Common Magic Items by Effects

Common magical items are NOT ubiquitous. These are items that are common enough that it makes sense to encounter them and that they would be fairly well known, but not everybody will have access to all, or even any of them. Especially in fringe communities away from denser population centers, unless said location is home to a master artisan, even the most common of magic items are relatively rare.

The following magic items are minor examples and would be some of the most prevalent. They are categorized by effects first, as those make the most difference in determining the severity of the magic. A magic that produces a small flame is minor in comparison to one that produces a bonfire, the only difference is in the size of the effect, and so a list of potential effects with examples are illustrated below.

Combos: several magical items on the list can fit across many of the categories. Generally, the more categories a magic item crosses into, the stronger or more expensive it is, but magic items aren’t limited to a single effect.

Terms:
Arotiles - magic item from a previous epoch, lit. “ancient gift or gift of the ancients”
Jālaorin- magic item made in the recent past with many uses or ongoing use
Chulik - magic item made recently made with one-time use

Combat Equipment:

At a point before any known recorded history of the 4th Epoch, it became so commonplace to have weapons imbued with a piercing or metal separating congruence that metal armor was entirely abandoned. It became infinitely more important to avoid the hit in the first place than to withstand it. Thus weapons and prowess (see below) were orienting towards speed and maneuverability within their congruence imbuements. Armored individuals eventually returned as an extremely specialized school of martial skill, with heavily imbued armor made to withstand piercing attacks. At this point the armor nullifying imbuements on weapons have almost all been abandoned but the mentality brought by switching styles towards mobility in combat has never been lost. Most weapons found have no magic about them whatsoever, but those that do possess an extremely wide range of effects, including some of those listed below.

Effects:

Directional/spatial:

Compass- a compass has many iterations, ranging from the most complex being fully rendered 3d topographical maps to sensations of assigned points of interest being in general directions. Certain compasses are worn on the wrist and cause the wearer to subconsciously move their arm in the direction of the programmed target, whether it is ‘north’ or ‘home’ or something else.

Town Bell- a bell that most small settlements have, that rings when a sapient being enters the town premises. Could potentially be connected to a national network that will ring a different tone if a known criminal enters the area.

Comboards - these consist of large chalkboards where whatever is written on the “primary” one is reflected on all of the “secondary” boards. This is very useful for sending out communications to the whole population of an area or to military bases. Comboards are a unique technology to Karg.

Emitting/reducing:

Glowlight- a small pearl-sized orb that constantly emits a wavelength of light. Glowlights can be used for about 100 years before running out of juice.

Muffler- an amorphous foam that reduces all sounds as they travel through the air. Vibrations still occur.

Flare- a magic item that when broken emits a near-blinding stream of light for a brief period of time before dissipating.

Fog/smoke maker- a magic item that typically resembles a small piece of anatomy from a living being, ranging from stomachs to heads, which upon activation, usually a harsh impact, begins billowing forth a surplus of gas that quickly fills the nearby space. More expensive variants contain specific gasses whereas more common ones will be filled with gasses whose main purpose is to create a vision screen.

Elemental- the magic item, upon activation, releases an element of the chosen type. Think traditional magic flaming swords and the like, but are not limited to weapons. Like the fog/smoke makers, these can have a variety of uses beyond bow and blade.

Instant fire starter- a wicked box that burns when the cord is pulled into it and out the other end, it stays lit until the wick emerges out the other side again, and can be reused after cleaning off the cord.

Morphing:

Skeleton key- a twig-like item that molds itself the best it can to fit any available space. Once inserted into a location like a lock, it will mimic the shape of the key to the best of its ability. Poorly made skeleton keys have a bad habit of making pockets unusable as they fill the pocket when inserted, making them near impossible to grab out again and causing much hassle for the lockpicker.

Unpickable lock- the counterpart to the skeleton key, it is a lock that shifts constantly, allowing entry only on a set condition apart from, or in addition to the standard key.

Living wire- a spool of thread, twine, sinew, or metal that loops and bends with a seeming life of its own. Besides being able to knot itself well, and untie on commands, high quality spools are able to bind to objects that match their type, linking them until released or severed.

Bending rod- a rod or beam that is able to bend several degrees without a pivot point, negating certain structural weaknesses of whatever larger implement it is a part of. (maybe a fun weapon like a spear that functions almost like a whip)

Extracting/infusing:

Oil siphon- a small cube pockmarked with holes, that when placed next to plant life will draw forth oils. Versions for animals also exist, although their composition and use is much the same.

State changing:

Whipcracker- a material that coils around an object and stiffens itself to a given shape. When activated the process is fast enough that the transition produces a noise like a whip crack. Commonly used when securing criminals as custom shackles.

Molding gloves- gloves that reduce the hardness/consistency of whatever they touch, making tough stone moldable like clay. The effects are always less pronounced on objects that are less hard. Touching a person with them would be no more than annoying, and grabbing mud, or even items with a heavy viscosity would show no difference.

Lengthener/shortener:

Time dilator- an item which slows down or expands the perception of time, but otherwise does not alter the person. Their reaction times are still similar to what they would be normally. Excessive use can lead to perception of time as a fusion of equally probable diverging pathways during use, and hallucinations outside of use.

Accelerate/decelerate:

Projectile accelerator- rather than applying extra force, or by repelling the projectile, the magic device magnifies the overall acceleration of the item when it is released until it comes into contact with another solid. Certain projectiles can almost completely ignore the acceleration of gravity and travel in perfectly straight lines.

Gathering Cart- a larger magic item that functions like a much larger version of a spring-loaded racing toy, the gathering cart accrues a cap-able amount of velocity while it is travelling that allows for segmented bursts of high speed and acceleration.

Imitator/appearance/copier:

Scene capture- A paper that when spread across a surface will imprint the appearance of the surface onto itself. Other variants include a parchment that when looked at from the correct angle, will seemingly vanish as it changes its appearance to perfectly match whatever is behind it when viewed.

Vanisher- a magic item that functions as a puppet, it imitates the actions of those it sees until they move out of its line of sight, where it will continue to mimic the actions until the congruence temporarily drains. Named as Vanishers because many of these dolls and puppets appear and disappear without a trace of theft, as if they walked away on their own.

Fleshmask- an item that mimics the consistency and appearance of flesh, it attaches itself to the body and creates a form-fitting mold of the person’s body part. This is normally used in grievous wounds, but can be used as beauty care for the ultra rich, or as disguises for (usually) non-humans, although only the most exquisite would be able to shift form from their user’s original body type to transform into something else, and only a select few in existence would be enough to cover an entire body.

Echo- an orb that seemingly captures the sounds of areas it is within when active and replays them.

Weight:

Floating orb- a magic item that reduces its own apparent mass allowing it to float in place, although other variants reduce the force required to move an object of its own mass. Stronger orbs are able to float with additional weight beyond their own mass.

Friction:

Float gas- creates a pocket bubble of gas that travels for a short distance before dissipating. Anything that comes into contact with it will have their coefficient of friction reduced dramatically. Its forms most frequently include wind instruments.

Onus- A small urchin-like stickable gem. It creates an exponentially stronger coefficient of friction, effectively grounding the item it touches, and rendering living beings extremely clumsy.

Emotion:

Fonts- (see replicating)

Concentration/distraction:

Lapse- a magic item in the form of a small bowl, cistern or pool, that muddles thought and removes clarity. Glancing at it is often enough to make the watcher forget what they were just doing, and staring at it brings about a state of stupor that is usually only broken by outside influence, or a deeper instinctual need such as hunger.

Tied/bound:

Data slate- a tablet that serves as an information source, tied to either other tablets or a library.

Promise rings- sappy and romantic magic items that let another living being understand the current emotional state of the partner, regardless of distance.

Severing & fracturing/mending & merging:

Sleet- congruence infused liquid that seeps into cracks and upon activation, enters a state of solid-and-liquid form that constantly freezes and expands while still following the patterns of a liquid, quickly expanding the cracks until the object is severed. Low quality sleet functions without much direction, but high quality can be primed and aimed.

Slicing nail- a short magical tool that parts gases, liquids, and solids that are very soft wherever it slides through, but then prevents those items from rejoining for a time afterward.

Haunt:

Carrion creator- what appears to be an ever-growing mass of meat and carcass is in actuality a magical item. Never growing beyond a rather small size, they continually produce random biological items from themselves in a never ending and slow stream. (could have a fun location that was overrun by either a bunch or 1 massive one)

Swapper:

Sensate- a gel that transmits the sensations of the wearer to another targeted individual.

Nullifier/enhancer:

Mum- a gag/mouthwrap sometimes used by cryptum to overcome bouts of cognitive pain, the mum neutralizes certain senses to alleviate the stress on their brains, and well-crafted mums can have much more targeted functionalities. Some iterations have been co-opted by the Slaver’s Syndicate and other such groups as a means to help control people.

Property shifting/transmuting:

Seed eater- a magic item that looks like moss, it eats the plant matter around it and converts it into a highly fertile mulch, although as it is not living itself, it does not grow, reproduce, nor spread. Variants and offshoots transform the plant matter into other substances, and in particularly haunted or grim locations, may function similar to carrion creators.

Enhancing/subtracting:

Prowess- a trailing ribbon of energy that wraps itself around the user, enhancing the bearer’s physique, stamina, appearance, or mental fortitude. Different colors, lengths, and shapes of ribbon affect the powers, versatility, and longevity of the beneficial effects, but something like a small blue ribbon around a finger would serve as a boost of coffee but for the whole day. These items are one of the most widespread and sought after common items, replacing armor for all but an extremely select few Armored.

Replicating:

Fonts- commonly used with emotions or sounds for places of worship, these magic items are assigned a set pattern to follow which they carry out repeatedly. These can either be of subtle emotional states, or musical patterns. Those that are built for emotion give a sentiment of the emotional theme to those nearby, almost subconsciously suggesting that that particular emotion is prevalent in the area, as if a crowd were feeling it without necessarily changing the moods of the people in the area of effect.

Inscriber- an item that replicates the way a living being progresses through life. When assigned an owner it will begin to overlap the person’s identity with its own, effectively turning into a personal journal that can contain images and writings. The limiting factors are the size of the book and the abstraction of thought. It will only write in itself during more focused and cognizant moments, and will eventually run out of pages, at which point it “dies” and becomes a normal item.

Attracting/repulsing:

Binder- the equivalent of a strong glue or quick-dry cement, oftentimes in the form of a paste, but in rarer cases may be seen as a beam that causes the objects it highlights to attract together. Outlying cases can have the objects partially fuse.

Absorbing:

Blood eater- used to harvest iron from livestock most frequently, but can be brought to battlefields, a blood eater extracts blood from corpses and ejects the iron. When eating, it is cold, almost freezing, to the touch, and only the iron is reclaimed; the rest of the blood is lost. Almost all of the existing iterations of this item were created before the Literary Purge Purge by an unknown crafter.

Dew Collector- a magic circlet that upon the sunrise instantly sucks the dew from a radius around it and holds it in a bubble above itself. If the dew was frozen, it still activates, but the bubble is made of ice.

Congruence catcher- a rarer and mostly useless item for a majority of the population, a congruence catcher absorbs the congruence in the world and stores it within itself as a neutral signature, amounting to about one person’s worth. Because it doesn’t change the rate of absorbing congruence, it only really is used for explorations into blighted regions, and even then it still drains.