Kwalish

[CapnZapp]

In 5th edition, the Apparatus of Kwalish is not only of legendary rarity, but the DMG specifically calls it unique.

 

[Umbran]

I always pictured Kwalish to be a gnome, despite how the rules of the game when he was first mentioned didn't allow gnome wizards of sufficient level.

 

[Tony Vargas]

In the embarrassingly derivative campaign world I came up with as a kid, I placed a very vaguely Venice-inspired city-state that, after I discarded the idea of their using firearms, I decided was a center for a unique school of magic that used clockwork mechanisms and bound elementals to create ornithopters and other fantastic mechanical devices and vehicles - considering that the Apparatus of Kwalish was the only non-artifact example of that sort of magic in the game, Kwalish became the long-ago founder of the city-state of Vis and the first of it's notorious 'Mechanicians.'