Alchemy difficulty numbers

[MetalBoar]

So, one of the characters in my game wants to start making potions. Looking at the Alchemy skill the section on creating potions and salves states:

The character makes an Alchemy test against the appropriate Difficulty Number.

But I can't find any listing for the difficulty numbers. I know in ED3 that there was an enchanting difficulty number on the healing aids chart in Goods & Services, but it isn't listed in the equivalent chart for ED4. Anyone know if it's somewhere else, or am I missing something, or was this just left out by mistake?

Thanks!

[The Undying]

Somewhere in the old forums, I believe Mataxes said that EDN (enchanting difficulty number) for stuff would be included in the Companion. Don't know if that's still the plan. You could use the stuff from ED3 to start, of course.

Fair warning: while it's interesting, Alchemy is pretty rough. As a skill: you can't spend karma on it, it takes a long time to rank up, and there isn't supposed to be any Thread Item support for it. Some of the better stuff takes A LOT of time (and silver) training. Your player might be a bit underwhelmed. But that's just my impression of it. I'm not saying the system is bad at all, I'm okay with the numbers, but it definitely places the craft more in NPC land or campaigns that plan on staying alive quite a while.

[RazanMG]

As many of my players takes Alchemy (at least 1 player for a campaign), because they like it so much, I made some "rules" so they got as much fun from it as they can, but not taking too long Real time.

Also there can be Thread Items for alchemy, I will include one at the end, with explanations.

Getting ingredients:
Buying - Unless your alchemist is well known/liked in Town/Village where he wants to buy ingredients, most herbalists will have steady clients for magical herbs, so he will have to convince the herbalist. Cost of buying ingredients for 1 test 10-20% of desired Potion (Potion of Healing 300 silver, so 30-60 silver).

Gathering - sometimes I ask my alchemist to test Alchemy in the middle of journey, if he pass he will spot some plant that he may use (I decide how much its worth). If he wants to go and just gather, I use two options:
1. Short gathering (3-4 hours), he makes Alchemy test and result is multiply by 5.
2. All day gathering (if I don't have any specified location), two tests of alchemy - first is with Difficulty of (5), successes are multiplied by 5 (to show how good are gathered plants), result of second is multiplied by the outcome of first.

So first test: result 13 ( 2 successes gives 10), second test is 7, 10x7=70 (I count it as "silver" as in Buying but for all Potion recipes he knows) . Now he can make many different Potions: Booster (5-10 "silver"), Healing (30-60). He could even try making Last Chance (60-120) - but his Alchemy is not high enough and his master didn't teach him yet.

Alchemy Thread Item:
There is no Alchemy Talent and Thread Items always give Talent Ranks, so....
From GMGuide:
Effects Available for All Thread Ranks:
• Add a +1 bonus to a test type (unarmed damage, ranged attacks, Charisma
tests, Climbing tests, Initiative tests, etc.).

Veil of Concocting
Wooden mask with eye protecting crystals in eye holes.
1 Rank
Effect: +1 to Potion and Salves making tests

2 Rank
Effect: +1 to Analysis tests

3 Rank
Effect: +1 to Gathering alchemical ingredients tests

4 Rank
Effect: +1 to creating Poisons tests

It cannot be too powerful, as alchemy is not a Talent, but will give your alchemist some edge (and fun I hope).
If he is committed to be best Alchemist in Barsaive he can have more that one such item, but Silver and Legend Point costs, also number of active threads, will be a good balance mechanism.

[MetalBoar]

Thanks for the responses!

I'm happy to use the 3rd edition rules until the companion comes out, I was just concerned that I was missing something that had already been published somewhere. This should be a long running campaign (assuming the players take the bait I have a long, world altering story arc in the works) and I expect the characters to hit warden-ish status before it's over so there's plenty of time for the character to learn alchemy to a high skill level. One of the players was asking about it so now I can give him accurate info on where the rules stand.

[The Undying]

Happy to help.

One last piece of advice: don't forget training and cool down time. Getting to anything above, say, Rank 4 (maybe 5) in a skill really doesn't jive much with an adventuring lifestyle. At rank five, IIRC, you're talking over a month dedicated training time and then two months of meaningful practice (definitely not dedicated, but the player should be spending regularly downtime in the evenings dabbling). That alone will only get most people to Step ~12, which is still pretty low for most things.

I'm not trying to be discouraging, just setting expectations. If your metaplot is super "go go go," this isn't going to work. If it isn't, some players need a little reinforcement that "it is okay to take time out from adventuring and do more mundane stuff like training." A short lived race, tho, likely does NOT have time for this kind of "ok so we spend three months in Throal getting smart" stuff.