Curiosa Mixtura Mortis: Introduction to Toxicology
Poisoning Skill
The poisoning skill in of itself governs seven distinct abilities:
- The ability to apply Poisons and Toxins to weapons and items with success
- The duration of how long a Poison lasts upon an item (weapons excluded)
- The difficulty a Poison is to cure.
- The amount of Poison applications a weapon with an applied Poison can deliver.
- The chance to deliver accurate strikes with a weapon to deliver an applied Poison or Toxin (chance to hit with Poison/Toxin).
- The ability to utilize special reagents in the crafting of custom Toxins.
- The ability to successfully create Toxins of varying difficulties.
Alchemical Poisons (AKA Poisons)
Alchemical Poisons (or simply Poisons) represent traditional, tried and true toxic mixtures that, when applied to a weapon, inflict a typical effect. These effects revolve primarily around the reduction of a target's health points over a designated amount of time, although exceptions do exist. Alchemical poisons, as indicated by their namesake, are crafted with the Alchemy skill. As Poisons consist of exact recipes and specific ingredients of which are widely known throughout the lands, they can be easily countered through the use of standard “cure” potions and mixtures.
The most common poisons are all derived from the same basic ingredients, and are often referred to simply by their potency and overall effectiveness. They are as follows:
- Lesser Poison: (Reduces current Hit Points by up to 7% once every 2 seconds for 20 seconds)
- Regular Poison: (Reduces current Hit Points by up to 10% once every 3 seconds for 30 seconds)
- Greater Poison: (Reduces current Hit Points by up to 15% once every 4 seconds for 40 seconds)
- Deadly Poison: (Reduces current Hit Points by up to 30% once every 5 seconds for 60 seconds)
- Lethal Poison: (Reduces current Hit Points by up to 35% once every 5 seconds for 80 seconds)
Poison Cure Resistance and Curing Poisons
Poisons can be cured by using alchemical cure potions or through certain Hematology mixtures. The Cure Rating of an alchemical potion or Hematology mixture indicates how strong the Cure effect will be, and works against a Poison's Cure Resistance. If a Cure effect is equal to or greater than a Poison's Cure Resistance, the Poison will be rendered cured. Every applied Poison has a Cure Resistance value associated with it, which is directly linked to the Poisoner's skill in applying Poisons along with the general strength of the Poison itself, and is calculated as follows: Poisoner's Skill / 2 + Poison Innate Bonus. The innate bonuses of Poisons are as follows:
- Lesser Poison: +5%
- Regular Poison: +10%
- Greater Poison: +15%
- Deadly Poison: +30%
- Lethal Poison: +35%
The Cure Resistance of an applied poison will be indicated to a Poisoner upon the successful application of a Poison upon a weapon or an item.
Cure potions range in their overall effectiveness to combat a Poison through use of their Cure Effectiveness rating. Alchemical Cure potions have the following ratings:
- Lesser Cure: 25
- Regular Cure: 50
- Greater Cure: 75
Hematology mixtures can vary in their Cure Ratings. The wise Poisoner must also take into account a target's specific skills, abilities and equipment when factoring in if they have the ability to cure themselves of a Poison. For example, while a Greater cure has a default rating of 75, a character possessing Contrivance Receptiveness II ability within the Alchemy school would benefit from a 90 point Cure Rating once bonuses have been applied, thus being able to cure a Deadly Poison applied from even the most skilled Poisoner.
Applying Poisons: General
Poisons can be applied to a wide variety of items, to include weapons, food and drinks, alchemical potions, Hematology syringes, and other various instruments that may involve being consumed or applied to one's body. Applying poisons to different types of items requires different levels of prowess in Poisoning. In general, weaker Poisons are easier to apply, whereas stronger Poisons are harder to apply. Different classes of weapons require varying different abilities to be purchased through the Poisoning skill menu in order for them to be coated with Poisons (and Toxins). Poisoned weapons will also have a limited number of uses, or “charges”, before the Poison is rendered useless. The Proficient Poisoning abilities can help alleviate the difficulty in applying poisons to items and weapons. To apply a Poison to a weapon or item, one must use a Poison Application Toolkit. Double-clicking the tool kit will allow you to target a Poison potion, and then the item you wish to poison. If successful, the Poison will be consumed and the item will be poisoned.
Triggering Poisons: Items
In the case of items, such as food, drink, potions and other similar consumables, when a poisoned item is used by a player or NPC, the poison will be applied to the player that would be consuming or using the item.
Triggering Poisons: Weapons
In the case of triggering the effect of a Poison when using a weapon, an attacker's skill in Poisoning will determine the general likelihood of applying a Poison upon a connected hit (10% skill would result in a 10% chance, for example.). Of note, when a Poison is successfully applied on a hit, a “charge” of Poison will be consumed. In addition, a percentage of durability of the weapon will be consumed due to the corrosive nature of Poisons.
Of considerable note is the weapon tactic Infectious Strike; this tactic can allow even the most ignorant in the ways of the Poisoning skill to successfully administer Poisons via a poisoned weapon, regardless of their skill.
Removing Poisons from Weapons
To remove Poisons from Weapons, one may use an Oil Cloth. Double-clicking the Oil Cloth will remove the poison from the weapon in question.
Toxicology
Toxins are custom-made blends and strains of debilitating caustic liquids that, when applied to weapons, can wreak havoc upon foes. Toxins, unlike their Poison counterparts, are longer-lasting and more versatile, being able to inflict specific negative alterations to stats and instill debilitating conditions as opposed to simply targeting the health of an adversary. Toxins are crafted from combining a combination of up to ten different Toxin Samples, special reagents that are gathered from animals, monsters and the wilds of Eden. Toxins are furthermore treated with Alchemical Oils, specialty mixtures created by Alchemists that directly affect a Toxins overall Duration and Corrosivity.
Skill level and prowess in Poisoning directly affects the types of Toxin Samples you may use in Toxin-craft, how many Samples you can add to a single Toxin concoction, and the likelihood of success in crafting a Toxin.
To access the Toxin-craft system, a character must acquire the Toxicologist ability. Once acquired, a character may use a Toxin Mixing Kit within range of a Toxin Table to open the Toxicology menu.
Anatomy of a Toxin
Toxins are defined by a few key elements; the ingredients and reagents used to create the Toxin, the duration a Toxin lasts when applied to a weapon, the corrosivity of a Toxin, and the effects a Toxin has when applied to a target.
Toxin Ingredients:
- Alchemical Oils
- Toxin Samples
Toxins, as noted above, are created by combining Toxin Samples and Alchemical Oils in order to create a coating that, when applied to weapons, will deliver varying negative conditions to a target upon a successful hit.
Alchemical Oils are the basis of all Toxins, and contribute to two key attributes of a Toxin; extending the Duration of a Toxin, and reducing the Corrosivity of a Toxin. Alchemical Oils are crafted by Alchemists, and are essential to the crafting of any and all Toxins. In of themselves, Alchemical Oils do not alter or contribute to the Effects of a Toxin other than altering the Toxin's overall Duration and Corrosivity.
Toxin Samples contribute to the Effects of a Toxin. Toxin Samples produce a wide variety of different effects, ranging from reducing specific stat points of a target by a given value for a short period of time, to outright lowering values such as Hit Points, Mana and Stamina. Toxin Samples add to the various Effects a Toxin instills, at the expense of reducing the Toxin's overall Duration and raising the Toxin's overall Corrosivity.
Toxin Samples are mainly acquired through using the Skinning skill upon certain creatures and monsters, and require the Specimen Specialist ability along with specimen vials to be harvested correctly.
Toxin Duration
All Toxins have a limited amount of time that they will remain viable after being applied to a weapon; this time period is known as a Toxin's Duration. When initially crafted, a Toxin's Duration may last anywhere from days to mere minutes, depending on the strength of the Toxin's effects. Toxin Duration can be extended by adding Alchemical Oils to a Toxin mixture, and is reduced by adding Toxin Samples; thus, it is important to temper and balance combinations of Oils and Toxin Samples to tailor Toxins of varying duration and intensities. Poisoners whom invest in the later tiers of the Toxin-craft ability line can benefit from bonuses to a Toxin's initial duration value.
Every time a Toxin is successfully applied to an enemy in combat, the Toxin's duration will be lowered by a given percentage value. By default, a Toxin's duration will be lowered by 10% upon every successful application. The value in which a Toxin loses duration upon a successful strike can be reduced down to 4% by investing in the Toxin Tactician abilities.
Toxin Corrosivity
All Toxins have an inherent Corrosivity value assigned to them as well, which represents the amount of durability damage that a weapon that has the Toxin applied to it will suffer upon it periodically over the duration of the Toxin's presence upon the weapon. Corrosivity has a very small chance to strike at any random time over the course of the Toxin's lifespan, and therefore, lower Corrosivity levels of Toxins are imperative in order to preserve weapon integrity. On average, a Toxin has around a 50% chance to perform a durability reduction equal to the Toxin's Corrosivity penalty roughly every minute or so that a Toxin remains applied to a weapon. More lethal Toxins will result in higher Corrosivity values, while weaker Toxins may have little to no Corrosivity to them. Corrosivity can be lowered by adding Alchemical Oils to a Toxin mixture, and raised by adding Toxin Samples.
Corrosivity can in fact lead to the destruction of a weapon if it's durability drops to zero once an application of a Toxin has been made. Therefore, it is encouraged that Toxin users pay close attention to equipment that is coated in Toxins.
Toxin Effects
As mentioned above, a Toxin's Effects can be varied. Over twenty different individual Toxin Effects can be found within the game world, and Toxin Samples will yield various combinations of these Effects in varying intensities. Effects from Toxin Samples give diminishing returns, so using identical Toxin Samples will progressively reduce the effectiveness of it's active effect or effects. Therefore, it is encouraged that aspiring Poisoners seek out a variety of different Toxin Sample reagents to use within their Toxin-crafting endeavors.
Toxin-craft Menu
Name
The name you wish to bestow upon your Toxin. Passed on to the final created item, as well as Formulas.
Effects
The Effects that your Toxin will deliver to an NPC or player when successfully administered in combat. Of particular note is the Toxin's Corrosivity and Duration.
Stability
The overall stability of the Toxin mixture, and a direct correlation to the likelihood of success in crafting the mixture. Your skill in Poisoning, coupled with the power and amount of total Toxin Samples used in a Toxin-craft attempt determines the overall Stability of a mixture.
Vial Loading Area
The area in which you can begin targeting Toxin Samples and Alchemical Oils for the use in Toxin-craft. A total of ten vials are available per toxin-craft attempt.
Decanter
The item artwork used for the final toxin-craft product. If successfully crafted, the Toxin will be placed within the item artwork displayed in this area.
Change Art
Opens the decanter selection menu, allowing you to choose different decanters to store your Toxin in. Serves aesthetic purposes only. Formulas
Used for saving and loading Toxin formulas. To save a toxin-craft mixture to a formula for future use, select the “Save New Formula” option, and target a blank Toxin formula (attainable from Artisans). To load a previously saved Toxin, use the “Create From Formula” option, and select a formula from your pack.
Mix and Cancel
Will attempt the toxin-craft craft or cancel the current mixture.
Applying Toxins: General
Toxins, unlike their Poison counterparts, are designed for more extended and general purpose uses. By their nature, Toxins normally enjoy longer periods of viable use, and are often utilized to augment play-styles, equipment builds and archetypes rather than instilling instantaneous and violent damage augmentations to health points. Due to this extended use nature, Toxins can only be applied to weapons, and are not suitable for being applied to food or instrumentality.
Toxins are also applied to targets in a more passive nature than Poisons. Whereas a skilled Poisoner will find that delivering Poisons during combat can be nearly guaranteed with high levels of skills, Toxins rely on penetrating a target's Poison Resistance value before they will be applied with success. Once a Toxin is applied to a weapon, the chance that the Toxin will be applied to a target upon a successful hit is based around the target's overall Poison resistance vs. the weapon user's Poisoning skill. The standard formula for this chance is as follows:
- Weapon User's Poison Skill – Target Poison Resistance = % chance for successful deployment of Toxin on weapon hit.
Targets with high levels of Poison Resistance can be especially resilient to Toxins applied by all but the most proficient Poisoner, and thus, Poisoners are encouraged to take into account a target's defensive capabilities when employing the use of Toxins. This crucial disadvantage of Toxins is however offset by the fact that Toxins traditionally enjoy more overall uses than Poisons, and are often less damaging to weapons than Poisons are. In addition, and probably most importantly, whereas Poisons can be cured through the use of Alchemical cure potions, Toxin effects cannot be purged from a victim until either they are knocked out, or the effect expires naturally. To apply a Toxin to a weapon, ensure that you have the appropriate skill perk for the type of weapon you wish to apply the Toxin to, and then utilize a Poison Application Toolkit. Double-clicking the tool kit will allow you to target a Toxin potion, and then the weapon you wish to apply the Toxin to. If successful, the Toxin will be consumed and the item will be poisoned. The success chance of applying a Toxin to different types of weapons vary, however as a rule of thumb, it is usually harder to successfully apply a Toxin to a weapon such as a crossbow than it is to a dagger.
Final Tips
Poisons are used for more violent and immediate reactions
Toxin Samples add and augment Effects of a Toxin, at the cost of raising Corrosivity and lowering Duration.
Alchemical Oils raise the Duration of Toxins, and lower Corrosivity, at the expense of using up a viable vial for Toxin effects.
Different qualities of Alchemical Oils will raise Duration more and reduce larger amounts of Corrosivity, at the expense of Stability. Poison Samples, like other harvested reagents, have a limited viable time-window to be used effectively; do not let them expire before being crafted into a non-expiring Toxin!