Selling magic items?

[Kaldra]

so i have a player who wants to sell enchanted items and potions, this sounds fine to me but then i started thinking about the items being bound and maintained by who ever made them. so once my player sells an item it feels like he should no longer be responsible for maintaining it aka it should no longer take up a slot; which seems fine nine times out of ten. but now a fellow player wants to buy some items to use on a more regular basis instead of them being loaned to him. the player buying an item should have to expend Something, a few things i have been considering are requiring fate points to be spent to use the item every time or perhaps one fate point per session per item to represent them empowering or the upkeep of the items. another idea i had would let people take a form of refinement for nothing but item slots.

any ideas? input?

[Belial666]

An item usable by someone else that is maintained by the original crafter requires one slot and has to be specifically made usable by others.

An item sold but not maintained should stop working after a time - usually in the same length of time the original crafter can make a replacement for the item they sold. Potions cannot be maintained and should last for 3 days or so. (I like the number 3)

An item sold and maintained typically takes up item slots from the new wielder. This means only practitioners with some experience in crafting (i.e. item slots) can maintain an item.

[Kaldra]

the players who want to buy the items are not casters though, one is a changeling then other is an red court infected and the last is a pure mortal. normaly non of them would be able to maintain an item on there own and the pc selling the items would like his slots back after it is no longer his. thats why i was thinking let people either spend fate points, accept one or more free compels or take refinement ( or a thematicaly named power ) solely for the purpose of attaining magic item slots.

[Tallyrand]

I feel with Dresden Files it's best to go as simple as possible.  I'd say that he should buy some appropriate level of resources to represent his business and the I'd allow him to take a stunt called "Big Sale" which allows him to to reduce his number of available Item or Potion slots until the end of the next scene (or the end of the next session depending on how your game flows) for a bonus to a resources roll at a 1 for 1 basis.

[Kaldra]

the issue isn't so much the business end so much as i dont want the other players getting access to magic items of there OWN for free

[Richard_Chilton]

To quote from the pre-publication PDF they gave me with my pre-order:
Items of Power
Items of Power is a catch-all category for abilities that are derived not from the person himself, but from the magical equipment he brings to the table.
----

If the other PCs are getting items of power, in theory this how you make them pay for it.
But that's not how I'm thinking of going.  I'm thinking of allowing a minor slot (say for a potion) "for free" - that is applying the +1 to something that only costs -1 for a net of 0, but only if it's that's the only thing they are carrying.  If they want two minors or a few majors then I'm thinking of coming up with something like a refinement, but something that you don't don't need a power to have...  If they are "Pure Mortal" I would definitely leave them that way.

Basically, play balance falls apart if some people get free lunches and others have to pay.  If Tom the Wizard spends weeks of downtime making impressive magic items for himself he's limited to a certain number, so if he spends that time making items for Dick the werewolf and Harry the scion then Dick and Henry would have to pay for their bonuses.  Otherwise they are getting magic items at no cost while Tom is still limited by what his powers say he can have.

Of course if people have to pay for items it matters who uses it.  I can foresee cases where X has it the item on his sheet but it makes sense for Y to hold it, which is an issue if Dick and Harry are basically acting a mules for Tom's magic items...

Theme wise...  I can't help noticing that Dresden doesn't handout magic items to his friends and allies.  He has his duster, but Murphy doesn't have enchanted armour.  He will sometimes share a potion (like he did with Susan), but he doesn't hand them out at the start of a mission.

Take the "we load up for bear and go into the Black Court lair" bit where he almost lost his hand - Dresden didn't hand out magical protections then.  He didn't ask his wheel man if he had any minor magic items to hand off.  Sure, he'll do things to let people see fairies, but Dresden doesn't share magic.

Now I'm wondering why.  Is it a trait of Dresden's or is it something more...  Elaine doesn't give her charges minor magics to protect them in White Night...  Thinking about the books Wizards don't seen to hand out minor magics unless someone really, really needs them (like the Gatekeeper did when Dresden needed to see).

Richard

[Kaldra]

i cant really see why not, it seems like it could be a common practice the only limit is time

[Belial666]

Because making a potion takes hours. Making a magic item takes months. It simply takes too long for one wizard to equip the rest of the group, even with merely potions that can't be maintained/recharged.

[luminos]

The rules for this is that if someone is using enchanted item slots (either user or maker) then its fine.  If not, its not fine.  The fact that he sells potions and items to the general public is irrelevant if the people he sells those items to don't have any impact on play; selling potions in such a case is just color, so you don't have to create actual potions for it.

[Korwin]

another idea i had would let people take a form of refinement for nothing but item slots.

+1

An Magic item needs an Magic Item Slot.
Normally that would be the creator.
If the creator makes one for another Char. and doesnt want to use his own Item Slots, then the other Char. need to take an Refinement for Item Slots.

[Todjaeger]

Actually Harry has given an enchanted item (singular) away, early in Grave Peril.  He gave a bracelet/charm made with a relic from a saint (fingerbone?), silver and a few other things, which he'd made to help protect him from ghosts and spirits.  When Bob found out about it afterwards, he pointed out to Harry the amount of effort which had been expended in making the charm in the first place.  He has also loaned Thomas his duster, but that was more so that Thomas could impersonate Harry, than for the coat to aid Thomas.

In the end though, as long as any items are properly accounted for in terms of enchanted item slots and with the appropriate restrictions on whether an item is usable by others, I would not care too much which character has what.  The only area where I would likely really place restrictions is that only the appropriate types of casters can be providing the slots used, i.e. sorceror's who are confined to just having 1 Refinement per spell-ability aren't able to take a bunch of extra enchanted item slots via Refinement beyond 2.

[Richard_Chilton]

Thinking about the books again - there was the sale of magic items.

Third Eye - the drug from the first book - was basically a potion.

Richard