Items & Economy

Item Rarity System

Items drop at five rarity tiers. Higher rarity items are rarer but have more properties and greater power:

Rarity	Approximate Drop Rate	Properties
Normal	~74%	Base stats only
Magic	~20%	2 extra properties (+ base if present)
Rare	~5%	4 extra properties (+ base if present)
Legendary	~1%	8 extra properties (+ base if present)
Boss	Special — guaranteed drops only	Pre-configured guaranteed drop from specific boss enemies
Unique	<0.1%	Pre-defined special stats

Loot quality multipliers: Zone modifiers and endgame scaling can multiply all rarity chances. At endgame with full modifier stacks (500%+), rare and legendary drops become significantly more common, making the crafting system viable.

34 Item Properties

Items can roll the following properties. Higher-rarity items can have more properties stacked together.

Offensive

Accuracy, Physical Damage, Fire Damage, Ice Damage, Lightning Damage, Poison Damage, Chaos Damage, Critical Chance, Critical Damage, Armor Penetration

Defensive

Armor, Evasion Rating, Block, Magic Block, Fire Resistance, Ice Resistance, Lightning Resistance, Poison Resistance, Chaos Resistance, Hit Point Boost

Stats

Strength, Agility, Intelligence

Utility

Movement Speed, Sight Distance, Gold Find, Magic Item Find

Potions

Health Potion, Health Potion Extra Charges, Health Potion Heal Amount

Equipment Slots (19 Total)

Characters have 19 equipment slots across five categories:

Weapons (2)

Slot	Purpose
Main Hand	Primary weapon
Off Hand	Shield, focus, or second weapon

Armor & Accessories (8)

Slot	Purpose
Body Armor	Chest piece
Helmet	Head slot
Gloves	Hand slot
Boots	Feet slot
Belt	Waist slot
Amulet	Neck slot
Defense Ring	Defensive ring
Attack Ring	Offensive ring

Skill Gems (5)

Slot	Trigger
Attack Skill Gem	Every 6 attacks
Defense Skill Gem	Passive defense ability
Utility Skill Gem	Utility effect
Area of Effect Skill Gem	Every 10 attacks
Magic Skill Gem	Every 13 attacks

Potions & Exploration (3)

Slot	Purpose
Health Potion	Active healing potion
Resource Potion	Secondary potion slot
Exploration Skill Gem	Exploration bonuses (trap detection, movement, etc.)

Special (1)

Slot	Purpose
Trophy Fragment	Temporary slot for boss trophy fragments before consuming

Equipping Items

Open your inventory, then equip an item one of two ways:

• Equip by name — say equip <item name> (for example equip helmet of ruin). The named item is found in your pack and equipped, even if it is not the item currently shown. Partial names work, so equip body armor matches Body Armor of the Forsaken.
• Equip the shown item — say equip on its own to equip whatever item is currently selected. Use next and previous to move the selection first.

Equipping an item already worn in that slot swaps the two: the old item returns to your pack. Because the item you equip leaves the pack as the old one returns, a same-size swap is a net-zero exchange and always succeeds even when the pack is full. A swap is refused only when the unequipped item needs MORE pack slots than the item you are equipping frees (a larger item replacing a smaller one with no free space); in that case the equip is a no-op that keeps you in the inventory menu and you are pointed at the stash, drop, or salvage to make room.

Gear helpers: fill empty slots, equip random gear, undo gear

Three free commands put on what you carry, and each runs only when you say it:

• Fill empty slots — say fill empty slots to wear the best item in your pack in each empty gear slot. A slot you already wear something in is never touched.
• Equip random gear — say equip random gear to put a random item from your pack into each gear slot one fits. You hear what went on and what it replaced.
• Undo gear — say undo gear right after to put the previous set back. An item you sold, salvaged or dropped since stays gone.

Wearing the best gear you find on every pickup is the Blood Emerald upgrade Auto Equip Best Gear. When you pick up or buy an item that beats what you wear, you hear one short line naming it and the command that wears it: fill empty slots for an empty slot, or opening your inventory and saying equip with its name. Each item is named once, and nothing is equipped until you say so. The starter zone hint teaches these commands to a new player.

Loot Drops from Enemies

Item Drops

How many times the game rolls to drop an item depends on enemy rarity:

Enemy Rarity	Drop Attempts
Normal / Magic	1 roll
Rare / Legendary	2 independent rolls
Unique	3 independent rolls
Boss	No random rolls — guaranteed drops only

Boss enemies skip random item rolls entirely. They only drop pre-configured items via their guaranteedSlotDrop field. Your Magic Find stat improves the chance of each roll producing an item for non-Boss enemies.

Where Dropped Loot Lands

Enemy item drops — random gear, guaranteed boss-slot drops, and trophy fragments — land on the square where the enemy died (the corpse square), not under you. A kill made from a distance (auto-attack, an area effect, or a quick-travel move that carries you several squares past the kill) therefore leaves the loot behind you; you step back onto the kill site to pick it up. The drop readout names the location so this is never a surprise: "The enemy dropped a {item} where it fell." Scan to find loot left behind — line of sight reports "You see items to the {direction}".

Currency (gold, soul shards, runes, potion essence) is the deliberate opposite: it is credited to your current square and swept into your balance automatically the same turn, so a remote kill never strands currency. That is why currency reads "plink to the ground" — collected at your feet — while items read "where it fell" — waiting on the corpse square.

Gold Drops

Higher-rarity enemies drop more gold:

Rarity	Gold Multiplier
Normal / Magic	×1
Rare	×2
Legendary	×3
Unique	×4
Boss	×5

Your Gold Find stat and subscriber status (+25%) increase the amount.

Rewards scale by enemy rarity and level, not by the difficulty-config tuning knob. Gold, XP, soul shards, runes, and potion essence are all a function of the enemy's enemyRarity and level (see ). The EnemyDifficultyConfig balance system (darkness_falls.enemy_difficulty_config) adjusts only an enemy's HP, damage, armor, and primary stats to tune challenge — it does NOT raise the reward an enemy yields. So two enemies of the same rarity and level grant identical rewards even when a difficulty config has made one tankier or harder-hitting. This is the current, intentional behavior: the reward signal is rarity and level, and difficulty configs are a separate combat-tuning lever. If reward-scaling-by-difficulty is ever desired it is a deliberate balance/design decision (a new reward multiplier on the config), not a bug — design is silent on it today, so it has not been added.

Potion Essence Drops

Enemy Rarity	Drop Chance	Amount
Normal / Magic	15%	1-2
Rare / Legendary / Unique	25%	1-3
Boss	50%	2-5

Soul Shard Drops

Enemy Rarity	Drop Chance	Shard Types
Normal	10%	Lesser only
Magic	15%	Lesser only
Rare	25%	Lesser + Royal
Legendary	40%	Lesser + Royal + Sovereign
Unique	50%	Lesser + Royal + Sovereign
Boss	100%	All types

Crafting Rune Drops (Rare+ enemies only)

Rune drops use a two-stage roll: a gate roll determines whether any rune drops at all, then conditional rolls inside determine which rune types.

Stage 1 — Gate Roll (chance to enter the rune drop phase):

Enemy Rarity	Gate Chance
Rare	5%
Legendary	10%
Unique	15%
Boss	50%

Stage 2 — Rune Types (conditional on gate passing):

Rune Type	Rare	Legendary	Unique	Boss
Awakening	always 1	always 1	always 1	1–3 (always)
Empowering	—	50% chance	50% chance	1 (always)
Transcendent	—	—	—	25% chance

Effective overall drop rates (gate × conditional):

Rune Type	Rare	Legendary	Unique	Boss
Awakening	5%	10%	15%	50%
Empowering	—	5%	7.5%	50%
Transcendent	—	—	—	12.5%

Crafting System

The Workbench in your hideout is where you craft, upgrade, salvage, and enchant items. You must physically walk to the workbench at coordinates (13,10) in the hideout — the menu appears when you're standing there.

Crafting Operations & Costs

Operation	Gold Cost	Material Cost	Notes
Salvage	Free	—	Returns gold + materials
Craft Normal	50 + L×5	2 lesser shards	Create new item
Craft Magic	150 + L×10	5 lesser shards + 1 awakening rune
Craft Rare	400 + L×25	5 lesser + 3 royal shards + 1 empowering rune
Craft Legendary	1,000 + L×50	10 lesser + 5 royal + 2 sovereign shards + 1 transcendent rune
Add Property (Magic)	100 + L×10	3 lesser shards	Random property
Add Property (Rare)	300 + L×20	2 royal shards	Random property
Add Property (Legendary)	1,000 + L×50	1 sovereign shard	Random property
Empower	(50 + L×5) × empLevel²	Scales exponentially	Boost base stats
Enchant	75-750 + L×(5-40)	Varies by rarity	Apply enchantment
Reforge	100-600 + L×(8-30)	Varies by rarity	Re-roll properties

L = item level. Empower costs scale quadratically with empower level.

Rarity Upgrade Costs

Upgrade	Gold Cost	Rune Required
Normal → Magic	50 + L×10	1 awakening rune
Magic → Rare	200 + L×20	1 empowering rune
Rare → Legendary	500 + L×50	1 transcendent rune

Salvage Returns

Item Rarity	Gold Return	Notes
Normal	(10 + L×5) × 1	Base return
Magic	(10 + L×5) × 2	Plus materials
Rare	(10 + L×5) × 4	Plus materials
Legendary	(10 + L×5) × 8	Plus materials

Each property on the item adds extra gold (L×2 per property).

Augment Cap

An augment is a property you add to an item, at the workbench with gold and soul shards or with a lesser, royal or sovereign soul shard. Each item takes a set number of augments for its rarity, on top of what it rolled: a magic item takes 1, a rare item 2 and a legendary item 4. The numbers live in AUGMENT_CAP_BY_RARITY in ; where this page and that constant differ, the constant is right. After each augment you hear how many of the cap the item holds, and at the cap you hear the cap and that it is reached, and no currency is taken. An item that already carries more augments than its cap keeps every one of them and only refuses a new one.

A Rarity Change Renames The Item

Upgrading an item's rarity, at the workbench or with a rune, and crafting an item at a set rarity, rename it from the properties it carries, so its name always wears the prefix of the rarity it has: a rare item with Strength is a Berserker's item, a legendary item with fire damage is an Infernal one.

Examine Reads The Whole Item

Examining an item reads every property and every triggered power it carries, never only the first few. Properties are read grouped so a long item stays listenable: offense, then defense, then attributes, then anything else, each as one sentence, and two rolls of the same stat are read as their sum. Powers follow under Item Powers, and the readout ends with how many of its augment cap the item holds. is the definition.

Currency System

Primary Currencies

Currency	How to Get	What It Buys
Gold	Enemy drops, item sales, salvage	Shops, crafting, paragon reset (10,000g)
Blood Emeralds	Real money purchase	Auction house, premium shop

Crafting Currencies

Currency	How to Get	Used For
Lesser Soul Shards	All enemies (10-50% chance)	Basic crafting, gambling shop
Royal Soul Shards	Rare+ enemies (25%+ chance)	Mid-tier crafting
Sovereign Soul Shards	Legendary+ enemies	Top-tier crafting
Potion Essence	All enemies (15-50% chance)	Recharge your health potion
Awakening Runes	Rare+ enemies (5-50% chance)	Normal → Magic upgrade
Empowering Runes	Legendary+ enemies (50%+)	Magic → Rare upgrade
Transcendent Runes	Boss enemies only (25%)	Rare → Legendary upgrade

Blood Emeralds (Premium Currency)

Blood Emeralds are purchased with real money and used primarily for the auction house. They come in packs:

Pack	Price	Blood Emeralds
Starter	$1	100
Value	$3	315
Popular	$5	550
Best Value	$10	1,250

Refund policy: Each purchase has a 30-minute refund window, unless you've used the auction house after the purchase.

Status Currency Readout

The status command surfaces both currencies on consecutive lines:

• Gold: N. — primary currency.
• Blood Emeralds: N. — premium currency.

Both are part of the status card so the player can verify balances with a single command and discover that blood emeralds are a live currency without having to enter a shop. Crafting currencies (soul shards, runes, potion essence) are surfaced via inventory rather than status to keep the status card concise; the status hint line names inventory for that purpose.

Drove from feedback 895 (Iron Wolf L8, HIDEOUT_ZONE): "enable to check blood emeralds if theyre even active yet".

Shop System

Four shop types serve different needs:

Shop	Currency	Purpose
Basic Shop	Gold	Buy level-appropriate gear from NPC vendors
Gambling Shop ("Exotic Shop" in-game)	Lesser Soul Shards (100/roll)	Random item at your zone's level — much higher chance of rare+ items
Auction House	Blood Emeralds	Buy/sell items with other players
Cosmetic Shop	—	Defined but not yet implemented

Gambling Shop

The gambling shop is the best soul shard sink in mid-game. For 100 lesser soul shards you get a random item at the current zone's level, with a dramatically increased chance of rare or legendary items:

Rarity	Base Chance	Gambling Chance
Unique	0.10%	0.50%
Legendary	0.90%	4.50%
Rare	5.00%	25.00%
Magic	6.50%	32.50%
Normal	87.50%	37.50%

About 1 in 4 gambling rolls produces a Rare or better item.

Three tables share the shop. The soul-shard table costs 100 lesser soul shards and uses the rarity table above. The blood emerald table costs 10 Blood Emeralds and guarantees a rare item or better. The subscriber table costs 25 Blood Emeralds and guarantees a legendary item. Only an active subscription can buy the subscriber table. A player who is not a subscriber, and a player whose subscription has lapsed, is refused by name and told the table comes with the subscription. The subscriber table continues the existing progression: soul shards buy a weighted roll, 10 Blood Emeralds buy a rare or better, 25 Blood Emeralds buy a legendary. Those two numbers are the design values for the owner to confirm.

Saying next slot or previous slot on a soul-shard slot keeps the soul-shard price and then names the subscriber table. An active subscriber hears that it costs 25 blood emeralds. Anyone else hears that it comes with the subscription.

The shop opens on the main hand slot. For an active subscriber the subscriber table is a real slot in that cycle, SUB_MAIN_HAND, after the health potion and before the main hand. Previous slot from the opened slot lands on it, and next slot from the health potion slot does too. On that slot the spoken price is 25 blood emeralds, and buy rolls the subscriber table, a guaranteed legendary, not the soul-shard table. A player without an active subscription never lands on a SUB_ slot.

The gambling shop is reachable in your hideout (the Exotic Shop / Lucky Shop). Alongside the gold basic shop and the Blood Emerald premium counter, the Exotic Shop is a hideout-wide facility: say "open lucky shop" (or "open exotic shop") anywhere in the hideout to spend lesser soul shards on a gamble for a random item of any equipment slot. This is the in-hideout place to spend the soul shards you earn from combat (drove from feedback 8609 — "a place where we could actually buy items within the hideout by spending some soul shots"). Because the hideout itself is level zero, a gambling roll there scales to your character level instead of the zone level, so the items are always level-relevant. The roll stays random, so the Exotic Shop never sells a targeted item — it complements loot-driven itemization rather than replacing it.

Auction House (Player Trading)

The auction house lets players buy and sell items using Blood Emeralds:

• Listing: At the auction house square (or the auction tab), say open inventory, scan to the item, then say sell (or sell ) to list it. The auction-house square copy advertises BOTH buying (open auction house) and selling (open inventory then sell) so the sell path is discoverable. The DARKNESS_FALLS sell / sell item / list for auction one-shot rows route to SHOP_SELL (.sellItemToShop); before they existed a spoken sell fell through to a cross-context reject and players reported no way to sell. Listed items move to your Auction Tab; set your price (minimum 10 BE). At the auction-house square a move or list command such as put in auction also lists the scanned inventory item, because INVENTORY to AUCTION_HOUSE is in BOTH ALLOWED_SALES and ALLOWED_MOVES () so the move and list path is no longer rejected with cannot move that item here, matching the sell path (feedback 8997/8998; regression scenario_test 2191)
• Buying: Browse all active listings, filter by price range
• Commission: The auction house takes a 20% cut on sales of 5+ BE (destroyed, not awarded to anyone)
• Price adjustments: Sellers can raise or lower their price by 10% increments
• Self-purchase: Blocked — you can't buy your own listings

Economy note: Blood Emeralds are a closed loop with a burn. Every sale destroys 20%, so the total supply slowly shrinks. New supply only enters through purchases.

Examine and Compare in Shops

When a player browses a shop (basic shop, gambling shop, auction house), the standard inventory voice commands work against the shop stock:

• examine reads out the full stat block of the currently scanned shop item: name, level, rarity, slot, properties.
• compare (or compare to equipped) reads out the player's currently equipped item in the same slot, then the shop item, so the player can hear the delta before spending gold or blood emeralds.

This uses the same readOutItemDetails and compareItemDetails paths that power inventory examine/compare — shop scan types are added to the same allowlist. Shop entry copy on each shop square advertises both commands.

Drove from feedback 863 and 864 (Iron Wolf L8, HIDEOUT_ZONE): "is there a way to examine and compare items in shops to what you have equipped".

The Blood Emerald shop is the exception: it renders a fixed enum catalog (BloodEmeraldConsumable) with no per-square item scan, so examine there has no scanned item to read out. Instead of the generic "you can only examine items from your inventory, equipment, shop, auction house, or stash" reject — which wrongly implies the player is not in a shop — the Blood Emerald shop answers examine with catalog guidance ("lists each consumable with its price and effect. Say buy and the item name to purchase one, or say repeat to hear the list again"). Drove from feedback 9092 (L12): the Blood Emerald shop "doesnt like to talk to me and messes the game up" — normal commands like examine returned a reject that read as the shop refusing to respond.

Resource Potion Restoration

Equipping a resource potion in the RESOURCE_POTION slot lets a class with a resource pool (Mana, Stamina, Energy) restore points mid-combat. Each charge restores 50% of the player's current maxResource, clamped to maxResource. Charges deplete one per drink and refill on hideout return like health potions. Like the health potion, the resource potion is gated on currentResource < maxResource — drinking while already at max is rejected. Implemented in resource-potion path.

Hideout Zone Magic String

The hideout zone is referenced in code by the literal zoneRef HIDEOUT_ZONE. Several systems gate behavior on this magic string (crafting workbench check, movement-rate override, exploration bonus skip, party teleport restriction). Treat it as a stable contract — renaming the zoneRef requires coordinated updates across every gate site.

Economy Flow Summary

Gold Economy (Circular)

Combat drops + Item Sales + Salvage → GOLD → Shop Purchases
                                             → Crafting Costs
                                             → Paragon Reset (10,000g)
                                             → Rarity Upgrades

Soul Shard Economy (Vertical)

Combat drops → Lesser Shards → Basic crafting + Gambling Shop (100/roll)
               Royal Shards  → Mid-tier crafting
               Sovereign Shards → Top-tier crafting

Blood Emerald Economy (Premium)

Real Money Purchase → Blood Emeralds → Auction House (buy from players)
                                      → Premium Shop
Auction Sales ───────────────────────────────────────── (minus 20% commission burned)

Item Storage

Location	Capacity	Purpose
Inventory	20 slots base, upgradeable to 40	Active items, equipped gear. +5 for subscribers; +5 per purchased backpack tier
Auction Tab	Variable	Items listed for sale
Stash	Shared across characters	Long-term storage
Ground (dungeon zones only)	Zone-local	Temporary drops

Drop restrictions: Cannot drop items in starter zones, the world hub, or the hideout. Cannot drop during combat.

Trophy Fragment System

Trophy fragments are rare items dropped only by specific bosses. When you consume a fragment, you permanently unlock a trophy at the account level. Standard characters receive its mechanical benefit; Current Season characters retain the collection and display without the bonus.

Boss Trophies

Boss	Level	Trophy	Bonus 1	Bonus 2
Fire Lord	4	Fire Lord Trophy	+15 Fire Resistance	+10 Fire Damage
Frost Queen	8	Frost Queen Trophy	+15 Ice Resistance	+10 Ice Damage
Storm Giant	99	Storm Giant Trophy	+15 Lightning Resistance	+10 Lightning Damage
Rage Demon	100	Rage Demon Trophy	+10 Strength	+15 Critical Damage
Death Knight	102	Death Knight Trophy	+20 Poison Resistance	+25 Armor
Fallen Paladin	106	Fallen Paladin Trophy	+50 HP Boost	+20 Armor
Chaos Lord	115	Chaos Lord Trophy	+20 Chaos Resistance	+15 Chaos Damage
Shadow Assassin	120	Shadow Assassin Trophy	+10 Agility	+5 Critical Chance
Archmage	130	Archmage Trophy	+10 Intelligence	+10 Magic Item Find
Dragon	131	Dragon Hoard Trophy	+20 Gold Find	+15 Magic Item Find

Note: Boss names and trophy bonuses match DarknessFallsCosmeticsTrophies enum. See trophy-room.md for full trophy room design.

How Trophy Fragments Work

1. Defeat a boss → a Trophy Fragment drops to the ground
2. Pick it up → it goes into your inventory (slot: Trophy Fragment)
3. Say "consume" or "use fragment" → the fragment is permanently used
4. Visit your Trophy Room to activate the trophy and gain its bonuses

Already own it? If you defeat a boss whose trophy you already own, the fragment won't drop — you get a message instead.

Trophy Equip System

• Trophies are account-wide collections; mechanical bonuses follow the season eligibility rule
• Max active trophy slots: level ÷ 10 (minimum 1) — Level 50 = 5 slots, Level 100 = 10 slots
• Activate and deactivate trophies in your Trophy Room