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Potions and Ingredients
April 25, 2026 at 04:45 PM
Initial potions reference covering recipe structure, brewing, digestion, and combat consumable use
Potions are the gating consumable for Sequence advancement. To climb from one Sequence to the next on a Pathway, a Beyonder must drink the Sequence-specific potion of their Pathway. Each potion has a fixed recipe of ingredients drawn from supernatural materials harvested in the world or distilled from defeated enemies. Brewing the potion, drinking it, and surviving its digestion are three separate tests.
Every Beyonder potion has the following components:
Main Ingredient: a unique supernatural material specific to the Sequence and Pathway. For Sequence 9 potions there is typically a single main ingredient; higher-Sequence potions add a second or third main ingredient that is significantly rarer.
Supplementary Ingredients: 3 to 5 mystic ingredients (herbs, blood components, rare metals) that round the formula and stabilise digestion. Sequence 9 supplements are mid-rarity and typically findable in starting-zone dungeons; Sequence 7+ supplements require deeper exploration or specific quest-locked drops.
Stabiliser: a single 'common' material (clean water, oil, candle wax) used as the carrier base.
Public reference for the Sequence 9 Seer Potion (preserved from the source material): 13 drops of Night Vanilla liquid, 7 Gold Mint leaves, 3 drops of Poison Hemlock distillate, and 9 grams of Dragon Blood Grass powder, suspended in a base of distilled rainwater. The game adapts these ingredients to in-world drop tables: Night Vanilla can be foraged in the Tingen outskirts; Gold Mint is sold by an apothecary in the Iron Cross Street Market; Poison Hemlock is dropped by Sequence 9 Beyonder Monsters in the introductory dungeon; Dragon Blood Grass is acquired through a quest-locked vendor.
Most ingredients drop from supernatural creatures, harvest from named anomaly zones, or sell from specific Beyonder vendors. Some ingredients are quest-locked: only after completing a specific story arc does the relevant vendor unlock the recipe. Others are gated behind factional reputation: the Nighthawks sell certain Sequence 7 ingredients only to characters with a high reputation rank in the faction.
The Trade Hub (a structured player marketplace) lets characters buy and sell ingredients between players. Mainland China-style listings use a fixed-rate currency; market-based listings use a free auction model. The two are separate and offer different liquidity profiles.
Brewing happens at the player's home alchemical bench or at a partner-faction's brewing hall (the Nighthawks' Tingen outpost has one for affiliated members). Brewing is a small mini-game: timing each ingredient addition, stirring at the right tempo, and reading the steam-pattern read-out for any sign of failure. A failed brew can ruin the ingredients (most ingredients are non-recoverable); a successful brew produces a vial that must be drunk within a limited in-game window or it spoils.
Drinking the potion is a story-locked ceremony. The player must:
1. Reach the Acting threshold for their current Sequence's Archetype.
2. Be at sufficient sanity (at least Calm-band; some Sequences require maximum sanity).
3. Have the right ritual prop for their Pathway's advancement ceremony.
4. Be at the appropriate ritual location (a quiet room, the Pathway's affiliated chapel, an open-water sloop).
Successful digestion grants the new Sequence's abilities and Archetype. Failed digestion deals heavy sanity damage and may regress the Beyonder by a Sequence; catastrophic failure transforms the character into a Beyonder Monster. See Sanity System for the failure-state details.
Some ingredients also serve as combat consumables. A small dose of Dragon Blood Grass in tincture form temporarily restores sanity in combat; a single Night Vanilla droplet can stabilise a low-sanity Beyonder ally for one ability cast. The game tracks separate inventory pools for 'brewing stockpile' and 'combat consumable stockpile' so players do not accidentally burn advancement ingredients on a tough pull.
Hoard ingredients across Sequences. The Sequence 8 advancement is the first 'real' wall; over-supplying for it is the most common pre-advancement preparation pattern in the Crimson Test tester reports.
Brew with a partner. A friend with a high alchemy skill can brew at lower failure rates; cooperative brewing lowers the ingredient-loss risk meaningfully.
Drink at maximum sanity. The biggest single sanity hit in the game is the advancement potion itself; entering the ceremony at full sanity gives the largest digestion margin.
Read the recipe before harvesting. Ingredient drop rates differ enough that planning the harvest path saves hours of farm time per potion.
