Alchemy Preview

[The Undying]

Posted this weekend. Link: http://fasagames.com/2017/09/15/alchemy ... g-preview/

It's nice to have some more meat on the alchemy - I could [definitely] be wrong, but I don't think this skill was ever really developed other than "half cost + time + DN for target item," with a few specific ingredients for certain things.

One fundamental issue that irks me with a lot of crafting in Earthdawn is the unit time: use of Skill A requires X time. Trivially easy things? X. Insanely complex things? X. For Alchemy, it takes 1 day to make a Booster Potion, and it takes 1 day to make a Last Chance Salve. Of all the crafting skills, Alchemy seems like the best example of something where Easy Thing should not take as much active attention as Hard Thing - at least in my vision, most of the time for brewing a Booster Potion is just letting things simmer, whereas a Last Chance Salve likely requires slow incorporation and the like.

Why does this matter (a.k.a., are you making a point or just being a burr in the developer's side)? To me, mechanical elements exist because there's the expectation that players will use it. Otherwise, it's needlessly mechanical because the GM can just hand wave it as it occurs behind the curtain. For the players to use it, it needs to be sufficiently accessible. Time is a resource, one that is more precious to some tables (always rushing from one emergency to the next) versus others (who regularly have months of downtime between adventures). When time is a scarce resource, things that require dedicated time gets farmed out to NPCs whenever possible - because there just isn't time. Even if a player is interested in doing Skill A, they'll just never have a chance.

I guess maybe what I'm saying is that some published rules for stacking dedicated time would be nice. Think of a wizened old Wizard sitting around in his/her keep. To me, unless that Wizard is doing SERIOUS SCIENCE level Alchemy, I see him/her going through the motions for basic needed stuff, either reading (Researching) around the active Alchemy steps or barely paying attention to the Alchemy steps while reading (because the motions are so rote). Maybe something as simple as cumulative -2 for each stacked dedicated time task. Wanna Research and Alchemy? -2 to both tests. Wanna Research AND Alchemize AND work on your Sword? -4 to all test. Maybe there's a limit to stack (2 seems realistic, 3 doesn't for some reason, and more than 3 seems right-out bizarre). Maybe there are some things that are stackable where others aren't (probably not worth annotating individual Talents/Skills, just a big "Stacking an individual skill or group of skills is subject to GM discretion").

Alternatively, breaking the units for dedicated time makes sense. However, I'd rather keep the simplicity of unit time while allowing stacking. It just feels like SOME change would be useful.

For me, this stems from the fact that I got Alchemy --DAY 1-- at character creation years and years ago. Did I ever make anything with it? Nope - losing a day to save 25 sp for a Booster Potion --AND-- risk failing is 100% unacceptable. Maybe it'd be useful if we were adventuring far from civilization and ran out of Booster Potions, but otherwise, it's just been a completely dead skill (into which I sank 3 points ). If we ever actually pick Earthdawn up again (still biding time for the Companion and initial impressions on the content), I plan on going Weaponsmith ... I guess because I'm a gluten for punishment because it'll never make sense to Craft anything.

[Mataxes]

I don't know if you overlooked this in the preview, but there are a couple of things to factor into the crafting.

1) You can choose to make more than one dose at no additional cost of time or materials, it's just an added +3 to the DN.
2) Extra successes convert to additional doses at no additional cost of time or materials.

Yes, the base time to craft any potion is 1 day, but when you compare the difficulties of the booster potion vs the last chance salve, you can make 3 booster potions (DN 7 + 3 + 3 = 13) at the same difficulty as a single last chance. Even if you don't intentionally go for the extra doses of the booster, you're automatically going to get an extra dose of booster compared to last chance for the same test result (as the minimum result of 13 on the last chance is automatically +1 success against the DN 7 for the booster).

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From a certain standpoint, I understand where you're coming from with regard to how much time stuff takes. It may not be very adventurous or exciting to sit around town for days to weeks while these kinds of things are done.

But for a 'realistic' setting (even one with magic), these things should take time. The Earthdawn setting is not one with assembly lines and mass production; everything is artisinal. I get that some groups don't allow for much downtime, but that's not the default assumption we're building into the setting, and the options at that point are either (a) shift your playstyle to allow for more downtime, or (b) handwave the time requirements for 'downtime' stuff you want to do.

I'm not really sure what to say beyond that. I don't think the latter is game breaking from a mechanical standpoint, and going more run-and-gun, loosey-goosey with regard to time management is a perfectly valid approach. It's just not the one I've opted to go with as the default assumption to allow for a more consistent overall setting where, while there are some wondrous and magical things, it's still (supposedly) a lower-tech environment.

[The Undying]

Thanks for the reply.

The assumption of downtime is a good point. It works for most races, and I could see how it'd work for more campaigns (a few time-sensitive scenarios, followed by a good chunk of off time). And, truth be told, if you're in a campaign where you're rushing from one thing to the next, any non-critical stuff really does make sense to push to NPCs.

The dislike for unit time is just a personal thing, but that's very likely just because of how our games have unfolded. And while I agree that some things do (and should) just take time, I just also like the idea of being able to combine actions where it makes sense (usually when someone's Step is sufficiently high to suggest the action is generally trivial). Ultimately, though, I think you're right: if you're going to make ONE Booster Potion, you'd probably love to have more than just the one, so getting 2-3 in one day rather than in three days is ESSENTIALLY still adjusting unit time by stacking the same action, just not stacking through action diversity (which is where my blinders were focused).

[Spader]

How much time does it takes to gather ingredients in the wild?

[Calamrin]

I imagine the same as the wilderness survival skill for searching for food and water but substituting alchemy skill to search.

So 2 hours a time, with a maximum of 4 attempts a day.

Can imagine a GM ruling certain items are rarer than basic food and water, and can only forage an area once in a certain time frame..... GM discretion required.

[The Undying]

Calamrin's suggest makes sense. I would potentially fork it, though:

1) You can search for ANY alchemical reagents in the general area. Same time, low difficulty. However, you should get more (maybe quantity of two or three per success), with the actual item at GM discretion. The items may be more general purpose items rather than key ingredients for something, or the Adept may not even know the ingredient's usefulness other than that the item is surely useful for alchemy.

2) You can search for A SPECIFIC alchemical reagent in the area. Same time, difficulty based on reagent. Probably fewer quantity per success. As a note, though, I'd have them make their test and then, if they get at least one success but the item isn't in that region, I'd tell them their character knows it wouldn't be in that region and didn't actually look (so they don't lose the time and can look for something else).

[Mataxes]

Note that Alchemical reagents/ingredients are not specified, they're intentionally vague. They are a way to simplify the mechanics of creating items, and are simply given a value in the recipe. Gathering those materials is likewise vague -- there's nothing that says you need to gather X amount of sampleroot.* Gathering the appropriate value of materials is enough, and this can typically be done anywhere.

If you want to flesh out more detail on the alchemical ingredients of recipes in your game, you are free to do so, but we aren't planning on offering more detailed support in the rules.

(* Rare/expensive ingredients are the exception. While we don't usually specify them in the recipes provided in the book, they are intended to be a particular item that is harder to locate, and left to GM discretion as suits the needs of their campaign.)

[The Undying]

I think it's a neat idea, not tying hands on ingredients. I have to admit, the idea that you just need to gather C silver in ingredients for many/most things felt weird, but it makes sense when you start thinking about the variety of plants available across Barsaive. Plenty of ways to brew that Booster. The same freedom also makes sense about the rare stuff, and the guidance "these shouldn't just be roll to gather stuff" makes sense, too.

Thanks!

[Calamrin]

I have to say i do really really like the new Alchemy rules... its a skill, not a talent...say you combined it with Physician skill....its virtually a new class in itself.

A lot of skills are talents for one class or another....but when a skills a skill alone and it has decent rules/thinking behind it it adds whole new dimentions to how a player can develop a character.

[Dyrmagnos]

There i see only 2 bad aspects in new alchemy system.
1) How long last (officially) gathering resources for crafting?

1.1 If 2 hours - we got circle 1 guy (not even adept) with alchemy lvl 1 in normal forest (dif 6).
- perception 7 + 1 skill = 8 so he got average 1.4 success per 2 hours so 1.4 x 6 x 4(per day) = 33,6 silver per day
- 33.6 x 6 days per week (i think people in Barsaive should work 6 days per week - like in medieval Europe) = 201,6 silver per week so
more than circle 4 weaponsmith with access to forge (quite expensive)
1.2 If 8 hours - same but 50 silver per week so like circle 1 weaponsmith but more dangerous (walking in barsaive post scourge forest is not safety)

2) (except gathering) as alchemy guy with lvl 5 skill (so hard for a player but so easy for BNs) we got step 12 alchemy so with every attempt we got average 2 booster potions so 2 x 50s - 25 (resources) = 75s per day. So per week we got 6 x 75s = 450s its like circle 9 weaponsmith...