potions). Besides if I increase the prices people will tend to migrate to multiclassed characters that will be able to use wands (till the wand system will be changed bwuhahahaha).
The fact that I am the only brewer on the server (more or less) tells me that DM are achieving what they want: to reduce the presence of crafters.
The discussion is - or is meant to be - to help everyone find a nice equilibrium about what a character with potion brewing feat can offer and what the PCs want to find on the server under the new system.
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Our module is set up with the idea that most people get potions from shops, not from crafters. I think that may be part of the fundamental logic that some people are missing.
Not that it has anything to do with Amaldyr's points necessarily, but a few people don't seem to realize how we view it. We want the average player who logs in to do some quests to have fun. We're not really aiming for the powerquester who knows he can squeeze an extra bit of gold out of every quest by relying solely on a PC potion brewer or wand crafter to cut his costs.
Its for that reason we're not going to make it easier to buy potions in bulk or increase how many someone can cast a day, or significantly increase profit margins for brewers.
Now, I'm ALL for making it more fun to brew potions. So ideas to do that are something I want to see.
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This is CoA, not some crappy Drizzt book where our epic hero defeats his enemies with no potions. Our fighters and barbarians need and demand potions, and I bet that you will not need 3 / day or even 9 / day when your greatest challenge is finding Shira's dog, but when you regularly murder vampires, try to fight the Shadovar, suffer through wars and hunt dragons you -will- appreciate being able to walk up to Belir and ask for 50 Cure Serious Wounds.
A wand crafter can get you 2 CSW wands in 10 minutes. Good luck trying to get those 50 potions! Like Jasede said: Straight up fighters and barbarians NEED potions. And not only them, paladins and rangers also need their fair share of arcane potions.
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Now, I'm ALL for making it more fun to brew potions. So ideas to do that are something I want to see.Perhaps make use of and adapt the code that works for being near a brewing cauldron to apply to places that are more interesting and dangerous. If there was, e.g., some hidden lab/cauldron somewhere where you could sacrifice some pixies to brew improved invisibility potions (or a bonus to regular invis ones), that might be fun…
Or perhaps have the script look for particular types of components in the inventory. (Limited-use) recipies that are more powerful might have a description that makes it clear if they are using illegal ingredients, for example - or they can be "recharged" (with dm-help) if the character with the recipie performs certain in-game actions..
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Now, I'm ALL for making it more fun to brew potions. So ideas to do that are something I want to see.
Take out the gold and experience component. Make recipies something anyone can learn IG through the right channels and then someone with the feat can do a 3-ingredient recipie ala hedge magic to make a batch of five potions.
eg. 5 x Potion of Death Armour: Skeleton's knuckle + Bodak's tooth + Gargoyle Skull
Or maybe not 5 a batch, but something like that?
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A brief analysis of the Arabellan Potion Market
I’ve been brewing potions for the last three months or so, enjoying the transition from the old crafting system to the new recipe based one. My summary is valid for Arcane brews, some of the considerations, I am sure, are valid for the divine brewers as well.
1. The crafting system
The new crafting system is quite intriguing. Instead of the simple “get the feat, buy the pass for the mage guild and set up your business†-
I've found it 10 times easier to earn gold than it was a year or two ago. Some of you have incredibly short memories!
You should gave no problem buying potions these days.
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My only concern is that the new system greatly limits the variety of potions one can buy from PCs.
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Something on brewing potions that I'd like to mention (perhaps again)..
I'm not really sure just how much the mechanics matter in making this fun - but what in my memory really makes brewing potions great is if you have a very sociable character. Somehow, it does not seem to work so well (for me, at least) for characters that I have tried to play who were more cynical and openly negative in their outlook. But with my first brewer-character (still under the old system), I remember I really loved doing it despite the limitations. Maybe, in part, that's just because it's so long ago, and that distorts things.
But, and to get to the point, potions are great because they're those small gifts you can use to grease the wheels of social interactions. It doesn't really work in the same way for wands etc. but that little potion here or there gifted to someone for free with a smile can just go so far in making your character seem nice and caring…
It greatly depends on the character, I think, whether or not potion brewing is fun. Not even so much on the player, maybe, but on the personality of the character one happens to play at the time.
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I like the suggestion Almadyr made of having merchants selling rare, high-demand recipes at far-off, dangerous locations. I like the suggestion of anything that provides an incentive to explore the distant corners of the server.
I don't like the idea of depending upon scripted quests to acquire recipes. The guaranteed gold and XP of scripted quests are incentive enough to do scripted quests. I would like recipes to provide more of an incentive to explore than to quest. That is only me and my likes and dislikes, however.
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I can understand the new brewing system and why it is in place but I think a few things need to be tweeked. Such as little things like buying the cure medium recipe for 77 gold, creating a cure medium potion for 40 gold (and 4 xp) and finding out you can buy them from Temon for 36 gold. I have thought about it and I know that DM’s won’t raise the prices across the server for the cure medium potions but I think it might do well with costing the brewer say 30 gold to create the potion or get rid of the recipe outright.
oh and should this be posted under bugs?