Thought Bottle: what is it?

[Osiris]

In complete Mage, tehre's a magic item called the Thought Bottle, and it apparently gives you XP or something, after you do something XP- draining, like a Wish? Does this gibe you free wishes?:smallconfused: If so, I am SO getting this!

[Tulya]

It's in Complete Arcane, page 150. Basically, you pay 500 XP, and then your experience at that moment of time is locked in for the bottle. At any later point, you can retrieve the stored value to reset your experience to that value.

So yes, you're essentially able to convert any amount of XP expended to a mere 500 xp lost. Your primary limit for crafting and casting spells with XP components becomes how much you're able to expend at one time.

[Golden Ladybug]

Effectively, it gives you a "Save State", which makes for some weird interactions. The standard trick, to the best of my knowledge, is to get a Wight or other Undead creature with Level Drain, intentionally fail the saving throw against the Negative Level and take the permanent level loss.

Because you drop to halfway between levels when you permanently lose a level, you have that much (halfway between levels) xp to spend on things like crafting.

Be warned that Thought Bottle abuse is generally considered incredibly cheesy.

[Cruiser1]

The standard trick, to the best of my knowledge, is to get a Wight or other Undead creature with Level Drain, intentionally fail the saving throw against the Negative Level and take the permanent level loss. Because you drop to halfway between levels when you permanently lose a level, you have that much (halfway between levels) xp to spend on things like crafting. Be warned that Thought Bottle abuse is generally considered incredibly cheesy.
Even cheesier is to have multiple Thought Bottles and nest their use, because then you can get large blocks of free XP numerous times in a row, instead of just once per day. For example, see this thread for an analysis of how to get literally millions of free wishes: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=217819 :smalltongue:

[Evolved Shrimp]

Be warned that Thought Bottle abuse is generally considered incredibly cheesy.

I always wondered: Is there a non-cheesy way to use the xp-saving mode of a thought bottle?

Edit: OK, reread the item description. I guess restoring lost levels from death or level drain is not really cheese. It still feels funny to me, though - like if one has crossed D&D with a video game or something.

[Chronos]

Though, there's already another non-cheesy (or at least, not as cheesy) way of restoring XP lost to level drain: The Restoration spell. And for death/resurrection, that depends on the character knowing when they're going to die and specifically preparing for it, which surely happens occasionally, but it hardly seems often enough to justify the item.

[Osiris]

Then yes, I think I'm getting this :smallbiggrin: