D&D 5E Orichalcum?

[Shadowdweller00]

Orihalcum is used extensively in manga/anime fantasy and RPGs from Japan, to the point I expect more people have heard of it from those sources than not. Ironically I first heard the term from the anime of Slayers, which is inspired by D&D rather directly.

Have you noticed any common themes in such works? Speaking as someone who prolly hasn't been exposed to as much Animé / Manga / Japanese RPGs as others.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I mean, they aren't far apart, and plenty of metals (and non-metals too!) get -ium instead of just -um. I always (erroneously) spelled it "oricalcum," no h, because that's how the characters in Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis pronounce it even though it's still

Just thinking about Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis makes me smile.

 

[Incenjucar]

I wonder why I always spelled it Orichalcium?

Super rare and often with story significance like Vibranium or as end-game crafting materials. There's a whole TV Tropes devoted to it. It was even used in Mickey Mouse comics!

In Slayers, it's near-immune to magic and used to seal and conceal magical energy, like lead to radiation.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Have you noticed any common themes in such works? Speaking as someone who prolly hasn't been exposed to as much Animé / Manga / Japanese RPGs as others.

The themes are similar to what you have here, from what I've seen. Orichalcum is associated with light, holiness, and/or the "best" equipment in terms of raw stats. (Other things, like cursed weapons, may be stronger in theory but require you to deal with negative consequences or find curse-neutralizing stuff, usually sacrificing an accessory-type slot to use such cursed items.) Excalibur, for example, is made from "orihalcon" in Golden Sun: the Lost Age. The only weapon better than Excalibur in GS:TLA is the Sol Blade, which is unique (whereas Excalibur can be crafted from as many orihalcon ingots as you can bring to the magic blacksmith guy.)

Even when it isn't specifically associated with light or holiness, it's almost always understood to be powerful and often innately tied to magic. That's pretty much what you've done here.

 

[Benjamin Olson]

See if you can find Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis on GoG.

Good advice in general. However it is worth noting that Steam currently has it on sale for a $2, whereas over on GoG it is presently a full priced $6.

 

[CreamCloud0]

Same. Oricalcum, hihi'irokane, and a handful of other such materials are sadly kind of under-used today. I love mithril, don't get me wrong, it's one of my favorites. But it does seem to suck all the air out of the "mythically-strong material" space, and whatever's left is usually gobbled up by adamant(ium/ite).

while i never played in an edition where it was a really significant factor i really love the concept of there being high-tier materials to make weapons and armour from that all had their own special properties and picking what to have your gear crafted out of would have significant impact on how you used it, mithril being super lightweight so you can make heavy armour count as medium like was mentioned or put thrown on bigger weapons, maybe oricalcum being anti-magic so you have magic resistance while wearing it or its weapons deal damage to normally resistant creatures, adamantium being superstrong making damage reduction armour and weapons with upped damage die sizes, and then there are the classic silver and cold iron.

there's so much you could do with a proper material system.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

while i never played in an edition where it was a really significant factor i really love the concept of there being high-tier materials to make weapons and armour from that all had their own special properties and picking what to have your gear crafted out of would have significant impact on how you used it, mithril being super lightweight so you can make heavy armour count as medium like was mentioned or put thrown on bigger weapons, maybe oricalcum being anti-magic so you have magic resistance while wearing it or its weapons deal damage to normally resistant creatures, adamantium being superstrong making damage reduction armour and weapons with upped damage die sizes, and then there are the classic silver and cold iron.

there's so much you could do with a proper material system.

Likewise, it's a crying shame 5e chose to gut the weapon properties of 4e rather than embrace them. Most are not complicated and they make for a much, much richer gameplay experience for any class focused on weapons.

I have a system I've developed from analyzing the 4e weapons. It doesn't perfectly match them, by intent, as there were some clear outliers that just sucked compared to other weapons of the same power level (simple, martial, exotic, or double.) But I still want to go through and trim it a little. I've been thinking for a while about potentially posting it here on ENworld.

 

[Mecheon]

Technically orichalcum almost got mention in 4E with the Orium dragons. Who are, Orichalcum dragons.

Anywho, having played way too much Terraria, clearly Orichalcum is roughly on par with mythril, but more suited towards anyone who'd benefit from massive criticals, because every piece of it does more crit. Also may or may not create magical flower petals when using weapons from it that slice the enemy up more

 

[jmartkdr2]

Have you noticed any common themes in such works? Speaking as someone who prolly hasn't been exposed to as much Animé / Manga / Japanese RPGs as others.

Exalted made it the sun god's favored metal, so it was associated with sun-themed things, like light, smiting undead, perfection, and leadership.

It was also made by distilling gold using only magma and sunlight as energy sources.

In every anime/manga/jrpg I've seen, the themes are similar: power and light.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I feel again the temptation to write up homebrew for magical materials. But I already have three other homebrew things I'm working on. I should finish at least two of them before adding anything more...