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I am working on a custom magic item whose purpose is to provide an archer with unlimited arrows. Yes, I am aware that such a property already exists for weapons called endless Ammunition +2. I however consider this ability to be horrifically overpriced and takes up valuable bonus space on my weapon(s).

My thought was to design a quiver, under the effect of the abundant ammunition spell, which happens to be a much lower level than the minor creation that endless is based off of.

There exist items from 3.5, not sure if they were real or homebrew. The quiver of plenty and Quiver of Anariel. Both have similar effects in that they can not only create arrows, but also create magical arrows as well. Now the QOP does a better job of fulfilling my needs, but I don't know if its priced well since I do not know the source.

Would having a 1×1×2000×2=4000 be the right right for an item that only creates unlimited arrows? Or does it need to be made slotless for 8000?

If I want to get more powerful arrows, would QOP or QOA be good pricing guides?

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  • \$\begingroup\$ Have you considered a normal (or Efficient) Quiver with Durable arrows, or does that not accomplish your goal(s)? \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jun 12, 2017 at 12:22
  • \$\begingroup\$ @Ifusaso I dont want to track them at all, and searching for arrows after every combat, or tracking them (Ive needed to track every arrow in every game Ive played so far) is tedious and I live to avoid. \$\endgroup\$
    – Fering
    Commented Jun 12, 2017 at 22:47
  • \$\begingroup\$ Fair enough; my GM lets me hand-wave. I've got 60 durable arrows and barring something destroying them or natural 1's, I can 'find' them as long as I don't go through 60 before I have the requisite minute or two in game. Of course I'd rather have Endless Ammo, but Paizo seems to value that too much imho. \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jun 13, 2017 at 12:43

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Those magic items are legit enough… and there's more

Both the quiver of Anariel (Lone Drow Web column "Companions of the Hall") (28,000+ gp; 1 lb.) and the quiver of plenty (Dragon Compenidum Volume 1 139) (18,000 gp; 1 lb.) are overpriced compared to the quiver of lies (Book of Vile Darkness 116) (12,000 gp; 0 lbs.) if all the wearer needs are standard arrows and the wearer never plans to upgrade.

All three items have issues: the Anariel having appeared on Wizards of the Coast's sister site to promote material from Mirrorstone, its juvenile publishing imprint; the plenty first appearing in Dragon then in a Paizo-published but Wizards of the Coast approved text; and the lies never having been updated for the 3.5 revision. Nonetheless, as these are—so far as I'm aware—the only D&D 3.5e bottomless quivers, they're to what a D&D 3.5e DM is supposed to compare a new bottomless quiver to when a PC sets out to design a similar original magic item.

On the campaign value of endless arrows

I suspect having endless arrows from a quiver is usually less expensive than the weapon special ability endless ammunition because the weapon special ability endless ammunition means not needing a quiver at all. In some campaigns the difference between an archer needing to scour the enemy stronghold to recover only his +1 endless ammunition mighty (+5 Str bonus) composite longbow (16,900 gp; 3 lbs.) instead of both his +1 mighty (+5 Str bonus) composite bow (2,900 gp; 0 lbs.) and his quiver of lies is totally worth that extra 2,000 gp. That extra 2,000 gp also means only having to worry about protecting the magic bow rather than the magic bow and magic quiver—getting the magic bow made of the strongest material so as to avoid it being sundered is likely less expensive than getting both bow and quiver made of that same material… and, if the archer does not protect his quiver, some smart enemy's gonna come along and sunder that magic quiver precisely because the archer has not protected it!

(I ran a campaign where one of the PCs was a dedicated archer, and I explained well beforehand that as the PC advanced in levels and his reputation grew, he'd need to be more and more careful of enemies sundering his bow and quiver. The player appreciated my heads-up and had his PC protect the crap out of his bow and had his PC tote several mundane quivers. When enemies did finally start making sunder attempts against the PC's bow, the PC was ready—the bow was magically reinforced and the PC had a backup bow just in case. Ask if that's a thing, too, in your GM's campaign. If the GM will never sunder or scatter your stuff—and, seriously, some GM's just don't—, this is far less of a concern.)

Consider instead a haversack full of arrows

What an archer really needs to weigh these oodles-of-arrows options against, though, is a handy haversack (2,000 gp; 5 lbs.) and 60 gp for eight hundred arrows. This supply—plus however many arrows the GM lets the archer tote on his body—means even the most profligate of volley archers will have enough arrows to last at least a level or two. (An archer that uses an impressive and absurd 40 arrows per encounter still typically only needs 520 arrows per character level in D&D 3.5e, for example.) Seriously, for the price of a quiver of lies, an archer can buy five haversacks of arrows—that is, without needing to resupply, enough for seven levels of continuous volley fire as described above—and have cash remaining.

Seriously, by comparison, a haversack full of arrows—that are kept securely in their quivers or wrapped in blankets so as not to pierce accidentally the haversack—makes both a bottomless quiver and the weapon special ability endless ammunition an extravagance likely reserved for high-level characters.

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    \$\begingroup\$ There's going to be games where "infinite arrows" is how ordinary quivers work, because nobody cares much about the arrows -- would that suggest dropping the price significantly down to low 4 digits or 3 digits? \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jun 12, 2017 at 9:50
  • \$\begingroup\$ Won't a Handy Haversack tear when the sharp arrow tips touch it, or is that only a feature of the Bag of Holding? \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jun 12, 2017 at 10:05
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    \$\begingroup\$ @doppelgreener I can imagine a GM compromising by saying, "Now that you've spent 2,000 gp on a haversack for arrows, just spend 30 gp once per level to top off your supply." However, I can't even really speculate beyond that because the GM must decide on a different value for endless arrows if he thinks the given values are outrageously high due of his playstyle. The game does provides guidelines for endless arrows and that's what the game says to use; if the GM doesn't use the guidelines, any estimate is just wild guessing. \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jun 12, 2017 at 10:06
  • \$\begingroup\$ @ThomasJacobs Answer updated to clarify. My previous comment may've come off as unreasonably sharp. My apologies. \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jun 12, 2017 at 11:52
  • \$\begingroup\$ Not a popular idea I had to recognize but for endless standard arrows I tend to just allow a revamped Spell component pouch. If this object always has enough bat dung, spoiled eggs, dragon scales, sand, butter, various kinds of hair, tiny bells and silver wire, rhubarb leaf and an adder's stomach, thorns, pieces of a tree struck by lightning, goose feathers, animal parts... I really think having it always contain enough arrows instead should be ok, too. What's good for the mage is good for the archer. \$\endgroup\$
    – Umbranus
    Commented Jun 12, 2017 at 20:48

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