Saturday, November 28, 2020

BX House Rule: Scroll Production

Sparked by a discussion in the B/X group on Facebook, and partly as an extension of my recent poast House Rule: Thieves’ Ability: Find/Disarm Traps and as an idea I had a while back about creating a detailed scroll production supplement (that went into detail about writing substrates, special quills, etc.), I decided to do simplified scroll production table. Generally, I don't like the idea of a "flat" chance of failure (15% according to Marsh/Cook Expert), regardless of the caster or spell level. This chart takes that into account. The higher in level the caster, the lower level the spell, the higher the chance of success (well... the lower the chance of failure), and vice versa.



Creating scrolls requires 500 gp and 1 week per spell level (e.g., creating a scroll for a 2nd level spell takes 1000 gp and 2 weeks). After the time and expense, the spellcaster rolls 2d6 on the the table below to determine success.
Optional Rules

Roll Modifiers: DM May allow roll to be adjusted by the spellcaster's Dexterity modifier, and/or Intelligence modifier (for arcane spell casters) or Wisdom modifier (for divine spellcasters).

High-quality Materials: For twice the normal cost, the spellcaster rolls as if one level higher than normal.

Rushed Production: For each week taken off of the production time, the spellcaster rolls as if one level lower than normal. A minimum of one week is required.

Multiple Spells on a Single Scroll: A caster may attempt to scribe multiple spells on a single scroll. This halves the normal cost of producing the scrolls separately. However, a success roll must be made for each spell being scribed, and any failure for any spell on the entire scroll ruins all other spells on the scroll (even if successfully scribed on their own).