Crafting at the Greywatch
Crafting at the Greywatch
The Greywatch is the party's workshop as much as its fortress. Its facilities are what turn raw monster-parts into finished gear.
The five gates
To craft any item you need all of the following:
- The recipe — see Dragon Crafting Recipes, or improvise under the general rules.
- A proficient crafter — a character proficient with the listed tool.
- A facility — the matching Greywatch facility (or a town that rents one, at extra cost and time).
- The materials — harvested parts on hand, spent as Craft Value.
- Cost and time — gold and downtime days below.
Greywatch facilities
| Facility | Tool | Crafts |
|---|---|---|
| Forge | Smith's Tools | Weapons, shields, metal & scale armor |
| Tannery | Leatherworker's Tools | Hide armor, cloaks, membrane goods |
| Laboratory | Alchemist's Supplies | Potions, oils, bombs, organ processing |
| Arcane Study | Arcana / spell focus | Wands, foci, lenses, and any enchanted (magic) item |
A facility the party controls lets the harvested material cover the item's raw-material cost — you pay only the labor/reagent figure below. Renting a town facility removes that offset (pay full market) and adds 50% to the time.
Cost and time by rarity
(At a controlled Greywatch facility, materials supplied.)
| Rarity | Cost (labor & reagents) | Time |
|---|---|---|
| Common | 25–50 gp | 1–3 days |
| Uncommon | 100–200 gp | 1–2 weeks |
| Rare | 1,000–2,000 gp | 3–6 weeks |
| Very Rare | 10,000–20,000 gp | 8–12 weeks |
Component Crafting Economy
Harvested components do more than fill a recipe — each carries a Craft Value (CV) set by its rarity, and an item is built by spending CV against a threshold.
Craft Value by rarity: Scraps 1 · Common 2 · Uncommon 4 · Rare 8 · Very Rare 16 · Legendary 32 · Artifact 64. (Each tier doubles, so laddering up from cheap parts is possible but deliberately inefficient.)
Building an item. Choose an item type — potion, poison, oil, scroll, ammunition, weapon, armor, shield, wand, staff, or wondrous item. Name one primary component: it sets the item's effect and caps its rarity. Then add secondary components whose type-tag matches the item until the total CV crosses a threshold. The output rarity is the highest threshold met — never above the primary's rarity.
| Output rarity | Single-use (potion, poison, oil, scroll, ammo) | Permanent / recharging (weapon, armor, shield, wand, staff, wondrous) |
|---|---|---|
| Common | 2 CV | 4 CV |
| Uncommon | 4 CV | 8 CV |
| Rare | 8 CV | 16 CV |
| Very Rare | 16 CV | 32 CV |
| Legendary | 32 CV | 64 CV |
A permanent or recharging item always costs twice the CV of a single-use item of the same tier. CV spent above the primary's rarity cap is wasted, or — at the DM's option — buys a minor flavor rider.
Effects by output rarity. Common components have no magic; they are pure CV and structure. Magic begins at Uncommon: Uncommon = +1, or one minor 1/day effect; Rare = +2, or a solid effect with a small rider; Very Rare = +3 / +2-with-teeth, or a strong 3/day effect; Legendary = a signature, multi-part effect. The primary component's descriptor themes the result; secondaries may add riders at the DM's discretion.
The rarity cap. The primary component caps the output: a Rare primary can never yield better than a Rare item, however much CV you pour in.
Worked examples
- White dragon horn → Staff of Frost. The horn is a Very Rare primary (16 CV; staff-stock; cold). A staff is permanent, so Very Rare needs 32 CV. The horn alone (16) only meets the Rare threshold → a Rare staff carrying 2 of its 4 spells. Add another 16 CV of frost-staff parts and it completes as the full Very Rare Staff of Frost.
- Dragon turtle shell-plates + storm-lens eyes → shield. The eyes are a Rare primary (8 CV; storm/shock; cap = Rare). The eyes alone (8) meet Uncommon → an Uncommon shield. Add four Common shell-plates (+8 CV) to reach 16 → a Rare shield, the most the eyes will allow.
Bastion turns
One bastion turn = 7 days. A crafter occupies one facility for the duration of a project; multiple crafters at different facilities work in parallel. A project longer than one bastion turn continues across turns so long as the facility and crafter remain assigned.
Example
The party wants Glacial Half-Plate (Rare). They have a smith proficient with Smith's Tools, a Forge at the Greywatch, and a hide's worth of Glacial Scales. They pay 1,500 gp and assign the smith to the Forge for 5 weeks (most of one bastion turn five times over — or run it alongside other projects at other facilities).