If I wanted to use my casters to forge or enhance magic items, how should I go about doing it? I'm guessing there's a recommended set of improvements I can add to my weapons and specific items I should be crafting. Since it costs a lot of money and exp, I don't want to create something only to find out I could have made something better.
With weapons wait until you can do +3, Holy and Axiomatic are the best adds as they affect most bad guys. Use NPC's whenever possible to make items. Amulet's of natural Armor and as for Wands either spells you use a lot of or handy spells like knock to keep combat spells available for casting.
For weapons wait till you can enchant an item to at least +3 with the enchantment of your choice. If you're playing good aligned parties Holy and Axiomatic are top choices as they affect most of the bad guys. If you're playing evil or neutral parties go for elemental damage as well as the pluses to hit (Keen to if your wizard learned it). As far as gear I tend to favor whatever boots one of their primary stats- Amulet of Wisdom +6 for clerics, Headband of Intelligence +6 for wizards, Gloves of Dexterity +6 for rogues, Girdle of Giant Strength for fighters/barbarians/paladins and Cloak of Charisma +6 for sorcerers. Rangers and Monks have several enchanted items they can use to their benefits while druids and bards can follow the route of clerics and rogues respectively. I rarely enchant armor so for that you're on your own...
If you use Rudy's Item Mod, a wizard can craft Girdle of Outer Protection +2/+4/+6 and Amulet of Inner Perfection +2/+4/+6.
If you don't otherwise obtain at least +1 weapons, it's worth making as many as you need to outfit every character. I had an early random encounter with a groaning spirit during which I had insufficient magic weapons and spells. It did not end well.
Magic weapons are very easy to obtain thankfully. Mostly +1 longswords. And of course there's the holy longsword +1 you get from Filiken at the beginning of the game for agreeing to marry Meleny.
The game's best weapons are glaives due to long range and requiring martial weapon proficiency. Ranseurs are approximately equal to glaives, but deal piercing instead of slashing damage. (Longspears are a second choice due to only needing simple weapon proficiency. Just don't give 'em to Monks or Druids since they lack proficiency.) The game's best ranged weapons are slings due to adding your STR mod to damage, and being blunt, and not needing a special action to reload. The game's best item enhancements are: +1, Holy, Keen, Icy Burst, Shocking Burst, and Fiery Burst - in that order. Cast greater magic weapon on a crafted weapon at high enough caster level to give it more + (that is, +2, +3, +4, or +5). The game's best armor and shield enhancements are: +1, +2, and +3 - in that order. (Too little variety in armor mods.) You could enchant armor with Spell Resistance just to sell it for lots of cash. The game's best non-consumable Wondrous Items to craft (assuming Rudy's Item Mod 0.8) are: Vest of Escape (continous freedom of movement!), +6 to stat items, Bracers of Armor (5 AC), Necklace of Natural Armor (5 AC), Boots of Speed, Cloak of Resistance (+5 to all saves), Helm of Reading Magic (for unlimited potion and scroll identification), Helm of Teleportation (if you want to avoid random encounters), Robe of the Archmage (spell resistance 17, stackable +1 saves, not much else to put in that slot), and Prayer Beads of Healing (mass cure serious wounds 1/day - for big parties) - in approximately that order. The game's best rings are: Invisibility (just kill Furnok and put his on a main character - reviving Furnok optional), Freedom of Movement (so you can get freedom of movement from a ring and equip the +6 STR/DEX/CON belt), Protection +5, and Major Fire Resistance (30 fire resistance - for being close to fire-damaging foes and your own fireball, delayed blast fireball, and flame strike spells!) - in approximately that order. Wands, staves, rods, and potions are occasionally useful to find and buy, but not worth spending a feat on to make in this game.
Periapts of Wound Closure should rank up there too, though I think Rudy's Mod may have nerfed them. For ranged weapons, I prefer composite long bows built for 18 STR. There are other Rings of Invisibility to be had, not to mention the Robes of Midnight.
The most important things to make for any and every party member is something to enhance their prime requisite scores. So Belts of Giant Strength for fighters, Headbands of Intellect for Wizards, etc. Most of these are created by wizards and clerics with access to the 2nd level spells like Bull's Strength or Fox's Cunning. Note that these spells are very limited on scrolls for wizards until very late in the game, so I would recommend taking them at level up and buying more common scrolls like Fireball to add to your spellbook. I would also suggest waiting until later levels to take the Create Magic Items feats because you don't want to waste the XP and gold to create +2 items as they cannot be upgraded to +4 or +6, better to hold off until you can create the high plus stuff. I also suggest making the Giant Strength belts for most party members, maybe not Monks who could better use Monk Belts, but everyone can benefit from a higher strength score, either from higher damage from melee weapons, or even having the wizard carry more loot back to town! Having that STR bonus to melee weapons (or composite bows!) helps no matter what weapon you have. Note that anyone using an item slot, like the Monk using a Monk belt, that you can use for an ability score bonus, you can always create them an Ioun Stone, so the monk can get a +2 STR bonus from the stone and still use the Monk Belt. The bonuses don't stack, so no need to have both. This is a good use of random encounter experience from the overland travel, or just resting over and over in the Temple. I like to have at least 2 party members with creation feats, so one doesn't fall too far behind the party's XP levels.
It's worth noting that weapons can be enchanted in stages, so if you want to make an Anarchic Icy Burst +3 scythe, you can enchant a master-work scythe to +1 as soon as you acquire the Craft feat, and wait till later to add the rewt of the enchantments. The major group of items where you have to decide when to craft are the stat boosters: do you make +2 gloves of dex as soon as you cwn, then update to +4, then to +6, or wait until you can make or buy +6 items? In my experience it's perfectly possible to take a party of legitimate point-buy PCs through the game with only the items they find or loot, so there's no requirement to have everyone tooled up with +2 items on every slot at level x or +6 by level y, although of course doing so makes you more effective. Prioritising items to the person who can make best use of them (belts of giant strength to fighters, hats of intellect to wizards) is obviously important, though it's also worth reducing penalties too: boosting a Wizard's strength to allow her to carry multiple staves, or a barbarian's wisdom to avoid being dominated is also worthwhile.
I tend to create magical items as early as I have the resources. Gold is no problem as you can sell at a profit if someone has a decent Appraise skill (and this can be boosted with spells when you enter a shop - well worth it for pricey items or when selling a large number of items). Also, there is a lot of XP to be had in the game. Even a few +2 ability enhancement items can make a difference in the early and middle stages of the pre-Verbo game. I will note that using random wilderness encounters has become a much riskier approach to gaining XP. With the potential for meeting much tougher opponents than in the past makes one take more care when moving overland. It is particularly dangerous for solo characters, since they will register as high level, but be all alone! When playing solo, these are the most common cause of death for my solo characters. I normally buff up before hitting the road now. (When I play solo, I normally like to avoid using NPCs or dominated creatures except when I need to for completing quests - I like to travel light) But random encounters inside locations remain the same, if one wants to harvest XP.
wow, I've been playing for years and I've never done any of this. Doesn't seem necessary. Although I've not done the Demons & Demigods Quest, yet. This 'quest' is not something I am into, but I can see how some enhancements would be needed for this.
You can easily gain the holy longsword, 2 +1 daggers, a +1 cleaver, and a +1 shortsword all before second/third level.
