Intimate Apothecary

Intimate Apothecary

Desire has symptoms. So do bad ingredients.

You trained as an Intimate Apothecary, preparing remedies for the bodily realities that accompany romance, fertility, pleasure and magical physiology. Your shelves may once have held contraceptive teas, fertility preparations, soothing salves, suppressants, stimulants, recovery draughts, perfumed oils and carefully measured compounds meant to make intimate life safer or more comfortable.

Work with your GM to determine where you learned the trade. Perhaps you apprenticed in a pleasure district, worked beside midwives and healers, supplied a temple, served an isolated community or traveled between settlements carrying preparations unavailable locally. Whatever the setting, you learned that discretion matters, dosage matters more and attractive packaging has never made an unsafe tonic reliable.

Skill Proficiencies: Arcana, Medicine

Tool Proficiencies: Herbalism kit

Languages: One of your choice

Equipment: An herbalism kit, three stoppered sample bottles, a small brass measuring spoon, folded packets of dried herbs, a stained recipe notebook, a scentless cleansing cloth, a keepsake bottle from your first successful preparation, a set of common clothes, and a pouch containing 10 gp

Feature: Measured Dose

Your training lets you recognize many common herbs, oils, solvents and mundane ingredients used in intimate medicine and personal care. By examining a preparation’s appearance, smell, labeling and ordinary physical properties, you can often identify obvious signs of spoilage, contamination, careless dilution or dangerous substitution.

You also know the professional habits of apothecaries, herbalists and healers who prepare such substances. In settled communities, you can usually locate a reputable supplier, determine where specialized preparations are legally sold and learn which local practitioner handles an unusual request.

This feature does not automatically identify poisons, magical potions or secret formulas. Proper analysis, tools or ability checks may still be required when the substance is rare, deliberately disguised or supernatural.

Suggested Characteristics

Intimate Apothecaries become difficult to shock and even harder to impress with miracle cures. Some are nurturing neighborhood professionals; others are exacting formulators who have watched one poorly measured spoonful create enough chaos for a lifetime.

d8	Personality Trait
1	I smell an unfamiliar preparation before I trust its label.
2	I measure twice even when the recipe says once.
3	I have a polite expression reserved for people asking whether something works “instantly.”
4	I remember people by the remedies they requested.
5	I keep notes because memory is not a dosage tool.
6	I become visibly interested when someone describes an unusual side effect.
7	I treat intimate complaints as ordinary health concerns, because they are.
8	I distrust any bottle decorated more elaborately than its ingredients are documented.

d6	Ideal
1	Care. People deserve competent help without shame. (Good)
2	Precision. The difference between remedy and harm is often measurement. (Lawful)
3	Access. Useful medicine should not belong only to the wealthy. (Good)
4	Discovery. The body still contains mysteries worth studying. (Any)
5	Discretion. A customer’s private concern belongs to them. (Neutral)
6	Pragmatism. If it works safely, I care less about whether polite society approves. (Chaotic)

d6	Bond
1	My mentor taught me never to laugh at a customer’s question.
2	A healer once trusted me with a formula I have sworn not to reproduce carelessly.
3	Someone survived a dangerous preparation because I recognized the problem in time.
4	An apothecary who copied one of my recipes changed a crucial measurement and damaged my reputation.
5	I am searching for a rare plant that could replace an expensive ingredient ordinary people cannot afford.
6	A former customer knows something about my past that I would rather remain confidential.

d6	Flaw
1	I can become impatient with people who ignore clear dosage instructions.
2	I sometimes assume a physical explanation exists for problems that are actually emotional.
3	Rare ingredients tempt me into taking risks I would normally reject.
4	I have tested preparations on myself more often than I admit.
5	I once sold a remedy I was not fully confident in because someone desperately needed hope.
6	I find it difficult to leave a mysterious side effect unexplained.