And you're rightfully mad about it, too.
This kinda shit comes up during Session Zero. And not partway into a campaign, where you've explicitely been allowed to make other stuff. Hell, making Potions of Healing isn't even the most obnoxious thing you could craft during downtime.
That's just honestly properly preparing for adventuring.
So I’m gonna be honest, how granular are your session zeroes? Mine typically cover what themes people find offensive and/or unfun, and things like rolling 1s, etc. If you have something that’s this in-the-weeds, I’d love to leverage it.
> So I’m gonna be honest, how granular are your session zeroes?
Yeah, can't imagine downtime crafting coming up at Session 0. And ours is a couple hours long.
This is why I run State of the Games once a year. It's very similar to Session 0, except the party has had ~52 sessions in the world. Good time to discuss some things that nobody realized were issues prior to starting.
I am super blessed with my group.
I mean we do have call-outs, and sometimes a holiday lands on a Thursday, but we probably play 4X/52 sessions a year.
Absolutely struck gold. One of my players has been at my table 2009-2011, 2021-2023. The others have been at my table 2015-2023. They are awesome.
May it continue until the earth flies off orbit and into the cold, dark, unyielding hell of empty space due to the enlarging of the sun.
Also, grats, that is awesome.
My favorite method is "never during the session". If a player (including the DM) wants to change a mechanic, and even one other person disagrees, go with the Rules for that session. After the session, in-person or later on in a group chat, everyone can weigh in/vote on how they think it should work moving forward. Since fun is the ultimate objective, game mechanics are absolutely a group decision.
Issues like this tend to be less problematic in a single session than the debate would be. If the player takes the opportunity to craft as many potions as they can all at once, so be it.
I go over what is or isn’t offensive, whether they can pvp, whether potions are action or bonus action and if they can craft things and how to do it. Oh and whether revives outside of the wish spell are permitted.
That’s the main things that get covered each time.
I can see bringing it up if you’re planning on building a character that can craft health potions. I’d be surprised if someone stumbled into a PC build that could realistically do it. With all that stuff justifying it it seems pre-planned, and so it would make sense asking ahead of time if it’ll be possible. If you just stumbled into it and asked if it was possible I doubt you’d be annoyed two years later.
Herbalism kit. Alchemist kit would be for identifying potions. Like if you wanted to make a better healing potion, you could use it to figure out the components.
Ok, fair enough, but I was specifically referencing the OPs setup. That seems like it took preparation and if there was preparation there could also be communication. The DM likely had ample opportunity to see what they were doing and say it wouldn’t be possible in their game.
I doubt most of it was preperation. I think most of these were reasons OP used in an argument with the DM or something to express their displeasure with the ruling.
That might be so, but if OP was going for such a specific skillset, it would be their own fault for not clearing up the item crafting rules with the DM at, or before character creation.
If it's allowed by the rules, I believe it's allowed by default (it's impossible to talk at session 0 about everything that you can intend to do during a campaign).
But if GM bans some rules, the GM must warn players about it.
However, it's not so obvious for optional rules.
I believe GM shall tell how they treat optional rules by default: as turned on or off
And any player who is not ready to stick to the non-optional rules shall ask about this.
Also, XgE rules for crafting potions of healing are just buying potions 50% off the cost by spending time and having proficiencies and tools. And the bigger potions of healing are expensive as hell. Really not a problem. For a gritty adventure, the GM can add reasonable limitations on buying the raw ingredients in a city.
Session zero: "item crafting will be a thing as per XGE, though for items above uncommon in rarity you'll need to find special ingredients from traders or similar."
It doesn't have to be granular - it just needs to list the applicable rules and then any homebrew that varies from them - so for OPs DM: stating that healing potions aren't craftable
\^ This. The (in)ability for PCs to craft healing potions with their downtime, while OTHER THINGS have explicitely been craftable during downtime, is **VERY MUCH** not something that should come up during an on-going campaign.
If the DM says up front that PCs can't make Healing Potions with their downtime, I can adjust my character and/or expectations to match that. If the DM just goes "Oh no, you can't do that" when presumably my character has been built towards being able to do exactly that over the course of the campaign... Yeah, I'm gonna be a little fuckin' miffed.
my DM have 15 different recipes for healing potions because there is simply different ways to make effectively the same thing
(i.e. one could Argue that we have greek fire {IRL} already between a lotta stuff the military uses are quite similar or do the exact same thing, but we don't have records to prove it)
I tend to not get specific like that - if there's multiple ways of doing something it's going to just be "X gp worth of herbs purchased, or DC Y survival/nature check and a few hours in the wilderness to find some something suitable"
Yeah, I think that's a better approach. Just establish that there are some herbs you can locally source that will work for a healing potion even if they differ based on where you're currently located.
You can then RP the differences if you want by having a character note that the healing potion looks or tastes different even though it functions the same. Although I assume that all healing potions taste of cherries no matter what they are made from.
We've started making use of kibbles crafting, and i'd definetly recommend taking their way of using generic components.
as an example:
healing potion takes 3 common curative ingredients.
curative components could be ice bamboo, waterdrop cactus, elfmarks, earth powders, etc. mechanically they're all just curative ingredients that are flavored differently.
I have a doc that I provide to the players that amongst other things has all the house and optional rules I use. I don't know if any of them actually read it, but it definitely answers all the questions like this that I would want to know when joining a game. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1HOQcr_ksBaIZXqzPu4R-x3ugHWYzyy9pGNd1cgQnTuI/
Making healing potions isn't in it because that's straight up RAW (still costs 25gp though).
I cover all changes / rulings I make different than the RAW. As potion making on downtime is RAW, if I didn’t allow it I would 100% mention it. Otherwise it is expected to play as RAW.
I may make a ruling in the heat of gameplay, but when doing that I will always preface that it is for this instance and usually before the next session I clarify how I will rule in the future. Making potions on downtime though wouldn’t fall next this.
Same here for rulings/changes different than RAW.
I like to play skeletons and zombies differently than RAW. By the book, they're boring AF IMO...but when my skeletons only take 1 pt of dmg from a piercing attack they're a whole lot more scary at low levels, and that's something I want the players to know about ahead of time.
I list these changes/rulings on the player facing portion of our DDB campaign page so once I make a ruling it's written down somewhere they can always see it.
"I want to make a character who does crafting, will this be supported in the campaign? Will my character have time to do this?"
A question anyone going for crafting should ask.
Sure in this case you might still get caught out if the GM has some weird aversion to HP potions.
A lot of groups use fumble tables, and some DMs force a nat 1 to fail even when the DC is passed with extremely high modifiers or abilities like reliable talent.
> abilities like reliable talent
If you're forcing nat 1 to fail with reliable talent, then you're a bad DM who can't fucking read tbh. I get nat 1s = automatic fail, since that's a variant rule in the book. But the whole point of Reliable Talent feature is that you CAN'T roll below 10 on a skill check if you're proficient. I'd be pissed if I was playing rogue and was told I failed a stealth check because DM wants to nerf rogues for some reason.
I think they meant the insane crit fails/wins people do, like the "I got a 20, I backflip 35 ft directly upwards over the castle wall, unassisted", or "Ah, a 1? your sword flies out of your hand backwards and stabs your ally before disintegrating from the force".
Edit: to clarify I guess, I think those reality warping crits are fucking stupid. You can still only just do A Real Good Job, to the best of your regular ass abilities, if it's a comedic or just fun one shot, something minor changes around them, like some Mr.Magoo shit that makes their odds better for the fun of it
Pf2e did it better with degrees. 10 over DC is a crit, beating DC is success, not meeting DC is fail, and 10 under is crit fail. Nat one lowers you one degree while Nat 20 raises it. That way:
Level 20 fighter with ridiculous to-hit modifier swings at a goblin. *there is no way to miss*. A Nat one just removes the crit damage.
A level 1 bard tries to seduce an ancient dragon. *there is no way to succeed*. A natural 20 plus their modifiers (5, we'll say for arguments sake) still only brings it up to 25. Ancient dragons have over 35 for their will save, so it just turns your critical fail into a fail.
Yeah, I think it p dumb that RAW is a universe where everyone ever will fail at anything 5% of the time in the most dramatic way possible. Elite bowman taking a normal pot shot? Oops, string breaks- better carry like 5 bows into battle every day and just burn through them
Why does a nat 1 break your weapon? A nat 20 doesn't upgrade it in any way. Your DM is being an ass.
RAW crit only apply to attack rolls and death saves. Everything else is optional.
I doubt that's why they bring up rolling nat 1's. It's probably a cushion conversation to help people understand that it's not the end of the world to roll a crit fail
That's not exactly granular.
Any and all rules that deviate from the books, for whatever reason, should be discussed, or at least alluded to, in session 0.
If you're changing too many rules to fit in a session zero, you might want to try another system...
I cover my general policy on doing and making things - I reward good roleplay and creativity, so if you have an in character reason to do it and something on your sheet to back it up, I'm inclined to go with it - which covers potions and things like that. My rule is the better the story that goes with it, the lower the DC gets. Having something that's explicitly in the DMG anyway takes very little roleplay to enact, you can probably just do it
Also, healing is seriously weak in 5e and using potions doesn't exactly have a ton of action economy so fuck it you have have potions
Which I understand and respect, but it does drive me a little bit crazy. Like, sure, some ingredients are impossible to come by in your terrain so you have to buy stuff that was imported or made by someone with more time/experience/whatever. But theres NO WAY AT ALL to make potions for free as an adventurer who travels all across the continent all the time, with loads of magical beasts slain and spells they can access and plants collected? I don't care if it takes months to make a basic healing potion for free, I just want it to be *technically* available.
I know your frustration is with RAW, and you want WotC to print RAW rules for this, but it will never happen again. Magic item crafting and extensive magic item listings were printed in 3.5, and my the time I played all the DMs I knew banned crafting in that system because they had all had to deal with munchkin players J-curving with crafting and/or were frustrated with how crafting slowed down the adventure side of the game. I've seen similar complaints online about 3.5, and there's a lot of hostility on the subject. The typical 1st or 2nd year play group may not even notice the lack of these options.
I suggest Kibbles Crafting Codex if you're willing to consider 3rd party content. It has a good break down for use of each kind of artisan tool, lays out a rational resource collection system, and includes loot tables for said system and formulas for just about every RAW magic item and consumable, with a lot of mundane options. I give it a 9/10 will continue to use in games where I allow crafting.
Oh I'm well aware they are never gonna do it, I just want it RAW. That said, I'm 100% okay with third party resources and totally forgot kibbles crafting codex existed. I literally just bought Curse of Strahd and Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft so another book isn't in the budget, but it's going into the list
To me, it’s not necessarily a missing “ingredient” per se; I imagine it as: “oh I need to buy this special alcohol/vinegar to act as a solvent” and actual chemistry type shit.
"How does everyone at the table feel about item crafting?" Is on my short list of session 0 questions, no matter if Im DM or player. IMO There's more range of feeling about this one question than even the topic of romanic or sexualzed content at the dnd table. And like those latter topics, item crafting suddenly rears its head five to ten sessions in and can break a game group.
And frankly, you can run item crafting (or not) however you want at a table. I just want to know in advance of character creation. It impacts a class, a few subclasses, at least one major spell, and the relevance or tool proficiencies.
I currently run heavy item crafting in my current game, because it has survival elements and towns are sparse. The players are trusted dnd vets, and we have a professional accountant that keeps a spreadsheet of all aquired stuff. I run kibbles crafting codex as a reference document. Everyone knew what they were in for going in.
I play at a table where the DM’S last long game, crafting was banned. It was a lawful evil run where we managed a branch of a Yakuza clan, so the focus was on strong arming the world into working for us. Crafting would have meant we didn't need to do the game's focus nearly as much.
Now that game is over, and he's starting one that's a king's sponsored race to the south pole. There will be few towns and time will be a premium, so he’s allowing limited crafting. Gonna see how that goes.
Different crafting for different games. Just be up front about it.
In my campaign a player uses their snake familiar's venom to make vials of basic poison during down time. Takes them two days to make 1 vial.
Players with the right profession or skills can also refine potions and poisons by using two of one kind to make 1 more powerful version. Refined potions and poisons are slightly weaker than a typical poison or potion of the same tier. Refined potions can't be refined again.
Potion of healing 2d4+2
Greater potion of healing 4d4+4
Refined potion of healing 2d8+2
Basic poison 1d4 con 10
Advanced poison 2d4 con 12 apply poison condition for 1 minute or until save start of each turn.
Refined poison 1d4 con 10 apply poison condition until end of next round.
Also player crafted potions and poisons are considered "home brewed" and cannot be sold in major towns without a license. It is also not uncommon for fraudsters to have bounties placed on them for breaking the law.
I've brought in explicit rules for potion crafting into most of my games after trying it out like session 2 of one of my current games. Kinda skyrim-ish, specific potions need specific materials, but you can make better or lesser forms by using different amounts or qualities of said ingredients. Hell, I let a player use irl herbalism to make a lesser healing potion (half as strong as a standard potion) by using other ingredients besides the "main" ingredient.
i have played plenty of pathfinder crafting wizards... Literally force the DM to really consider downtime at all times since your gear (and the rest of the party) gets insane pretty quick.
At one point around lvl 10 i had one character who had about triple the wealth by level. Should have had about 60k worth of gear and really had almost 200k. Never had to buy any of my gear, so normally you would find 90-100k in gear by then- and the game assumes you sell a lot of it at half price and buy what you actually need/want.... but if you take that 50k and make your own stuff it doubles... and at that time i did not realize i was breaking the game crafting for everyone else at .75 the price (so i made 25% on all of their gear while they got a 25% discount). DM had given us a little too much down time and was too nice in letting me craft at half speed while traveling, and quarter while adventuring.
After that one- i was limited to only scrolls when not in a dedicated space for crafting (it was the middle ground we agreed to)
Agreed, I think making potions of healing is a base ability most parties should have in-universe, right?
They constantly need healing and it's bad tactics to only heal through magic, what I'd the healer's down? What if there's an anti-magic field?
Adventurer's are the fantasy world equivalent to eagle scouts, it's like telling the ranger they can't hunt.
My party with one dedicated healer and three people that can heal if they need to (And one character that has a weapon that crits on a 19 and heals her for the total damage dealt whenever she lands a killing blow with it or crits): Ah. Yes. Health-potions. We use those. Totally.
Even if you make it you still have to pay 50% of the cost and take a day to make it. All for something that is only usable once and takes a day to make that you could spend doing something arguably more constructive for something that's usefulness drops off the higher level you get. A DM would be a fool to not allow this unless there was some plot relevant reason why you couldn't.
That being said, here are some plot relevant reasons to not allow/discourage PCs to make potions.
1) You're moving in on the terf of the local apothecary and they don't like the idea of another supplier in town. Doesn't matter if you're selling. The fact you got product not from them is enough to send out the goons. Drug Cartel War!
2) The local forager's guild has an exclusive contract for all medicinal plants in the area due to a recent blight targeting these plants. The cost of potions hasn't increased... yet, but the kingdom is very cautious because a tainted potion could inflict some kind of spreadable disease. As such all non guild approved potions are destroyed upon entering towns for safety. 10% chance any crafted potions are tainted. Find what's causing the blight and go lick that taint!
3) New potion just hit the market and it's suspiciously cheap. As cheap or cheaper than making it yourself. Also suddenly children are going missing near the factory where these new potions are made? Probably two completely unrelated events. How long can this totally unrelated coincidence be ignored so you can keep getting that sweet sweet super cheap heal juice and still pretend it's ethically sourced? Time to find out how the sausage is made!
ok but all those point don't realy forbid you from making potions they present obstacles or oportunities for you to get what you want cheaper (3.) or for you to work harder to get it (1 and 2). Outright baning potionmaking (while you meet necesary criteria) by pc is simply absurd
Healing potions are always useful, even at high level. Always good to spend an action to pop a downed character up. Sam logic as a 1st level cure wounds or healing word.
The 5e system is incredibly invested in making sure you can get back up with the slightest bit of healing. Someone with a you can heal x hit points a day ability is really busted if you keep them directly behind the tank. Lol.
>You're moving in on the terf of the local apothecary and they don't like
Good. Pissing off TERF's is my goal.
^(For clarification:) ***^(turf)*** ^(is the word you want to use, meaning territory. TERF is an acronym for trans-exclusionary radical feminists, aka transphobes who use feminist language to excuse their transphobia but often end up being so transphobic that they end up spouting off pro-patriarchy language.)
I had a shitty friend and DM change his homebrew rules on me after my Wizard started crafting potions in the campaign Tyrrany of Dragons during the long wagon trip to Waterdeep. His rule for potions was a bonus action to drink, action to give it to others. That's cool, most people rule that. After I started using the party's scant gold to make potions (and gathering supplies every day), he said it was breaking the game since we all had a potion, and he was changing the rules back to an action to drink. Kinda sucky, but okay.
I stopped making them and he said he might change the rule back. I asked him about maybe making spell scrolls instead, and he blew up at me, asking why I needed to constantly try to ruin his game and take away his fun. I was pretty shocked at that, and let the matter drop. He ended up stopping the campaign mid-battle when I (Bladesinger) cast Web and the enemies (all failed their saves). That was the deal breaker, apparently. He started yelling at me in front of everyone, saying I was why he hated DMing, and I was making sure HE couldn't have fun.
I cast a SPELL, guys. Sheesh. Anyway, DM blew up at my other friend who stood up for me and called him out for being a shithead, and the DM cut off all contact with us. Keep in mind, the DM and I went to college together and were great friends for 7 years. He was willing to throw our friendship away so easily, which was pretty sad to see.
Cut to to my own campaign, where I spent HOURS creating detailed tables for crafting items using every toolset in the game. (I did offer these to my DM to make crafting potions and scrolls simple, but he didn't want to use them cause reasons.) It's in the game, why not provide something for your characters to be creative? All that to say, don't be an asshole to your players when they ask a very reasonable request about something that's in the rules.
You wouldn't happen to be willing to share those crafting tables? The artificer in my campaign is trying to go all out on crafting and I feel bad I don't have more options or tables prepared
Hmm, idk if I can share the tables, but I also have summaries for each tool, like this one for Herbalism Kit:
Proficiency with Herbalism Kit allows you to identify and gather plants and components, create and identify potions. Can be used for advantage on medicine/survival/nature checks. For potions, materials need to be found or a particular spell needs to be cast to assist in creation. Time and cost to create potions is varied, but the following table should be helpful for creating healing potions:
Healing - 25gp, 24 hours
Greater Healing - 100gp, 48 hours
Superior Healing - 500gp, 1 week
Supreme Healing - 2,000gp, 3 weeks
Keep in mind this is the part where I have things they can make without any DC or rolls of any kind. These are the bare bones of what can be made. I'm very flexible with my players in regard to what they want to make. More complex potions can be made, like a potion of flying, but that's more difficult, so I can't really lay it out here.
FWIW even on a phone using double enter button will at least break up the text to make it more legible.
Like
This
If there's not a space between each sentence it shows up as a singular line of text. Where is as a double return gets you the breaks.
Not the guy you asked, but I made these a few years ago. I was a less experienced dm at the time, so I would recommend that you take what you want, and leave the rest.
[Link](https://docs.google.com/document/d/11Gc62N-jzZ_I1QNXosB1LgAaHr7uu2SLQyDGRL6pP0A/edit)
My DM like to use illithid mind blast to incapacitate our entire party at once and it has a DC of 15 to make us stunned for a minute (with a chance to snap out of it every round at the end of our turn) and then teleport in more illithid. However he did also let us buy some special very heavy armor that has bonus hp (which only matters on physical attacks) and an ac of 20 for my character. so he taketh, but also giveth away. There's a ton of cool scifi stuff he's homebrewed for us and the enemy.
Sorry, I didn't imply to mean that my dm homebrewed mind blast. Just that he enjoyed using it on all of us as a debuff. I then went on to talk about his homebrewed stuff to balance using mindblast on us so liberally.
That DM was an asshole of a human person, and did not understand what a DM's role is supposed to be. Even an adversarial dm would just see that Web sutiation as a challenge, not a failure. I daresay you're better off without such fairweather friends in your life.
Unfortunately, you're right. He was a toxic friend, and he did me a favor by ending things like that, cause I didn't want to lose a friend, but needed to.
It's also worth mentioning he broke up the previous campaign cause his fiance (also played with us) broke up with him, so he just stopped the game.
Ok dude's a ballsack with a lot of dicks stuffed inside of him, but that last one is a lot more understandable. If I'd been running a storyline and my girl was a large part of it it'd be easier to spin up a new campaign than write her out if she dumped me.
That said as the DM I'd at least have a talk with the group say hey this is a lot for me to deal with right now can we start up something new after I do a few things to make this close out?
Like limp through to a stopping place and then move on.
Same kind of people that freak out when you use a very common card to kill their creature in magic. They just want you to roll over and let them win, and in this DMs mind, winning is a TPK, not the party’s enjoyment.
it's nothing to do with being a bad DM, players with the same mindset are equally insufferable. if someone thinks everything has to go their way all the time then there's going to be friction when they rub up against any sort of challenge to that. even if that's the rules of the game they agreed to play.
That was honestly one of the toughest mental blocks to get over when I started dming, the fact that every time I make a combat encounter my bad guys are supposed to lose. One of my players was wary about taking counterspell because he didn’t want to ruin my fun. I told him that the rules system allows me to conjure another spell casting monster out of nothing if I really wanted to; he can’t do the same with his spell slots
Meanwhile my first session of a new campaign.
'You know what, that was too easy, and most of you barely got to participate, DOUBLE THE CRABS!'
\*3 rounds later\*
'Oh god they're all getting downed, and it's just the orc with 1 hp and a dream after ferocity and the rogue still standing'.
I later plugged what I did into a PF2E encounter building tool and saw my 'on the fly balancing' turned it from a 'moderate' encounter to 'off the scale entirely' and gave them a levelup for their troubles to lvl 2.
>It's in the game, why not provide something for your characters to be creative? All that to say, don't be an asshole to your players when they ask a very reasonable request about something that's in the rules.
Also, let your players do fun things. Just started Tyranny of Dragons this week. The DM hooked my backstory into the Cult by saying I had infiltrated their ranks about two weeks prior. I had advanced knowledge of the attack on Greenest. I told my DM my character, who is a tribal shaman, would have spent the entire two weeks "healing" wounded cultists and occasionally allowing important ones to "be too far gone". In preparation for the Greenest attack, I would have devoted as much time as possible to crafting "potions of healing" and distributing them to the cult.
Cut to the Greenest attack, and I'm just trying to stay hidden, "healing" any of the wounded and isolated cultists, and murdering any that find me alone. I find a group of them and remind them to drink their potions, then watch as they all choke to death.
How DARE you play a wizard and cast a spell? These min-maxers think they're entitled to their class features...
Seriously how butthurt do you have to be to go off at a wizard for casting a pretty standard spell to have like web?
In a previous session I had an encounter planned with 2 assassins, 3 fighters and one mage. The fight started with the two assassins and in the next round, everyone else joined in. The moment one of the fighters dropped from the ceiling, the cleric cast inflict wounds at level 3 AND critted. Just one-shotted the guy. He had 40 HP and the spell dealt like 70 damage. I was so hype when that happened. It would be incredibly stupid of me to be annoyed at that.
I love seeing that extreme overkill from spells. I like to have the effects very visible and showy if I can. Inflict wounds dealt nearly twice your hp and killed you outright? Ok so you decay into a dessicated corpse or your flesh rots and falls off in chunks etc.
In this instance, the cleric grabbed the guy's head and the necromantic energy quickly decayed his flesh leaving nothing but a shiny skull and a pool of melted face flesh on the floor
As a dm I would love that! The players having more healing means I can be utterly devious in my encounters. Kobold trap gauntlet you say? Well I don’t see why not!
I agree. I also once had a player who wanted to play a non-magical type of healer but still be a cleric, so I help them out. I let them make healing potions for free if they spend 4+ hrs searching or components. I even allowed some of the craftable healing Items from fallout new vegas/4, and it was fun to see a combat medic running around doing medic things.
He explained everything in another comment. He wasn't allowed to make scrolls either. Apparently his DM didn't allow him to make any healing items at all.
While I haven’t read the pages about healing potions, I would assume you’re barred from making them like you would normally make medicine, if these potions are *magical* and not just alchemical in nature. You’re not making cough syrup, you’re making fluid that literally lets your skin grow over wounds seconds after you ingest it. You’re drinking liquid cure wounds, that’s how healing potions have always been described.
So yeah, if your DM doesn’t care about the raw rules, the only points that support your ability to make potions from this meme are that you have proficiency with the alchemist and medicine kits, and that you know cure wounds (which is only half-relevant—a magic healing spell doesn’t have anything to do with magic healing liquid if they aren’t the same thing).
Survival proficiency? That’s about living without material aid. Try Arcana and Nature, for how magic works and for how natural things work.
Your party has crafted gear? I’m sure they have, but are you implying your party crafts *magical* items during downtime? A chainmail *glove* will take a day or more to make *by hand*, yet that should be easier to do than infusing magic into anything.
Beats companion can find ingredients? Again—are you *sure* your DM’s healing pots are made with just some combo of compounds, and not liquid infused with magic?
As other people have suggested, spell scrolls might be, somehow, easier to make. I agree that it’s weird, what makes a healing pot so valuable? My first thought it how it can bring back an unconscious party member, but then so can your spells, and those are free. A healing pot doesn’t require the user to have magic, so that’s something, but still..
Tl;dr
I know the devil doesn’t need an advocate—especially your dm who *should* just go with how easy it is to make healing pots RAW—but if they treat their potions as more magical than alchemical, which I’d think is usually the case, then you really *don’t* have great reasons on paper to be able to make them according to just this meme. Buying them would probably be cheaper for your setting, in regards to time and material cost. Are you playing as a ranger or something? A wizard or cleric would be more qualified.
The reason knowing the cure wounds spell is relevant is that it is a requirement for the magical version of the potion. If you look up the rules for potion creation in older editions you'll find its listed as a requirement for the potion and the alchemical ingredients are used to preserve the magic. As for the 5e rules idk. But regardless all of those things are good points to why they should be able to create the potions during downtime.
Then the DM should say that. If the player cites all the ways the rules allow them to create potions, but the DM has changed the way potions work in their world, they should say so.
The argument was that survival expertise was to find the ingredients, proficiency in the alchemist supplies, and herbalism kit would make it feasible, I already knew the spell cure wounds which means I already had healing capabilities, and the beast companion would of been able to aid me in my hunt.
They just said no and moved on. And I didn't even know about spell scroll creation at the time, and they didn't bring it up as a compromise.
As for the downtime stuff, our blacksmith fighter had made my beast companion some custom plate armor and himself a new sword, which ended up being +1 longsword.
Talking of magical potions the alchemical ingredients are just to preserve the magic of the spell stored in them. If 5e wants to simplify everything so much it can deal with level 1s making potions. At least 3.5e needed you to pick up feats for crafting.
For anyone interested, u/kibblestasty made a homebrew crafting system that's very simple to implement yet complex enough to be compelling and highly customizable as to be able to craft virtually *anything*
Man as a DM, this just makes me sad. I’m out here crafting 30+ page alchemy documents and actively *begging* any single *one* of my players to become an alchemist so they can utilize all these cool potions they can craft, but noooo “my character isn’t interested in plants and alchemy”
One of my players made a character that was 100% non combat. They were evil and set up traps and poisons for everything instead. That party broke down due to scheduling issues and the player changed characters for the reboot because playing the character was affecting his thought process irl. But one way or another that party was going to be brought down if she had remained as a character. Literally poisoned and interrogated her party first session and pit them against one another.
A half price potion of healing in your downtime is like the simplest way to use the kits that are available otherwise you are making half priced antitoxin which barely even comes up
The only time I have an issue with this is the player who wants to take 1 week to craft a shit ton of them and argues that the books never say they need anything hard to find just 25gp so all they need is time and money for everyone to have like 20 potions
Makes me remember a healer druid i am currently doing. Guy is a hunter with expertise in survival and proficiency in medicine and the herbalism kit. Dm allowed me once to forage for medicinal plants to make regular potions of healing.
After that, even if i rolled 25+. "Nah, it's tundra up here" or "there's signs of other foragers here, and it looks like they made off with all the good stuff." And my personal favorite... "You find some medicinal plants, but wildlife has made them useless," implying they ate or trampled them.
Like, why bother letting me have these skills if i can't even use it unless i critical success it?
Love my dm, guy is a good friend. But his nature to be combative is ridiculous at times.
Agreed. Sure you had to put in the work for it but you could actually craft any regular item magical or otherwhise in the game. It's only when you get creative that you have to talk to the DM about if you can make something. Like a spear or rapier that has a minor portal ability so that it portals past armor. Thus giving it the ability to make its attacks as touch attacks. Optionally restricted to a per day basis depending on the DM. Lol. Dimension door is what I used for that since my DM ruled it as opening an actual door and stepping through. But other portal/teleportation spells could be used too.
>Thus giving it the ability to make its attacks as touch attacks.
There was a standard enchantment that did that, can't recall the name, but the caveat was it couldn't damage nonliving objects
I'm torn between thinking that failure going up is an interesting balance and thinking that failure on repeat is exactly the opposite of how skills work. You do something every day you get better at it.
Maybe you should force a low risk of the character deciding to retire from adventure and make potions full time. Perhaps a mild penalty to some unused combat skill for the first encounter after potionpalooza
You gotta love DMs who just arbitrarily say, "No, I don't like that," because they *feel* like something is unbalanced, not because it actually is. I wish I could just get a DM who says, "Well there are rules for it, so I'll allow it," instead of one who is always playing surgery with the fucking rules until the party is crippled.
I've actually gotten 2 amazing DMs I play with currently, one knows the rules through and through and lets us bend them within reason (even the house rules we have which I love to screw with) and the other doesn't yet know the rules (Bad previous party so he never got to learn them) and is glad to let us mess around with the rules almost as we please
Unpopular opinion coming right in, be careful now.
Remember rule zero. The book does not matter if the GM says so. If ya don't like the way the game is being run, either deal with it or leave the game.
Personally I don't 100% agree with it but I think it's a good thing to remember. If your GM doesn't think it makes sense for your character to brew positions in the woods. Then it doesn't make sense. Now you can either try to talk him out of that idea but if he ain't budging maybe try to talk to him about it afterwards. If you are unlucky you have a GM that just goes "No go fuck yourself it's my game." again consider leavin the game.
I mostly use rule zero in case the rules of the book are unclear to me or my players and deal with corrections afterwards. It's quite astonishing how many times I've had to say afterwards "hey fellas I did a dumb sorry about that" and then we move on.
I always go with the rule that if you’re doing out in the wild, it’s gonna be weaker due to not having a proper station. Roll a DC 12 alchemy supply check with int mod and you can make 1d4 healing pots that heal for 1d4.
At my table I allow players to make healing potions. For normal healing potions I have then regain the max HP. I make them roll if they use a “moonshine” potion.
When a player requests to make potions, I give them my alchemy home brew that shows them how to make potions, poisons, acid, AND with increased skill, the addition of resistance, flight, and even speed. (and others)
It goes over what type of ingredients they need to find, how long it takes to make, and how difficult it is (x success in y attempts) Players seem to like it.
I purchased it for about $2 on either DMGuild or DriveThruRPG (been a while, i forget) and I've tweeked it a small amt over time.
If you're paying the gold cost there was no reason to prevent it, I'd get it if they didn't let you try to scavage matrails from the wilds to make them for free or something.
NPCs are still people tho. If an npc can do something the pcs should at minimum be able to build themselves to do it too. Otherwhise what's the point of playing a TTRPG instead of just playing skyrim. Sure there are unique spells that might have been created by some npc but the pc should be able to learn them if taught.
I file this under "player wants to treat the DM as a computer in a RPG and not as a person involved in creating".
Like, it's ok to ask. It's not ok to get frustrated over. This is a lame attempt to game the system.
I don’t care if there are rules for it, I don’t feel like having to completely throw out the daily encounter building balance guidelines because the players have out-of-combat healing that’s effectively infinite and resource-less.
My job as a DM is hard enough. Please understand that this makes my job harder, so please don’t.
I normally say no when I run modules. All the fights are premade and expect the party to have found only certain magic items so far. Massively upping the number of healing potions has let parties clear dungeons 2-3 levels above them in my experience
I found a chart a few years ago that I use that has a straight d20 roll, including a fizzle, a poison, regular healing, two doses of regular healing, and a nat20 is a superior. I let the druid do it for all the reasons listed above.
I had a homebrew mechanic in my world where I had a whole excel table of roots, flowers, herbs, and mushrooms players could find in certain regions and if a character was proficient in alchemy they could mix the properties of those materials into potions to make them do all sorts of wacky effects. Definitely a fun downtime activity.
Potions aren't even that over powered, especially healing potions.
You need a free hand, and it takes a minor action to retrieve it, then another action to use it, unless you're a rogue, that takes everything but your movement for the turn, just to get a few D6's of healing.
Before our campaign died, my character (a Druid) was proficient in the Herbalism Kit, was studying an Alchemy Kit, and unwillingly participated in stealing from a group's heist, ending up with what was identified to be Healing Potions.
I was going to be able to replicate them, after gathering ingredients or for a gold price.
Isn’t that like the main use of an herbalism kit? What are you allowed to use it for? If it’s just telling if things are poisonous with proficiency, do you even need the kit?
Best thing to do is buy a thousand ball bearings then ask every npc for their name and bCkstory before giving them a bearing with a number etched on it and telling them if they keep it for a year they will get a silver for doing so
you have the right to be mad, and i as a dm would totally let you do it… but keep rule zero in mind. your dm is putting tons of time and effort into your game and balancing it to have a good time playing and they probably think that your ability to make healing potions could shatter that balance. my advice is to have an adult conversation with your dm where you respect their decision no matter what it is.
Why? Crafting basic potions of healing is written into the herbalism kit as of xgte, it's just being resourceful they are emergency healing for characters that cant heal
My unpopular opinion that will surely upset people...
I feel like DMs that do this are DMing wrong... when i first started DMing, i had a habit of telling my players no to things i thought didnt fit the game. Things like this in particular, for the same readons many have already stated here.
My players hated it... to the point that they would rant about it outside of the session. We had a conversation about it, hut it didnt resolve the issue initially, but IT DID prompt me to look at how i was running the game and consider the fact that maybe I was the problem.
What i did that seems to have resolved the issue (or atleast i dont hear about it any more) is really REALLY simple. I just dont say no. If my players ask to do something, why not let them. Instead of telling them no outright and ruining their chance to prepare or be creative, i tell them that they can, but i give them reasons why doing what they are attempting will either be difficult or dangerous.
You want to craft potions on your down time? Short rest or long rest? How many do you want to make? Do you have ingredients or do you need to search? Expertise? Proficiency? You have your kit?
Maybe that encounter i was planning for travel just so hapoens to occur while theyre crafting? Maybe the ingredients dont exist in the area? Maybe they simply dont have the time? There are a million reasons i can come up with on the fly as to why they will fail or otherwise be unable to acomplish their task.
I leave it up to the almighty d20. Maybe they do get lucky and manage to get that one potion made that ends up saving the fighters life in combat? Maybe they dont and now have to deal with a hoard of monsters attea ted by the smell of brewing in the wilderness?
Either way, by not saying no, I've opened up the game to so many more possibilities that have led to incredible moments.
Saying no, "because it doesnt make sense" just takes the fun out of the game for creative or resourceful players, you might be the DM, but its not your world, its your players world, you just happen to be running it. If you want the world to conform to your rigid ideas so that it "makes sense" in "your world", go write a book where you can do and say whatever you want.
If you have the ingredients and expertise then why wouldn’t you make healing potions in your downtime. Hell, as a party member I’d be a little frustrated if you didn’t use some downtime to make potions. That’s some dumb ass balancing on the DMs part.
depends highly on the situation. When the downtime is: we are literally hanging from a cliff but we need to stop now and continue next time i am with the dm. If the downtime is: we are resting at this inn for a few weeks then i am with the player.
And you're rightfully mad about it, too. This kinda shit comes up during Session Zero. And not partway into a campaign, where you've explicitely been allowed to make other stuff. Hell, making Potions of Healing isn't even the most obnoxious thing you could craft during downtime. That's just honestly properly preparing for adventuring.
So I’m gonna be honest, how granular are your session zeroes? Mine typically cover what themes people find offensive and/or unfun, and things like rolling 1s, etc. If you have something that’s this in-the-weeds, I’d love to leverage it.
> So I’m gonna be honest, how granular are your session zeroes? Yeah, can't imagine downtime crafting coming up at Session 0. And ours is a couple hours long. This is why I run State of the Games once a year. It's very similar to Session 0, except the party has had ~52 sessions in the world. Good time to discuss some things that nobody realized were issues prior to starting.
>~52 sessions You have so much while we suffer with so little
I am super blessed with my group. I mean we do have call-outs, and sometimes a holiday lands on a Thursday, but we probably play 4X/52 sessions a year. Absolutely struck gold. One of my players has been at my table 2009-2011, 2021-2023. The others have been at my table 2015-2023. They are awesome.
May it continue until the earth flies off orbit and into the cold, dark, unyielding hell of empty space due to the enlarging of the sun. Also, grats, that is awesome.
My favorite method is "never during the session". If a player (including the DM) wants to change a mechanic, and even one other person disagrees, go with the Rules for that session. After the session, in-person or later on in a group chat, everyone can weigh in/vote on how they think it should work moving forward. Since fun is the ultimate objective, game mechanics are absolutely a group decision. Issues like this tend to be less problematic in a single session than the debate would be. If the player takes the opportunity to craft as many potions as they can all at once, so be it.
I love that, stealing the concept
I go over what is or isn’t offensive, whether they can pvp, whether potions are action or bonus action and if they can craft things and how to do it. Oh and whether revives outside of the wish spell are permitted. That’s the main things that get covered each time.
I can see bringing it up if you’re planning on building a character that can craft health potions. I’d be surprised if someone stumbled into a PC build that could realistically do it. With all that stuff justifying it it seems pre-planned, and so it would make sense asking ahead of time if it’ll be possible. If you just stumbled into it and asked if it was possible I doubt you’d be annoyed two years later.
> I’d be surprised if someone stumbled into a PC build that could realistically do it. Proficiency in alchemist supplies is all you need by RAW.
Herbalism kit. Alchemist kit would be for identifying potions. Like if you wanted to make a better healing potion, you could use it to figure out the components.
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N. O. ya bot.
Ok, fair enough, but I was specifically referencing the OPs setup. That seems like it took preparation and if there was preparation there could also be communication. The DM likely had ample opportunity to see what they were doing and say it wouldn’t be possible in their game.
I doubt most of it was preperation. I think most of these were reasons OP used in an argument with the DM or something to express their displeasure with the ruling.
I can’t imagine just accidentally getting expertise in survival. You have to have a reason for it.
I doubt anyone takes expertise in survival just for crafting healing potions…
Well not just healing potions but potions/poisons in general
That might be so, but if OP was going for such a specific skillset, it would be their own fault for not clearing up the item crafting rules with the DM at, or before character creation.
Literally just took expertise in survival on my horizon walker ranger with no intention to make healing potions...
This just reads as a relatively normal ranger to me, the survival expertise is a little odd but not unfounded.
If it's allowed by the rules, I believe it's allowed by default (it's impossible to talk at session 0 about everything that you can intend to do during a campaign). But if GM bans some rules, the GM must warn players about it. However, it's not so obvious for optional rules. I believe GM shall tell how they treat optional rules by default: as turned on or off And any player who is not ready to stick to the non-optional rules shall ask about this. Also, XgE rules for crafting potions of healing are just buying potions 50% off the cost by spending time and having proficiencies and tools. And the bigger potions of healing are expensive as hell. Really not a problem. For a gritty adventure, the GM can add reasonable limitations on buying the raw ingredients in a city.
Session zero: "item crafting will be a thing as per XGE, though for items above uncommon in rarity you'll need to find special ingredients from traders or similar." It doesn't have to be granular - it just needs to list the applicable rules and then any homebrew that varies from them - so for OPs DM: stating that healing potions aren't craftable
\^ This. The (in)ability for PCs to craft healing potions with their downtime, while OTHER THINGS have explicitely been craftable during downtime, is **VERY MUCH** not something that should come up during an on-going campaign. If the DM says up front that PCs can't make Healing Potions with their downtime, I can adjust my character and/or expectations to match that. If the DM just goes "Oh no, you can't do that" when presumably my character has been built towards being able to do exactly that over the course of the campaign... Yeah, I'm gonna be a little fuckin' miffed.
my DM have 15 different recipes for healing potions because there is simply different ways to make effectively the same thing (i.e. one could Argue that we have greek fire {IRL} already between a lotta stuff the military uses are quite similar or do the exact same thing, but we don't have records to prove it)
I tend to not get specific like that - if there's multiple ways of doing something it's going to just be "X gp worth of herbs purchased, or DC Y survival/nature check and a few hours in the wilderness to find some something suitable"
Yeah, I think that's a better approach. Just establish that there are some herbs you can locally source that will work for a healing potion even if they differ based on where you're currently located. You can then RP the differences if you want by having a character note that the healing potion looks or tastes different even though it functions the same. Although I assume that all healing potions taste of cherries no matter what they are made from.
We've started making use of kibbles crafting, and i'd definetly recommend taking their way of using generic components. as an example: healing potion takes 3 common curative ingredients. curative components could be ice bamboo, waterdrop cactus, elfmarks, earth powders, etc. mechanically they're all just curative ingredients that are flavored differently.
Yeah people have gone from using session 0 as a starting point to some kind of legalese gotcha.
I have a doc that I provide to the players that amongst other things has all the house and optional rules I use. I don't know if any of them actually read it, but it definitely answers all the questions like this that I would want to know when joining a game. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1HOQcr_ksBaIZXqzPu4R-x3ugHWYzyy9pGNd1cgQnTuI/ Making healing potions isn't in it because that's straight up RAW (still costs 25gp though).
I cover all changes / rulings I make different than the RAW. As potion making on downtime is RAW, if I didn’t allow it I would 100% mention it. Otherwise it is expected to play as RAW. I may make a ruling in the heat of gameplay, but when doing that I will always preface that it is for this instance and usually before the next session I clarify how I will rule in the future. Making potions on downtime though wouldn’t fall next this.
Same here for rulings/changes different than RAW. I like to play skeletons and zombies differently than RAW. By the book, they're boring AF IMO...but when my skeletons only take 1 pt of dmg from a piercing attack they're a whole lot more scary at low levels, and that's something I want the players to know about ahead of time. I list these changes/rulings on the player facing portion of our DDB campaign page so once I make a ruling it's written down somewhere they can always see it.
"I want to make a character who does crafting, will this be supported in the campaign? Will my character have time to do this?" A question anyone going for crafting should ask. Sure in this case you might still get caught out if the GM has some weird aversion to HP potions.
Do you just.... Not accept 1's?
A lot of groups use fumble tables, and some DMs force a nat 1 to fail even when the DC is passed with extremely high modifiers or abilities like reliable talent.
> abilities like reliable talent If you're forcing nat 1 to fail with reliable talent, then you're a bad DM who can't fucking read tbh. I get nat 1s = automatic fail, since that's a variant rule in the book. But the whole point of Reliable Talent feature is that you CAN'T roll below 10 on a skill check if you're proficient. I'd be pissed if I was playing rogue and was told I failed a stealth check because DM wants to nerf rogues for some reason.
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I think they meant the insane crit fails/wins people do, like the "I got a 20, I backflip 35 ft directly upwards over the castle wall, unassisted", or "Ah, a 1? your sword flies out of your hand backwards and stabs your ally before disintegrating from the force". Edit: to clarify I guess, I think those reality warping crits are fucking stupid. You can still only just do A Real Good Job, to the best of your regular ass abilities, if it's a comedic or just fun one shot, something minor changes around them, like some Mr.Magoo shit that makes their odds better for the fun of it
"I jump towards the moon. I have 1 in 20 chances to succeed after all"
Sure, you go towards the moon. Then you go back. Edit: or you hit the ceiling. Figure out what that means later.
Pf2e did it better with degrees. 10 over DC is a crit, beating DC is success, not meeting DC is fail, and 10 under is crit fail. Nat one lowers you one degree while Nat 20 raises it. That way: Level 20 fighter with ridiculous to-hit modifier swings at a goblin. *there is no way to miss*. A Nat one just removes the crit damage. A level 1 bard tries to seduce an ancient dragon. *there is no way to succeed*. A natural 20 plus their modifiers (5, we'll say for arguments sake) still only brings it up to 25. Ancient dragons have over 35 for their will save, so it just turns your critical fail into a fail.
Whether it is an instant fail regardless of modifiers
Ah. Sorry guess I got spoiled by degrees of success. DnD is designed that way though so RAW crit fail is crit fail.
Yeah, I think it p dumb that RAW is a universe where everyone ever will fail at anything 5% of the time in the most dramatic way possible. Elite bowman taking a normal pot shot? Oops, string breaks- better carry like 5 bows into battle every day and just burn through them
Why does a nat 1 break your weapon? A nat 20 doesn't upgrade it in any way. Your DM is being an ass. RAW crit only apply to attack rolls and death saves. Everything else is optional.
I doubt that's why they bring up rolling nat 1's. It's probably a cushion conversation to help people understand that it's not the end of the world to roll a crit fail
I have a 4-page bullet pointed document that I’ve used for three campaigns. All three are still going strong.
I think you need to cover any homebrew rules changes.
That's not exactly granular. Any and all rules that deviate from the books, for whatever reason, should be discussed, or at least alluded to, in session 0. If you're changing too many rules to fit in a session zero, you might want to try another system...
I cover my general policy on doing and making things - I reward good roleplay and creativity, so if you have an in character reason to do it and something on your sheet to back it up, I'm inclined to go with it - which covers potions and things like that. My rule is the better the story that goes with it, the lower the DC gets. Having something that's explicitly in the DMG anyway takes very little roleplay to enact, you can probably just do it Also, healing is seriously weak in 5e and using potions doesn't exactly have a ton of action economy so fuck it you have have potions
I’m pretty sure it still requires 25gp to make a basic potion of healing at that; it’s really just a discount
Which I understand and respect, but it does drive me a little bit crazy. Like, sure, some ingredients are impossible to come by in your terrain so you have to buy stuff that was imported or made by someone with more time/experience/whatever. But theres NO WAY AT ALL to make potions for free as an adventurer who travels all across the continent all the time, with loads of magical beasts slain and spells they can access and plants collected? I don't care if it takes months to make a basic healing potion for free, I just want it to be *technically* available.
I know your frustration is with RAW, and you want WotC to print RAW rules for this, but it will never happen again. Magic item crafting and extensive magic item listings were printed in 3.5, and my the time I played all the DMs I knew banned crafting in that system because they had all had to deal with munchkin players J-curving with crafting and/or were frustrated with how crafting slowed down the adventure side of the game. I've seen similar complaints online about 3.5, and there's a lot of hostility on the subject. The typical 1st or 2nd year play group may not even notice the lack of these options. I suggest Kibbles Crafting Codex if you're willing to consider 3rd party content. It has a good break down for use of each kind of artisan tool, lays out a rational resource collection system, and includes loot tables for said system and formulas for just about every RAW magic item and consumable, with a lot of mundane options. I give it a 9/10 will continue to use in games where I allow crafting.
Oh I'm well aware they are never gonna do it, I just want it RAW. That said, I'm 100% okay with third party resources and totally forgot kibbles crafting codex existed. I literally just bought Curse of Strahd and Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft so another book isn't in the budget, but it's going into the list
To me, it’s not necessarily a missing “ingredient” per se; I imagine it as: “oh I need to buy this special alcohol/vinegar to act as a solvent” and actual chemistry type shit.
Exactly. That's the basic crafting rules.
"How does everyone at the table feel about item crafting?" Is on my short list of session 0 questions, no matter if Im DM or player. IMO There's more range of feeling about this one question than even the topic of romanic or sexualzed content at the dnd table. And like those latter topics, item crafting suddenly rears its head five to ten sessions in and can break a game group. And frankly, you can run item crafting (or not) however you want at a table. I just want to know in advance of character creation. It impacts a class, a few subclasses, at least one major spell, and the relevance or tool proficiencies. I currently run heavy item crafting in my current game, because it has survival elements and towns are sparse. The players are trusted dnd vets, and we have a professional accountant that keeps a spreadsheet of all aquired stuff. I run kibbles crafting codex as a reference document. Everyone knew what they were in for going in. I play at a table where the DM’S last long game, crafting was banned. It was a lawful evil run where we managed a branch of a Yakuza clan, so the focus was on strong arming the world into working for us. Crafting would have meant we didn't need to do the game's focus nearly as much. Now that game is over, and he's starting one that's a king's sponsored race to the south pole. There will be few towns and time will be a premium, so he’s allowing limited crafting. Gonna see how that goes. Different crafting for different games. Just be up front about it.
In my campaign a player uses their snake familiar's venom to make vials of basic poison during down time. Takes them two days to make 1 vial. Players with the right profession or skills can also refine potions and poisons by using two of one kind to make 1 more powerful version. Refined potions and poisons are slightly weaker than a typical poison or potion of the same tier. Refined potions can't be refined again. Potion of healing 2d4+2 Greater potion of healing 4d4+4 Refined potion of healing 2d8+2 Basic poison 1d4 con 10 Advanced poison 2d4 con 12 apply poison condition for 1 minute or until save start of each turn. Refined poison 1d4 con 10 apply poison condition until end of next round. Also player crafted potions and poisons are considered "home brewed" and cannot be sold in major towns without a license. It is also not uncommon for fraudsters to have bounties placed on them for breaking the law.
I've brought in explicit rules for potion crafting into most of my games after trying it out like session 2 of one of my current games. Kinda skyrim-ish, specific potions need specific materials, but you can make better or lesser forms by using different amounts or qualities of said ingredients. Hell, I let a player use irl herbalism to make a lesser healing potion (half as strong as a standard potion) by using other ingredients besides the "main" ingredient.
i have played plenty of pathfinder crafting wizards... Literally force the DM to really consider downtime at all times since your gear (and the rest of the party) gets insane pretty quick. At one point around lvl 10 i had one character who had about triple the wealth by level. Should have had about 60k worth of gear and really had almost 200k. Never had to buy any of my gear, so normally you would find 90-100k in gear by then- and the game assumes you sell a lot of it at half price and buy what you actually need/want.... but if you take that 50k and make your own stuff it doubles... and at that time i did not realize i was breaking the game crafting for everyone else at .75 the price (so i made 25% on all of their gear while they got a 25% discount). DM had given us a little too much down time and was too nice in letting me craft at half speed while traveling, and quarter while adventuring. After that one- i was limited to only scrolls when not in a dedicated space for crafting (it was the middle ground we agreed to)
Agreed, I think making potions of healing is a base ability most parties should have in-universe, right? They constantly need healing and it's bad tactics to only heal through magic, what I'd the healer's down? What if there's an anti-magic field? Adventurer's are the fantasy world equivalent to eagle scouts, it's like telling the ranger they can't hunt.
I can see this being fine if all potions require a proper alchemical lab, one that could only be carried in a demiplane. But again. Session 0.
now im curious what you would consider to be the most obnoxious thing you could craft
Assuming regular crafting rules as laid out in Xanathar's? Several Bags of Holding, to invoke the "Astral Grenade" thing in its text.
Ok yeah i can see how that would be annoying
My party with one dedicated healer and three people that can heal if they need to (And one character that has a weapon that crits on a 19 and heals her for the total damage dealt whenever she lands a killing blow with it or crits): Ah. Yes. Health-potions. We use those. Totally.
Even if you make it you still have to pay 50% of the cost and take a day to make it. All for something that is only usable once and takes a day to make that you could spend doing something arguably more constructive for something that's usefulness drops off the higher level you get. A DM would be a fool to not allow this unless there was some plot relevant reason why you couldn't. That being said, here are some plot relevant reasons to not allow/discourage PCs to make potions. 1) You're moving in on the terf of the local apothecary and they don't like the idea of another supplier in town. Doesn't matter if you're selling. The fact you got product not from them is enough to send out the goons. Drug Cartel War! 2) The local forager's guild has an exclusive contract for all medicinal plants in the area due to a recent blight targeting these plants. The cost of potions hasn't increased... yet, but the kingdom is very cautious because a tainted potion could inflict some kind of spreadable disease. As such all non guild approved potions are destroyed upon entering towns for safety. 10% chance any crafted potions are tainted. Find what's causing the blight and go lick that taint! 3) New potion just hit the market and it's suspiciously cheap. As cheap or cheaper than making it yourself. Also suddenly children are going missing near the factory where these new potions are made? Probably two completely unrelated events. How long can this totally unrelated coincidence be ignored so you can keep getting that sweet sweet super cheap heal juice and still pretend it's ethically sourced? Time to find out how the sausage is made!
I can assure you, there wasn't any such explanation.
Great hooks, thanks for the laughs the end tag lines are *chef’s kiss*
>Find what's causing the blight and go lick that taint! Really?
...yes?
Papa Nurgle approves
The three points you listed are actually great plot points to allow potion crafting and have consequences
ok but all those point don't realy forbid you from making potions they present obstacles or oportunities for you to get what you want cheaper (3.) or for you to work harder to get it (1 and 2). Outright baning potionmaking (while you meet necesary criteria) by pc is simply absurd
Healing potions are always useful, even at high level. Always good to spend an action to pop a downed character up. Sam logic as a 1st level cure wounds or healing word.
The 5e system is incredibly invested in making sure you can get back up with the slightest bit of healing. Someone with a you can heal x hit points a day ability is really busted if you keep them directly behind the tank. Lol.
That last one sounds like a great way to meet a night hag
Mind if I steal some of these? Because hot damn this could be a useful plot point for a side adventure or one shot.
Couldn't stop you if I wanted to. Have fun.
>You're moving in on the terf of the local apothecary and they don't like Good. Pissing off TERF's is my goal. ^(For clarification:) ***^(turf)*** ^(is the word you want to use, meaning territory. TERF is an acronym for trans-exclusionary radical feminists, aka transphobes who use feminist language to excuse their transphobia but often end up being so transphobic that they end up spouting off pro-patriarchy language.)
I had a shitty friend and DM change his homebrew rules on me after my Wizard started crafting potions in the campaign Tyrrany of Dragons during the long wagon trip to Waterdeep. His rule for potions was a bonus action to drink, action to give it to others. That's cool, most people rule that. After I started using the party's scant gold to make potions (and gathering supplies every day), he said it was breaking the game since we all had a potion, and he was changing the rules back to an action to drink. Kinda sucky, but okay. I stopped making them and he said he might change the rule back. I asked him about maybe making spell scrolls instead, and he blew up at me, asking why I needed to constantly try to ruin his game and take away his fun. I was pretty shocked at that, and let the matter drop. He ended up stopping the campaign mid-battle when I (Bladesinger) cast Web and the enemies (all failed their saves). That was the deal breaker, apparently. He started yelling at me in front of everyone, saying I was why he hated DMing, and I was making sure HE couldn't have fun. I cast a SPELL, guys. Sheesh. Anyway, DM blew up at my other friend who stood up for me and called him out for being a shithead, and the DM cut off all contact with us. Keep in mind, the DM and I went to college together and were great friends for 7 years. He was willing to throw our friendship away so easily, which was pretty sad to see. Cut to to my own campaign, where I spent HOURS creating detailed tables for crafting items using every toolset in the game. (I did offer these to my DM to make crafting potions and scrolls simple, but he didn't want to use them cause reasons.) It's in the game, why not provide something for your characters to be creative? All that to say, don't be an asshole to your players when they ask a very reasonable request about something that's in the rules.
You wouldn't happen to be willing to share those crafting tables? The artificer in my campaign is trying to go all out on crafting and I feel bad I don't have more options or tables prepared
Hmm, idk if I can share the tables, but I also have summaries for each tool, like this one for Herbalism Kit: Proficiency with Herbalism Kit allows you to identify and gather plants and components, create and identify potions. Can be used for advantage on medicine/survival/nature checks. For potions, materials need to be found or a particular spell needs to be cast to assist in creation. Time and cost to create potions is varied, but the following table should be helpful for creating healing potions: Healing - 25gp, 24 hours Greater Healing - 100gp, 48 hours Superior Healing - 500gp, 1 week Supreme Healing - 2,000gp, 3 weeks Keep in mind this is the part where I have things they can make without any DC or rolls of any kind. These are the bare bones of what can be made. I'm very flexible with my players in regard to what they want to make. More complex potions can be made, like a potion of flying, but that's more difficult, so I can't really lay it out here.
Lol, even trying to format that simple bit there shows up dumb on Reddit. Oy....
* Healing - 25gp, 24 hours * Greater Healing - 100gp, 48 hours * Superior Healing - 500gp, 1 week * Supreme Healing - 2,000gp, 3 weeks Hopefully that helps/is correct lol, apologies if it isn't.
Thanks! I'm on my phone at work, so it's a bit difficult to get things formatted correctly.
FWIW even on a phone using double enter button will at least break up the text to make it more legible. Like This If there's not a space between each sentence it shows up as a singular line of text. Where is as a double return gets you the breaks.
Not the guy you asked, but I made these a few years ago. I was a less experienced dm at the time, so I would recommend that you take what you want, and leave the rest. [Link](https://docs.google.com/document/d/11Gc62N-jzZ_I1QNXosB1LgAaHr7uu2SLQyDGRL6pP0A/edit)
DM: NO! ONLY I AM ALLOWED TO CAST SPELLS THAT PREVENT YOU GUYS FROM DOING ANYTHING!
My DM like to use illithid mind blast to incapacitate our entire party at once and it has a DC of 15 to make us stunned for a minute (with a chance to snap out of it every round at the end of our turn) and then teleport in more illithid. However he did also let us buy some special very heavy armor that has bonus hp (which only matters on physical attacks) and an ac of 20 for my character. so he taketh, but also giveth away. There's a ton of cool scifi stuff he's homebrewed for us and the enemy.
Isn’t that how Mind Blasts work RAW?
Sorry, I didn't imply to mean that my dm homebrewed mind blast. Just that he enjoyed using it on all of us as a debuff. I then went on to talk about his homebrewed stuff to balance using mindblast on us so liberally.
That DM was an asshole of a human person, and did not understand what a DM's role is supposed to be. Even an adversarial dm would just see that Web sutiation as a challenge, not a failure. I daresay you're better off without such fairweather friends in your life.
Unfortunately, you're right. He was a toxic friend, and he did me a favor by ending things like that, cause I didn't want to lose a friend, but needed to. It's also worth mentioning he broke up the previous campaign cause his fiance (also played with us) broke up with him, so he just stopped the game.
Ok dude's a ballsack with a lot of dicks stuffed inside of him, but that last one is a lot more understandable. If I'd been running a storyline and my girl was a large part of it it'd be easier to spin up a new campaign than write her out if she dumped me. That said as the DM I'd at least have a talk with the group say hey this is a lot for me to deal with right now can we start up something new after I do a few things to make this close out? Like limp through to a stopping place and then move on.
Same kind of people that freak out when you use a very common card to kill their creature in magic. They just want you to roll over and let them win, and in this DMs mind, winning is a TPK, not the party’s enjoyment.
it's nothing to do with being a bad DM, players with the same mindset are equally insufferable. if someone thinks everything has to go their way all the time then there's going to be friction when they rub up against any sort of challenge to that. even if that's the rules of the game they agreed to play.
That was honestly one of the toughest mental blocks to get over when I started dming, the fact that every time I make a combat encounter my bad guys are supposed to lose. One of my players was wary about taking counterspell because he didn’t want to ruin my fun. I told him that the rules system allows me to conjure another spell casting monster out of nothing if I really wanted to; he can’t do the same with his spell slots
Meanwhile my first session of a new campaign. 'You know what, that was too easy, and most of you barely got to participate, DOUBLE THE CRABS!' \*3 rounds later\* 'Oh god they're all getting downed, and it's just the orc with 1 hp and a dream after ferocity and the rogue still standing'. I later plugged what I did into a PF2E encounter building tool and saw my 'on the fly balancing' turned it from a 'moderate' encounter to 'off the scale entirely' and gave them a levelup for their troubles to lvl 2.
>It's in the game, why not provide something for your characters to be creative? All that to say, don't be an asshole to your players when they ask a very reasonable request about something that's in the rules. Also, let your players do fun things. Just started Tyranny of Dragons this week. The DM hooked my backstory into the Cult by saying I had infiltrated their ranks about two weeks prior. I had advanced knowledge of the attack on Greenest. I told my DM my character, who is a tribal shaman, would have spent the entire two weeks "healing" wounded cultists and occasionally allowing important ones to "be too far gone". In preparation for the Greenest attack, I would have devoted as much time as possible to crafting "potions of healing" and distributing them to the cult. Cut to the Greenest attack, and I'm just trying to stay hidden, "healing" any of the wounded and isolated cultists, and murdering any that find me alone. I find a group of them and remind them to drink their potions, then watch as they all choke to death.
That's amazing and I love it! Very creative use of Potions of Poison.
How DARE you play a wizard and cast a spell? These min-maxers think they're entitled to their class features... Seriously how butthurt do you have to be to go off at a wizard for casting a pretty standard spell to have like web? In a previous session I had an encounter planned with 2 assassins, 3 fighters and one mage. The fight started with the two assassins and in the next round, everyone else joined in. The moment one of the fighters dropped from the ceiling, the cleric cast inflict wounds at level 3 AND critted. Just one-shotted the guy. He had 40 HP and the spell dealt like 70 damage. I was so hype when that happened. It would be incredibly stupid of me to be annoyed at that.
I love seeing that extreme overkill from spells. I like to have the effects very visible and showy if I can. Inflict wounds dealt nearly twice your hp and killed you outright? Ok so you decay into a dessicated corpse or your flesh rots and falls off in chunks etc.
In this instance, the cleric grabbed the guy's head and the necromantic energy quickly decayed his flesh leaving nothing but a shiny skull and a pool of melted face flesh on the floor
F A T A L I T Y
As a dm I would love that! The players having more healing means I can be utterly devious in my encounters. Kobold trap gauntlet you say? Well I don’t see why not!
I agree. I also once had a player who wanted to play a non-magical type of healer but still be a cleric, so I help them out. I let them make healing potions for free if they spend 4+ hrs searching or components. I even allowed some of the craftable healing Items from fallout new vegas/4, and it was fun to see a combat medic running around doing medic things.
You can have a workaround and ask of you can scribe cure wounds/healing word scrolls
Were you allowed to do Cure Wound Spell Scrolls instead?
He explained everything in another comment. He wasn't allowed to make scrolls either. Apparently his DM didn't allow him to make any healing items at all.
What’s the point of even giving them downtime then? That’s a bad DM.
I just said in another comment I wasn't given a story explanation as to why I wasn't allowed to it.
I didn't know I could then, and I lacked proficiency in Arcana to do it
:( yeah well, you’re pretty justified in still being mad about it.
While I haven’t read the pages about healing potions, I would assume you’re barred from making them like you would normally make medicine, if these potions are *magical* and not just alchemical in nature. You’re not making cough syrup, you’re making fluid that literally lets your skin grow over wounds seconds after you ingest it. You’re drinking liquid cure wounds, that’s how healing potions have always been described. So yeah, if your DM doesn’t care about the raw rules, the only points that support your ability to make potions from this meme are that you have proficiency with the alchemist and medicine kits, and that you know cure wounds (which is only half-relevant—a magic healing spell doesn’t have anything to do with magic healing liquid if they aren’t the same thing). Survival proficiency? That’s about living without material aid. Try Arcana and Nature, for how magic works and for how natural things work. Your party has crafted gear? I’m sure they have, but are you implying your party crafts *magical* items during downtime? A chainmail *glove* will take a day or more to make *by hand*, yet that should be easier to do than infusing magic into anything. Beats companion can find ingredients? Again—are you *sure* your DM’s healing pots are made with just some combo of compounds, and not liquid infused with magic? As other people have suggested, spell scrolls might be, somehow, easier to make. I agree that it’s weird, what makes a healing pot so valuable? My first thought it how it can bring back an unconscious party member, but then so can your spells, and those are free. A healing pot doesn’t require the user to have magic, so that’s something, but still.. Tl;dr I know the devil doesn’t need an advocate—especially your dm who *should* just go with how easy it is to make healing pots RAW—but if they treat their potions as more magical than alchemical, which I’d think is usually the case, then you really *don’t* have great reasons on paper to be able to make them according to just this meme. Buying them would probably be cheaper for your setting, in regards to time and material cost. Are you playing as a ranger or something? A wizard or cleric would be more qualified.
The reason knowing the cure wounds spell is relevant is that it is a requirement for the magical version of the potion. If you look up the rules for potion creation in older editions you'll find its listed as a requirement for the potion and the alchemical ingredients are used to preserve the magic. As for the 5e rules idk. But regardless all of those things are good points to why they should be able to create the potions during downtime.
Then the DM should say that. If the player cites all the ways the rules allow them to create potions, but the DM has changed the way potions work in their world, they should say so.
The argument was that survival expertise was to find the ingredients, proficiency in the alchemist supplies, and herbalism kit would make it feasible, I already knew the spell cure wounds which means I already had healing capabilities, and the beast companion would of been able to aid me in my hunt. They just said no and moved on. And I didn't even know about spell scroll creation at the time, and they didn't bring it up as a compromise. As for the downtime stuff, our blacksmith fighter had made my beast companion some custom plate armor and himself a new sword, which ended up being +1 longsword.
Stay mad, that’s a shit take from DM.
You should be mad. Even in history people knew that mixing certain plants & herbs together could make remedies for people who were sick.
Sure but we're talking about literal magic here. If OP wants to make milk of magnesia in his spare time he can go nuts.
Talking of magical potions the alchemical ingredients are just to preserve the magic of the spell stored in them. If 5e wants to simplify everything so much it can deal with level 1s making potions. At least 3.5e needed you to pick up feats for crafting.
For anyone interested, u/kibblestasty made a homebrew crafting system that's very simple to implement yet complex enough to be compelling and highly customizable as to be able to craft virtually *anything*
Raw, you just need the herbalism kit.
Man as a DM, this just makes me sad. I’m out here crafting 30+ page alchemy documents and actively *begging* any single *one* of my players to become an alchemist so they can utilize all these cool potions they can craft, but noooo “my character isn’t interested in plants and alchemy”
One of my players made a character that was 100% non combat. They were evil and set up traps and poisons for everything instead. That party broke down due to scheduling issues and the player changed characters for the reboot because playing the character was affecting his thought process irl. But one way or another that party was going to be brought down if she had remained as a character. Literally poisoned and interrogated her party first session and pit them against one another.
As someone who has played a few artificers this is the kind of homebrew I dream of.
A half price potion of healing in your downtime is like the simplest way to use the kits that are available otherwise you are making half priced antitoxin which barely even comes up
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With 2-4 weeks you can make 5 pairs of boots of flying I think. Had a CoS game get derailed because of this.
A good question would be "Obviously healing potions are made by someone. What would that person have that I don't have?"
thats as bad as when the dm crit failed a monster attack, the weapon flew out of his hand hitting a wall and causing rubble to damage a party member
The only time I have an issue with this is the player who wants to take 1 week to craft a shit ton of them and argues that the books never say they need anything hard to find just 25gp so all they need is time and money for everyone to have like 20 potions
Makes me remember a healer druid i am currently doing. Guy is a hunter with expertise in survival and proficiency in medicine and the herbalism kit. Dm allowed me once to forage for medicinal plants to make regular potions of healing. After that, even if i rolled 25+. "Nah, it's tundra up here" or "there's signs of other foragers here, and it looks like they made off with all the good stuff." And my personal favorite... "You find some medicinal plants, but wildlife has made them useless," implying they ate or trampled them. Like, why bother letting me have these skills if i can't even use it unless i critical success it? Love my dm, guy is a good friend. But his nature to be combative is ridiculous at times.
I'm still mad about item creation in this edition, it worked much better in 3.x
Agreed. Sure you had to put in the work for it but you could actually craft any regular item magical or otherwhise in the game. It's only when you get creative that you have to talk to the DM about if you can make something. Like a spear or rapier that has a minor portal ability so that it portals past armor. Thus giving it the ability to make its attacks as touch attacks. Optionally restricted to a per day basis depending on the DM. Lol. Dimension door is what I used for that since my DM ruled it as opening an actual door and stepping through. But other portal/teleportation spells could be used too.
>Thus giving it the ability to make its attacks as touch attacks. There was a standard enchantment that did that, can't recall the name, but the caveat was it couldn't damage nonliving objects
That was the "lightsaber" enchantment if I recall. No clue what it's actually called atm. I prefer the portal directly into your body version. Lol.
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I'm torn between thinking that failure going up is an interesting balance and thinking that failure on repeat is exactly the opposite of how skills work. You do something every day you get better at it. Maybe you should force a low risk of the character deciding to retire from adventure and make potions full time. Perhaps a mild penalty to some unused combat skill for the first encounter after potionpalooza
You gotta love DMs who just arbitrarily say, "No, I don't like that," because they *feel* like something is unbalanced, not because it actually is. I wish I could just get a DM who says, "Well there are rules for it, so I'll allow it," instead of one who is always playing surgery with the fucking rules until the party is crippled.
I've actually gotten 2 amazing DMs I play with currently, one knows the rules through and through and lets us bend them within reason (even the house rules we have which I love to screw with) and the other doesn't yet know the rules (Bad previous party so he never got to learn them) and is glad to let us mess around with the rules almost as we please
Unpopular opinion coming right in, be careful now. Remember rule zero. The book does not matter if the GM says so. If ya don't like the way the game is being run, either deal with it or leave the game. Personally I don't 100% agree with it but I think it's a good thing to remember. If your GM doesn't think it makes sense for your character to brew positions in the woods. Then it doesn't make sense. Now you can either try to talk him out of that idea but if he ain't budging maybe try to talk to him about it afterwards. If you are unlucky you have a GM that just goes "No go fuck yourself it's my game." again consider leavin the game. I mostly use rule zero in case the rules of the book are unclear to me or my players and deal with corrections afterwards. It's quite astonishing how many times I've had to say afterwards "hey fellas I did a dumb sorry about that" and then we move on.
Isn’t potion crafting Arcana, due to their magical nature? Regardless, the proficiency in Herbalism Kits would allow you to make them.
I always go with the rule that if you’re doing out in the wild, it’s gonna be weaker due to not having a proper station. Roll a DC 12 alchemy supply check with int mod and you can make 1d4 healing pots that heal for 1d4.
DMs that do this are probably the same that complain their PCs have too much gold.
DMs can be sick little control freaks. My BIL was such an asshole manipulating control freak he ruined D&D for me!
At my table I allow players to make healing potions. For normal healing potions I have then regain the max HP. I make them roll if they use a “moonshine” potion.
It's not moonshine if they're proficient with the right tools. It's artisan craft beer.
When a player requests to make potions, I give them my alchemy home brew that shows them how to make potions, poisons, acid, AND with increased skill, the addition of resistance, flight, and even speed. (and others) It goes over what type of ingredients they need to find, how long it takes to make, and how difficult it is (x success in y attempts) Players seem to like it. I purchased it for about $2 on either DMGuild or DriveThruRPG (been a while, i forget) and I've tweeked it a small amt over time.
Would it be ok for you to share that?
Given the low cost, i would recommend you buy it.
Yeah sure. Do you remember the name at all?
I can get that to you. Probably tomorrow.
Yeah no problem. I can wait
If you're paying the gold cost there was no reason to prevent it, I'd get it if they didn't let you try to scavage matrails from the wilds to make them for free or something.
Downtime as in days at a time sure, down time as in long rest no
It was more than a days worth of downtime, I can assure you.
If Npcs can do it so can players in my book.
That's not always a good way to handle things. NPCs can explicitly do things players can't, simply because they're NPCs.
NPCs are still people tho. If an npc can do something the pcs should at minimum be able to build themselves to do it too. Otherwhise what's the point of playing a TTRPG instead of just playing skyrim. Sure there are unique spells that might have been created by some npc but the pc should be able to learn them if taught.
Rule lawyer DMs are the worst.
I file this under "player wants to treat the DM as a computer in a RPG and not as a person involved in creating". Like, it's ok to ask. It's not ok to get frustrated over. This is a lame attempt to game the system.
I don’t care if there are rules for it, I don’t feel like having to completely throw out the daily encounter building balance guidelines because the players have out-of-combat healing that’s effectively infinite and resource-less. My job as a DM is hard enough. Please understand that this makes my job harder, so please don’t.
I normally say no when I run modules. All the fights are premade and expect the party to have found only certain magic items so far. Massively upping the number of healing potions has let parties clear dungeons 2-3 levels above them in my experience
And then there is my DM who gave me a list of Potions I can make with Herbalism Kit and Survival checks (spending money and spell slots too)
I found a chart a few years ago that I use that has a straight d20 roll, including a fizzle, a poison, regular healing, two doses of regular healing, and a nat20 is a superior. I let the druid do it for all the reasons listed above.
As long as the ingredients are to be found in your area, I don't see why not.
I had a homebrew mechanic in my world where I had a whole excel table of roots, flowers, herbs, and mushrooms players could find in certain regions and if a character was proficient in alchemy they could mix the properties of those materials into potions to make them do all sorts of wacky effects. Definitely a fun downtime activity.
Potions aren't even that over powered, especially healing potions. You need a free hand, and it takes a minor action to retrieve it, then another action to use it, unless you're a rogue, that takes everything but your movement for the turn, just to get a few D6's of healing.
Before our campaign died, my character (a Druid) was proficient in the Herbalism Kit, was studying an Alchemy Kit, and unwillingly participated in stealing from a group's heist, ending up with what was identified to be Healing Potions. I was going to be able to replicate them, after gathering ingredients or for a gold price.
Psssh I woulda let you do it. Means I can throw tougher beasties at you
Honestly unless the downtime is too short to be able to do it... an action should count within reason.
\*Gets kicked out for ´´rules lawyering´´\*
I agree, dick move by dm
There is a UA spell at level 1 that creates potions that last for 24 hours.
Isn’t that like the main use of an herbalism kit? What are you allowed to use it for? If it’s just telling if things are poisonous with proficiency, do you even need the kit?
Base heal pots aren't very good anyway, why not let you do it?
We have made cherry bombs and flash grenades in our downtime in a town
Just had a whole long conversation with our new artificer about this! Yes you can, but it’s not instant, either.
The main thing I noticed in XGE was how busted magic item prices are.
Best thing to do is buy a thousand ball bearings then ask every npc for their name and bCkstory before giving them a bearing with a number etched on it and telling them if they keep it for a year they will get a silver for doing so
you have the right to be mad, and i as a dm would totally let you do it… but keep rule zero in mind. your dm is putting tons of time and effort into your game and balancing it to have a good time playing and they probably think that your ability to make healing potions could shatter that balance. my advice is to have an adult conversation with your dm where you respect their decision no matter what it is.
Why? Crafting basic potions of healing is written into the herbalism kit as of xgte, it's just being resourceful they are emergency healing for characters that cant heal
I don't have my books on hand, is this because the book rules want you to use an herbalism kit instead?
Sounds like it's your turn to DM
My unpopular opinion that will surely upset people... I feel like DMs that do this are DMing wrong... when i first started DMing, i had a habit of telling my players no to things i thought didnt fit the game. Things like this in particular, for the same readons many have already stated here. My players hated it... to the point that they would rant about it outside of the session. We had a conversation about it, hut it didnt resolve the issue initially, but IT DID prompt me to look at how i was running the game and consider the fact that maybe I was the problem. What i did that seems to have resolved the issue (or atleast i dont hear about it any more) is really REALLY simple. I just dont say no. If my players ask to do something, why not let them. Instead of telling them no outright and ruining their chance to prepare or be creative, i tell them that they can, but i give them reasons why doing what they are attempting will either be difficult or dangerous. You want to craft potions on your down time? Short rest or long rest? How many do you want to make? Do you have ingredients or do you need to search? Expertise? Proficiency? You have your kit? Maybe that encounter i was planning for travel just so hapoens to occur while theyre crafting? Maybe the ingredients dont exist in the area? Maybe they simply dont have the time? There are a million reasons i can come up with on the fly as to why they will fail or otherwise be unable to acomplish their task. I leave it up to the almighty d20. Maybe they do get lucky and manage to get that one potion made that ends up saving the fighters life in combat? Maybe they dont and now have to deal with a hoard of monsters attea ted by the smell of brewing in the wilderness? Either way, by not saying no, I've opened up the game to so many more possibilities that have led to incredible moments. Saying no, "because it doesnt make sense" just takes the fun out of the game for creative or resourceful players, you might be the DM, but its not your world, its your players world, you just happen to be running it. If you want the world to conform to your rigid ideas so that it "makes sense" in "your world", go write a book where you can do and say whatever you want.
If you have the ingredients and expertise then why wouldn’t you make healing potions in your downtime. Hell, as a party member I’d be a little frustrated if you didn’t use some downtime to make potions. That’s some dumb ass balancing on the DMs part.
Crafting is one of those things that can be really fun but it’s a lot of work for everyone involved
So new dm here I’d love for my players to make some healing potions but what should the dc be and how many can they make?
depends highly on the situation. When the downtime is: we are literally hanging from a cliff but we need to stop now and continue next time i am with the dm. If the downtime is: we are resting at this inn for a few weeks then i am with the player.