Alchemy

an ancient practice shrouded in mystery and secrecy, alchemy is the study of transformation. Alchemists learn how to break down materials in to their base elements and use their skills to combine them again in to something greater. Master alchemists tend to take their secrets to the grave, forcing novices to experiment with their craft -- sometimes with deadly results.

Basic Requirements

Characters must have Alchemist's supplies or access to laboratory to pursue this trade. Characters that are not proficient with Alchemist's supplies receive disadvantage on any results roll when brewing a potion or oil, where proficient characters will receive their normal proficiency bonus.

Skill Level

The calibre of potions an alchemist is capable of crafting are represented by his skill level: apprentice, journeyman, master, and artisan.

To attempt potions of a higher skill level characters must have successfully crafted five recipes of the preceding level.

Materials

Common alchemical reagents are often available for purchase in major cities and some smaller settlements. They can also be gathered in the wild at the rate of 25g (or 4d10) worth of reagents per day.

Discovering Recipes

In order to craft a potion an alchemist must have learned its recipe. While recipes are sometimes traded between alchemists, it is much more common to learn through experimentation.

To experiment, the alchemist will spend the appropriate amount of time and reagent cost for their skill level, and make an alchemist skill check (pg2). If successful, they may choose any formula from the attempted skill level for which they have met the difficulty check and learn its recipe. Regardless of the outcome, reagents are consumed in the process of research.

Fumbling

If a character rolls below the 'fumble' value for the desired potion's skill level when experimenting or crafting, the DM may roll for results on the 'fumble' table.

Experimentation

Level Time (days) Reagent Cost (gold) Apprentice 3 400 Journeymen 15 2200 Master 120 8400 Artisan * *

Artisan level recipes represent truly amazing feats of alchemy, requiring extracted essences of highly specific reagents. An alchemist eligible to learn these recipes immediately recognizes the worth of any useful materials they come across, and may attempt to learn their formulas by spending twice the amount time and reagents as required on the crafting table.