Vintage Treasures
Table of Contents

Overview #
Tucked away within the tightly packed, tenement-lined streets of The Cairns is Vintage Treasures, an eclectic shop specializing in excavated artifacts and historical curiosities.
It is a place where the grime of Ustalav’s capital meets the buried history of the region, offering a chaotic but charming stop for adventurers navigating the fog-shrouded streets of Caliphas.
Atmosphere & Architecture #
Squeezed between two towering, soot-stained buildings, the shop is marked by a heavy, iron-bound oak door and a swinging metal sign depicting a magnifying glass crossed with a messenger’s satchel. Inside, the air is thick with the scent of turned earth, alchemical polish, and dwarven pipeweed.
The shop is dimly lit by sputtering lanterns, but the proprietor has strategically positioned polished brass mirrors to reflect amber light directly onto the walls. The floor space is cramped and cluttered; every available surface groans under the weight of half-cleaned historical trinkets, tarnished coins, and rusted armor plates. Notably, the primary display cases are built uncomfortably low to the ground, forcing taller patrons to stoop awkwardly to examine the wares.
The Proprietor: Gardain Ruby-Eye #
The shop is owned and operated by Gardain, a rock dwarf who is unusually short, even among his own kin.
Appearance: Gardain cuts a memorable figure with his bright pale green eyes, long ear lobes, and a head of lush purple hair. His skin is heavily decorated with ink. Despite his diminutive stature, he possesses a pair of incredibly powerful, calloused hands.
Demeanor: He maintains a friendly and welcoming attitude toward his customers. While he has a pragmatic and sometimes unimaginative approach to his trade, his genuine curiosity about the world outside makes him an eager conversationalist.
The “Torso” Gallery #
Gardain’s most defining trait is his utter obsession with celebrity status and notoriety. He views every visiting adventurer or person of note as a potential addition to his personal “Wall of Fame”.
He insists on taking a commemorative photograph with every famous patron who enters Vintage Treasures. However, because Gardain stubbornly frames every shot based on his own eye level, the resulting pictures are almost entirely headless. The walls of the shop are proudly lined with dozens of these portraits—featuring a beaming Gardain standing next to the belts, midsections, and torsos of Ustalav’s elite.
Shop Features & Services #
The “Dig Bins”: Near the entrance are several large, sturdy wooden crates filled with unsorted excavation dirt and low-value trinkets. Gardain encourages patrons who don’t mind getting their hands dirty to sift through the muck themselves, offering whatever they find for a handful of copper.
The Messenger’s Board: Behind the main counter sits a massive corkboard plastered with sealed letters, delivery manifests, and local postings. Because Gardain operates a thriving messenger business, this board is a vital source of local gossip, courier jobs, and news circulating through The Cairns.
The Iron Lord’s Reliquary: While the front of the shop is dedicated to pottery, old coins, and standard curiosities, a heavy, locked iron door in the back hides Gardain’s true passion. In honor of Gorum, he keeps a private stock of ancient weapons and armor that have seen glorious, bloody history. He only allows access to this back room if a patron can prove their martial prowess or regale him with a worthy tale of battlefield victory
Current Inventory #
Spun Cloud (White)
common
7gp
Level: 2 | Type: consumable | Damage: 0
Activate 1 (manipulate)
On the Elemental Plane of Air, small clouds of differing colors can sometimes float separately from other cloud formations. Clever people can spin these clouds into small handfuls, creating a magical bundle of elemental power. Unlike most bottled breath, spun clouds don't have any effect on you while you hold them in your lungs, but you can exhale the cloud as a single action. When exhaled, the cloud flows out and expands into a @Template[burst|distance:20] within 60 feet of you. The cloud dissipates after 1 minute.
A white cloud swirls with winds that speed up travel. A creature that starts its turn in the cloud gains a +10-foot item bonus to its land Speed and fly Speed (if it has one) until the end of its turn.
Effect: Spun Cloud (White)
Nectar of Purification
common
3gp
Level: 1 | Type: consumable | Damage: 0
Activate A (manipulate)
A shimmering liquid, nectar of purification is often stored in bottles similar to those used for vinegar. This oil casts a 1st-rank Cleanse Cuisine spell over any food or drink onto which it's poured. The nectar evaporates as it takes effect, leaving the taste and texture of the food or drink unaltered.
Sextant of the Night
common
95gp
Level: 4 | Type: equipment | Damage: 0
This finely wrought sextant is made from silver with several onyx mirrors and shades made from thin sets of crystal glass. A fine spyglass made of silver is affixed to the frame; removing the spyglass destroys the sextant. By all appearances, the sextant shouldn't function, as the shades and mirrors are swapped, but when you look through the spyglass, you see a night sky during the day and the sun during the night, as if day and night were inverted. When you use the sextant, you gain a +1 item bonus to Survival checks, which increases to a +2 item bonus when you Sense Direction.
Feather Token (Fan)
common
15gp
Level: 4 | Type: consumable | Damage: 0
Each feather token appears to be a simple feather from some exotic bird. The feather's shaft, dipped in gold, bears a single arcane rune. Activating a feather token causes it to transform into another object, which then can be used as normal for that object. Each feather can be activated only once, with most of them permanently becoming the item in their description.
Activate A Interact
Activating this feather requires you to fan it in a given direction. If this direction is toward the sail of a vessel, the feather flutters up toward the sail and fans continuously, filling the sail with air and granting the vessel a +10-foot circumstance bonus to its Speed for 8 hours. If fanned in any other direction, it instead produces a single casting of Gust of Wind (DC 20).
Masquerade Scarf
common
30gp
Level: 2 | Type: equipment | Damage: 0
This delicately embroidered scarf matches with every outfit and can even complete a costume or disguise with illusions.
Activate—Masquerade 1 minute (manipulate)
Frequency once per day
Effect You arrange the scarf over your lower face, and it casts a 1st-rank Illusory Disguise spell on you, which ends immediately if the scarf is removed. You can alter the scarf's appearance or make it invisible as part of the illusory disguise, but it can still be felt if touched.
Oil of Mending
common
9gp
Level: 3 | Type: consumable | Damage: 0
Activate 1 minute (manipulate)
A vial of oil of mending appears to have countless translucent threads swirling within. Applying this oil to an item casts a 2nd-rank Mending spell to repair the item.
Composer Staff
common
80gp
Level: 4 | Type: weapon | Damage: 1d4 bludgeoning
A composer staff is short and shaped like an elegant black conductor's baton with a silver tip. When waved through the air, it hums melodically. In this way, you can play it as though it were an instrument, and it grants a +1 item bonus to Performance checks made with it.
Activate Cast a Spell
Effect You expend a number of charges from the staff to cast a spell from its list.
- Cantrip Haunting Hymn, Summon Instrument
- 1st Concordant Choir
Craft Requirements Supply one casting of all listed ranks of all listed spells.
Protective Netting
common
50gp
Level: 3 | Type: equipment | Damage: 0
Troops fighting in locales filled with insects wear enchanted gauzy nets over their heads, draped from wide flat hats, to protect against swarms of stinging or biting creatures. While wearing protective netting, if you would be exposed to disease or injury poison from an attack, attempt a @Check[flat|dc:17]. On a success, you are not exposed.
Activate—Flutter Net r (manipulate)
Frequency once per day
Trigger A swarm enters your space
Effect Your protective netting flutters rapidly, keeping the swarm away. You gain a +1 item bonus to saving throws against effects originating from swarms for 1 minute.
Effect: Flutter Net
Unifying Emblem (Sklar-Quah)
common
60gp
Level: 3 | Type: equipment | Damage: 0
These tattoos were first created using designs and techniques from the seven Shoanti clans. Each clan is known for one tattoo in particular. The clans would seal alliances in ancient days by tattooing their emblems on members of other clans to symbolically share their gifts. Though these tattoos are respected, the clans reserve their most prestigious symbols for true members of the clan. The tattoo allows you to understand and speak Shoanti. If you already know that language, you instead gain a +1 item bonus on Diplomacy checks you make when speaking Shoanti to someone who understands it.
The tattoo of the Sun clan depicts a songbird with flame emitting from its beak.
Activate 1 – 3
Frequency once per day
Effect The tattoo casts Concordant Choir.
Candlecap
common
12gp
Level: 1 | Type: equipment | Damage: 0
The crown of a candlecap is stitched leather sewn in the shape of a small bowl. Fixed inside the bowl is a melted nub of wax with a small black wick.
Activate 1 (manipulate)
Effect You shake your head, and the candle wick ignites. The candlecap sheds dim light in a 20-foot radius. The candle doesn't require oxygen and can't be smothered or quenched. Activating the candlecap again douses the light.
Gecko Potion
common
3gp
Level: 1 | Type: consumable | Damage: 0
Activate A (manipulate)
A gecko potion is a sticky, tawny brown liquid with flecks of sand suspended in it. For 5 minutes after drinking this potion, your fingertips sprout thousands of microscopic, bristled hairs that cling to objects, granting you gain a +1 item bonus to Climb and Palm an Object checks and to your Reflex DC against Disarm attempts.
Effect: Gecko Potion
Potion of Acid Retaliation (Lesser)
common
12gp
Level: 3 | Type: consumable | Damage: 0
Activate 1 (manipulate)
For 1 minute after drinking a potion of acid retaliation, you glow with a faint aura of acid energy, and a creature that touches you (such as by making an unarmed attack or using a spell with a range of touch against you) takes acid damage.
The aura deals 1d4 acid damage.
Scroll of 1st-rank Spell
common
4gp
Level: 1 | Type: consumable | Damage: 0
Casting a Spell from a scroll requires holding the scroll in one hand and activating it with a Cast a Spell activity using the normal number of actions for that spell.
The spell must appear on your spell list. Because you're the one Casting the Spell, use your spell attack modifier and spell DC. The spell also gains the appropriate trait for your tradition (arcane, divine, occult, or primal).
Any physical costs are provided when a scroll is created, so you don't need to provide them when casting from a scroll. If the spell requires a locus, you must have that locus to Cast the Spell from a scroll.
Note: To create a scroll or wand of a specific spell, drag the spell from the compendium or compendium browser into the inventory of a PC, NPC, or loot actor.
Smoking Sword
common
60gp
Level: 3 | Type: weapon | Damage: 1d8 slashing
Smoke constantly belches from this +1 magic longsword. Any successful Strike with this sword deals 1 extra fire damage. You can use a special action to make the blade's edges light on fire.
Activate—Stoke Flames 1 (concentrate) Until the end of your turn, the blade deals 1d6 extra fire damage instead of just 1. After you use this action, you can't use it again for 10 minutes.
Potion of Shared Memories
common
4gp
Level: 1 | Type: consumable | Damage: 0
Activate 1 (manipulate)
A potion of shared memories can transfer recollections from one creature to another. To place a memory in the potion, you must hold the vial and focus on a particular memory for 1 minute. This memory must be of a single event, location, person, or otherwise encompass a span of about 1 minute. The clear fluid takes on a shimmering hue reminiscent of the stored memory and gains a slightly sweet taste.
Upon consuming the potion, the drinker vividly recalls the memory, and thereafter can remember it as easily as a memory they actually experienced. An unwilling drinker can refuse to absorb the memory.
Adaptive Cogwheel
common
5gp
Level: 2 | Type: consumable | Damage: 0
Usage affixed to a firearm
Activate f (concentrate)
Requirements You're wielding the affixed firearm.
This tiny copper gear is attached to the side of a firearm with a matching bolt or pin. When you activate it, the affixed weapon magically transfigures itself into the form of any simple or martial firearm to which you have access, harmlessly ejecting any contained ammunition in the process. Any runes or attached items present on the affixed weapon remain active unless incompatible with its new form, in which case they're suppressed for the duration of the transformation. The effect lasts until the beginning of your next turn.
Dazzling Rosary
common
15gp
Level: 4 | Type: consumable | Damage: 0
Activate Cast a Spell
When energy courses through these lustrous beads, they glow brightly in the sacred colors of the spellcaster's faith. A Spiritual Weapon empowered with this catalyst flashes with bright light when it critically Strikes a target, causing the target to be Dazzled until the beginning of your next turn. The rosary can be used with a spiritual weapon of 4th level or below.
Effect: Dazzling Rosary
Heartmoss
uncommon
55gp
Level: 3 | Type: equipment | Damage: 0
This burgundy moss grows in heart-shaped clumps and releases a pleasant, calming scent. The spell DC of any spell cast by Activating this item is 17.
- Armor You gain resistance 2 to mental damage and a +1 item bonus to saving throws against effects with the emotion trait.
- Weapon After you cast a healing spell by activating the heartmoss, the weapon exudes a soothing scent. Your Strikes with the affixed weapon have the nonlethal trait for 1 minute. Until the end of your next turn, Strikes with the affixed weapon cause the target to be Stupefied{Stupefied 1} for 1 round if it hits (or for 3 rounds on a critical hit).
Activate Cast a Spell
Effect You cast Stabilize.
Conrasu Coin (Arbiter)
uncommon
7gp
Level: 3 | Type: consumable | Damage: 0
Activate F (concentrate)
Trigger You attempt a Diplomacy check to Make an Impression.
These wooden discs sometimes form spontaneously at the Wood Pile, a secret conrasu location suffused with extraplanar energy. A conrasu coin can be activated to call upon the power of a specific type of aeon.
This coin has small wings like an arbiter, the messenger and diplomat aeon. When you activate the coin, you gain a +2 circumstance bonus on the Diplomacy check, which increases to a +3 circumstance bonus to [[/act make-an-impression]] on a creature with the aeon trait.
Bottomless Stein
uncommon
25gp
Level: 2 | Type: equipment | Damage: 0
A magic item regarded as holy by followers of Cayden Cailean, this ornate metallic stein is always filled to the brim with delicious ale, no matter how much is drunk or spilled. If it is emptied (such as by being gulped quickly or upended onto the floor), the bottomless stein will fill again within 1 round as long as it is right side up, though it's impossible to transfer the ale to another container to sell it or store it for later. The exact type of ale with which the stein is filled is determined at the item's creation, and cannot be changed thereafter.
Tables #
People #
| Name | Description | Ancestry | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gardain Ruby-Eye | Owner of Vintage Treasures and notorious fame hound | Dwarf | alive |