Enchanting

An enchanter binds magic into things. Trained in Enchanting, you have its recipes on the Enchanting… list in the abilities menu. You can work anywhere: no anvil, no tools, an hour’s quiet work with the thing in your lap. The magic comes from magic crystals, and the colour of a crystal decides what kind of magic it can give.

You need:

• Skill: Enchanting. A craftsperson may take the Spellwright trade; wizards, witches, and aristocrats may start with it (Which skills you start with). No one teaches it.
• Stock: magic crystals.
• Place: anywhere, with no tools.

Enchanting an item

• Kindle makes a plain item magic, with one affix (a prefix or a suffix). It takes one crystal.
• Quicken adds a suffix to a magic item with only a prefix, or a prefix to one with only a suffix.
  • Cost: one crystal.
  • Needs: room for one more affix on the item (its capacity).
  • On a rare item: it adds one more affix of either kind, if the item has room, and takes a heart-crystal too.
• Recast rolls a magic item’s affixes anew: as many as it had, of the same kinds (a prefix for its prefix, a suffix for its suffix), all of the crystal’s colour. It takes one crystal. It does not work on a rare item: unbind it, then imbue it. With a soul-fetter you keep one affix you choose, and only the rest are rolled.
• Imbue makes a plain item rare, with a name and three to six affixes, as many as a found rare item rolls but never more than the item’s capacity. It takes three crystals, and the order you choose them in matters: the first affix is of the first crystal’s colour, the second of the second’s, the third of the third’s, and any more of any of the three. The item must hold three affixes at least (“It would not hold so much.”).
• Ennoble makes a magic item rare: one affix more, of the crystal’s colour, and a name. It takes one crystal, and the item must hold three affixes at least and have room for one more.
• Unbind takes every affix off a magic or rare item. It is plain again, and you get nothing back. It takes no crystal.

Each recipe works one item you carry. You must take it off first if you wear or wield it, and you must know what its magic is (identify it first). A unique item or something a quest asks for cannot be enchanted. Arrows, bolts, and other ammunition are worked a whole stack at once, for the same crystals as one item. Imbue’s three crystals may all come from one stack.

The check adds one to the difficulty for every 3 item levels of the roll.

Which magic a crystal gives

A crystal gives only magic of its colour’s families (the colours table lists them). A red crystal never gives mana, a blue one never gives life. If nothing of that colour can be added to the item (it already has every kind the colour gives, or the item cannot take them), the work is refused before it starts: “No more of that nature will take.”

Keeping magic out with seals

A seal keeps one family of magic out of the roll. After you choose the crystals, the work asks for up to three seals: a list of the families your crystal’s colour gives, in words (“fire”, “the critical”, “mana”). Choose one by its letter, or None (-) for no more seals. The rest of the roll is drawn as before, only never from a sealed family. So a red crystal sealed against fire and the critical can still give damage, strength, or life, but never fire or the critical.

Each seal costs one more crystal of the same colour, taken from the crystals you chose (for Imbue, from the first of its three whose colour has that family), and makes the work longer. A seal holds for that one work only: it leaves nothing on the item. You cannot seal a family the crystal’s colour does not give (“The red crystal holds nothing of mana.”), the same family twice, or a family the item already has or could never take (“There is nothing to seal there.”).

• A seal costs one more crystal of the colour it seals and adds 30 minutes to the work. A roll takes at most 3 seals.
• A heart-crystal is what Quicken takes beside its crystal to add an affix to a rare item.
• A soul-fetter is what Recast takes to keep the affix you choose.
• Soulglass on a creature of level 15 or more: a 10% chance of a heart-crystal or a soul-fetter (even odds). A dragon always leaves a heart-crystal.
• Salvaging a rare item of item level 10 or more: a 3% chance of a heart-crystal or a soul-fetter (even odds).

The rare materials

Two rare materials go further than any crystal:

• A heart-crystal lets Quicken add an affix to a rare item, one at a time, as long as the item has room for it. Each Quicken on a rare item takes one heart-crystal beside its crystal.
• A soul-fetter lets Recast keep one affix exactly as it is. The work asks which affix to keep after the seals (only when you carry a soul-fetter); the other affixes are rolled anew.

Both are spent whether the work takes or not, as the crystals are. The list above says where they come from, and how often.

How strong the magic is

The affix is rolled as loot is, at an item level: the greater of the item’s own and your reach (a plain item’s, Kindle’s and Imbue’s, is your reach). Your reach grows with Enchanting, from item level 1 to 12 (the table above). So a beginner kindles weak magic, and a master rolls the strongest tiers. A deep find you quicken, recast, or ennoble keeps its own item level if it is higher than your reach. The item takes the roll’s item level.

The check

When the work is done you make one check: 2d12 plus your Willpower modifier plus Enchanting’s craft bonus, against the recipe’s difficulty plus one for every three item levels of the roll (Unbind: of the item’s own item level). A natural 2 always fails and a natural 24 always succeeds. If you are interrupted, you put down your work and nothing is spent.

• Made: the item is enchanted and you know its magic. “The long sword takes the red crystal’s glow. It is now a Sharp long sword.” An imbued or ennobled item wakes with its name: “The long sword drinks the three crystals and wakes as Grim Bite.”
• Failed: the crystals go dark and are spent, with any heart-crystal or soul-fetter. The item is as it was. A failed Unbind leaves the magic where it was.
• A natural 2: the crystals are spent and the item warps: it is damaged, as a failed temper damages it, and an item already damaged falls apart. An item of Proof is spared. Of a stack of arrows or bolts, only one warps; the rest are as they were.

Every finished work, made or not, can train Enchanting.

Example: kindling a long sword. A wizard with Willpower 14 and Enchanting 20 kindles a plain long sword with a red crystal.

• The roll’s item level: a plain sword has none of its own, so Kindle rolls at her reach at Enchanting 20: 3.
• The difficulty: Kindle’s 11, plus 3 ÷ 3 = 1: 12.
• What she adds: +2 for Willpower 14 (modifiers), +1 craft bonus from Enchanting 20: +3. The dice must reach 9: 80.6%.
• A natural 2 (1 roll in 144, 0.7%) warps the sword.

Quicken works on a magic sword, at the higher of its item level and her reach. A sword from a dungeon’s sixth floor, of item level 6, rolls at its own 6: Quicken’s 13 plus 2, difficulty 15, and the dice need 12, 61.8%.

See also: Magic crystals, Magic items, and Prefixes and suffixes.