Potable Potions Plentifully Presented with Purpose and Precision

Potions are cool.  You give them out, they get used, they're gone.  Plus they break easy, they interact with each other... there's so much capacity for chaos in the hyper-magic fluid you have rammed in your fanny pack.

I wanted to make myself a big list of potions for my own use, so I ganked a whole bunch from Goblin Punch.  He already wrote up most of the potions someone would need in the most sensible way I can conceive writing them.  So I stole that too... but that's what we're here for right?  When the stealing was done, and the obvious spectrum of healing potions were added to the list, I still needed to write up a few dozen of my own potions, so here those are in GP style, to enhance and completely ruin your pcs' lives (particularly if they're the sampling types).  Drink up!


32 Potions

1 – Animal Friendship – at will 'Animal Friendship' spell (DC 13) for one hour. Looks like fur or feathers. Smells like droppings or guano. A small sip makes a bird sing overhead, a squirrel dart past, or fish leap out of water.

2 – Strength of the Plain - Strength increases, roll d100: 01-50 Str21, 51-75 Str23, 76-86 Str25, 87-95 Str27, 96-00 Str29. Lasts 1d4 hours, anything strength related suffers -1 for one hour after. Looks like marbled flesh or stone in red, white, and pink. Smells like a gym. A small sip lightens your load, eases your aches, and energizes.

3 – Mind Reading - Gain the effects of 'Detect Thoughts' (DC 13). Looks like dense purple liquid with a cloud of pink in the center. Smells like eucalyptus and rain. A small sip imparts an (obvious) emotional echo from a party member.

4 – Inebriation - Anyone who drinks even half of this potion becomes catastrophically drunk (-4 to everything) for six hours. Three hours of splitting headaches persist afterward (-2 concentration, intelligence checks, initiative). Looks like red-gold liquor. Smells like a dead cat. A small sip gets you insta-buzzed.

5 – Secret Serpent Tongue - You get a +4 to charisma checks for one hour. Looks like sparkling gray and blue sand in water. Smells like egg yolk. A small sip makes someone nearby give you an innocent compliment.

6 – Liquid Illusion - If you drink it, you will believe the most horrible thing you can think of is growing in your stomach and going to soon kill you. This is false, there is no further danger, and lasts six hours. If poured out, it exists as a semi-solid smoke or phlegm that forms into a crude monster shape of your choice. The smoke-phlegm creature mock attacks a target of your choice for one turn. It seems to be damaged by weapons and non-bite attacks, but cannot be hurt. A creature biting the decoy must make a constitution save or be choked to death, it will then discorporate. Looks like roiling green-black smoke. Smells like a cellar or cave. A small sip will give you deja vu.

7 – Antimagic Water - Cancels all spells affecting you and suspends and magical constant effects natural to you or emanating from your person if consumed. Makes you immune to lasting magical effects for the duration and save against other spells at +2. Lasts 1d6 hours, then you shit out all your magic gut bacteria for an hour and save against magic at -1 for a week. Dispels magic if poured onto objects. If poured over yourself, makes you immune to all magic, in addition to the consumed effects with a duration of 1d6 turns (10% chance of magic rash setting in 1d4 weeks afterward). Looks like water. Illusions cannot be seen through its transparent liquid (effectively a seriously distorted 'True Seeing' lens). Smells like bleach doughnuts. A small sip makes a random magical effect on yourself to “flicker”.

8 – Oil of Fiery Burning - Impossible to drink. Deals 1d4 damage to anyone opening, then dexterity check to close or it explodes. 6d6 damage on explosion or thrown impact (dexterity save for half damage). Looks like iridescent molasses. Smells like - it's on fire! A small sip is nearly impossible and completely insane.

9 – Insight of the Center Eye - You get a +4 to wisdom checks for 1d6 turns. If you use wisdom for spells you may cast one spell without using a slot, of spell level no higher than half your character level. Looks like a nebulous, blue-black, star-dusted sky. Smells like heavy, bitter incense. A small sip makes you remember something important a mentor, or parent imparted to you long ago.

10 – Epiphany Philter - You get a +4 to intelligence checks for one 1d6 turns. If you use intelligence for spells you may cast one spell without using a slot, of spell level no higher than half your character level. Looks like cloudy gray fluid with something softly glowing obscured in the center. Smells like ozone. A small sip gives you a great idea about something that is no longer pertinent.

11 – Rubber Soul - You become rubbery in body and spirit, your joints seem to move oddly and your skin seems shinier. All ranged physical and magical attacks against you bounce off and affect the attacker 25%, or another random individual otherwise. Close range attacks of either type always ricochet back at the attacker. You can fit yourself through spaces as if you were one size category smaller. Your melee attacks deal -2 damage each, while your ranged attacks deal +2 damage each. Lasts 1d8 rounds. Looks like opaque, pink and fibrous like erasers. Smells like moist grass. A small sip makes your tongue rubbery, bouncing off your teeth and the roof of your mouth. You talk like a drunk or someone on Novocaine for a few minutes.

12 – The Gateway - Unless you have prepared yourself with fasting and meditation beforehand, you will spend 1d4 hours madly feverish and violently vomiting, all your stats are -3 for 1d6 days. When you peak four hours in, you are projected into the astral plane via an ineffably ancient dream structure. You will not pass unless you defeat, impress, or bargain with the ur-beast guardian spirit/archetype/demon/whatevs. The guardian cannot kill your body, but can reduce you to a permanent comatose state if it “kills” you in the astral. Those injured by the guardian must succeed a wisdom save when they exit to the material plane or take 1d4-1 permanent intelligence damage (minimum 1). Looks like murky orange-brown tea or juice. Smells like the breath of a great predatory beast. A small sip tastes like rotten bark, coffee, and shit. The next time you sleep you will dream of the guardian who mocks your indecision, and begins to consume you before you wake. You are now afraid of the potion, the guardian, and the gateway: you are ever aware of the potion if it is within 50', and without special compensation any attempt you make to battle the guardian is at -2.

13 – Stench - Your every secretion become a pungent and overwhelming 'Stinking Cloud' effect centered on you. You are immune to your own secretions. Last for 1d4 hours, much less if you drink a lot of water, wine or beer. Doubles wandering monster frequency for duration. Throw to create a 'Stinking Cloud' where it breaks. Looks like layers of yellow, green, and brown silt or smoke. Smells like a kind of sulfuric-grandma-maggotflesh-dysentery-henhouse-landfill – before your brain cuts the connection to your nose to spare you (can't smell or taste for 1d6 turns). A small sip makes you repulsively flatulent or gives you awful BO for one turn.

14 – Sterility - You become permanently unable to have children. No effect on immature creatures. Looks like opaque red globs suspended in clear yellow fluid. Smells like alcohol and semen. A small sip tastes like sweat and bad wine, and makes your testicles or ovaries ache briefly if you are able to breed.

15 – Demon Blood - If you succeed a save (wisdom, spell) you acquire a demonic power or attribute (regeneration, at will power, great strength, etc.) for incorporating the blood into your own, but you are forever marked with an unnatural taint. If you fail the save a greater demon begins to manifest within you and will eventually consume your body and spirit as it reforms its own. Looks like brown-black silt at the bottom, a layer of dark red sludge, topped with a layer of bubbling red. Smells like sulfur and split carcasses. A small sip tastes like rotten meat and clotted blood.

16 – Angel Lymph - If you succeed a save (wisdom, spell) you acquire a celestial power or attribute (regeneration, at will power, great charisma, etc.) for incorporating the lymph into your own body, but you are forever marked with a supernatural aura. If you fail the save a greater angelic being begins to manifest within and around you and will eventually consume your body and spirit as it reforms its own. Looks like bunches of dozens of tiny membranous yellow lights floating in a cloudy white liquid. Smells like light wine. A small sip tastes like liquid baklava.

17 – Magical Intensity - Any spells you cast with a variable component have that component maximized. Lasts three rounds. Looks like layers of chocolate pudding. Smells like gunpowder. A small sip makes your fingers twitch, and gives you a feeling of building magic within you.

18 – Scent Neutralization - Your scent is completely neutralized for 2d4 hours. Looks like dark gray silty water. Smells like nothing. A small sip tastes like black licorice, and neutralizes your scent for 5 seconds (weirds the hell out of dogs).

19 – Vicious Visage - Your face painfully contorts into a horrifying grimace for the duration, terrifying any fear-affected creature who meets your gaze. You may cover your face to spare others. Lasts 1d6+2 rounds. Looks like water, your reflection is always hideous within. Smells like rubber. A small sip is so sour you make a terrible face for a moment.

20 – Eidetic Memory - You have a perfect memory of anything you experience for the duration, you can make accurate maps, memorize the contents of entire books, etc. Lasts 1d4+1 hours. For 1d4 turns after you will be unable to remember important information. Looks like gray mucous. Smells like a childhood memory. A small sip tastes like rancid butter and makes you feel like you're forgetting something...

21 – Elixir of Energy - For one week you are nearly tireless, requiring only 45 minutes of light sleep a day to function. You are capable of making 300% progress on nearly any downtime type activity (spell research, item creation, construction, investigation, etc.), but you receive no bonuses in combat. When the effect wears off, you will remain exhausted until you spend an entire day eating and sleeping. Looks like frothy neon green, constantly in motion splashing and swirling. Smells like paint thinner... and apples. A small sip is bitter and awful.

22 – Poetry - You may only communicate in poetic verse or song, this makes it impossible to cast spells with verbal components. You are unable to be quiet, and will always orate in the fullest possible voice. Finally, adds +2 to any check involving poetry or song. Lasts 1d4 hours. Looks like the distorted reflection of lines of black text on white, you can almost make it out... Smells like, Spring becomes summer / the scent of blossoms floating / stirs a deeper need. A small sip causes you to rhyme off the next thing you hear.

23 – Ruinous Riches - Save vs. petrification/constitution/whatever, if you fail one of your limbs becomes an amount of gold and gems equal to its volume, if you succeed you permanently lose 1d8 hp, which becomes a quarter of a cubic foot of material per hp. The transmutation is clean and leaves no wounds. Looks like glittery golden goo. Smells like blood. A small sip will make you spit out a diamond tooth, or slough off a nacreous fingernail.

24 – Vomitous Birth - In 1d4 rounds you violently and uncomfortably spew forth 1d6 creatures, one per round. The creatures are bizarre, misshapen and unfinished in appearance, every one different, some may resemble you in a small way. They begin as single hit die creatures and grow one hit die per round for two rounds. They are non-intelligent and do not take orders, they will attack anything that attacks them or you first. Otherwise they will remain near you (like ducklings) unless driven off. Looks like many grape-sized, spheres of clear jelly, with pulsing dark nuclei. Smells like a terrarium. A small sip tastes like ham and oatmeal and makes your stomach loudly growl.

25 – Worthless Corpse - As per 'Veins of the Earth'. Lasts 1d8 turns. Looks like gray and white-yellow dust. Smells like moldering corpses. A small sip tastes like ashes, makes your cheeks sink and your skin turn grayish for a few minutes.

26 – Forgetfulness - You forget the last 1d4 (infinitely exploding) days. Looks like cool purple-blue swirls. Smells like something you've smelled before but can't put your finger on. A small sip makes you forget what the potion tastes like.

27 – Delicious - Drinking the entire potion is the greatest gastric event of your life, you will be unable to move, take any action, or even properly think for 1d6 rounds (injury will restore sense), it is that good. All other food and drink will be pale and disappointing compared to the Delicious potion, and you will do anything to acquire more if you are convinced it exists somewhere. If you refuse to pursue more of the potion you are aware of, you suffer -2 to all rolls as your every thought is corrupted by daydreams of it. Looks like sparkling water ever so slightly tinted pink. Smells like nothing. A small sip is potentially worse than drinking the whole thing... save (wisdom, spells) or you are still addicted AND you're still carrying a bottle of the stuff that you are now madly possessive of. Absolute worse case: everyone in party gets a sip.

28 – Cerebral Parasite – This potion is a growth/collection medium for a kind of astral parasite, drinking it removes many of your astral mindform's natural defenses, creating a perfect place for an Endless Astral Worm to lay an egg. The egg will fuse with your astral mindform, begin to absorb it, and grow. You will become more and more intelligent, less charismatic and gain up to two bonus wizard spell casting levels over the next 1d6 months before permanently transforming into an illithid (your character is forever lost). Looks like clear light green gel. Smells like minty bleach. A small sip makes you feel ambiguously vulnerable for a moment.

29 – Space Hands - Your hands become as a gray clear crystal that reflects no light, for the duration they are completely indestructible. Once per round you may reach a hand through the dimensions and pull out something (gonna need a whole other table for this) random, some will be held/wielded some thrown into this dimension. If you succeed an unarmed attack on a foe you may initiate this power within their body, dealing 1d10+4+damage modifier and any damage appropriate to the random object. Lasts 1d4+2 rounds. Looks like a layer of deep blue on the bottom and a layer of bright orange on top. Smells like a catcher's mitt. A small sip makes you want to punch a wall.

30 – Liquid Tool - These come in a variety of forms: (3) tents and a stocked campsite, a battering ram, a siege tower, a covered wagon, (30) iron swords, a great pile of climbing gear, (5) highly unpredictable firearms and (60) uses of ammo and powder, etc. Looks like it's crammed full of wood or cloth or metal. Smells like wood, cloth, metal, gunpowder. A small sip makes you spit out some unraveled rope, a small chunk of iron, splinters, etc.

31 – Undeath - You die, swiftly and painfully. If you are 4^th level or lower, you return as a mindless form of undead. If you are 5^th level or higher, you return as an intelligent form of level appropriate undead. Looks like black oil. Smells like mold. A small sip hurts you deep inside, save (constitution, poison) or a random internal organ dies and returns to functionality as an “undead organ”, the character is unaware. The organ functions well enough, but can be turned/destroyed and creates all sorts of problems for clerics/paladins.

32 – Immacula's Elixir - Heals all damage, poisons, diseases, regrows any lost organs or limbs, erases scars, restores lost levels. For the next 1d4 turns, your status cannot be affected (you cannot be petrified, poisoned, diseased, put to sleep, etc.) and any wound received immediately heals. If you are older than prime physical age, you grow younger 1d20 years. Looks like shimmering rainwater with a green glowing seed inside. Smells like rain and young shoots. A small sip tastes like sugar, dew, and lime, erases weariness and quenches your thirst for a time.

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Been playing a bit in-setting, which is helping me grow my information in the right directions, but saps my time to post here.  It all feeds the same dark beast though.  Working on like five d100 encounter tables by terrain at once.  Thought I'd finish one of those first, but trying to roll for random treasure in 5e just made me super disappointed and I had to fill an obvious hole.  First time playing 5e... it works, I've seen worse for sure.  Lot of poor design in the rule books, there are all these things I have to struggle to look up, or help new people look up because they are bizarrely hidden.  The lack of summon monsters is annoying, but I always end up making my own summon monster spells/tables anyhow (I love it).  Till next time, careful sniffing that philter.