Imbuements

Imbuements are temporary enhancements placed into an item's imbuement slots (items have 1–3 slots). Each comes in three tiers — Basic, Intricate, Powerful — with rising cost, better effect, and lower success chance. An imbuement lasts about 20 hours of use before it fades. On a failed attempt the slot stays empty but the gold and materials are spent; a protection option guarantees success for an extra fee.

Tiers

Weapon imbuements

Armor & any-slot imbuements

• Damage, leech, critical and weapon-skill imbuements go on weapons; protection, speed, capacity, magic level and shielding go on armor and other gear.
• Skill imbuements are weapon-specific (Slash on swords, Chop on axes, Bash on clubs, Precision on distance).
• Elemental imbuements convert, they don't add. Scorch, Venom, Frost, Electrify and Reap turn a share of your weapon's physical damage into that element — your total damage stays the same. Their value is in hitting a creature's weakness (or dodging its physical resistance), not in raw numbers.
• Elemental imbuements only fit weapons that deal pure physical damage. A weapon that already carries its own elemental damage — a fire sword, an ice rapier, an amber weapon — cannot take one, because a hit only has a single elemental damage channel and the weapon is already using it. The imbuing window will tell you rather than let you waste the gold and materials.
• Imbuements are preserved when you reroll an item's rarity with an Orb.
• An imbued item can't be sold to a shop NPC until the imbuement is removed.