Master Artisan (feat for better masterwork bonuses)

[rferries]

Master Artisan
Arms, armour, and tools you craft are of exceptionally fine quality.

Prerequisites
Dwarf, elf, non-humanoid, or character level 6th.

Benefits
Whenever you craft a masterwork item, it gains a +1 masterwork bonus instead of its normal bonus. For each +10 you add to the Craft DC of the masterwork component (normally DC 20), the masterwork bonus of the finished item increases by +1. Masterwork bonuses have different effects, according to the item type (see below)

Weapons
Add the weapon's masterwork bonus to attack and damage rolls. For each +1 of the weapon's masterwork bonus, increase its hardness, damage die (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsterFeats.htm#improvedNaturalAttack), threat range, and critical multiplier by 1.

For each +1 masterwork bonus of a ranged or thrown weapon, the maximum number of range increments is increased by one and the penalty for firing beyond the first range increment is reduced by 2.

Armour
For each +1 of the armour's masterwork bonus:

Increase the armour's hardness, armour bonus, and maximum Dexterity bonus by 1
Reduce the armour's arcane spell failure by 10% and its armor check penalty by 2
Treat the armour as one category lighter than normal for purposes of movement and other limitations.

For each +1 bonus of the armour's masterwork bonus, grant its wearer a hardness of 1 if it’s light armor, 2 if it’s medium armor, and 3 if it’s heavy armor. For example, a suit of +3 masterwork full plate would grant its wearer hardness 9.

Shields
For each +1 of the shield's masterwork bonus:

Increase the shield's hardness and shield bonus by +1
Reduce the shield's arcane spell failure by 10% and its armor check penalty by 2
Improve shield bashes made with the shield as though it were a masterwork weapon.

For each +1 bonus of the shield's masterwork bonus, grant its wearer a hardness of 1. This stacks with the hardness granted from wearing masterwork armour.

Tools
For each +1 of the tool's masterwork bonus, increase the circumstance bonus it increases on skill checks by +5.

Alchemical Items
For each +1 of the item's masterwork bonus, double all numerical effects of the item (including but not limited to range increments, damage die, durations, and bonuses) other than save DCs. Add the item's masterwork bonus to its save DC (if any).

Special
You may not take 10 when crafting an item with a masterwork bonus greater than +1.

A fighter or wizard may select Master Artisan whenever they could select a bonus fighter or wizard feat.


A feat for all the Tolkienesque dwarves/elves, Arabian Nights genies, folklore fairies, etc. (plus the occasional aged human smith).

Note that these masterwork bonuses can be ruled as either magical or nonmagical in origin, and are intended to stack with the enhancement bonus from standard magic weapons/armour (the enhancement bonus is a function of how powerful the enchantment on an item is, whereas the masterwork bonus is a function of how finely crafted the item is to start with).

The cost to craft the items doesn't increase; as your skill increases you can get better results from the same base material.

This is obviously a huge leap in power, but it helps non-spellcasters more than spellcasters. Furthermore they can be fluffed in such a way as to be non-magical, helping keep suspension of disbelief - "the set of full plate is so finely crafted that it doesn't restrict your motion at all, and the alloy is so strong it weighs a fraction of the normal weight but provides the same (and better!) protection".

The increased hardness of the items (not the hardness they grant) is meant to help prevent sundering/damage from oozes etc. I was considering granting them saving throws as magic weapons too.

The increase in damage die for weapons is probably overboard and redundant with the flat bonus to attacks/damage, but I like it anyways.

Finally, some samples: a +5 masterwork dagger would have a Craft DC of 70 (for the masterwork component), which could be accomplished via a mix of skill ranks, a masterwork tool, and a magic item granting a competence bonus. The dagger would have the following stats: 4d6+5 damage (not including Strength bonus), threat range 14-20, critical multiplier x7.

A +5 masterwork set of full-plate would grant an armour bonus of +13, have no armor check penalty or spell failure chance, count as light armour, and grant hardness 15.

And this is before adding the benefits of magic arms & armour! :)

[rferries]

Forgot to say, credit to the good people in (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?534843-Upgrading-alchemy) these (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?534066-Condensing-a-few-Crafting-skills-3-PF) threads (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?534853-Weapons-amp-Upgrades-Fix-(for-use-with-3-5-amp-Pathfinder)) for inspiration (especially Morphic Tide).

[AOKost]

Personally, I love it! Well thought out, and executed.

I hate to suggest it... but you might want to reduce the spell failure chance down to 5% reduction... it makes me physically cringe cause I love the 10%... but I feel 5% might be better balanced...

I'm also torn as to whether or not to require Skill Focus (Craft [Armorsmithing, Bowmaking, and Weaponsmithing) and 6 ranks in each before you can gain this if you're not an elf, dwarf or non-humanoid...

Have you given thought to feats other racial templates to be added so a human could add Feycraft to an item?

[darkbuu_1]

I love and am terrified by the thought of a double+ masterwork weapon. I really want to say "it's too much" especially the increased threat range AND multiplier, but I think I'm just being overly cautious. Are they before or after keen/improved critical?

The other thing I wanted to meantion is crafting progress is measured by rolled result*craft DC meaning crafting this stuff will actually takes less time than regular masterwork items.

Other than those things, this is great and I'll be using these if I ever get round to running a game.

[AOKost]

I love and am terrified by the thought of a double+ masterwork weapon. I really want to say "it's too much" especially the increased threat range AND multiplier, but I think I'm just being overly cautious. Are they before or after keen/improved critical?

The other thing I wanted to meantion is crafting progress is measured by rolled result*craft DC meaning crafting this stuff will actually takes less time than regular masterwork items.

Other than those things, this is great and I'll be using these if I ever get round to running a game.

These are before Improved Critical or Keen or any other adjustment/modifier

I'd love to see a compendium of what you've come up with thus far for crafting... Your Craftsman prestige class, materials, etc in one PDF or even Doc for easy access XD

[rferries]

Personally, I love it! Well thought out, and executed.

I hate to suggest it... but you might want to reduce the spell failure chance down to 5% reduction... it makes me physically cringe cause I love the 10%... but I feel 5% might be better balanced...

I'm also torn as to whether or not to require Skill Focus (Craft [Armorsmithing, Bowmaking, and Weaponsmithing) and 6 ranks in each before you can gain this if you're not an elf, dwarf or non-humanoid...

Have you given thought to feats other racial templates to be added so a human could add Feycraft to an item?

Thanks!

Re: ASF - yes I had it at 5% originally, but then I realised you'd need a +10 (!) masterwork bonus to fully reduce to ASF from a tower shield (whyyyyy does a shield have more ASF than full plate?!?!). It was important to me that a non-epic crafter could fully remove the ASF, so I'll leave it at 10% (or maybe reduce it by 5% for armour and 10% for shields?).

Re: Skills - since you can't really use the feat without skill ranks, and I couldn't think of an elegant way to write a prereq ("9 ranks in a Craft skill"?) I'll leave it like this for now. It's intended for use with any Craft check you make so specifying Armoursmithing etc doesn't quite make sense.

Re: Feycraft - I'm not really familiar with this (did you tell me about it ages ago? sorry!). The idea of races using this feat to create their special racial items (e.g. drow and their sun-averse magic items) is a cool idea though!


I love and am terrified by the thought of a double+ masterwork weapon. I really want to say "it's too much" especially the increased threat range AND multiplier, but I think I'm just being overly cautious. Are they before or after keen/improved critical?

The other thing I wanted to meantion is crafting progress is measured by rolled result*craft DC meaning crafting this stuff will actually takes less time than regular masterwork items.

Other than those things, this is great and I'll be using these if I ever get round to running a game.

Keen and Improved Critical would stack with the masterwork improvement, yep! So the sample dagger would have a threat range of (7-20) haha! Note that by the time you can craft such a weapon the party wizard is winning encounters with a single meteor swarm/wail of the banshee/gate/shapechange spell.

Yep I think it's appropriate that a master crafter not only makes better items with the same starting materials, but can do so in less time.

Thanks and let me know how it goes. The numbers (especially Craft DCs) might need some fudging in case PCs wriggle their way into getting higher masterwork bonuses too early.

What would everyone think about masterwork items being able to inflict/ignore critical hits? Something like, for every +1 bonus a weapon reduces a creature's immunity (or fortification etc) to critical hits by 20%, and armour grants resistance to critical hits of 20%. So the sample dagger would fully ignore crit immunity of undead etc, and the sample armour would grant that immunity. The relative % chances could be fudged i.e. armour could grant 30% crit resistance per +1 bonus (so a +5 weapon would still only have a 50% chance of a critical hit against +5 armour).

[AOKost]

Thanks!

Re: ASF - yes I had it at 5% originally, but then I realized you'd need a +10 (!) masterwork bonus to fully reduce to ASF from a tower shield (whyyyyy does a shield have more ASF than full plate?!?!). It was important to me that a non-epic crafter could fully remove the ASF, so I'll leave it at 10% (or maybe reduce it by 5% for armour and 10% for shields?).

Re: Skills - since you can't really use the feat without skill ranks, and I couldn't think of an elegant way to write a prereq ("9 ranks in a Craft skill"?) I'll leave it like this for now. It's intended for use with any Craft check you make so specifying Armoursmithing etc doesn't quite make sense.

Re: Feycraft - I'm not really familiar with this (did you tell me about it ages ago? sorry!). The idea of races using this feat to create their special racial items (e.g. drow and their sun-averse magic items) is a cool idea though!



Keen and Improved Critical would stack with the masterwork improvement, yep! So the sample dagger would have a threat range of (7-20) haha! Note that by the time you can craft such a weapon the party wizard is winning encounters with a single meteor swarm/wail of the banshee/gate/shapechange spell.

Yep I think it's appropriate that a master crafter not only makes better items with the same starting materials, but can do so in less time.

Thanks and let me know how it goes. The numbers (especially Craft DCs) might need some fudging in case PCs wriggle their way into getting higher masterwork bonuses too early.

What would everyone think about masterwork items being able to inflict/ignore critical hits? Something like, for every +1 bonus a weapon reduces a creature's immunity (or fortification etc) to critical hits by 20%, and armor grants resistance to critical hits of 20%. So the sample dagger would fully ignore crit immunity of undead etc, and the sample armor would grant that immunity. The relative % chances could be fudged i.e. armor could grant 30% crit resistance per +1 bonus (so a +5 weapon would still only have a 50% chance of a critical hit against +5 armor).

Feycraft is part of a template that Fey craftspeople can add to items... Elves, Dwarves, Gith, and many other races have their own special templates.

I would really love to see Fortification as part of Armor, but maybe not Shields up to 75% or so... I kinda feel that total immunity to critical hits should come either by becoming undead, a construct or an ooze, or other creature specifically immune to critical hits, or have something magical to prevent critical hits, or some special class feature...

As for Mastercraft weapons overcoming critical hits... I like the idea, but I feel that should also be left to class abilities...

As for Prerequisites, I'd suggest something like: Prerequisites: Dwarf, elf, non-humanoid, or (using Pathfinder and homebrew) 6 ranks in Craft (Metal), Craft (Wood), Craft (Stone), Craft (Leather/Weaving/tailoring?), Skill Focus (Craft [Metal]), Skill Focus (Craft [Stone]), Skill Focus (Craft [Wood]), Skill Focus (Craft [Leather/Weaving/tailoring?])

For this feat, it would literally pay to be a long lived race such as an elf or dwarf... but as one that loves playing a crafts-person, I usually go with Dwarf because they have all the best racial crafting abilities. There are a few other races that could bear mentioning, but not many...

As to shields... you could easily specify that Shield ASF is reduced by 10% instead of 5%. Tower Shields are a veritable wall in front of you... so I can understand how it would be hard to cast while carrying one, but it shouldn't be a 50% failure chance... maybe 25%? Some armor, due to it's description alone makes me understand why it's got such a high spell failure chance, such as Stone Plate with it's 40% (IIRC) but others shouldn't have any penalty whatsoever... Quilted armor or Gamisons are slightly bulky, and actually provide very good protection (discussion for another time) but I wouldn't consider them to hinder spellcasting in real life in the slightest, so shouldn't even warrant the 5% (IIRC) they get...

[King of Nowhere]

I think increase to critical range AND multiplier is really too strong, especially when you start stacking it. I would rebalance it as "every +1 masterwork gives +1 to hit and damage, every +2 increased the damage dice, and every +3 increases crit range and multiplier by 1". So you won't have a schyte that crits 17-20/*7, stacking with improved critical and possibly prestige class bonuses.
As for the +5 to skill, I'd lower it to +3 at most. Again, I fear what may happen by stacking that bonus too much. Plus, I'd make a supplementary rule that you can't get a bonus from masterwork items greater than half your ranks in the skill; the reason is that if you're not good at it, you get no benefit from great tools, because you don't know how to use them.

I also believe this feature stacks really well with my homebrewed class the specialized expert (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?532254-An-NPC-class-to-make-badass-npcs-without-overshadowing-the-pcs-specialized-expert): intended as an npc class to make a master artisan/scholar/whatever that has awesome rolls to one single skill but sucks at everything else, so that the pcs may need to hire one for a specific task, but he doesn't overshadow them in any other way. As he levels up, he becomes more and more specialized.

So I am going to introduce this in my campaign world, with the following modifications:
1) it is not a feat, but something that only specialized experts can do.
2) It requires super specialization to give a +1 masterwork bonus, foremost in the field to give up to +3, and any masterwork bonus greater than +3 is an achievement of a lifetime.

This has the following benefits in terms of story and balance:
1) the pcs can't just craft their uber weapons by having one of them spend a single skill point per level plus one feat. Instead, they need to find someone very skilled to make those weapons/armors, and someone who can make masterwork weapons cannot make masterowrk armors or tools, and viceversa. This also help explain why those masterwork things aren't common, and it gives a greater reward to find them.
2) getting a greater than +1 masterwork bonus requires a specialized expert of at least 10th level who specialized on an even narrower field. If he can make +2 masterwork swords, he cannot make +2 masterwork spears. getting a +4 or more masterwork requires a specialized expert of level 16+ who decided to make that object as the masterwork of his entire life. This again keeps those items rare, and explains why not every magic weapon is uber masterworked. I mean, consider it: if you want to spend the 25k gp 1k xp to make a +5 sword, and you can enchant a nonmagical sword that gives a lot of cumulative plusses, then who wouldn't get such a weapon? It's a pittance compared to all the other resources you invested. Unless there was only one guy - or possibly none - in the whole world who knew how to make such a well crafted object. Which leads to all kinds of quests about finding that guy and convincing him to make you an uber-masterwork object, or finding a secret stash that the guy made before he passed of old age centuries ago. Due to the hyperspecialized nature of specialized experts, it is really difficult to find one who is foremost in the field you need; much harder than finding a wizard to cast a 7th level spell, because every 13th level wizard can cast a 7th level spell, but a specialized expert must be foremost in a very specific field, and you need to try dozens of them before finding the one you need.

This way you can use masterwork items as quest rewards, instead of being something that the players can craft at the expence of 1 feat and 1 skill point per level.

[rferries]

Feycraft is part of a template that Fey craftspeople can add to items... Elves, Dwarves, Gith, and many other races have their own special templates.

I would really love to see Fortification as part of Armor, but maybe not Shields up to 75% or so... I kinda feel that total immunity to critical hits should come either by becoming undead, a construct or an ooze, or other creature specifically immune to critical hits, or have something magical to prevent critical hits, or some special class feature...

As for Mastercraft weapons overcoming critical hits... I like the idea, but I feel that should also be left to class abilities...

As for Prerequisites, I'd suggest something like: Prerequisites: Dwarf, elf, non-humanoid, or (using Pathfinder and homebrew) 6 ranks in Craft (Metal), Craft (Wood), Craft (Stone), Craft (Leather/Weaving/tailoring?), Skill Focus (Craft [Metal]), Skill Focus (Craft [Stone]), Skill Focus (Craft [Wood]), Skill Focus (Craft [Leather/Weaving/tailoring?])

For this feat, it would literally pay to be a long lived race such as an elf or dwarf... but as one that loves playing a crafts-person, I usually go with Dwarf because they have all the best racial crafting abilities. There are a few other races that could bear mentioning, but not many...

As to shields... you could easily specify that Shield ASF is reduced by 10% instead of 5%. Tower Shields are a veritable wall in front of you... so I can understand how it would be hard to cast while carrying one, but it shouldn't be a 50% failure chance... maybe 25%? Some armor, due to it's description alone makes me understand why it's got such a high spell failure chance, such as Stone Plate with it's 40% (IIRC) but others shouldn't have any penalty whatsoever... Quilted armor or Gamisons are slightly bulky, and actually provide very good protection (discussion for another time) but I wouldn't consider them to hinder spellcasting in real life in the slightest, so shouldn't even warrant the 5% (IIRC) they get...

Ah I see. Presumably there's already a way to make feycraft stuff though?

Yeah I'll leave the fortification/ignoring crit immunity stuff out, just makes for more dice rolling; too complex!

I'll also leave the prereqs as they are, the feat really does require Craft ranks to function anyways.

ACF is anti-arcane prejudice! I'll leave the masterwork bonus as it is too; any increment less than 10% means that there will be some armours/shields that still haven't reached 0% even with a +5 bonus (which is the highest bonus I intended to be reachable pre-epic).


I think increase to critical range AND multiplier is really too strong, especially when you start stacking it. I would rebalance it as "every +1 masterwork gives +1 to hit and damage, every +2 increased the damage dice, and every +3 increases crit range and multiplier by 1". So you won't have a schyte that crits 17-20/*7, stacking with improved critical and possibly prestige class bonuses.
As for the +5 to skill, I'd lower it to +3 at most. Again, I fear what may happen by stacking that bonus too much. Plus, I'd make a supplementary rule that you can't get a bonus from masterwork items greater than half your ranks in the skill; the reason is that if you're not good at it, you get no benefit from great tools, because you don't know how to use them.

I also believe this feature stacks really well with my homebrewed class the specialized expert (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?532254-An-NPC-class-to-make-badass-npcs-without-overshadowing-the-pcs-specialized-expert): intended as an npc class to make a master artisan/scholar/whatever that has awesome rolls to one single skill but sucks at everything else, so that the pcs may need to hire one for a specific task, but he doesn't overshadow them in any other way. As he levels up, he becomes more and more specialized.

So I am going to introduce this in my campaign world, with the following modifications:
1) it is not a feat, but something that only specialized experts can do.
2) It requires super specialization to give a +1 masterwork bonus, foremost in the field to give up to +3, and any masterwork bonus greater than +3 is an achievement of a lifetime.

This has the following benefits in terms of story and balance:
1) the pcs can't just craft their uber weapons by having one of them spend a single skill point per level plus one feat. Instead, they need to find someone very skilled to make those weapons/armors, and someone who can make masterwork weapons cannot make masterowrk armors or tools, and viceversa. This also help explain why those masterwork things aren't common, and it gives a greater reward to find them.
2) getting a greater than +1 masterwork bonus requires a specialized expert of at least 10th level who specialized on an even narrower field. If he can make +2 masterwork swords, he cannot make +2 masterwork spears. getting a +4 or more masterwork requires a specialized expert of level 16+ who decided to make that object as the masterwork of his entire life. This again keeps those items rare, and explains why not every magic weapon is uber masterworked. I mean, consider it: if you want to spend the 25k gp 1k xp to make a +5 sword, and you can enchant a nonmagical sword that gives a lot of cumulative plusses, then who wouldn't get such a weapon? It's a pittance compared to all the other resources you invested. Unless there was only one guy - or possibly none - in the whole world who knew how to make such a well crafted object. Which leads to all kinds of quests about finding that guy and convincing him to make you an uber-masterwork object, or finding a secret stash that the guy made before he passed of old age centuries ago. Due to the hyperspecialized nature of specialized experts, it is really difficult to find one who is foremost in the field you need; much harder than finding a wizard to cast a 7th level spell, because every 13th level wizard can cast a 7th level spell, but a specialized expert must be foremost in a very specific field, and you need to try dozens of them before finding the one you need.

This way you can use masterwork items as quest rewards, instead of being something that the players can craft at the expence of 1 feat and 1 skill point per level.

The bonuses do add up, but they keep non-casters in line with casters at least when it comes to damage output (which is really the only trick most noncasters have).

The bonus from tools is powerful (and can be used to create better tools etc.) but there's already +30 competence bonuses available from magic items.

Cool idea re: making it an NPC ability!

[King of Nowhere]

So, I worked out my balance to use this ability in my campaign:

1) make it something that only specialized experts can do. That ensures those items are rare enough.

2) specialized experts with the super specialization class feature (4th level) can get a +1 masterwork bonus, but it does not stack with magic. I introduced this limitation only because I've got an already running campaign world, and 4th level specialized experts aren't that rare, and I didn't want to retroactively change all magic weapons +2 or greater also getting masterwork bonuses.

3) Specialized experts with the foremost in the field class feature (10th level) can get an extra +1 stacking with magic. So the most powerful magic weapons will mostly have this level of masterwork. but! Weapons can get ruined in fighting, and this level of masterwork is such that simple magic does not fix them perfectly. After every battle, you get one chance in six that your weapon will be ruined enough to lose that +1. There are only two ways to fix that: have a specialized expert with foremost in the field repair it, or cast limited wish. So, basically it costs you resources to keep your weapon pimped up.

4) greater masterwork bonuses can only be obtained with achievement of a lifetime (16th level), making it something rare indeed. And they are still subject to ruining, though they would only lose one single bonus (so a +2 weapon with increased damage, increased critical range and increased critical multiplier may become +1, or lose any of the other properties). Chances are, at any given time there can be nobody in the world with the skill to make or fix such a weapon. Somebody who is foremost in the field can only restore the weapon upwards to a +1 bonus; to restore it fully, you need someone who has made his achievement of a lifetime to make such weapons, or a full wish spell.

5) for tools, bonuses are somewhat smaller, capping around +10. Anyway, I don't allow the full +30 magic bonus to skill check except for the most basic skills. No item in my world gives more than +5 to diplomacy, and concentration is restricted to +10. Basically I don't want anyone using magic instead of skills; not if they want to get the same results.

6) It is intended that only specialized users can get the most of those bonuses; a commoner with a supermasterwork sword wouldn't be able to swing it right to deal more damage or more critical. Still, the exact limitations on those are left unstatted. It is assumed that by the time one wil get a supermasterwork item, one will be high level enough to know how to use it to full potential.

This way, I was able to retroactively introduce those kind of masterwork items in a campaign world while making them rare enough that it made sense they were never mentioned before. Of course one can use less restrictive rules if one introduces that level of masterwork from the beginning.

I particularly like the compromise of making those weapons ruined after time. It explains why a high level artisan who used his achievement of a lifetime to craft a supermasterwork weapon won't just keep make more of them until he floods the market: at some point, he'll be tooo busy fixing those already existing. it also worked perfectly with a few already estabished pieces of world lore; for example, the church of nerull has given their second-best schyte to their best assassin; why not the very best? because the very best is supermasterwork, and there is nobody living who took achievement of a lifetime (make war schytes). So when the party will face that assassin, kill him and take his gear, he will return with a more powerful weapon, and it will make perfect sense in the game world.

[rferries]

Looks good, hope your players have fun! My only quibble is having the weapons wear down - I feel that masterwork weapons should be built to last... though I get your point about maintaining their scarcity that way.

[Quarian Rex]

I have some thoughts on this and it went a bit longer than I intended. Tone doesn't always come across well on the internet so just remember that I like what you're doing here and I think that I'm helping. So...

This is a great idea that I see as trying to cram too much in too quickly, with the end result that it would never actually be allowed at the table. Why? Because you have completely eclipsed the utility of magic arms and armor (to a ludicrous level), and even special materials (this functionally replaces mithril and adamantine in crafting) with a feat and a skill check.

Having the mastery bonus apply as an enhancement bonus (not the bonus type, just the same function) while simultaneously increasing hardness/crit range/crit mult/damage die/range increment and range penalty reduction (and this is just on weapons) results in a franken-monster. Scimitars do 6d6+5 (13-20/x7) damage (with a crit range of 5-20 w/keen!), Greatswords do 12d6+5 (14-20/x7) damage, and Longbows do 8d6+5 (15-20/x8) damage out to 600ft without penalty and 1600ft at max. That is before magic, before feats, and before class abilities. You have Greatswords doing 84d6+35 damage on a crit, and that will happen on 65% of the hits with keen or the increased critical feat. That is crazytown. That will never be allowed into an actual game. And worst of all... it's boring. It is currently just a race to a higher bonus because each increase is exponentially more powerful than the last. That doesn't feel like a masterwork. It feels like a cheap powergrab. I don't think that this is your actual intent.

I think that there is a very simple fix for this. Have the mastery bonus apply to the items hardness and basic enhancement (to-hit/damage, AC, skill bonus, etc.) and leave the other options as selections to be made with mastery points. This allows specialization, so that a master crafter can make five different masterworks of the same item (of the same quality) and have each be mechanically unique.

Along with this you also need to put limits on these upgrades. Allowing five size increases on the damage die of a weapon, that stack with actual size increases, is absolutely game breaking. You want meaningful, desirable enhancements, not things that will completely trivialize the game as written. To that end I would recomend something like this...

Master Artisan
Arms, armour, and tools you craft are of exceptionally fine quality.

Prerequisites
Dwarf, elf, non-humanoid, or character level 6th.

Benefits
Whenever you craft a masterwork item, it can gain a masterwork bonus instead of its normal bonus. For each +10 you add to the Craft DC of the masterwork component (normally DC 20), the masterwork bonus of the finished item increases by +1. This masterwork bonus can stack up to +5 maximum (with a DC 70). Masterwork bonuses have different effects, according to the item type (see below)

Weapons
Add the weapon's masterwork bonus to its hardness and to attack and damage rolls. This bonus is nonmagical (and so is not susceptible to dispels, or areas of antimagic) and does not stack with the enhancement bonus from magical weapons and similar.

For each '+' of the weapons masterwork bonus one of the following options can be selected:

The weapons damage die (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsterFeats.htm#improvedNaturalAttack) can be increased by one step. This can be selected multiple times, and their effects stack, but each selection after the first counts as two selections.
The weapons threat range can be increased by one. This increase is added last, after any other modifiers such as the Keen enchantment. This can be selected multiple times, and their effects stack, but each selection after the first counts as two selections.
The weapons critical multiplier can be increased by one. This can be selected multiple times, and their effects stack, but each selection counts as two selections.
A Special Weapon Feature (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/equipment/weapons/#wpn-quality-blocking) can be added to the weapon. This can be selected multiple times, selecting a different feature each time.
Add a +2 to CMB and a +1 to CMD when using a specific maneuver matching a special weapon feature that the weapon posesses. This can be selected multiple times, either to increase the bonuses with a single maneuver or to add bonuses to another.


Additionally, ranged or thrown weapons may also select:

The maximum number of range increments is increased by one. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.
The penalty for firing beyond the first range increment is reduced by 2. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.



Armour
Add the armour's masterwork bonus to its hardness and to its armour bonus to AC. This bonus is nonmagical (and so is not susceptible to dispels, or areas of antimagic) and does not stack with the enhancement bonus from magical armours and similar.

For each '+' of the armour's masterwork bonus one of the following options can be selected:

Increase the armour's maximum Dexterity bonus by 1. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.
Reduce the armour's armor check penalty by 2. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.
Reduce the armour's arcane spell failure by 10%. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.
Treat the armour as one category lighter than normal for purposes of movement and other limitations. This option can be selected only once and it counts as two selections.
Grant its wearer a DR/Adamantine of 1 if it’s light armor, 2 if it’s medium armor, and 3 if it’s heavy armor. This counts as two selections, but it can be selected multiple times and the effects stack. If this option is used on a suit of adamantine armour then the DR becomes DR/- and stacks with that of adamantine.


Shields
Add the shield's masterwork bonus to its hardness and to its shield bonus to AC. This bonus is nonmagical (and so is not susceptible to dispels, or areas of antimagic) and does not stack with the enhancement bonus from magical armours and similar.

For each '+' of the shield's masterwork bonus one of the following options can be selected:

Reduce the shield's armor check penalty by 2. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.
Reduce the shield's arcane spell failure by 10%. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.
Improve shield bashes made with the shield as though it were a masterwork weapon.
Grant its wearer a DR/Adamantine of 1 that stacks with similar bonuses due to masterwork armour. This counts as two selections, but it can be selected multiple times and the effects stack. If this option is used on an adamantine shield then the DR becomes DR/- and stacks with that of adamantine armour.



Tools
For each '+' of the tool's masterwork bonus it gains a +5 circumstance bonus on skill checks and increases the hardness of the tool by 1. This bonus is nonmagical (and so is not susceptible to dispels, or areas of antimagic).

Alchemical Items
For each '+' of the item's masterwork bonus one of the following options can be selected:

Add +1 to the item's save DC. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.
Multiply a single numerical effect of the item (including but not limited to range increments, damage die, durations, and bonuses) other than save DCs by X+1 where X=the number of times this option has been selected. This can be selected multiple times, each selection after the first counts as two selections, either stacking its effect or applying to a different numerical effect.
Add an additional dose/use of the item. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.


Special
You may not take 10 when crafting an item with a masterwork bonus greater than +1.

A fighter or wizard may select Master Artisan whenever they could select a bonus fighter or wizard feat.


This proposal may seem like a radical change but it really is not. This merely lets the creator make meaningful choices and have the end result be something that won't make the game world implode. It doesn't provide every benefit all at once but when properly enchanted and forged from the right materials you can achieve whatever individual effect you originally wanted, and you now have items that border on being lesser artifacts instead of mere magic items. I think that is a beautiful place to be.

Thoughts?

[BRKNdevil]

Dragon Magazine 358 had something on this

[rferries]

I have some thoughts on this and it went a bit longer than I intended. Tone doesn't always come across well on the internet so just remember that I like what you're doing here and I think that I'm helping. So...

This is a great idea that I see as trying to cram too much in too quickly, with the end result that it would never actually be allowed at the table. Why? Because you have completely eclipsed the utility of magic arms and armor (to a ludicrous level), and even special materials (this functionally replaces mithril and adamantine in crafting) with a feat and a skill check.

Having the mastery bonus apply as an enhancement bonus (not the bonus type, just the same function) while simultaneously increasing hardness/crit range/crit mult/damage die/range increment and range penalty reduction (and this is just on weapons) results in a franken-monster. Scimitars do 6d6+5 (13-20/x7) damage (with a crit range of 5-20 w/keen!), Greatswords do 12d6+5 (14-20/x7) damage, and Longbows do 8d6+5 (15-20/x8) damage out to 600ft without penalty and 1600ft at max. That is before magic, before feats, and before class abilities. You have Greatswords doing 84d6+35 damage on a crit, and that will happen on 65% of the hits with keen or the increased critical feat. That is crazytown. That will never be allowed into an actual game. And worst of all... it's boring. It is currently just a race to a higher bonus because each increase is exponentially more powerful than the last. That doesn't feel like a masterwork. It feels like a cheap powergrab. I don't think that this is your actual intent.

I think that there is a very simple fix for this. Have the mastery bonus apply to the items hardness and basic enhancement (to-hit/damage, AC, skill bonus, etc.) and leave the other options as selections to be made with mastery points. This allows specialization, so that a master crafter can make five different masterworks of the same item (of the same quality) and have each be mechanically unique.

Along with this you also need to put limits on these upgrades. Allowing five size increases on the damage die of a weapon, that stack with actual size increases, is absolutely game breaking. You want meaningful, desirable enhancements, not things that will completely trivialize the game as written. To that end I would recomend something like this...

Master Artisan
Arms, armour, and tools you craft are of exceptionally fine quality.

Prerequisites
Dwarf, elf, non-humanoid, or character level 6th.

Benefits
Whenever you craft a masterwork item, it can gain a masterwork bonus instead of its normal bonus. For each +10 you add to the Craft DC of the masterwork component (normally DC 20), the masterwork bonus of the finished item increases by +1. This masterwork bonus can stack up to +5 maximum (with a DC 70). Masterwork bonuses have different effects, according to the item type (see below)

Weapons
Add the weapon's masterwork bonus to its hardness and to attack and damage rolls. This bonus is nonmagical (and so is not susceptible to dispels, or areas of antimagic) and does not stack with the enhancement bonus from magical weapons and similar.

For each '+' of the weapons masterwork bonus one of the following options can be selected:

The weapons damage die (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsterFeats.htm#improvedNaturalAttack) can be increased by one step. This can be selected multiple times, and their effects stack, but each selection after the first counts as two selections.
The weapons threat range can be increased by one. This increase is added last, after any other modifiers such as the Keen enchantment. This can be selected multiple times, and their effects stack, but each selection after the first counts as two selections.
The weapons critical multiplier can be increased by one. This can be selected multiple times, and their effects stack, but each selection counts as two selections.
A Special Weapon Feature (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/equipment/weapons/#wpn-quality-blocking) can be added to the weapon. This can be selected multiple times, selecting a different feature each time.
Add a +2 to CMB and a +1 to CMD when using a specific maneuver matching a special weapon feature that the weapon posesses. This can be selected multiple times, either to increase the bonuses with a single maneuver or to add bonuses to another.


Additionally, ranged or thrown weapons may also select:

The maximum number of range increments is increased by one. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.
The penalty for firing beyond the first range increment is reduced by 2. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.



Armour
Add the armour's masterwork bonus to its hardness and to its armour bonus to AC. This bonus is nonmagical (and so is not susceptible to dispels, or areas of antimagic) and does not stack with the enhancement bonus from magical armours and similar.

For each '+' of the armour's masterwork bonus one of the following options can be selected:

Increase the armour's maximum Dexterity bonus by 1. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.
Reduce the armour's armor check penalty by 2. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.
Reduce the armour's arcane spell failure by 10%. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.
Treat the armour as one category lighter than normal for purposes of movement and other limitations. This option can be selected only once and it counts as two selections.
Grant its wearer a DR/Adamantine of 1 if it’s light armor, 2 if it’s medium armor, and 3 if it’s heavy armor. This counts as two selections, but it can be selected multiple times and the effects stack. If this option is used on a suit of adamantine armour then the DR becomes DR/- and stacks with that of adamantine.


Shields
Add the shield's masterwork bonus to its hardness and to its shield bonus to AC. This bonus is nonmagical (and so is not susceptible to dispels, or areas of antimagic) and does not stack with the enhancement bonus from magical armours and similar.

For each '+' of the shield's masterwork bonus one of the following options can be selected:

Reduce the shield's armor check penalty by 2. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.
Reduce the shield's arcane spell failure by 10%. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.
Improve shield bashes made with the shield as though it were a masterwork weapon.
Grant its wearer a DR/Adamantine of 1 that stacks with similar bonuses due to masterwork armour. This counts as two selections, but it can be selected multiple times and the effects stack. If this option is used on an adamantine shield then the DR becomes DR/- and stacks with that of adamantine armour.



Tools
For each '+' of the tool's masterwork bonus it gains a +5 circumstance bonus on skill checks and increases the hardness of the tool by 1. This bonus is nonmagical (and so is not susceptible to dispels, or areas of antimagic).

Alchemical Items
For each '+' of the item's masterwork bonus one of the following options can be selected:

Add +1 to the item's save DC. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.
Multiply a single numerical effect of the item (including but not limited to range increments, damage die, durations, and bonuses) other than save DCs by X+1 where X=the number of times this option has been selected. This can be selected multiple times, each selection after the first counts as two selections, either stacking its effect or applying to a different numerical effect.
Add an additional dose/use of the item. This can be selected multiple times and the effects stack.


Special
You may not take 10 when crafting an item with a masterwork bonus greater than +1.

A fighter or wizard may select Master Artisan whenever they could select a bonus fighter or wizard feat.


This proposal may seem like a radical change but it really is not. This merely lets the creator make meaningful choices and have the end result be something that won't make the game world implode. It doesn't provide every benefit all at once but when properly enchanted and forged from the right materials you can achieve whatever individual effect you originally wanted, and you now have items that border on being lesser artifacts instead of mere magic items. I think that is a beautiful place to be.

Thoughts?

Hey, no worries re: tone, you come across as very polite and helpful.

Yeah, this is a whole whack of numbers thrown together without particular flavour (like so many melee fixes, haha). It was a brute-force partial solution to the linear warriors, quadratic wizards problem. On the one hand I did go overboard in complexity... e.g. the increase in damage die and critical multiplier could be dropped to leave just the bonuses on attacks, damage, and critical threat range. I wouldn't want to tone it down too much though; even using the current bonuses a masterwork +5 greatsword may do an arbitrarily high amount of damage but it still doesn't compare to shapechange, dominate monster, a timestop/cloudkill/delayed blast fireball/forcecage combo, etc.

The one flavourful part of this is the fact that the masterwork bonus can be ruled as non-magical. This allows it to fill in for magic weapons in low-magic campaigns, and gives non-spellcasters a explanation for how they can fight on more equal terms with spellcasters.

Please remember that the Craft DC for a +5 masterwork weapon is meant to be so high that you can't get them until 20th level (depending on DM leniency), and even that assumes buying/enchanting a bunch of skill-boosting equipment. As mentioned above, at those levels the spellcasters will be throwing around wish etc so fighters deserve love too. :D

Your alternate ruleset is very cool, but I kind of wanted to avoid having different options for the masterwork system. This way, a +2 masterwork +2 flaming longsword will always be a +2 masterwork +2 flaming longsword (already a mouthful!), rather than a +2 masterwork (damage die+1, threat+1) +2 flaming longsword, or any of the various other possible options.

Alternatively, I'd be fine having different options only if they were always applied cumulatively and in the same order, so that everyone knows that a +1 masterwork weapon also gets a damage die increase, a +2 masterwork weapon gets both the damage die increase and a threat increase, and so on up to a +5 weapon getting a critical multiplier increase plus all the lower-level benefits. Something like this:


A masterwork weapon gains a masterwork bonuses on attack and damage rolls equal to its masterwork bonus.
Its damage die increases by one step for every even level of the masterwork bonus.
Its critical threat range increases by one for every odd level of the masterwork bonus.
Its critical multiplier increases by one for every five levels of the masterwork bonus.


The ranged enhancements to range increments etc are mild enough that they should always be applied (again, compare to the ranges of Long spells that casters gets from the start).

For armour, I had it in my head that I wanted to make "Witch-King" archetypes possible in this way - arcane spellcasters wearing masterwork full plate without fear of arcane spell failure. This makes me less inclined to tamper with the bonuses, but I suppose the abilities could be rescaled to a progression as above. The hardness (rather than damage reduction) granted from armour was a deliberate choice, to reduce energy damage as well. I should make a clause that it doesn't halve or quarter any energy type or damage from ranged weapons though.

As with ranged weapons, I feel that alchemical items are mild enough that they deserve all the bonuses together.

Thanks for the feedback!


Dragon Magazine 358 had something on this

Huh cool. Don't suppose there's a link anywhere?

[BRKNdevil]

not without breaking rules no. shouldn't be to hard to find, try reddit or some /tg subforum

[rferries]

not without breaking rules no. shouldn't be to hard to find, try reddit or some /tg subforum

Oh duh haha thanks, I was thinking it was open source. Will do!