Rune of damage choice - allows you to change the damage type of your weapon
Lens of an alternate timeline - BREAK LENS <quest> to gain a, non-epic, quest honours line. Merge that timeline with this one, where the only difference is that one honours line!
While I know it will most likely never be a thing, I can hope:
<something cool sounding> - by having this artifact, you can take ONE out of guild skill (under normal skillflex rules) instead of a normal choice. and to go with that Power Converter - Be able to use power skills when you normally wouldn't (ie, when a skill requires commune nexus power when you are a city person)
To continue attempting to beef the artisan market:
Rune of the magic wardrobe: Attaching it to a wardrobe (or chest) allows ENTER [item] to enter a magical hiding place, which removes you from who and all its variants, like a cloaking gem. You can't leave that room, but you'll be hidden. If you own two such runes/runed pieces of furniture, you can link them. Entering a piece of furniture would then instead teleport you to the other.
With all the unseemly drug and alcohol artifacts, I feel obligated to suggest a vaguely Hallifaxian artifact.
Reeducation Mallet: BOP <target> WITH MALLET - changes the personality of a mob. You can make illithoids friendly, order mobs brave, etc. Either make one mallet for each influence type, or make the result random. Lasts until the mob shuffles.
For Mister Zvoltz, Pejat has been terminated by the Replicant Dynodeon.
Echoing Earworm By feeding this little beastie 3p, you gain the effects of a single song as if a friendly bard were playing it. Syntax is EARWORM <skillset> <skill>. Power cost is in addition to whatever power cost the song has, and the effect persists for 1 hour. Does not work under truedeaf.
Diadem of Dialects Allows you to understand any non-divine spoken language. (obviously won't translate Crowspeak, gratuitous Greek, extraneous Latin, woebegotten Welsh, or player-created 'charming' brogues. May or may not work on Delportian.)
I would REALLY REALLY REALLY love some way to reset my family status to build a new family. I feel like the family system is pretty static, as there just aren't enough new character to really raise a new big house. Being able to reshape families would be a massive boon to family and historical family RP. If that has to be an artifact, so be it.
In addition to (or instead of) an artifact to reset family status, how about some artifacts that are specifically aimed at the family system? I think I'll propose that they be fluffed as family traditions because that makes more sense than physical items for this kind of thing, but the same mechanics apply. They're all things that I'd like to see changed in the family system, either as artifacts or not, but I don't know how big a deal any of them would be to change and I haven't deeply considered all of the possible gameplay implications. I've probably suggested a few of these before.
Tradition of Patronage: Allows the family head and anyone that s/he authorizes OFFER PATRONAGE TO <PLAYER> to bring that player into the family as a retainer. A retainer counts as a member of the family for the purposes of family size and honor generation, but the retainer cannot pass on the family status to spouses or children. A person who is already part of a different family can become a retainer, at which point they stop counting as a member of their original family for family size and honor generation. Both the patron and the retainer can break the relationship at any time, with honor loss comparable to a person rejecting family. This one is especially good because it lets people get involved in families without committing their character to actually being a noble in the families where that sort of thing is relevant.
Tradition of Polygamy: People in this family can have multiple spouses. No matter how many marriages a person is involved in, they can only ever be in one family at a time.
Tradition of Aristocratic Marriage: Members of this family can propose to their cousins, aunts/uncles, and any more distant relations. Useful because Hallifax (and I assume most other orgs) is preposterously inbred as it is and this would make marriage more convenient.
Tradition of Disproportionate Influence: Your family counts as being 1 person bigger than it really is for determining lesser and greathouse status. Can be stacked up to some reasonable cap that prevents two person greathouses. Useful because getting 50 people is an incredibly steep requirement given Lusternia's current population.
Tradition of Secularism: Your family patron can now be set to "Secular" which gives an honor trickle for people who are not members of any order instead of being in the patron's order. Useful for family's that don't want to align themselves with a specific god and for those that specifically want to embrace secularism and mortal power.
Tradition of Polytheism: Can have a second family patron for the purposes of honor trickle. Stackable up to some reasonable limit. Should probably be mutually exclusive with Secularism for thematic reasons.
Any sufficiently advanced pun is indistinguishable from comedy.
I love all of that stuff. The bind I've been is having joined (long before thinking about it) a family that isn't a good fit for any historical houses and later wanting to participate in a historical house as a blood member. Leaving the family to start one from scratch that will make it to Great House feels impossible: There just won't be enough children to induct :C Some of those alternate traditions would go a long way to helping, and each feels like a substantially different mode, unlike the existing traditions which are all slightly different ways to gain a resource I care nothing about
Doctoral Tam+: allows for free classflexing per IG day rather than 3 IG months. Racial flexibility hasn't broken things, so I'm projecting this would likewise be awesome.
Manna of the Gods+: a level above the current Manna artifact. Everyone loves more demi-weight.
Tzaraziko's Eye: sees through falsehoods and shows the true name of those wearing stoles, curio masks, and marauder's masks. As an added bonus, ignores titles and surnames on room looks, too.
Optional: just make seeing curio masks/stoles a CONFIG. They're unnecessarily spammy nowadays, unhelpful to novices, and mostly gotten through a promo or order anyways. Can keep the Eye to combat the MM then alone.
Rune of Enhanced <influence type>: allows selected influence type to work even on immune-attitude creatures.
Optional: Someone above, Alic I think, also suggested a hammer to whack someone to change their personality type. I wouldn't mind this option, either, assuming it's a temporary attitude change that reverts maybe in an RL hour.
Now, for things that are random/probably a long shot/potentially griefy:
Oathsworn Citizenship: allows the owner to pledge themselves to a denizen organization for a Lusternian year. Belonging to a denizen org increases influence xp gains for the holder to those denizens, attunes the citizen to cries of the denizens if they're hunted, but also renders the holder unable to call upon Avechna if they're slain in defense of the denizens (aka holder is open PK in denizen territory). Resets on the 1st of Estar. Pre-maturely breaking the oath can be done for x-cost/x-consequence.
Note: Kinda half-baked since I don't know a) if this would cause a channel to be made for each denizen org or b) how the interplay would work for denizen orgs without org territory. Maybe it just works for those denizen orgs with territory. Also, currently, if a denizen defender dies trying to kill someone bashing the denizens, I'm 80% sure they get Avechna's protection. This citizenship is meant to be a boon and a risk to the holder by removing this protection.
<modifier> Orb of Power: once activated, converts your reserves to the power associated to a given organizational nexus. Activating this orb, however, not only comes with a 5% reserve power deduction, but also causes a steady drain on active power at a rate of 1p per 16s. When active, the user also cannot link to their home nexus to replenish their reserves.
Note: Again, half-baked. Yes, it may empower rogues, but with the classflexing system, without guild permission for skill use, they're out of luck even with the orb. This just ups inter-organizational diplomacy making. 99% chance of being griefy.
Altar of <village> Reconciliation: when activated (insert cost of activation here), offerings to the altar will slowly push village feelings for your home organization to a more positive mindset. Can only be activated in a room of the village you seek to mend feelings with, or a room immediately adjacent to the territory. Once activated, the altar stays raised until the next revolt or can be deactivated early for x-cost/x-consequence. Approximate 10mil essence per level of village feelings raised. Can only be used by members of your home organization.
Note: May be better suited as a quest reward. Can also consider a way for non-org members to defile the altar down to get rid of it. Once the altar is gone, village feelings will act the same as they normally would once again. (ie. if Rockholm is Discontent with Mag cause they hold Angkrag, and someone raises the altar to bring Mag feelings back to Neutral. If the altar is defiled down, then the feelings won't immediately revert back to Discontent, but slowly work their way back there).
This is something @Sylandra and I were joking about. As silly/pointless as the idea is, I'd honestly love it!
BFF Pendant (50db?): A pendant that breaks in two, friendship necklace style. You offer one half to another person, and if they accept, they are your BFF! You see when your BFF logs in or out, and you both get a line in your honors (near the stuff about spouse and family) that states you are Best Friends Forever with <person>. You may only have one BFF at a time. The friendship can be broken after being accepted, but the pendant will cease to exist.
Curious Curio Cabinet - when placed in a manse and left alone, strange things happen within this cabinet. Curios that were there come out...different. (transforms one complete curio into another, once per month, same time every month, but only if it's been left alone for at least x time.)
Tomes of Transendance - while you hold one of these tomes, you can give instruction on the contained skill to whomever you desire, regardless of your actual skill level. Tomes come in several flavours, such as Tome of Transcendant Music, Tome of Transcendant Beastmastery, and Tome of Transcendant Herbalism. For those already transcendant in the relevant skill, your lessons will flow faster than usual, since you can refer back to the Tome to emphasize the lesson.
This incredibly disgusting rag has seen better days. You can use this to envenom a weapon with any venom using the syntax ENVENOM # WITH (VENOM) RAG. Unlimited uses, can only be used on weapons.
----- A sigil of everflowing: 100 credits.
Attach to a vial. That vial is now an artifact vial, but it cannot be linked to the liquid rift or put into a bandolier. Any liquid of any kind which is filled into it will never end, and can be sipped/applied/whatever as many times as possible. Can never be emptied, but can be refilled to change the liquid it holds. -------
Curios that change your tells to give them a sort of ambiance.
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Vesterra's Flag of Noncombatants (meh)
Raising this flag keeps you from being attacked on prime for 24 hours. If you are declared and attacked on prime, you are instead bounced instantly to the Portal of Fate. While the flag is in effect, you may not step onto a non-prime plane, or enter a village your org does not own, or enter enemy territory. If you do, the flag is inactive for 12 hours.
Everiine said: The reason population is low isn't because there are too many orgs. It's because so many facets of the game are outright broken and protected by those who benefit from it being that way. An overabundance of gimmicks (including game-breaking ones), artifacts that destroy any concept of balance, blatant pay-to-win features, and an obsession with convenience that makes few things actually worthwhile all contribute to the game's sad decline.
A sigil of everflowing: 100 credits.
Attach to a vial. That vial is now an artifact vial, but it cannot be linked to the liquid rift or put into a bandolier. Any liquid of any kind which is filled into it will never end, and can be sipped/applied/whatever as many times as possible. Can never be emptied, but can be refilled to change the liquid it holds.
Didn't the never ending health/mana/bromide go for a few thousand credits each in auctions? I highly doubt anything that gives never ending potions would be less than 3K credits if not more around 5K+, as nice as it would be have such an artifact open to everyone.
I don't actually know, I don't remember it ever selling here.
Everiine said: The reason population is low isn't because there are too many orgs. It's because so many facets of the game are outright broken and protected by those who benefit from it being that way. An overabundance of gimmicks (including game-breaking ones), artifacts that destroy any concept of balance, blatant pay-to-win features, and an obsession with convenience that makes few things actually worthwhile all contribute to the game's sad decline.
They were sold in two separate auctions. I believe in the first one they went for less (I seem to recall only paying a bit over 1000 for mine), in the second the health went higher. But that was a very, very, very long time ago so I may not be remembering correctly.
There are 6 total in the game (2 health, 2 mana, 2 bromides), and I cannot remember who has the other five aside from Ialie (who has a bromides iirc).
Item of making certain quests bearable (AKA: Magnifying Glass/Powder of Ibn Ghazi/Forensics Kit): Allows you to discover all the hidden objects in the room. Excellent for quests where the hidden object in the room isn't actually a part of the room longdesc.
Edit: Or make it a skill in discernment. Just give me some way to work through quests like these.
Everyone is a genius. But if you judge a fish on its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.
Wear this mask and fall asleep to see/speak in dream form. You don't have access to any dreamweaving abilities, and you cannot move from the room. Your body will be plainly visible and vulnerable on the ground, asleep. Sleeping/waking requires a sequence to complete (can't be done fast).
A re-usable sacrificial dagger. It is a low-cost alternative to the cameo/intaglio, but the catch is you have to suffer death xp loss to reincarnate, and you have to go to the portal of fate, etc.
Comments
Estarra the Eternal says, "Give Shevat the floor please."
If kiss lips only used 1 hour at a time of the 24 that would be amazing.
Gain access to Newton for 24 hours. (Suggested before in some variant, but those honor lines are tortureeee).
Lens of an alternate timeline - BREAK LENS <quest> to gain a, non-epic, quest honours line. Merge that timeline with this one, where the only difference is that one honours line!
While I know it will most likely never be a thing, I can hope:
<something cool sounding> - by having this artifact, you can take ONE out of guild skill (under normal skillflex rules) instead of a normal choice.
and to go with that
Power Converter - Be able to use power skills when you normally wouldn't (ie, when a skill requires commune nexus power when you are a city person)
By feeding this little beastie 3p, you gain the effects of a single song as if a friendly bard were playing it. Syntax is EARWORM <skillset> <skill>. Power cost is in addition to whatever power cost the song has, and the effect persists for 1 hour. Does not work under truedeaf.
Diadem of Dialects
Allows you to understand any non-divine spoken language. (obviously won't translate Crowspeak, gratuitous Greek, extraneous Latin, woebegotten Welsh, or player-created 'charming' brogues. May or may not work on Delportian.)
Tradition of Patronage: Allows the family head and anyone that s/he authorizes OFFER PATRONAGE TO <PLAYER> to bring that player into the family as a retainer. A retainer counts as a member of the family for the purposes of family size and honor generation, but the retainer cannot pass on the family status to spouses or children. A person who is already part of a different family can become a retainer, at which point they stop counting as a member of their original family for family size and honor generation. Both the patron and the retainer can break the relationship at any time, with honor loss comparable to a person rejecting family. This one is especially good because it lets people get involved in families without committing their character to actually being a noble in the families where that sort of thing is relevant.
Tradition of Polygamy: People in this family can have multiple spouses. No matter how many marriages a person is involved in, they can only ever be in one family at a time.
Tradition of Aristocratic Marriage: Members of this family can propose to their cousins, aunts/uncles, and any more distant relations. Useful because Hallifax (and I assume most other orgs) is preposterously inbred as it is and this would make marriage more convenient.
Tradition of Disproportionate Influence: Your family counts as being 1 person bigger than it really is for determining lesser and greathouse status. Can be stacked up to some reasonable cap that prevents two person greathouses. Useful because getting 50 people is an incredibly steep requirement given Lusternia's current population.
Tradition of Secularism: Your family patron can now be set to "Secular" which gives an honor trickle for people who are not members of any order instead of being in the patron's order. Useful for family's that don't want to align themselves with a specific god and for those that specifically want to embrace secularism and mortal power.
Tradition of Polytheism: Can have a second family patron for the purposes of honor trickle. Stackable up to some reasonable limit. Should probably be mutually exclusive with Secularism for thematic reasons.
BFF Pendant (50db?): A pendant that breaks in two, friendship necklace style. You offer one half to another person, and if they accept, they are your BFF! You see when your BFF logs in or out, and you both get a line in your honors (near the stuff about spouse and family) that states you are Best Friends Forever with <person>. You may only have one BFF at a time. The friendship can be broken after being accepted, but the pendant will cease to exist.
(transforms one complete curio into another, once per month, same time every month, but only if it's been left alone for at least x time.)
Tomes of Transendance - while you hold one of these tomes, you can give instruction on the contained skill to whomever you desire, regardless of your actual skill level. Tomes come in several flavours, such as Tome of Transcendant Music, Tome of Transcendant Beastmastery, and Tome of Transcendant Herbalism. For those already transcendant in the relevant skill, your lessons will flow faster than usual, since you can refer back to the Tome to emphasize the lesson.
This incredibly disgusting rag has seen better days. You can use this to envenom a weapon with any venom using the syntax ENVENOM # WITH (VENOM) RAG. Unlimited uses, can only be used on weapons.
-----
A sigil of everflowing: 100 credits.
Attach to a vial. That vial is now an artifact vial, but it cannot be linked to the liquid rift or put into a bandolier. Any liquid of any kind which is filled into it will never end, and can be sipped/applied/whatever as many times as possible. Can never be emptied, but can be refilled to change the liquid it holds.
-------
Curios that change your tells to give them a sort of ambiance.
--------
Vesterra's Flag of Noncombatants (meh)
Raising this flag keeps you from being attacked on prime for 24 hours. If you are declared and attacked on prime, you are instead bounced instantly to the Portal of Fate. While the flag is in effect, you may not step onto a non-prime plane, or enter a village your org does not own, or enter enemy territory. If you do, the flag is inactive for 12 hours.
There are 6 total in the game (2 health, 2 mana, 2 bromides), and I cannot remember who has the other five aside from Ialie (who has a bromides iirc).
Edit: Or make it a skill in discernment. Just give me some way to work through quests like these.
Wear this mask and fall asleep to see/speak in dream form. You don't have access to any dreamweaving abilities, and you cannot move from the room. Your body will be plainly visible and vulnerable on the ground, asleep. Sleeping/waking requires a sequence to complete (can't be done fast).
Basically a one-room peek into out-of-phase.