How to Run an Alchemy System in D&D 5E — Full Guide
Alchemy adds depth to exploration, downtime and roleplay — without breaking your campaign's balance.
D&D 5E gives you potions as loot items, but it doesn't give you a real alchemy system. Players find a Potion of Healing, drink it, move on. There's no crafting, no discovery, no reason to interact with the herbalist in town.
A proper alchemy system changes all of that. Suddenly, wilderness exploration has a purpose. Downtime has value. And that goblin alchemist the party dismissed becomes someone worth talking to.
Here's how to run one at your table — and how Alchemy Vol.1 gives you everything you need to do it without hours of prep.
The Core Loop
A good alchemy system has three phases: gather, craft, use. Each phase gives players something to do and something to think about.
- Find ingredients in the wild
- Buy from herbalists
- Harvest from creatures
- Grow in a garden
- Combine ingredients
- Use tools proficiency
- Spend downtime days
- Risk failure or accidents
- Drink as a bonus action
- Apply as oil or poison
- Throw as a bomb
- Trade or sell
Setting Up the Ingredient System
The key to making alchemy feel real is giving ingredients properties that players can discover and experiment with. Each ingredient should have at least three pieces of information: where it grows, how to harvest it, and what it does.
Alchemy Vol.1 includes 20 illustrated ingredient cards with exactly this information — growth conditions, harvest difficulty and alchemical properties. You can hand them directly to your players as they discover each one.
When a player harvests an ingredient for the first time, hand them the card face-down. Let them spend a downtime activity to identify it — this makes discovery feel rewarding and adds tension to unknown ingredients.
The Crafting Roll
Keep crafting simple. An Intelligence (Alchemist's Supplies) check, DC based on potion rarity:
- DC 10
- Half day of work
- Basic ingredients
- DC 15
- Full day of work
- Rare ingredients
- DC 20+
- Multiple days
- Exotic ingredients
On a failure by 5 or more, consider a minor mishap — a wasted ingredient, a minor explosion, an unexpected side effect. This adds stakes without being punishing.
50 Potions Ready to Use
The hardest part of running alchemy is creating interesting potions that don't break the game. Alchemy Vol.1 includes 50 unique potions with their recipes, effects, preparation time and stability. Each one has its own illustrated card — hand them out as your players discover new recipes.
The potions range from straightforward healing and buff potions to more unusual effects: potions that enhance senses, alter appearance, affect the environment or interact with specific creature types. There's enough variety to make alchemy a genuine strategic layer in your campaign.
"My players loved the added items to our game." — Mike, verified buyer
Alchemy in the World of Elyssia
Alchemy Vol.1 was designed for Elyssia — a homebrew world where magic is forbidden and alchemy took its place. In Elyssia, alchemists are respected professionals, magic users are hunted, and the line between the two is blurry enough to get you executed.
This setting makes alchemy feel essential, not optional. But the mechanics work in any D&D 5E campaign — you don't need to use Elyssia's lore to benefit from the system.
Pairing Alchemy with Other Systems
Alchemy works best when it connects to other parts of your campaign. A few pairings that work well:
Archaeology Vol.1 adds ancient ruins where rare ingredients and forgotten recipes can be discovered. Blood Magic Vol.1 introduces darker alchemical compounds that blur the line between chemistry and the forbidden arcane. Both are set in the same world and designed to work together.
