On Dwarves and Dwarfdom

Martel De Fer: These enormous hammers were preferred by the Deep Dwarves, and were usually used to break up infantry formations. While a martial weapon for a large character, and favoured for their enormous stopping power, a Martel De Fer is too heavy and too huge for a medium-sized character to wield without an Exotic Weapon Proficiency. A Martel de Fer deals 2d8 bludgeoning damage, is Huge, and threatens a critical hit on a natural 20. It deals triple damage on a confirmed critical.

Maul: Mauls were typically used for rock-breaking and other steady, pounding work. Their variance in damage was fairly regular; however, occasionally, they could be used to make single, devastating blows. For this reason, they're typically considered an equal to the quintessential human weapon, the greatsword. A Maul deals 2d6 bludgeoning damage, is Large, and threatens a critical hit on a natural 20. It deals triple damage on a confirmed critical.

Absoldum: These stones are usually only found on unholy sites, or places where truly abhorrent acts have been performed. Only the most vile of characters will willingly wield weaponry or wear armour constructed of Absoldum, despite its eerie abilities.

Absoldum stones, when powdered and added to a molten metal, grant the metal in question a sort of unholiness that permeates it. The metal is forever forbidden from being the subject of a bless weapon spell or a magic weapon or greater magic weapon spell cast by a good cleric or a neutral cleric of a good deity. However, the weapon will always deal an extra +2d6 unholy damage to good foes. Armour forged of it allows the wearer to deliver this damage with a touch attack.

The largest deposit of Absoldum known in Cobrin'Seil is the Altar of Ravid, where the god Edih took his twenty-four hour long revenge upon Ravid Godslayer for the boy's world-saving actions. Enough Absoldum to incarnate its power in an item costs 32,000 gold pieces, and the stone cannot be ground into powder by a nonevil character.

Blachalcum: Even mythic references to this metal are few and far between. Also known as Ebonalcum or Black Orichalcum, this is the most powerful of the ebon metals. Rare beyond description, it possesses not only life but an innate sentience as well. Any items crafted of Blachalcum are automatically sentient, with the capabilities of a magic item with Semiempathy-level communication, and occasionally owns to special attributes that make it more obviously magical.

Blachalchum typically costs at least an extra +22,000 gold pieces over the cost of an item normally. Its main value over normally awakened items is that Blachalchum typically has a very understandable sentience, much like a dog or other domesticated animal - and despite its magical nature, the powers granted by its sentience are in fact nonmagical.

Deadsteel: Deadsteel is ferociously rare, mostly because the only people in the world who really value it are either Forsakers or the psionically gifted people of the Nbyanan crystal deserts (to whom metal items are rare enough). Most people who have the money and skill to artifice items of strange and esoteric materials are the sort to prefer magical items - not something like Deadsteel.

Deadsteel is as tough as iron, and slightly more brittle (hardness 9), despite being worked steel. Deadsteel is only forged from iron deposits found in dead magic zones, and it seems to be one of the few materials that holds completely to an utterly nonmagical nature in Cobrin'Seil. While Adamantium is nonmagical, and Blachalchum is but a strange and advanced life-form, they both have faint crackles of magic in them. Deadsteel does not.

Weapons, shields and armour forged of Deadsteel are immune to all magical effects, both positive and negative. They have no particular advantage as far as holding an edge or providing protection do over normal steel. However, Deadsteel doesn't just resist magic - it abhors it completely.

Weapons forged of Deadsteel snuff out magic completely when they strike an object or person under the effect of a spell. This is identical in effect to a targeted dispel magic cast by a 10th level sorceror, but its effect is completely nonmagical. Enough Deadsteel to craft a weapon capable of this effect costs 90,000 gp over the base cost of the item, and the weapon in question cannot be magically enhanced in any way.

Armour and shields of Deadsteel protects against magical effects in much the same way - any spells cast at the wearer of such armour must first defeat the armour's counterspelling effect (as if by a dispel magic cast by a 10th-level sorceror) before the spell will take effect. This only functions for spells targeted on the wearer. Deadsteel sufficient to imbue this effect costs 81,000 gp over the cost of the armour normally, and the armour cannot be magically enhanced in any way whatsoever.

Ethril: One of the rarest of the mystic ebon metals, Ethril is as light as willow wood and can float. It is as strong as fine nickel steel and totally unaffected by any degree of cold.

This black mithril is known to be toxic to all elvenkind, even to driders and deodanths, the most deviant branches of that race. The merest touch causes nausea to elves, and any blow with a weapon composed of Ethril does an additional 2d6 damage. Interestingly, orcs also experience nausea when they touch Ethril - but they do not take any extra damage from weapons crafted of it.

Ethril is still ultimately a kind of Mithral, and as such, shares the properties of items composed of the metal. It adds another 17,000 gp to the cost of a mithral item of the same type. It seems the toxic affect towards elves, however, is magical, as it can be supressed.

Of course, elves hate those who use it. In the oldest elven legends, ethril was called "Eliadolyn" or Kiss of Death.

Godscopper: Looking like copper, this metal is extremely rare, its origin unknown. Never knowingly wasted in weapons, godscopper armor completely blocks any critical hit which would normally affect the area it covers. This protection is completely nonmagical, and adds to the cost of the armour as indicated on the following table. Light armour of Godscopper has a 25% chance of negating a critical hit or sneak attack, Medium armour has a 75% chance, and Heavy Armour always negates such hits. These bonuses do not stack with any form of Fortification enhancement.

Godscopper is excruciatingly expensive and hard to find. Dwarves in particular revere Godscopper.

True Silver: The strange ur-metal known as True Silver is so intensely rare and potent that a single drop of it is worth over 500 gold pieces. The University of Soloria trading price for an ingot of True Silver weighing a full pound is 54,000 gold pieces. This incredible price, however, is not without a good reason. True Silver, when used in the process of rendering magical items, can reduce the XP cost of the item's creation. Every 5 gp worth of True Silver is worth 1 XP for the purpose of item creation.

True Silver is ferociously rare, and usually, not for sale. Because it is so rare, its price is usually vastly inflated over the trade cost. Arnemeas the Wild owns a pipe made of pure True Silver. This is most curious, because Arnemeas the Wild doesn't smoke. This is just further indication of the flippance with which Arnemeas regards what most people deem valuable or important.

True Silver in an item is effectively worthless; the actual process of rendering the metal seems to change it to be identical to the substance of the item it is used to make, and it cannot be reforged to its primal state.

Vartium: A shiny metal of a peculiar blue-green hue, vartium is quite rare, but when a deposit is found it is invariably a large one (minimum of 14 tons of metal if all the ore is refined). For all non-magical uses, vartium is close to a good nickel steel in its tensile and heat-related properties.

Objects composed of Vartium, however minor a quantity of it, are actually quite resistant to magical interference. These items have a +2 bonus to saving throws. Enough Vartium to imbue an object with this property is about four pounds, and costs roughly 3,600 gold pieces.