TW Creation Rules Modifications

[Thinyser]

My apologies if this thread was started elsewhere.
Anyone find something in the creation rules they needed to change?

On first glance, I think the rule that gems carats can be increased/decreased to change the activation costs is far too overpowered.
I limited how much the carats could be increased to no more than 2x. Otherwise, I found the resident Techno-Wizard changing all of his weapons to have an activation cost of 2-4 PPE and only requiring a dozen hours of creation.
Granted large gems are not readily available in Rifts, there is no rule prohibiting attaching dozens of tiny gems, thereby effecting a large gem.
Any thoughts? Anyone else find some rules that needed to be changed??

Other than that, I have told the TW players that other items might be limited according to GM calls, but this is one rule change I certainly made.

I agree that this is overpowed but hey its Rifts I expect nothing less.

Scarcasm aside...I would do something similar or simply make the cost of gems even more outrageous...if he wants a gun that only cost 4 PPE to shoot and does 6d6 MD he is gona fork over some coin for those gems

[RainOfSteel]

Anyone find something in the creation rules they needed to change?

Yes.

On first glance, I think the rule that gems carats can be increased/decreased to change the activation costs is far too overpowered.

Yes it is.

I limited how much the carats could be increased to no more than 2x. Otherwise, I found the resident Techno-Wizard changing all of his weapons to have an activation cost of 2-4 PPE and only requiring a dozen hours of creation.

That is a substantial problem. The rules may say, "GM Approval Required", but if the rules make it so that the GM must arbitrarily tweak every single item, then there is an issue.

Granted large gems are not readily available in Rifts, there is no rule prohibiting attaching dozens of tiny gems, thereby effecting a large gem.
Any thoughts? Anyone else find some rules that needed to be changed??

The rules require gems of a certain carat size. In the forumla, twelve one-carat gems still provide a divisor of 1, not 12.

---------------------------------------------------------------

And here are some links to existing discussions:

RU TW Weapons Question

Something missing from TW Creation Rules

Techno-Wizard in the new Rifts Ultimate book

Using Techno-Wizardry in UR

What TW Items do you plan or making?

[Thinyser]

Granted large gems are not readily available in Rifts, there is no rule prohibiting attaching dozens of tiny gems, thereby effecting a large gem.
Any thoughts? Anyone else find some rules that needed to be changed??

The rules require gems of a certain carat size. In the forumla, twelve one-carat gems still provide a divisor of 1, not 12.

Thats not what i got out of it....i believe it specifies total gem weight not gem weight of a single stone...I could be wrong...I'll have to reread that section.

[Thinyser]

Yep I was right....here is what it says:

P131 first column #4 required gems
....the primary spell will require up to the device level...in half carats, of that particular type of gem, either as one large gem or several small gems used together for the single primary spell

Ok so this establishes that the primary spell's required "gem" can be several smaller gems linked together in some fashion. This for the purpose of the creation is considered the "primary spell's required gem" even if it is several linked together.

P131 first column #5 base PPE construction cost
....add together all the PPE costs of the spells used in the spell chain, and multiply this total by the device level x10, and finaly devide that total by the number of carats in the primary spell's required gem.

P131 first column #6 activation cost
Activation cost = PPE construction cost / 20.

So since the Primary spell's required gem CAN be several smaller gems linked together and the rest of the process hinges on this, then the PPE activation cost IS lowered by the use of more gem weight for the "Primary spell's required gem" even if the weight is contributed by several smaller gems linked together.

[RainOfSteel]

Yep I was right....here is what it says:

P131 first column #4 required gems
....the primary spell will require up to the device level...in half carats, of that particular type of gem, either as one large gem or several small gems used together for the single primary spell

That's totally silly. So much for worrying about the rarity of gems.

Well, that means you can automatically assemble as many 1 carat common stones as you wish. Rarity cannot be invoked as a factor in locating sufficient weight in stones to reduce the activation cost to 1 PPE, because 1 carat stones are hugely more common that higher carat gems.

That is just insane.

-----------------------------------------
My House Rule: The Primary Gem must be a single gem.

My House Rule: To be constructed. A proper pricing chart that takes into account the increasing credit cost of larger carat sizes.

[Thinyser]

Yep I was right....here is what it says:

P131 first column #4 required gems
....the primary spell will require up to the device level...in half carats, of that particular type of gem, either as one large gem or several small gems used together for the single primary spell

That's totally silly. So much for worrying about the rarity of gems.

Well, that means you can automatically assemble as many 1 carat common stones as you wish. Rarity cannot be invoked as a factor in locating sufficient weight in stones to reduce the activation cost to 1 PPE, because 1 carat stones are hugely more common that higher carat gems.

That is just insane.

-----------------------------------------
My House Rule: The Primary Gem must be a single gem.

My House Rule: To be constructed. A proper pricing chart that takes into account the increasing credit cost of larger carat sizes.

Agreed...and remember I didn't MAKE the rules I am only the messenger

[Shark_Force]

it says the number carats of gems of the required type. it doesn't say only the number of gems required.

it's intended to keep you from doing cheesy stuff like including a secondary spell that requires a 20 credit gem so that you can put 1000 carats into the device when you should be putting diamonds or sapphires or rubies in for 1,000 times that amount.

any particular reason you pulled this up?

[cchopps]

My apologies if this thread was started elsewhere.
Anyone find something in the creation rules they needed to change?

On first glance, I think the rule that gems carats can be increased/decreased to change the activation costs is far too overpowered.
I limited how much the carats could be increased to no more than 2x. Otherwise, I found the resident Techno-Wizard changing all of his weapons to have an activation cost of 2-4 PPE and only requiring a dozen hours of creation.
Granted large gems are not readily available in Rifts, there is no rule prohibiting attaching dozens of tiny gems, thereby effecting a large gem.
Any thoughts? Anyone else find some rules that needed to be changed??

Other than that, I have told the TW players that other items might be limited according to GM calls, but this is one rule change I certainly made.

I really don't like which spells they connect to which gems. It doesn't even really follow much of a pattern. Not even talking about cost, but just some sort of metaphysical grouping of similar spells, but it is only so-so... I also think that spells that don't easily lend themselves to TW weapons or mods should require more expensive gems.

C. Chopps

[cchopps]

Even 1 carat gems should be rare, just because you have the credits for 1000 1 carat gems doesn't mean you can find them. Rifts is post apocalypse setting you can't just order them online. Your GM could do what mine did, look up the gem on wikipidia find out where its found and modify the price base on that. So now to pay off a debt to a tecno-mage I need gems that are X5 normal cost at my location. I can either go half way across North America to find them at book cost or deal with Atlantis witch my pc could do if he was willing.

I think that makes a lot of sense if you are playing Rifts RMB or not in one of the Federation of Magic kingdoms, Lazlo, Merctown, Arzno, or the Colorado Baronies. All these places with self-described "TW Factories." For Post-Apocalypse, North America just seems so crowded sometimes.

C. Chopps

[Mack]

My apologies if this thread was started elsewhere.
Anyone find something in the creation rules they needed to change?

On first glance, I think the rule that gems carats can be increased/decreased to change the activation costs is far too overpowered.
I limited how much the carats could be increased to no more than 2x. Otherwise, I found the resident Techno-Wizard changing all of his weapons to have an activation cost of 2-4 PPE and only requiring a dozen hours of creation.
Granted large gems are not readily available in Rifts, there is no rule prohibiting attaching dozens of tiny gems, thereby effecting a large gem.
Any thoughts? Anyone else find some rules that needed to be changed??

Other than that, I have told the TW players that other items might be limited according to GM calls, but this is one rule change I certainly made.

IMHO, the largest problem is which gems are used for which spells. Roughly speaking, the more PPE the spell needs the more rare (i.e. expensive) the needed gem should be. For example, the Resurrection spell (650 PPE) uses the red-orange Agate with a value of only 60 credits. I built a TW version of this spell with 75 carats, needing only 4.33 PPE to activate, and a Construction Cost of only 5,300 credits.

Probably the easiest way to fix this is to use the spell's PPE as a multiplier in the formula (or maybe use the spell level as a multiplier). That would make more difficult spells... more difficult to build.

[Shark_Force]

My apologies if this thread was started elsewhere.
Anyone find something in the creation rules they needed to change?

On first glance, I think the rule that gems carats can be increased/decreased to change the activation costs is far too overpowered.
I limited how much the carats could be increased to no more than 2x. Otherwise, I found the resident Techno-Wizard changing all of his weapons to have an activation cost of 2-4 PPE and only requiring a dozen hours of creation.
Granted large gems are not readily available in Rifts, there is no rule prohibiting attaching dozens of tiny gems, thereby effecting a large gem.
Any thoughts? Anyone else find some rules that needed to be changed??

Other than that, I have told the TW players that other items might be limited according to GM calls, but this is one rule change I certainly made.

IMHO, the largest problem is which gems are used for which spells. Roughly speaking, the more PPE the spell needs the more rare (i.e. expensive) the needed gem should be. For example, the Resurrection spell (650 PPE) uses the red-orange Agate with a value of only 60 credits. I built a TW version of this spell with 75 carats, needing only 4.33 PPE to activate, and a Construction Cost of only 5,300 credits.

Probably the easiest way to fix this is to use the spell's PPE as a multiplier in the formula (or maybe use the spell level as a multiplier). That would make more difficult spells... more difficult to build.

the spell's PPE *is* a modifier in the formula. the spell's level is not, however. it might help, but it just means you're going to need a few more 60 credit gemstones and you're back to the same place, not to mention all the *reasonable* costs will go up along with all the unreasonably low ones. net result: the only items people will be making are the ones that cost way too little, and nobody will even bother making the ones with appropriate costs.

[Mack]

And there is one other thing I'd like to see addressed: The definition of Construction Cost. Per the book, it's "the average price for purchasing such a magical item on the Black Market!" That's not exactly what "construction costs" means.

[Shark_Force]

And there is one other thing I'd like to see addressed: The definition of Construction Cost. Per the book, it's "the average price for purchasing such a magical item on the Black Market!" That's not exactly what "construction costs" means.

funny. i was just reading those rules the other day, and remembered you complaining about this previously when i came across, in my copy of RUE (first line after the formula is presented on page 131, under the subheading 8. Construction cost of the device):

"The Construction Cost of a TW device, plus the cost of labor, is the average market price for purchasing such a magical item on the Black Market!"

not sure where you're reading from, but they appear to have the correct idea in at least one place

[Mack]

And there is one other thing I'd like to see addressed: The definition of Construction Cost. Per the book, it's "the average price for purchasing such a magical item on the Black Market!" That's not exactly what "construction costs" means.

funny. i was just reading those rules the other day, and remembered you complaining about this previously when i came across, in my copy of RUE (first line after the formula is presented on page 131, under the subheading 8. Construction cost of the device):

"The Construction Cost of a TW device, plus the cost of labor, is the average market price for purchasing such a magical item on the Black Market!"

not sure where you're reading from, but they appear to have the correct idea in at least one place

I'm reading from p131, right after the Construction Cost formula that's in italics. Actually, it refers to the "Black Barket" in my copy.

(Note, I'm using the First Printing, Aug 2005.)

Edit - I just checked the published eratta, and it reflects your post.

[Shark_Force]

And there is one other thing I'd like to see addressed: The definition of Construction Cost. Per the book, it's "the average price for purchasing such a magical item on the Black Market!" That's not exactly what "construction costs" means.

funny. i was just reading those rules the other day, and remembered you complaining about this previously when i came across, in my copy of RUE (first line after the formula is presented on page 131, under the subheading 8. Construction cost of the device):

"The Construction Cost of a TW device, plus the cost of labor, is the average market price for purchasing such a magical item on the Black Market!"

not sure where you're reading from, but they appear to have the correct idea in at least one place

I'm reading from p131, right after the Construction Cost formula that's in italics. Actually, it refers to the "Black Barket" in my copy.

(Note, I'm using the First Printing, Aug 2005.)

Edit - I just checked the published eratta, and it reflects your post.

huzzah! i propose a party with potentially profitable TW fireworks!

[Ziggurat the Eternal]

And there is one other thing I'd like to see addressed: The definition of Construction Cost. Per the book, it's "the average price for purchasing such a magical item on the Black Market!" That's not exactly what "construction costs" means.

funny. i was just reading those rules the other day, and remembered you complaining about this previously when i came across, in my copy of RUE (first line after the formula is presented on page 131, under the subheading 8. Construction cost of the device):

"The Construction Cost of a TW device, plus the cost of labor, is the average market price for purchasing such a magical item on the Black Market!"

not sure where you're reading from, but they appear to have the correct idea in at least one place

I'm reading from p131, right after the Construction Cost formula that's in italics. Actually, it refers to the "Black Barket" in my copy.

(Note, I'm using the First Printing, Aug 2005.)

Edit - I just checked the published eratta, and it reflects your post.

huzzah! i propose a party with potentially profitable TW fireworks!

That is a logical fallacy. There is no profitable TW, however, they are all remarkably bad ass.

[Thinyser]

My apologies if this thread was started elsewhere.
Anyone find something in the creation rules they needed to change?

On first glance, I think the rule that gems carats can be increased/decreased to change the activation costs is far too overpowered.
I limited how much the carats could be increased to no more than 2x. Otherwise, I found the resident Techno-Wizard changing all of his weapons to have an activation cost of 2-4 PPE and only requiring a dozen hours of creation.
Granted large gems are not readily available in Rifts, there is no rule prohibiting attaching dozens of tiny gems, thereby effecting a large gem.
Any thoughts? Anyone else find some rules that needed to be changed??

Other than that, I have told the TW players that other items might be limited according to GM calls, but this is one rule change I certainly made.

I really don't see a problem with the rules, getting your hands on the propper gemstones should be some good adventures in and of themselves.

Or if your in a place like Phase World's Center or some orther really large and well stocked trading center you could buy them, but then If I have gems available for sale they are limited in quantity and 2 to 4 times the cost.

[G]

Catlord - I see tho hast cast "raise dead thread".

A repost from me in 2005: viewtopic.php?t=46390&highlight=

I just read through the new TW rules and thought I would list my thoughts (a bit late, but I don't see any good solutions to the problems). Those who have seen my site know that I have quite a few TW creations and insight into them.

Problems:
-The new rules work off gem values which are arbitrary. The magic system was setup with PPE and to a lesser degree level being the 'balancing' factors. (I use the term balance in rifts loosely)
-the new rules are overly complicated
-the markup for creating TW items could have been stated more clearly (its listed as 35 - 60% in RUE, 10-14,000 profit on a 40,000 sale, though you have to do some quick math)

Symptoms:
People will reduce all construction time/costs by:
-Creating every item at level 1
-use large carat values
-use many small carat gems to produce one large one (this could almost have been a typo)

Results:
-The TW lightsword costing 1775 credits above: 1d4x10md for 1PPE to activate (I put together a quickie spreadsheet that doesn't round) where the flaming sword used to cost 70,000 credits do 4d6md AND you needed to know the firebolt spell and have 7ppe to use. There better not have been that much power creep since the last main book...15 years ago. As the flaming sword now costs 90k and 14 PPE to activate without the spell (perfectly acceptable), I can see its the new rules that can be too easily abused.

Fixes
I'm surprised people haven't figured out easy fixes yet. Here are my initial thoughts..I thought I would post them, see what feedback and thoughts everyone else has while I think.
-The minimum level a device can be created at is 1/2 the highest spell level used in the device. No more level 1 lightswords modified to do more damage with the secondary spell annihilate. This means at lower levels you will be converting powers sources to magic (eclips & vehicles), creating wing boards (every TW needs a flying surfboard...its a style thing) and other things a beginner should be doing. I will make an exception for all the starting spells, since you start with them you should be able to put them into TW devices immediately (however you should not have enough money to do so, I think 10 spells was fine, giving people more spells tends to make them think about how to use them in a RP perspective less, so I don't think 25 is really a good idea. On an unrelated note I think PB was brilliantly devious in giving TWs magic net as a starting spell, now most won't bother to learn the overpowered carpet spell & it will be more uncommon in TW devices).
-The TW MUST be the device level in order to create the device. The TW must now be level 8 before creating the GB annihilation cannon.
-Finally by making the primary gem a single gem only (which I believe was probably the intent at some point), GMs have a very easy way of limiting the 40 carat gem. You can't find anything over 5ish without a quest that involves mostly RP...munchkins everywhere will commence suffering now)

Although I agree that as the carat value increases the price should increase exponentially, I'm not sure its worth making a rule for that. I follow the KISS rule. Diamonds, for those who care: 5carats of .5c costs 15,000USD & a 5c diamond costs 115,000USD. Soo ladies, if someone gets you a 5c rock they are serious.


The question we have to ask ourselves is, are are we happy or do we want something simpler? If you want simple guidelines:
-device level: 1/2 of the highest level spell created, you need to be this level to create the item.
-PPE cost to create: 10x spells ppe cost
-Activation cost: as the normal spell
-Time to build: ppe of spells / 4 (so a lightblade takes 5 hours while something with annihilate takes 150 or 15 10 hour days). leaves more time to RP.
-Cost to create: ppe of spells x 2000. So a lightblade costs 20,000 while annihilate costs 1,200,000

But the stats aren't where the fun lies, its all the RP things like gathering together the parts, having lots fun trying models when you fail your roll, (If I were to flush this out more, I'd like a chart to give GMs ideas - just because you fail your roll doesn't mean the result shouldn't be fun - so your healing device takes all your PPE and transfers it to the person you are trying to heal... , getting the spells to make the items, etc. All the ideas in all the books are still perfectly workable using a simplified method which leaves us all more time to create items - which is afterall what you & your GM want to be doing when you play a TW, not trying to figure out how to abuse the rules and how your GM will deal with it. So when you ask your GM to create an annihilation cannon for the GB the GM is free to say "and you think your going to find a 1M diamond for that? Which PC are you selling to the chop shop? Mowahahaha!" and if you do, you at least know that not everyone and their dog is going to have that 1M diamond..because your creation is not only rare, but unique.

[killhound]

i have created a tw creation sheet that i thnk works well. and i have found that the price of gems is a grate deturant to making overly powerful devices. i have also found that powerful devices usualy take weeks to build and that means in game time a device that takes 160 hours if you devote 8 hours a day well do the math. most traveling tw's can only devote 2 to 4 hours a dayon a device. im a heavy collision technition and that gives me a unique prospective on how this prosess works building cars that have been turned inside out is not an easy job.i make my living on playing beat the clock.and over the 17 + years ive been doing body work i have learned how to cram 200 hours in a week and a 1/2 - weekends so less than 10 days. the only qwestion i would is are those actual hours or billable hours?