FrivYeti/RevisedArtifactCreationRules

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Revised Artifact Creation

When Book of Three Circles came out, I took one look at the artifact creation system and winced. Too easy, I thought. Too bizarrely simplistic. And it's not based on Crafts - what's with that? I resolved to make myself another system. And then, of course, one thing led to another, and I never quite got around to it. Then, I heard that Savant and Sorcerer was coming out, and I grabbed it, looking up the revised artifact creation rules with glee.
Then I got kinda confused. The rules, as laid out, more or less took artifact creation completely out of the realm of anything players could reasonably do. More than that, it threw my general idea of how common artifacts were out the window.
As portrayed in S&S, a master dragon-blooded craftsman (Int 5, Crafts 5 (Jewelry +3), and the charm that converts specialties into auto-successes), with a well-equipped forge, is at Diff 5 to create a Collar of Dawn's Cleansing Light. Assuming that he rolls average successes (8) on each roll, it will take him four seasons to craft this necklace, as long as he doesn't do anything else. A Mask (Artifact 2) is at Diff 6 and needs 30 successes, meaning that he will require a whopping 15 seasons (three years) to make, assuming he doesn't make anything else in that time.
This struck me as slightly odd. Even for a dragon-blood, a simple daiklave requiring three years of your life to create, three years during which you do absolutely nothing else, is pretty harsh. How would that possibly be a Resources 4 item? How would it even get made? Similarly, many of the factors for creation struck me as bizarre, and I finally sat down and revised the system. Here it is:

Step 1: Determine Artifact Level

This is a fairly easy step. The first step is to add the Power and Usefulness of the item. I do not use Game Impact, because I kind of like things to be useful, and I loathe Script Immunity, because I feel that if something is on your sheet, and it gets removed, it should be replaced. If it isn't, it has no Script Immunity. Having added these scores together, add any Benefits (see below) to the total, and then substract any Drawbacks (again, see below). When that is done, halve the result (rounding uneven numbers up). This is the artifact's rating.

Benefits:
Benefits are small things that can make an artifact easier or harder to use. The following benefits are things I've already thought up:
Multiple Effects: The character's artifact does multiple things. Each secondary effect must be of a power level at least 1 lower than the current power level, and raises the total Power by 1 (if it's Power is 2 or more points below the artifact's primary power) or 2 (if it is one point below).
Hearthstone Attunement: The artifact has a Hearthstone setting that can partially attune the artifact. The Hearthstone must be set in the artifact, but the artifact's attunement cost is reduced by 2x the Hearthstone rating. Generally, there is a required power of the Hearthstone to be placed in this artifact, which is chosen at creation. Regardless, this is a 1-pt benefit.
Reduced Attunement or Activation Cost: The artifact costs less to attune or activate. For every 2 pts placed in here, reduce the effective power of the Artifact by 1 when determining attunement or activation. (For 1 pt, reduce the total cost by 1). The cost can be reduced to nothing, in which case it can be used by mortals.
Subtle: The artifact appears completely mundane until used; no one can tell that it is a magical construct without powerful Charms or magic. This increases the total by 2 pts.
Alternate Attunement or Activation: 5 motes of the artifact's attunement cost can instead be activated by spending 1 Willpower or 1 Health Level (decide at creation). If there is no attunement cost left, the artifact can be used by mortals. In the case of committment, the Willpower or Health Level must be committed.

Drawbacks:
Drawbacks make an artifact harder to use.
Increased Attunement or Activation Cost: The object is harder to activate or use. This functions identically to the Essence Drawback in Savant and Sorcerer; each point reduces the total by one.
Requirements: The artifact is not always active. If the artifact requires the character to have a certain rating or above (or below) in a particular Attribute, Ability, or Virtue (3, 4, or 5 and above / 1, 2, or 3 and below), it is a 1-pt requirement. Alternately, a 1-pt requirement can be something easy to fulfill, such as leaving the artifact in sunlight for at least one hour a day. A 2-pt requirement is more stringent, and could require the character to have a 5 (or 0-1) in a Trait, or might not function for at least a third of the time (at night, for example). A 3-pt requirement, finally, is an object that can only be used in strict circumstances (against Anathema, for example). The device fails to function as long as the requirement is not met.
Maintenance: This functions identically to the Maintenance Drawback in Savant & Sorcerer.

Step 2: Design

Normally, a character will be constructing artifacts based on existing plans or an existing artifact. This is not easy. If the character is replicating an artifact, they must roll Intelligence + Occult at a difficulty equal to the artifact rating +2 (just the artifact rating if they don't mind taking the artifact apart), and get a total of five successes. This takes one week of study per roll.
If the character is building an artifact based on plans, they do not need to roll. They simply need to follow the plans. However, they do require Crafts, Lore, and Occult at the artifact's level + 1, and access to the plans.
Finally, the character can try to design an artifact from scratch. The ST should secretly roll Intelligence + Lore, Intelligence + Occult, and Intelligence + Crafts, in an order chosen by the player. Each roll is at (Artifact Level + 2) difficulty, and requires three successes per level of the artifact. Each roll represents a week of time. If a botch is rolled, the ST should randomly add a Drawback.
If the character has already made one of these artifacts, they can make another one. Congrats.

Step 3: Tools, Materials and Assistants

This section is mostly the same, for descriptive purposes, as the Savant and Sorcerer section. However, the difficulty modifiers are different.
Working with only basic tools applies a +3 difficulty to the roll.
Working with a basic workshop, or with Charms that simulate it, applies a +2 difficulty to the roll.
An advanced workshop applies a +1 difficulty to the roll.
A Shogunate-era workshop applies a +0 difficulty to the roll.
A First Age workshop reduces the difficulty of the roll by 1.

In addition, the character can use assistants to speed the process. No more than five workers may aid the character on the task, and there is only so much they can do; also, pure mortals are essentially useless to the process.
Trained thaumaturges and god-blooded artisans add +1 die if five are present.
Low-essence Dragon-Blooded, elementals, and gods (Ess 1-4 for Dragon-Blooded, 1-3 for the others) as well as First Circle Demons, add +1 die for three assistants, and +2 dice for five.
Low-Essence Celestials add +1 die for two, +2 dice for four, and +3 dice for five assistants.
Mid and High-Essence Dragon-Blooded, and Mid-Essence Celestials, elementals, and gods, as well as Second-Circle demons, add +1 die for 1, +2 dice for 2-3, and +3 dice for four to five assistants.
High-Essence Celestial Exalts, gods and elementals and Third Circle demons add +1 die each.

Finally, the components of the construction can speed it up. Artifacts require a number of special components equal to (The Artifact rating -1). Adding one component to a Level 1 or 2 artifact, two to a Level 3 or 4 artifact, or three to a Level 5 artifact reduces its construction difficulty by 1. If this would lower it to 0, it instead adds a free success. These components must be rare and hard to find; at the Storyteller's discretion, exceptionally rare components may substitute for more than one rare component.

Step 4: Construction

Construction is a series of Intelligence + Crafts rolls. The difficulty (modified by Step 3) is determined by the artifact's rating:
Level 1 Artifacts are made at Difficulty 2, require only 10 successes, and require one week per roll.
Level 2 Artifacts are made at Difficulty 3, require 25 succeses, and require two weeks per roll.
Level 3 Artifacts are made at Difficulty 4, require 40 successes, and require one month per roll.
Level 4 Artifacts are made at Difficulty 5, require 60 successes, and require one season per roll.
Level 5 Artifacts are made at Difficulty 7, require 100 successes, and require two seasons per roll.

A botch anywhere during the construction process is catastrophic, and results in a horribly flawed artifact. In addition, if the character goes three rolls without adding to the number of successes stacked, the artifact's construction fails.

a comment

I like this a lot. In fact, I like it so much I may give it a whirl when / if I ever get my series off the ground  :)
You hit some of my major complaints about S&S right on the head.
Kudos! -- Taichara