“Build a man a fire and he will be warm until the end of the day. Set a man on fire and he will be warm for the rest of his life”.

Crafters make things out of raw resources. There are three types of crafter based upon the kinds of items they are able to craft. There are smiths, artisans and jewel-crafters.

In each case you can either an initial level of crafting expertise as a starting character by spending 6 points or take a level of expertise as a veteran skill pick. Each type of crafting has three levels journeyman, master and grandmaster. The level of crafting expertise you hold will define the quality of items you are able to make and the number of work units you have available in order to craft items and conduct research.

A journeyman crafter has access to 6WU per day, a master crafter has 10WU per day and a grandmaster crafter has access to 12WU.

A crafter unlike an alchemist cannot work without some kind of workshop; a set of resources that facilitate his activities and common to all crafters. He also needs a set of tools specific to his craft depending on the kind of items he is capable of making. A superior workshop adds an extra 1WU to the crafters own whilst a master-crafted workshop adds 2WU.

A journeyman crafter can make standard and superior items by default, a master crafter adds master-crafted items to this list. A grandmaster can do all of these and additionally silver and ornate items.

The crafter can either use their pool of crafting WU to make things they know how to make or in order to conduct research into how to make new things. In order to make an item the crafter must acquire a set of materials and spend the requisite number of WU. They will then receive a item card representing the item which must be attached to an appropriate OC item (phys-rep).

Resources come in different quality/grade. Available resources include wood, metal, cloth,stone, sand and leather which are all available in (O)rdinary and (H)igh grades. Also available are gemstones which can be cut by jewel-crafters to achieve specific effects and jewellery grade metals to support jewel-crafters specific needs.

Both research and item creation is coordinated by a dedicated crafting referee (Frederick) who can also supply resources for an agreed price if you are struggling to acquire your own. Each faction has access to resources based on the nature of their nation and its geography.

Smiths

A smith can craft armour and weapons. In the case of weapons this includes small items such as daggers through swords, axes, maces and so forth to include larger items such as pole-arms and staves.

Armor is broken down into items that cover specific body areas. So helmets, breastplates, gauntlets, greaves and bracers etc are all individually crafted items .

In the case of superior and master-crafted items the only real benefit to these items is their ability to hold magical power instilled into it through use of ritual or other forms of magical item creation. A superior item can hold such power for upto 1 year whilst master-crafted items can do so for an extended period.

In order work metal of any kind charcoal is required which is essentially burnt wood. An early phase research possibility for smiths can be to make charcoal either in small qualities or through additional research more efficiently.

It is also possible to research how to give weapons specific mundane abilities appropriate to their form. Axes can be crafted that can shatter shields, daggers that can go “through” armor and so forth. These are difficult skills to research but have huge potential for the dedicated crafter. It also possible to research how to work with esoteric materials such as cold-iron and star metal.

There is an metaphysical relationship between metals and specific spheres of magic. It is well known that there is a relationship between spiritual magic and silver with such weapons being required to hurt certain undead for example. Gold is known to have a similar relationship with the sun and hence with magic (magery). It is to be expected that copper would have a symbolic relationship with the corporeal sphere.

The final thing I would like to mention in this section is sockets. It is possible to craft weapons and armors to include sockets into which other items such as cut gems can be placed.

Artisans

The role of the artisan is to make a variety of utilitarian items from metal, leather, cloth, stone and so forth i.e. not weapons/armor. The artisan skill incorporates tailors, engineers, glass makers and a variety of other sub-disciplines.

One specific thing to note about artisans is that the skill can be combined with the surgery skill in order to undertake things like tattooing and body modifications.

Artisans can also work with those with conjunctional magics in order to fashion items such as bandages and clothing that have specific properties required for them to practice their art.

It is also the crafting discipline that can make scroll paper and create crafted stones appropriate for sigil inscription which are required by those interested in those skill sets. It is furthermore the crafting discipline capable of learning how to make things like workshops, tools and alchemical laboratories.

Jewelcrafters

The final crafting discipline to mention is jewel-crafting. This is an expensive skill to exploit as it requires the usage of jewellery grade metals and the use of gemstones. It is however the only skill set that is capable of making things like rings, necklaces, brooches and so forth.

The skill is required in order to cut gemstones. The process of cutting gemstones allows for them to do specific things like store magical energies as well as other effects. The nature of gemstones is dependent on at least two characteristics namely the colour of the gem and the number of cuts applied.

The colour is related to spheres of magic. A blue gem has a correspondence with spiritual energies, a red gem with magery and green corresponds to corporeal. This author supposes these colours could be mixed to align with conjunctional effects. A gem I believe can be cut upto three times with each cut a research project in its own right with the final cut giving the greatest effects.

In Conclusion

It is worth concluding this section with a shout out to the crafting guilds. Each of the above types of crafter have a player led organisation where like minded characters can come together and share knowledge and make connections. This is really an area where creativity and collaboration add dividends and it is well worth reaching out to others for support and to discuss ideas. It is also usually much cheaper in terms of WU to learn a skill from another than research it from scratch.