Unchained Crafting


Rules Questions


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Hey I have a question about the new crafting system from unchained.

Lets say your crafting a long sword 15GP and its a DC of 10 and you make 1 GP of progress per day. Say you have a craftsman with a +20 to his check so taking 10 you get 30 so that's 5 GP of progress a day so it would take 3 days to make a long sword.

Now if your making a master work long sword it costs 315GP base market Price DC 15, using the same craftsman taking 10 you get 30 and 8GP worth of progress a day so it takes 39.375 days or 40 days to make a Master work sword. Right?

Then if you get into adamantite weapons, base price +3000 so 3015 that includes master work quality. DC 20 so 12 gold progress a day so 251.25 days to make or 252 rounded up. Or does it go from the masterwork price of 315 for how long it takes to make 27 days?

I mostly want to know how long these things take to make so when my PC's want an item I can tell them how long it would take to make it "roughly"


Without double-checking your math, you've basically got it. Even with the Unchained crafting rules the summary is: don't.

I think the design is there to prevent low-level PCs from making money crafting mundane items and selling them. The problem is that by about 5th level, things like masterwork weapons start being a tiny percentage of your net worth, and the crafting rules just prevent you from doing anything cool (for yourself).


Close, except that martial weapons (your example longsword, 15gp) are "Normal" difficulty, meaning DC-15, 2gp/day base progress:
Skill Check of 30 exceeds DC by 15, so 4x speed (8gp/day) = 2 days.

Masterwork Longsword (Complex): 315gp, DC-20, 4gp/day base:
Skill Check of 30 exceeds DC by 10, so 3x speed (12gp/day), so 26.25 days.

Adamantine Longsword (Intricate): 3015gp, DC-25, 8gp/day base:
Skill Check of 30 exceeds DC by 5, so 2x speed (16gp/day), so 188.625 days.


Anguish wrote:

Without double-checking your math, you've basically got it. Even with the Unchained crafting rules the summary is: don't.

I think the design is there to prevent low-level PCs from making money crafting mundane items and selling them. The problem is that by about 5th level, things like masterwork weapons start being a tiny percentage of your net worth, and the crafting rules just prevent you from doing anything cool (for yourself).

I can see the intent there. Sadly, I also see the downside. I've always wanted my front-line characters to have some ability to make their own weapons, and finally am getting one in the game I'm in. She currently has half of a masterwork greataxe ... and I'm really not looking forward to trying to make an adamantine one.

Especially since after a storyline incident (a good one, mind), my barbarian is intent on keeping her 'original' axe. (In the sense that she can replace the haft, then the head, then rework the head, then fit a new haft, et cetera.)


Qaianna wrote:
Anguish wrote:

Without double-checking your math, you've basically got it. Even with the Unchained crafting rules the summary is: don't.

I think the design is there to prevent low-level PCs from making money crafting mundane items and selling them. The problem is that by about 5th level, things like masterwork weapons start being a tiny percentage of your net worth, and the crafting rules just prevent you from doing anything cool (for yourself).

I can see the intent there. Sadly, I also see the downside. I've always wanted my front-line characters to have some ability to make their own weapons, and finally am getting one in the game I'm in. She currently has half of a masterwork greataxe ... and I'm really not looking forward to trying to make an adamantine one.

Especially since after a storyline incident (a good one, mind), my barbarian is intent on keeping her 'original' axe. (In the sense that she can replace the haft, then the head, then rework the head, then fit a new haft, et cetera.)

If she's tied to the specific axe, there's a 2nd level spell for that: Masterwork Transformation


Took me forever to find but. http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/wondrous-items/wondrous-items/r-z/tools -amazing-tools-of-manufacture

Allows you to do 2,000gp worth of crafting in one hour once per day. Really helps on the mundane stuff, but might have trouble finding the exact one you need since it's randomly determined when created.


The description stating 'determined randomly' applies to tools encountered in loot. If you are making your own Amazing Tools of Manufacture, you can certainly choose the Craft skill they are made for.


Mr.$mith wrote:
Say you have a craftsman with a +20 to his check so taking 10 you get 30 so that's 5 GP of progress a day so it would take 3 days to make a long sword.
CraziFuzzy wrote:

Close, except that martial weapons (your example longsword, 15gp) are "Normal" difficulty, meaning DC-15, 2gp/day base progress:

Skill Check of 30 exceeds DC by 15, so 4x speed (8gp/day) = 2 days.

I can't believe that you both messed that up. It's pretty simple:

For one thing, it doesn't really matter what the DC is with regards to progress, since the progress is doubled by the amount over the DC one makes (a 30 skill check will give the same 16 gp per day progress regardless of if it was an extremely simple or very intricate item)

But 30 is 3x5 over 15, meaning 2^3 times faster, meaning 16 gp per day progress (regardless of the type of item).

Anyway, I too agree that it's silly that unchained crafting system didn't fix the slow pace of crafting masterwork or special material items.

In fact, not only that, but unchained crafting system doesn't even really speed things up much at all compared to normally. A DC30 item being made by someone with a 30 craft check would result in 13 gp progress per day, which is only 20% slower. Most items that are only 15 DC would be half that progress, but personally I ignore that rule for crafting since —like unchained admits— it's stupid. One should just take their craft check result and multiply it by itself to get the progress.

That said, if one wanted to be a really fast crafter, one could take the Master Alchemist feat. Obviously that doesn't cover weapons and armor though. Any sane GM should allow a new feat that allows the same thing to be done with weapons and armor (10x progress and +2 to skill), or miscellanea— although I'm not sure why anyone would spend a feat to craft a non-weapon, non-armor, non-alchemical item quickly.

Lastly, I personally made house rules to allow for faster armor/weapon crafting. It's pretty simple in my opinion:

  • Time taken to craft items of masterwork quality will not exceed 2x the time it takes to craft a regular version. (stacks additively with material multiplier)
  • Time taken to craft items of alternate materials will not exceed 4x the time it takes to craft a regular version (stacks additively with masterwork multiplier)
  • Time taken to craft armor is calculated as if the cost of the armor was 10x it's AC bonus in gold pieces (treat 0 AC as 0.5)

Aside from that, there's the thing I previously mentioned where a crafter will just take their skill check squared for progress, rather than involving the DCs for progress which is nonsensical. The great thing about it is that you now have a "crafting budget" which means you can just craft 128 gold (master Alchemist 30 skill check) of any combination/assortment of items each day, rather than having to deal with each tiny cheap item individually which is a mess.

I recommend you use those 4 rules instead of following unchained which is just a big house rule anyway (only officially endorsed by Paizo).


jwtelesio wrote:

Took me forever to find but. http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/wondrous-items/wondrous-items/r-z/tools -amazing-tools-of-manufacture

Allows you to do 2,000gp worth of crafting in one hour once per day. Really helps on the mundane stuff, but might have trouble finding the exact one you need since it's randomly determined when created.

Man, I'm kinda clueless why someone would get that when it can't really do anything useful short of craft special material weapons/armor fast, but who is in such a rush that they'd spend 12 000 gp to do so? Normally people will only need to craft a weapon or armor very rarely. In addition, it makes it cost 1/2 rather than 1/3.

The other use is crafting alchemical items, but those could be crafted cheaper (1/3 cost), and likely even a similar speed (or even faster for cheap items) if one had the master alchemist feat.

I guess it'd be useful for crafting poisons for someone who doesn't have Master Alchemist, but even then the person will end up paying 1/2 price instead of 1/3 price. I would think a person frequently using poison would rather save the countless thousands of gold (lost by spending 1/2 value rather than 1/3 value) plus 12 thousand gold by getting Master Alchemist rather than the item though.


Joesi wrote:

Man, I'm kinda clueless why someone would get that when it can't really do anything useful short of craft special material weapons/armor fast, but who is in such a rush that they'd spend 12 000 gp to do so? Normally people will only need to craft a weapon or armor very rarely. In addition, it makes it cost 1/2 rather than 1/3.

The other use is crafting alchemical items, but those could be crafted cheaper (1/3 cost), and likely even a similar speed (or even faster for cheap items) if one had the master alchemist feat.

I guess it'd be useful for crafting poisons for someone who doesn't have Master Alchemist, but even then the person will end up paying 1/2 price instead of 1/3 price. I would think a person frequently using poison would rather save the countless thousands of gold (lost by spending 1/2 value rather than 1/3 value) plus 12 thousand gold by getting Master Alchemist rather than the item though.

I bolded the bit that might explain the lack of love for crafting. (Then again, I remember the steep price of trying to do this in second edition. Ouch.) On the other hand, how long did it take in reality to make a good sword or axe? Or a 'masterwork' one?


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Joesi wrote:
Mr.$mith wrote:
Say you have a craftsman with a +20 to his check so taking 10 you get 30 so that's 5 GP of progress a day so it would take 3 days to make a long sword.
CraziFuzzy wrote:

Close, except that martial weapons (your example longsword, 15gp) are "Normal" difficulty, meaning DC-15, 2gp/day base progress:

Skill Check of 30 exceeds DC by 15, so 4x speed (8gp/day) = 2 days.

I can't believe that you both messed that up. It's pretty simple:

For one thing, it doesn't really matter what the DC is with regards to progress, since the progress is doubled by the amount over the DC one makes (a 30 skill check will give the same 16 gp per day progress regardless of if it was an extremely simple or very intricate item)

But 30 is 3x5 over 15, meaning 2^3 times faster, meaning 16 gp per day progress (regardless of the type of item).

Way to be condescending, and then still get it wrong. The Alternate Crafting rules do not say that the crafting time doubles for every 5 you exceed the check by. It specifically states:

Pathfinder Unchained, pg. 72 wrote:
If you exceed the DC by at least 5, your progress doubles. If you exceed the DC by at least 10, your progress triples, if you exceed it by at least 15, you quadruple your progress, and so on.

So what i wrote was 100% correct. Exceeding the check by 15 quadruples the speed, so the base of 2gp/day is multiplied by 4 to 8gp/day, completing a 15gp longsword in 2 days.

The basis for this IS that the progress 'doubles' for every 5 you exceed the check, but the way multiples in pathfinder work is that they do not rise exponentially. In pathfinder, a x2 multiplier, combined with a x2 multiplier, results in a x3 multiplier, NOT x4. If you really wanted to turn this into a math formula, it would be:
DailyProgress = BaseDailyProgress * TRUNC((CheckResult-DC)/5)+1)


Yeah, right. Major fail. It would be so much simpler my way I don't know why they keep making things more complicated than they need to be

Lantern Lodge

The TV show Forged in Fire, Lets people attempt to craft serviceable weapons in 2 hours. and those typically look like shit. then the final 2 are given a few days to a week to complete a weapon. I believe it would take at least 8hours to make a normal weapon.

would love to learn this skill but sadly i need a job that earns a living lol. one day, ill learn it, one day.


First of all, you're in the rules questions forum, not the off-topic section.
Second of all, you're a year late.

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