They can use rods, staves, and wands as implements. A design & development article in Dragon #376 (June 2009) provides interesting insights into the development of the artificer, such as the fact that special rules only used by the artificer were replaced by more standard 4e mechanics because the new rules 'didn’t amount to enough mechanical benefit'". The 4e playtest artificer was updated quite a bit for his first official appearance in the Eberron Player's Guide, with the biggest change being to his healing infusions, which was intended to help differentiate him from other leader classes. Shannon Appelcline (author of Designers & Dragons) wrote that "the artificer was the first character class to be playtested as part of D&D Insider, in an article that was collected in Dragon #365 (July 2008). The artificer as an official base class appeared in the Eberron Player's Guide (July 2009). No published race has artificer as a favored class, though being a warforged artificer gives players the advantage of being able to use infusions on themselves. A homunculus is similar to a Wizard's familiar but more intelligent and generally better equipped to a single task. At fourth level Artificers may craft a homunculus companion. Specific infusions can be cast to repair or inflict damage to any creature with a construct subtype. Ĭonstructs, mechanical beasts, and particularly Warforged fall under the artificer's area of influence. Thus Artificers are able to make use of item creation feats without the experience penalty that other spell casters must take. These points can be used instead of experience points in the creation of new magic items. Artificers receive a number of craft reserve points every level. Īn artificer can create magic items for which he or she does not have access to the prerequisite spells. Infusions work similarly to spells but must be implanted in a specific object, giving it a temporary magic effect. The artificer uses Intelligence-based Infusions instead of typical magics and psionics. The artificer's abilities act primarily on items and constructs. In D&D 3rd edition, the artificer was introduced as a base class in the Eberron Campaign Setting (2004). This artificer channels magic into or through non-living items for their own personal use, thus any spells in the Enchantment/Charm school which happen to affect living things, and the entire school of Necromancy are opposed to the Artifice specialty and off limits to the artificer of AD&D 2nd edition. The first appearance of an artificer was as a wizard specialist introduced in the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd edition supplement Player's Option: Spells & Magic (1996) where artifice was a newly added specialty within the School of Thaumaturgy.
Publication history Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd edition Artificers represent many of the high-magic elements of Eberron as a campaign setting.
They are a major defining feature of a Dragonmarked house, House Cannith, and the common people in the metropolis of Sharn and other cities rely heavily on artificers to maintain the magical infrastructure. Though introduced as a wizard specialist in Player's Option: Spells & Magic (1996) and as a prestige class for gnome arcane spellcasters in Magic of Faerûn (2001), artificers were first added as a standalone class in the Eberron campaign setting. 2.1 Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd edition.