Adventuring Gear + Alchemy Items

YOU CAN SKIP OVER THE ADVENTURING GEAR SECTION BECAUSE IT'S BORING BUT HERE ARE THE GOOD PARTS: Salt damages oozes and can be used to preserve meat.  Lots of thing can be animated by necromancer PCs because they're mostly animal products: grease, ink, oil, etc.  High quality mirrors are as rare as minor magic items.  Go read the Alchemical Items section, those are a lot more interesting.

If you're reading this on your phone the tables probably won't render well, but that's fine, just skip to the bottom and read this post backwards, staring with the interesting alchemy bits.

So here is part of that list.  It just includes Adventuring Gear and Alchemical Items.  I'll do the other stuff (Hirelings, Weapons, Armor, Lodging, Investments, Services, Animals) later.

by Viktor Titov

How to Read This

Short Name is the quick, efficient way to refer to an item.

Full Name is the more interesting way to refer to an item.  It's how NPCs in the game will refer to the item, if the DM is really into it and y'all are talking to someone that speaks adventurer.  Some of these might just be adventurer slang, really.  If there are different types, they will all be listed.  (e.g. Woskum and Brusky are both types of liquor.)

Cost is in gold coins, for most systems.  Whatever the unit is that gives 1 xp.

Inventory Slots is how much space they take to carry.  Most people can carry a number of items equal to their Str+5.

Availability is how hard it is to find these items.  If you see 'City', you know you can probably find it in a major city.  'Town' means that you can probably find it in a town.  If you see neither, that means that it's probably not available on any open market.

ADVENTURING GEAR
Short Name	Full Name	Cost	Inventory Slot	Availability
Liquor, flask (3 doses)	Woskum Brusky Horlick Scumbo Snakey	10	1	City
Blanket	Blanket	5	1	City	Town
Bottle, glass	Bottle, glass	5	1	City
Caltrops, bag	Dragon's teeth, bag Tribulations, bag	5	1	City	Town
Clothing, common	Scrappers	10	-	City	Town
Clothing, noble	Wagonscrews	100	-	City
Crowbar	Jimmy pig Iron crow	5	1	City	Town
Chalk	Gypsy stick	1	-	City	Town
Garlic, bulb	Stinking rose	1		City	Town
Grapple + 20' Rope	Grapnel	10	1	City	Town
Grease, sack	Tallow, sack	1	1	City	Town
Holy symbol, wood	Nine eyes, glove	5	1	City	Town
Holy symbol, silver	Nine eyes, glove, silvered	50	1	City
Holy water, vial	Holy water, vial	25	1/3	City
Ink, vial	Atrament, vial	5	1/3	City
Lantern, hooded	Lantern, hooded	10	1	City
Lantern, bullseye	Lantern, bullseye	20	1	City
Lockpick, Set	Rat fingers	10	1	City
Mirror, copper	Mirror, copper	10	1	City
Mirror, glass	Looking-class	200	1	City
Oil, flask	Leviathan oil, flask	20	1	City
Pole, 10'	Dungeon stick	1	1	City	Town
Ration	Salted fish Offa Dried Gosca Jo Bread Hard tack Stone cheese	1	1/3	City	Town
Rope, hemp, 50'	Rope, hemp, 50'	10	1	City	Town
Rope, silk, 50'	Rope, silk, 100'	200	1	City
Salt, bag	Salt, bag	10	1	City
Shovel	Dungeon spoon	10	2	City	Town
Soap	Soap	2	1	City
Spellbook, blank	Spellbook, blank	100	1	City
Spike, iron	Spike, iron	1	1/3	City	Town
Stake, wooden	Stake, iron	1	1	City	Town
Flint and Tinder	Tinderbox	5	-	City	Town
Torch	Torch	1	1	City	Town
Waterskin	Waterskin	1	1	City	Town
ALCHEMICAL ITEMS
Acid, vial	Aqua regia, vial	50	1/3	City
Antidote, greater	Carbuncle	300	1/3
Antidote, lesser	Bezoar	100	1/3	City
Antiplague, vial	Rosewater, vial	50	1/3	City
Black sugar, packet	Black sugar, packet	300	1/3
Bomb	Goblin bomb	100	1
Bomb, stink	Sulfur bomb	300	1	City
Brain jelly	Brain jelly	500	1
Cigarette, pack	Cigarette, pack	10	1/3	City
Cave stench, vial	Cave stench, vial	100	1/3	City
Crystiletto	Charcorran dagger	100	1
Dehydrated water, ampule	Dehydrated water, ampule	300	1/3
Dust of dryness, pouch	Dust of dryness, pouch	300	1/3
Elixir of Youth, vial	Azoth, vial	1000	1/3
Fairy dust, pouch	Fairy dust, pouch	100	1/3
Fireworks	Fireworks	50	1
Gas, blinding	Beggarmaker, powder	300	1
Gas, rage	Fumes of hell, vial	300	1
Gas, sleep	Olobia, powder	500	1
Gas mask	Gas mask	30	1
Green slime, vial	Green slime, vial	300	1/3
Ingested poison, bitter	Nightshade, powder	10	1/3	City
Ingested poison, subtle	Orpiment, gem	100	1/3
Ingested poison, deadly	King of poisons, powder	500	1/3
Insect repellant, vial	Bog myrtle, vial	10	1/3	City
Jeklogen, vial	Jeklogen, vial	300	1/3
Liquid light, ampule	Liquid light, ampule	50	1/3	City
Midnight wind, ampule	Midnight wind, ampule	100	1/3
Mithridatium, vial	Mithridatium, vial	500	1/3
Mondmilch, vial	Mondmilch, vial	100	1/3
Mutagen, vial	Mutagen, vial	100	1/3
Obliviax, packet	Obliviax, packet	300	1/3
Ooze, vial	Ooze, bottled	300	1/3
Philosopher's stone	Philosopher's stone	???	1/3
Philosopher's frost, crystal	Philosopher's frost, crystal	300	1/3
Poisoned arrow, sleep	Olobia paste, arrow	50	1/3	City
Poisoned arrow, slow	Black hellbore, arrow	10	1/3	City
Poisoned arrow, weak	Viper venom, arrow	100	1/3	City
Poison arrow	Red devil frog slime, arrow	200	1/3
Rust powder, pouch	Rust powder, pouch	500	1/3
Shrieker sprout	Shrieker sprout	50	1
Smoke bomb	Smoke bomb	50	1
Sovereign glue, vial	Sovereign glue, vial	500	1/3
Spiders, bag	Spiders, bag	20	1/3
Stim jelly	Talakeshi jelly	100	1	City
Truth serum, vial	Truth serum, vial	100	1/3	City
Alicorn, powder, pouch	Alicorn, powder, pouch	500	1/3
Universal solvent, vial	Alkahest, vial	500	1/3
Unwater, skin	Unwater, skin	50	1

Adventuring Gear

Liquor, Flask

Just a bunch of booze.  Can be thrown like a flask of oil, except for half as long.  Good for rousing people and making friends.  If you drink it, you get drunk.

<sidebar> Rules for getting drunk: your critical failure range increases by 1 for every point of Drunk. </sidebar>

Bottle, Glass

Glass bottles are entirely anachronistic in a psuedomedieval setting!  But they're more interesting than goat bladders, because they break.

<sidebar>Rules for breakage: glass bottles and vials each have a 50% chance of breaking when you take fall damage.  Roll for each item separately.<sidebar>

Caltrops, Bag

If you're distracted (by a chase, for example), you need to succeed on a Wis check to notice caltrops.  You can spend a round walking through them safely or attempt to jump/dodge them with a Movement check.  Running through them unawares will automatically fuck up your feet.  Fucked up feet cause you to move at half speed for the rest of the day.

Crowbar

Turns most doors from a question to "can we open this door?" to "how long will it take us to open this door?"

Grease, Sack

Dex check to avoid slipping, losing grip.  Also can give you a bonus to squeeze through stuff, or escape grapples.  Made from living stuff, so it can be affected by any necromancy that can affect cows (or sheep, in some places).

Holy Symbol (Glove Embossed with The Nine Eyes Against Chaos)

Used by clerics.  A leather glove with nine eyes in the palm, embossed and painted.

Holy Water

2d6 damage to undead.  If drank, has a 2-in-6 chance to cure a curse.  The only fuel that holy fire can use is holy fire.

Ink, vial (Atrament)

Atrament is made from burnt ivory (at least in this setting).  Because it was once part of a living creature, it can be affected by any necromancy that can affect stags (or elephants, in some places).

Lanterns

Hooded: 30' radius.  Bullseye: 60' cone.  If a bullseye lantern is your only light source, combat is difficult (-2 to hit).  If dropped or thrown, they spill.

Lockpicks

Break on a critical failure.  Critical success means you can do all sorts of shit with the lock: extract it, trap it, rekey it, etc.

Mirror, Copper

Good for seeing around corners, and entirely anachronistic.  Don't worry about it.  But if you want to use a mirror to petrify a medusa, you'll need a higher quality mirror than this little dinky shit.

Mirror, Glass

Yes, you can petrify a medusa with this one.  Not available in stores, since the means to its manufacture have been lost.  Ask the king if he has one, or the elves.

Oil, Flask

In a lantern, burns for 2 hours.  As a molotov cocktail, burns for 1d4 damage, 4 rounds, 5' diameter puddle.  Alternatively, a line of fire across a 10' hallway.  Jumping over fire requires a Movement check, and in the case of animals and goblins, a Morale check.

Oil is made from leviathans (sea monsters, basically).  Reduce the price by 50% if you are in a seaside town.

Rations

Try to keep track of what rations are made from--meats are potentially necromantically active.  (And yes, a bunch of reanimated strips of salted fish can make a great distraction.)

Rope, Hemp

Holds 1 person and their gear safely (~200 lbs).  Start making X-in-6 checks if the rope is put under heavier loads, impacts, or shearing (such as sawing it back and forth along a jagged lip).

<sidebar>I've played around with making some items weigh more when wet, such as rope.  I thought of this brilliant idea when I had to carry wet rope for 6 miles.  I don't know how much fun such a rule would be in play, but you know me: I like the idea of keeping simple hazards hazardous.  Water, darkness, climbs.  Water might be significant enough as it is (since it extinguishes most light sources), and may not need any extra rules.</sidebar>

Rope, Silk

Holds 3 people and their gear safely (~600 lbs).  Much stronger than hemp rope.

Salt, bag

2d6 damage if dumped on an ooze.  Can also be used to salt meat, turning it into rations.

<sidebar>Unsalted meat becomes inedible after 1 day.</sidebar>

Soap

Functions like grease except that it can get you cleaner instead of dirtier.  Necromantic potential: cow.

Spellbook

Holds 10 spells.  Built to resist water and fire, thank Heaven.

Torch

Lasts 2 hours.  If you drop them, they continue to burn.

<sidebar>If the party is fighting intelligent foes with darkvision, be sure to have them attack the light sources, especially if there's only one.  Orcs will happily use a combat maneuver to snatch a torch out of your hand and fling it 50' down the hallway.</sidebar>

by Viktor Titov

Alchemical Items

Acid, vial

Can be used to melt a lock, a metal bar, or an 4" hole in the floor, down to the level below.  With 10 vials of acid, you can melt a hole down the next dungeon level large enough to squeeze through.  On a creature, it does 1d6 damage per round for 3 rounds, or until washed off.

Aqua regia is mixture of nitric and hydrochloric acid.  It's orange.  (Note: if you haven't had a chance to play with acids as part of your DM education, I suggest that you do.  Hydrochloric acid is nasty stuff--you can't even hold a small beaker of 12M at arm's length without it fucking with your eyes and respiration.)

Antidote, greater (Carbuncle)

A carbuncle is a smooth, green stone from the forehead of a creature that is also called a carbuncle.  The animal looks a bit like a soft-shelled armadillo famed for its capacity to will itself to die, spoiling its precious carbuncle stone in the process.

If swallowed, a carbuncle instantly cures any poison.

Antidote, lesser (Bezoar)

A rough stone harvested from the stomach of a nine-year-old goat that has been been a special diet its whole life, primarily consisting of shellac, persimmons, and potash.

If swallowed, a bezoar causes intense stomach pains, instantly curing any poison while simultaneously dropping you to 0 HP and disabling you for a round while the two poisons war within your body.

Antiplague, vial (Rosewater)

Diseases are caused by bad smells and miasmas.  The cure, therefore, is a good smell.  Breathing through a rosewater-scented handkerchief gives you +4 to save against contracting diseases.  If drank, it gives you the same bonus against ongoing diseases.

Any perfume will have the same effect; rosewater is just the cheapest one.

Black sugar, packet

If eaten, everything that is said to you for the next 8 hours will be treated as a suggestion.

Bomb (Goblin bombado)

The default bomb deals 3d6 damage in a 10' radius, Dex check for half.  You can cut the fuse to be any length you desire, up to 10 rounds.  A bomb will go off prematurely if it ever takes fire damage directly (100% chance) or if you take fall damage or fire damage while carrying it (2-in-6 chance).  This is just the default bombado--goblins can make a bomb as big as you want.

<sidebar>Like the name implies, bombados can only be purchased from, and manufactured by, goblins.  This is because they are made from large amounts of goblin dung (which are the only true explosives in Centerra, because of reasons).  For many goblins, dung is the only tax they are required to pay, and most goblin towns have a munitions factory located in a position of prominence.</sidebar>

Bomb, stink, vial

Made from volatile sulfur compounds and crushed stink bean.  When broken open, creates a thin cloud 20' in diameter.  Make a Con check each round of exposure.  Failure results in you being unable to do anything except stagger around retching.  Goblins and creatures without noses are immune.  Animals with powerful noses (wolves, etc) automatically fail their Con check.

Brain Jelly

If packed into the skull of a fresh-killed corpse, it will animate and perform simple commands.  Lasts 10 minutes if the body is damaged (default) or a full day if the only thing damaged was the brain (e.g. death via strangulation or head trauma).  The animate creature is not undead.

Cigarettes, pack

If smoked, gives you +4 to save vs fear and makes you much easier to track.  A pack of cigarettes lasts 3 days of dungeoneering (and holds 20 cigarettes).

Cave stench, vial

Smells of rotting meat.  Will attract scavengers and predators after 1d6 exploration turns.  Any tracking creature that passes through cave stench will have its delicate sinuses wrecked, and will be unable to track for the rest of the day.

Crystilletto

From Charcorra.  Single-use daggers that break off in a target, dealing 1d6 additional damage to that creature each time it takes a standard action.  Lasts until the creature spends a standard action extracting it.

Dehydrated water, ampule

Creates 100 gallons of water when broken. It pulls the water in from the air in the dungeon, so you may notice some chapped lips in the minutes after its use.  Works fine in deserts, but is obviously useless in outer space.

Dust of dryness, pouch

Absorbs 100 gallons of water.  If used as a weapon, deals 5d6 damage to a water elemental or 3d6 damage to an ooze.

Elixir of youth, vial (Azoth, vial)

Ages you 1d6+6 years towards the ideal physical age of 21.  Regrows lost limbs.  Cures mutations.  You permanently gain 1 point of Con.

Azoth is the end goal for most alchemists.  The Philosopher's Stone is only pursued by young alchemists, who have not lived long enough to fear old age.

Fairy dust, pouch

Harvested from fairies.  Allows you to fly (at walking speed) as long as you only think about happy things.  If you want to think about happy things while bad things are happening, you need to make a Charisma check.  It is impossible to think about happy things while taking damage.  Lasts 10 minutes.

Fireworks

Also of goblin manufacture.  Most people have never seen fireworks, and the world is full of misinformation regarding them.  Engravings and drawings of fireworks always depict them as leaping imps and dancing dragons.

Gas, Blinding

20' radius.  Con check vs blindness.  If you fail, you get a second Con check after 10 minutes.  If you fail that one, you remain blind permanently.

Gas, rage (Fumes of hell)

20' radius.  Con check vs rage like a barbarian.  (+2 to attack and damage, must attack each turn, no defensive or subtle actions, must pursue fleeing opponents, can attempt to stop raging prematurely 1/round with a 2-in-6 chance of success.)

Made by bottling the literal fumes of hell, where they emerge from the ground in the Brimstone Waste.

Gas, sleep (Olobia vapors)

20' radius.  Basically just a sleep spell.

Gas mask

Protects against dangerous gases and ambient diseases.  (Does not protect against injury-associated diseases, such as when a dire rat bites your leg and then breathes on the wound.)

Goblin hammer

It's really just a long-handled hammer, a grenade, and a detonated strapped together.  Single use, 3d6 damage.  100% chance of detonating if you take fall damage while carrying it, or if its dropped.  (If its in your hands when you fall, you can throw it in a random direction as a free action.)

Green slime, vial

Literally just a tube full of green slime.

This is the most illegal thing on this list.  Because of the enormous potential for destruction, simply carrying a vial of green slime into a city is sufficient evidence of Attempted Civicide.  You will be tortured for a long, long time before you are allowed to die.

DM's Note: Everything in the last paragraph is common knowledge.  Always inform your players before they bring horrible bioweapons up from the Underworld.

Grenade (Goblin grenado)

Explodes after 1d2 rounds, dealing 2d6 damage in a 10' radius, Dex check for half.  A grenado will go of prematurely if it ever takes fire damage directly (100% chance) or if you take fall damage  or fire damage while carrying it (3-in-6 chance).

<sidebar>Grenados are the best and you should give them to your players whenever possible.</sidebar>

Ingested poison, bitter (Nightshade)

Deals 1d6 damage per round for 1 round (successful Con check) or 3 rounds (failed Con check).  Bitter taste must be disguised with strong food.  Note: human NPCs in the GLOG rarely have more than 3 HD, and so a failed Con check here is basically sufficient to kill any NPC you want.

<sidebar>Just as explosives are the favored tactic of goblins, so are poisons the favored tactic of halflings.  If you want the fancy poisons, they're the ones to talk to.</sidebar>

Ingested poison, subtle (Orpiment)

Orpiment is a type of arsenic sulfide crystal.  It looks like an ugly orange-yellow gemstone.  It functions like Nightshade (above) but is absolutely undetectable by taste.

Ingested poison, deadly (King of Poisons)

No taste.  No save.  Manufactured by filling a large jar with toads, scorpions, snakes, and spiders.  After a day, the jar is opened and the surviving animal christened 'the king of poisons'.  It is fed pieces of the other animals before being dried out and ground up.

Insect repellant (Bog myrtle).

Makes you easier to track.

Jeklogen, vial

Turns you into your anti-self.  Invert all stats (e.g. 13 becomes 7) and invert all of your character's traits.  Boys become girls, black hair becomes white.  They know everything that the previous character knew.  Lasts 2 hours.

The new character is still under control the same player, but has the inverse goals. . . sort of.  They know that they won't exist unless the first character drinks more jeklogen, so they have a very good motive to behave.  (Bottom line: you aren't required to act against your own interests if your character drinks Jeklogen).  Nearly all of them resent this limitation intensely.

Liquid light, ampule

When exposed to air or water, it shines as bright as a torch for 10 minutes.  If splashed on a creature that is damaged by sunlight, deals 2d6 damage to them.  If splashed on a creature with darkvision, they get -4 to hit until they can wipe it off (standard action).

Midnight wind, ampule

Also known as vapors of night.  When broken, all fires within 10' are extinguished.  Fires larger than a campfire may survive (X-in-6 chance, determined by the DM).

Mithridatium, vial

Gives you a permanent +2 vs Poisons.  Stacks.

Mondmilch, vial

If drank, you will believe everything you hear for the next 30 seconds, and you will forget any conflicting memories.  If people tell you conflicting information during these 30 seconds, you will go mad.

DM's Note: get out a stopwatch and make the players do this in real time.

Mutagen, vial

Gain a random mutation.  If fed to a small animal (dog-sized or smaller) it grows into a mutant, humanoid version of that creature with Int 3d4.

Obliviax, packet

If this powder is eaten, total amnesia is the result.  If the powder is blown into someone's face, they forget the last minute.

Ooze, vial

This is just a baby ooze with 1 HP.  If you feed it a cow, you'll have a full size ooze on your hands in about 2 hours.  If you throw it on someone, it will deal 1d4 acid damage each round until it is scraped off.  Available in all the varieties of ooze.

Philosopher's Stone

A nondescript grey stone.  Anything it touches turns into gold.  There is no limit on this, so if you give it to your players, expect to have your whole campaign turned upside down.

If the philosopher's stone is ever broken, a thing like a small purple slug will emerge from the geode-like interior and fly away.  All the gold that it created will revert to its original substance.

Philosopher's Frost

Looks like a chunk of ice.  If it touches water, or a water-containing substance, it will freeze it.  Additionally, any water that comes into contact with materials frozen by the philosopher's frost will also be frozen.  (See also: ice-nine.)  If it ever spreads to the water table, rivers, or oceans, all of the world's water will freeze.

If the original piece of philosopher's frost is ever shattered, all of the alchemically-frozen water will revert to normal.  Creatures killed by it will revive without any ill effect except a phobia of the cold and nightmares of winter.

Poisoned Arrow, Sleep (Olobia Paste)

Con vs sleep.  Multiple arrows in a single turn still result in a single Con check vs sleep, but each arrow beyond the first gives a -1 penalty.

<sidebar>For the price of three arrows, you can poison a melee weapon.</sidebar>

Poisoned Arrow, Slow (Black Hellebore)

Takes 1 minute to take effect.  Con vs poison.  1d6 damage per round for 1 round (on a successful save) or 3 rounds (on a failed save).

Poisoned Arrow, Weak (Viper Venom)

Takes effect immediately.  Con vs poison.  1d4 damage per round for 1 round (on a successful save) or 3 rounds (on a failed save).

Poisoned Arrow, Weak (Red Devil Frog Slime)

Slime harvested from the skin of the red devil frog.  Takes effect immediately.  Con vs poison.  1d6 damage per round for 1 round (on a successful save) or 3 rounds (on a failed save).

Rust powder, pouch (Metal rot, powder)

Functions exactly as the touch of a rust monster.  Enough to turn a suit of armor into so much garbage.  The powder looks like gritty black mold.  Single-use.

Metal rot is actually a disease that rots metal.  It is common in water, which is why water causes rust.  It is killed by exposure to air.

by Brian McLachlan

Shrieker sprout

A cute little shrieker mushroom, about the size of a penis.  Shrieks whenever there is movement near within 10'.  Sold with each of its 'mouths' pre-gagged, so it won't be screaming the whole time you're carrying it in your backpack.

Smoke bomb

Creates a cloud of thick smoke 20' in diameter.  Great for escaping, since pursuers cannot see which way you went, and will choose randomly from the possible directions that they know about.

Sovereign glue, vial

Can join any two objects together.  Can repair broken weapons and armor.  Can attach a severed limb to a stump (fresh stump, old stump, your arm, someone else's arm, doesn't matter).  If poured in a wizard's ear, the wizard can fuse spells.  If two people make out with it in their mouths, they'll fuse.

Sovereign glue is greatly desired by all alchemists.  It's an essential precursor in the production of a philosopher's stone or azoth.

Spiders, bag

Exactly what it says on the tin.  1 point of damage on a direct hit, but will distract anyone nearby who is freaked out by thousands of spiders crawling everywhere.

Stim jelly (Talekeshi jelly)

A shitty health potion used by junkies and atheists.  You regain 1d4 HP and take 1d4 Con damage.  Fairly easy to find in slums.  Administered by rubbing it into the gums.  Chronic usage causes psychosis.  Made from the brains of abused cattle.

Truth Serum

Smells like rubber cement.  You'll have to force it down their throat.  Used for interrogation, but mostly just causes mad babbling.  Lasts 30 minutes, then the person falls unconscious for 12 hours.  Assuming the PCs are using this to interrogate people, roll a d4 every 10 minutes.

1 - mad rantings, useless.
2 - they respond to your questions, but they don't address your questions directly.
3 - they don't respond to your questions, but some things they say are potentially useful.
4 - they babble in response to your questions.  There is useful information hidden among the chaff.

Alicorn powder, pouch

Cures all diseases, poisons, and restores all lost HP.  Thereafter, you suffer the curse of the unicorn, and all critical successes you roll are inverted into critical failures.

Universal solvent, vial (Alkahest, vial)

Able to separate anything into its prime components.  Can purify anything (by separating the poison into an immiscible layer).  Can eject a soul from a body (potentially curing demonic possession).  If you want to get really 4e with it, you can also use it to separate enchantments from items, and move them onto other items.  Can move curses the same way.

In most cases, the element that was separated has now been washed off/vomited/sedimented as a separate material that you can now carry around in the vial, like magical run-off.  For example, if you used alkahest to extract a demon, the demon is now a small crystalline man formed for bile salts and denatured alkahest.  You can carry him in your pocket.  Rehydrating him allows him to escape this form, while eating him allows him to repossess you.

Alkahest is greatly desired by all alchemists.  It's an essential precursor in the production of a philosopher's stone or azoth.

Unwater, skin

Destroys dissolved oxygen in water.  Water-breathing creatures will begin to suffocate immediately.  Harmless if drank.  Can affect a potentially large area, about 500' in diameter.  Invented to repel merfolk attacks.