Alter Box

Alteration boxes (aka "alter boxes") are capable of taking select mundane weapons, cloaks, pouches, belts, and shoes and adding certain skins and gems to their appearance.

Usage

A skin or gem is placed in the box with the item to be altered. Once the lid is closed, one of the following results occurs:

Success: As you close your ebonwood box, you hear a mechanical whirring begin within it. Several measured ticks echo faintly, the unmistakable sound of a ratchet. The device hums along smoothly, giving off an odd assortment of clicks, ticks and clunks until, with one last ratcheting sound, the box falls silent.
Roundtime: 15 sec.

Failure: As you close your ebonwood box, you hear a mechanical whirring begin within it. Several measured ticks echo faintly, the unmistakable sound of a ratchet. Just as the device seems to be settling in, you hear a loud *CLACK* that contrasts sharply with the smooth sounds you heard before. With that, the box falls silent.
Roundtime: 5 sec.

Analyze

You analyze your ebonwood box and sense that the creator has provided the following information:
This ebonwood box can add certain gems and skins to select weapons, cloaks, pouches, belts, and shoes.  Buckles can be added to belts.  Place both items inside and close the box.

The box can be altered as long as it makes sense with the loresong and mechanical whirring.

Loresong

A pale, pearly-grey fog mists your vision, slowly clearing to reveal a view of an unfamiliar city, seen from a great height.  A sense of vertigo sweeps over you as you swoop down into the city at impossible speed, flying through the narrow streets and into a tiny window near the foundation of a simple cottage.  Your dream-like flight comes to a sudden halt within a cluttered workshop filled with gears, springs, and other contraptions.  Seated on a high stool at the workbench in the middle of this mechanical maelstrom is a wizened gnome, busily tinkering with a polished ebonwood box.
Roundtime: 6 sec.

Even before the last notes of your song have finished, your vision clouds and clears again, returning you to the scene of the cluttered workshop.  Some time seems to have passed since you last saw the wizened gnome, for now he is holding the ebonwood box in his hands, turning it this way and that in clear pleasure with his handiwork.  As he opens it, you hear a soft mechanical whirring, which increases in volume as the vision fades....
Roundtime: 9 sec.

The last notes of your song twist into a mechanical whirr as your vision of the old gnome and his workshop return.  The workbench is heaped with various weapons, cloaks, pouches, belts, and shoes to the gnome's right, and a random collection of gems, pelts and buckles to his left.  The wizened craftsman hums merrily as he selects one thing from each pile, pops them into the ebonwood box perched on the workbench before him, and closes it.  From deep within the box, a mechanical whirring starts up, pushing you back into your natural time and place....
Roundtime: 7 sec.


Almost before you can begin your song, your vision is swept away to the tiny workshop.  A moment or two only seem to have passed, for the gnome has just reached into the ebonwood box set before him.  He dances about the room in a merry, disjointed little jig, holding up a spiked mithril mace with a star ruby set in its haft.  You reach out towards the box and wake from your revelry with a jolt, as the reality of the cold surface of the box you are holding brings you out of your song.
Roundtime: 9 sec.


The box rests silently in your hands.

Examples of Alterations

Belt with gems:
You put a spike adorned belt in your ebonwood box.
You put a hedgehog-shaped gem in your ebonwood box.

You remove a spike adorned belt dusted with hedgehog-shaped gem flecks.

Container with gem:
You put a small sack in your ebonwood box.
You put a small pink pearl in your ebonwood box.

You remove a small sack clasped with a pink pearl solitaire from in your ebonwood box.

Boots with gem:
You put a green sapphire in your ebonwood box.
You put some slouched tawny leather boots in your ebonwood box.

You remove some slouched tawny leather boots set with tiny green sapphire studs from in your ebonwood box.

Cloak with gem:
You put a piece of flower coral in your ebonwood box.
You put a cloak in your ebonwood box.

You remove a cloak dusted with flower coral flecks from in your ebonwood box.

Container or cloak with skin:
You put a large sack in your ebonwood box.
You put a velnalin hide in your ebonwood box.

You remove a large sack woven with thin strips of velnalin hide from in your ebonwood box.


Weapon with gem:
You put a piece of blue ridge coral in your ebonwood box.
You put a veniom-hilted glaes estoc in your ebonwood box.

You remove a veniom-hilted glaes estoc with a piece of blue ridge coral set in its hilt from in your ebonwood box.

Weapon with skin:
You put a centaur hide in your ebonwood box.
You put a feras rapier in your ebonwood box.

You remove a feras rapier with a centaur hide-wrapped hilt from in your ebonwood box.

Examples of Existing Boxes

a silver-swept golden box: Sweeping silver brushwork glides over the mirror-finished golden surface of the box's lid, picking out the silhouette of a sword driven halfway into a craggy hillside. An intaglio diamond glistens from just above the clasp of the box, a complex network of interlocking thread-thin mithril lengths.

a polished ebonwood box: This small box is crafted from dark ebonwood and polished smooth.  A thin lacquer covers the surface, adding a subtle luster to the black hue.  Gold hinges serve to raise and lower the flat lid, while an ornate gold clasp adorns the front of the box.

a polished driftwood box: This small box is crafted from driftwood and polished smooth. A thin lacquer covers the surface, adding a subtle luster to the pale hue. Platinum hinges serve to raise and lower the flat lid, while an ornate platinum clasp adorns the front of the box.

Caveats

It should be noted that once an item has been through the box it cannot go through it again. 

Some scripted items work, although perhaps not all. 

Only gems that are subject to the abilities of Purification Song (1004) seem to be usable. Likewise, only skin items (skin, hide, pelt, fur, etc) work - body parts (horn, hoof, fang, tail, and the like) do not. 

Different types of gems provide different results on containers.

The appraisal value of the item doesn't change.

There seems to be no option to determine the outcome or whether or not an item will even work.