Metal, Alloys and Ores

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Basic Irons & Steels

Iron
Iron is a very common metal, mined throughout the world from large sedimentary ore bodies (mostly hematite and magnetite), from which the pure metal is smelted. Iron is tougher but more brittle than steel. However, heavy bludgeoning weapons (such as maces) are traditionally cast from iron. Note that inferior grade steel (as may be used in poor and isolated human areas and amongst many humanoid cultures) is treated as iron for game purposes.
Lore/Uses: Iron is the cheapest and most abundant, useful and important of all metals. It forms the metallurgical base for all advanced cultures. Annealed iron is used in a vast range of utilitarian and everyday objects (such as cookware, fences, gratings, architecture). Tempered iron is used for some weapons and armors, but more often for nails, tools and horseshoes. It is combined with other metals to make different alloys, most importantly with carbon to make steel.


Purpure
A rare variety of normal iron ore, it naturally has a purple metallic sheen to it. This sheen is retained when purpure is processed into steel. Purpure steel weapons are the arms of choice for Sarkotos nobility (especially when refined to fine quality or superior grade).


Steel
All steels are hard metal alloys of varying amounts of iron, carbon and other trace elements. The addition of carbon to iron makes it stronger, more resilient, and able to hold a much keener edge. Steel is generally a mid gray color, that polishes to dull silvery sheen when worked or honed. Better quality steels are a cold blue (generally, the bluer the steel, the better the quality).

Steel (Standard Steel, Swordsteel)
This is standard grade steel, the average of what is found across the human lands of the realms, and used in most areas (that have steel age technology) for weapons and armor. Use standard stats for weight, cost, speed, etc. of armor and weapons. Steel weapons and armor are made by careful case-hardening and subsequent forging; as well as by layering and welding together steels of varying harnesses, to produce hard yet durable items.

Fine Steel (Quality Steel)
This is high grade fine steel that either: Come from unusual or exceptionally pure iron deposits, and have undergone special refining and alloying processes, often with unusually pure carbon and using rare or secret amalgams, or, has been worked and crafted into quality equipment by exceptional craftsmen with more time, skill and care than the average smith. Master craftsmanship OR the highest quality materials are the hallmarks of fine steel.
Arms and armor made using fine steel by expert craftsmen have had more time spent in general tempering and finishes, the balance of the weapon or the cut and working of the mail or armor plates. Quality weapons are carefully made to be perfectly balanced, light in the hand, but heavy in the blow. Blades and sharp weapons may be forged from the finest steel for flexibility and sharpness; the steel carefully folded, hammered, and tempered to a superb edge. Other weapons are specially hardened, hammered and weighted.
Much of the arms and armor made by dwarven craft-folk is of fine steel, which accounts for their popularity and expense, so most equipment of dwarven manufacture can be assumed to be of this quality. Some elven communities produce elven steel, which is a type of fine steel (and which can also be alloyed with small amounts of mithral to produce the alloy used in making enchanted elven chain mail).

Superior Steel (Sarkotosan Steel)
This is the most exceptional grade of steel available: it is mined from the most pure of iron deposits, and has been carefully refined with the purest of carbon and secret amalgams, and has undergone numerous alloying and forging processes, creating a steel that is superior to all other common alloys. This metal is only available from the most skilled of metallurgists of Sarkotos, those who spent their lives furthering the arts of refining, tempering and folding steel alloys. Items fabricated of this steel must be lovingly made by master craftsmen. Both exceptional craftsmanship AND the highest quality materials are the hallmarks of superior steel.
The best dwarven equipment is often of superior grade (so many experienced dwarven fighting folk will have access to superior items). Elven steel, when worked by true masters of their craft, produce superior items.

The difference between fine and superior steel
Fine (quality) steel is exceptional in either the quality of its materials and its refining process, OR in the forging and craftsmanship of the item itself. Superior steel is exceptional in both. If a lesser craftsmen uses the best iron and carbon, and the best refining and forging process, they can still only produce quality items, at best. Likewise if the most skilled master craftsman can only access common materials, he too can produce quality items at best, no matter how much time and care he takes.

Lore/Uses (For All Types): Steel is the standard metal used in armor and weaponry throughout the Realms. It is also used for a wide range of utility wares (everyday objects such as pots and pans and wheels). In more advanced humanoid cultures, stamped steel is often used as coinage.

Special Metals and Alloys

Arandur
Arandur is a rare natural metal found in igneous rock, usually as streaks of blue-green ore amid vitreous glass. So that it does not become as brittle as the glass it is found in, it must be tempered with the blood of a red or blue dragon in its forging (so high-grade Arandur is understandably rare!) The finished forged metal is silver-blue with a green reflective shine.
Lore/Uses: Once the exclusive secret of the gnomes, this legendary metal has since been worked by elven smiths of Kir'viir. Many gnomish locks and hooks, as well as some fabled elven warblades, have been forged of arandur, though new forgings (and folk who know how to work the ore) are both rarer than ever today.


Cinnabryl Steel (Red Steel)
This is steel residue left after the ‘depletion’ of the metal-like cinnabryl. Most famous on the world of Mystara, it is found in our world in small quantities of rough but quite pure steel in the very heart of the Theocracy of Madder. Has a vermillion (deep red) cast to the steel when worked or tarnished, which can be shined to a blood red colour.
Lore/Uses: Most often forged into weapons, to make use of its special properties. Evil and militant folk of the south are known to prefer red steel because of its sheen that is the colour of blood (and so has a potential to strike fear into the hearts of their foes).


Darksteel
This is an extremely rare steel alloy whose composition and refining was a secret of the lost Ironstar dwarven clan. The alloy is silvery in hue when polished or cut, but its exposed surfaces have a deep, gleaming purple lustre, and reputedly harder and more durable than any adamantite based alloy. One downside to such legendary toughness, is that it is said it weighed far, far more than any other metal. Rumors are found saying that a dagger of Darksteel weighed the same as a longsword of standard steels. It can rarely be found rarely as ingots from old treasures chambers or old dwarven mines, or already forged into weapons and armor. The secret of its composition and manufacture seems as lost as the Ironstars themselves.
Lore/Uses: The unique properties of darksteel make it very valuable, and it is eagerly sought by dwarves and by adventurers of other races. Certain smiths in Navahla offer 7,000 gp or more for an intact darksteel ingot. It is then reworked into weapons and armor (often magical).


Dlarun
This bone-white metal can take a high polish and is often mistaken for ivory when seen in finished items, but it has a distinctive greenish sheen in candlelight and when in the presence of magical radiance. Derived from roasting clay dug from the banks of certain rivers, dlarun is first gathered as white chips among the fire ash, which are then melted in a hot crucible filled with a secret mixture of liquids (most from plants of the deep South). A lump of soft, soap-like metal results that can be readily carved by anyone with a sharp knife. When the desired end result has been achieved, a second heating (in the open flames of a fire fueled and supplemented by secret ingredients, this time) transforms the metal into lightweight rigidity.
Lore/Uses: Dlarun is a little-known metal mined exclusively by halflings from the Theocracy of Madder, who guard the secret of its forging, and sell only the finished metal. Dlarun is usually encountered after having been formed by halflings into animal or plant-shaped figurines, inlay plates, and hilts for weapons (guard, grip and pommel adds up to the pound needed to confer its special abilities). It is also fashioned into light helms, to make the most of its light weight and its mind-protection properties.


Glassteel
This is steel that has been enspelled with the glassteel wizard spell. Legends suggest a natural form of glassteel can be mined from certain areas of the Knockskull Mountains in Alzorc.
Lore/Uses: Glassteel is expensive as only powerful wizards can produce it. The small amounts available are generally used for a variety of laboratory equipment, windows in wealthy villas or spelljamming vessels, or for an exotic-looking weapon or armor suit. The winged elves (the Avariel) prize glassteel, using it for much of their armory and architecture (which suggests they have an alternative supply or means of manufacture).


Meteoric Iron (Starmetal)
This metal is only found on the Prime Material and even then is rare at best. It is forged from ore garnered from meteors that have fallen to the world’s surface. It cannot be harvested from amongst the rocks of space because it is the process of entering the atmosphere that gives starmetal its special properties.
Lore/Uses: Usually used to produce weapons such as daggers and armor. Meteoric iron is considered holy by a number of faiths, especially the churches of deities favored by elves.


Mithril (Mithral, Truemetal, Moonsteel)
Mithril is a pure, silvery-blue, shining metal especially prized by elves and dwarves (who call it truemetal), and who are both expert in smelting pure mithril from its glittering, soft silvery-black ore. This rare metal is found in very small deposits all over the world (from the depths of the Underdark to surface rocks). Mithril is the lightest and most supple of metals hard enough to be used in the making of armor. It is astonishingly resilient (durable and flexible under stress).
Lore/Uses: Mithril is one of the most treasured metals, period, both for its excellent combat performance and because it affects creatures as silver. Elves hoard mithril (using it in the making of most of their magic arms and armors), and try to control areas where it occurs. Deposits are scattered in small veins and pockets all over, but concentrated mostly in the mountains that line the Ballari Ridgebacks. Mines are usually under the control of wary elven or dwarf clans. The secrets of its working are closely guarded. Mithril is used to make fine jewelry, quality armor (usually mail) and excellent weaponry.
Mithril is usually used pure. It can be alloyed with a small amount of steel without diminishing its special properties. The famous elven chain mail, an elven speciality and semi-secret. Note that elven chain uses small amounts of precious mithril alloyed with quality steel to give strength and flexibility to the fine chain links. Such elven chain gives the protection of normal chain mail, and yet is flexible and light enough to be worn under clothing. (Note that the fine and intricate construction process is just as important as the material used). Legends say that mithril can be alloyed with superior steel in secret processes to make adamantite, but the veracity of this is not known.


Silver-Iron
Silver-iron is not an alloy, but rather a semi-magical (or alchemical) bonding of silver and cold iron. The finished products, almost always weapons, have a mottled black and silver appearance.
Lore/Uses: Silver-iron weapons have a striking mottled appearance. In the world they are generally produced in dwarfholds and are considered a preferred sidearm of many of the affluent of that region.


Titanium
Titanium is a lustrous white metal. Titanium is mined from igneous ore bodies, from the minerals ilmenite, rutile and sphene. Dwarves jealously guard most of the known deposits of titanium and value it highly. Titanium is strong and lightweight, ductile when pure and malleable when heated.
Lore/Uses: Titanium is principally used in a range of alloys to impart strength, and is prized in weapons grade steels. Items of pure titanium are used when heat resistance is required.


Tungsten
Tungsten is a steel gray to tin-white metal. It is rare in nature, being mined from tiny deposits of wolframite ore in the northern mountains and adjoining Underdark. Its workability decreases with impurity, so at present only dwarves possess the metallurgy skills to purify the metal sufficiently to put it to good use (and who feel akin to its enchantment-resisting property). This pure tungsten is referred to a essential or true tungsten.
Lore/Uses: Tungsten is used in small quantities in special alloys to produce the hardest tool steels known, and which have excellent heat resistance. If of sufficient purity, this true tungsten can be used for making items of extreme toughness and heat resistance, such as weapons, armor and forge tools. Tantalum (a gray, heavy and very hard metal that is difficult to extract from its parent ore) can be considered to act the same as tungsten.

Adamant-Based Alloys

Adamant
Superior to and rarer even than mithril, this is the most powerful of the metals found on the Prime. Its natural form is only found within the depths of the Underdark and as such, is usually only found in the hands of those who live deep underground. Because of its rarity it is highly prized, and the small deposits are jealously guarded, mostly by drow and duergar. It is a hard, jet black ferromagnetic ore found around hardened volcanic flows; and is refined by exacting and largely secret methods into one of two alloys: the dark, flexible adamantine (adamantium if of insufficient purity) and the durable but difficult-to-work adamantite. Both are invariably dull black, and will not normally shine. If heavily honed or polished the alloys have a soft green sheen.


Adamantite
Adamantite alloy is second to none in terms of strength, hardness and durability. A few clans of deep-delving dwarves mine rare deposits of adamant and laboriously refine it using secret methods into adamantite, creating mighty weapons and armor to aid their desperate conflict against the fell races of the Underdark. The few adamantite-alloy items that exist on the surface world are almost certainly dwarf-made.
Adamantite takes far longer to smelt with the rare alloying materials, and many times longer to work than other steels (dwarves say this is why the lazy drow short-cut the process by irradiating adamant into adamantine instead of manually working the adamant into adamantite).


Adamantine (Drow Steel)
Drow of the Underdark are rumored to hoard an abundance of adamantine, an alloy of adamant made malleable by carefully exposing the alloy components to a specific combination of radiations and enchanted materials. This process takes a long time, and hence is on-going: the adamant ore that will be used in the adamantine alloy may spend a year or more baking in the cold, hard radiations of a guarded, highly-prized natural cyst-cavern, in the heart of what was once a magma flow. The resultant adamantine is used to create the legendary quasi-magical items of the Drow. Irradiated adamantine has powerful properties, which are further enhanced through enchantments cast by Drow sorcerer-smiths. These items do not radiate a magical dweomer, even if further enchanted.
Adamantine (Drow Steel) is unstable and will break down in direct sunlight. When exposed to the sun for more than 2 rounds at a time (and any exposure totaling 5 rounds in a 5 day period), irreversible decay begins. Within 2d6 days, the items lose their properties, and crumble to a worthless powder (that may have alchemical uses, but cannot be reconstituted into adamantine). Drow items, when not exposed to the Underdark radiation sources and if they are carefully protected from the sunlight, lose their properties after 1d20+30 days, thereafter performing as normal steel items. They retain their shape and usefulness as normal items indefinitely as long as they are not exposed to sunlight. To retain their full properties, a drow item must be exposed to a radiation source in the Underdark for one week in every four. Most such areas are jealously guarded by the drow, who build their settlements close by. These radiation sources only appear on the Prime (and probably in the domains of the Drow pantheon) and, oddly enough, drow adamantine immediately begins to decay (as if affected by sunlight) when taken to another plane.


Adamantium
This is simply adamantine alloy of insufficient purity or properties to maintain an irradiation. Drow sell significant quantities of adamantium to other Underdark races when they discover it will not hold an irradiation. Adamantium is deliberately refined from adamant alloy by derro and duergar, who usually do not have access to the radiation cysts to create adamantine. While it is not as strong as adamantine, it has the advantage of not decaying in sunlight, and so is used by Underdark peoples when raiding the surface.
Lore/Uses (For All Types): Used mainly for armor and weaponry, to make the most of its properties of incredible strength and extraordinary resilience.

Other Metals & Alloys

Antimony
A brittle, lustrous white metal occurs in nature as pure metal or as a streaked silvery crystalline ore, stibnite. Found in veins and hot spring deposits, or as a by-product of lead-zinc and mercury mines. The ore must be smelted to obtain pure antimony, which is then used in a variety of alloys (most importantly, it is mixed with tin and lead to make pewter), metal treatments and paints, and in alchemical mixtures (especially associated with medicines and weaker poisons).


Arsenic
Pure arsenic is a steel gray, very brittle, crystalline, semi-metallic solid. Usually found in an ore form called realgar (a orange-red mineral) and as orpiment (a canary yellow ore), associated with silver and lead ores, and sometimes with tin ores. Not mined specifically, it is a by-product of silver, lead and zinc mining.
Lore/Uses: Arsenic is used in medicines, paints and as a virulent poison.


Brass
Brass is a durable though somewhat brittle yellow alloy, consisting essentially of copper and smaller amounts of zinc (up to 30%). Malleable and somewhat, it can be drawn into wire only with difficulty, so is usually beaten into plates.
Lore/Uses: Brass has a long association, and is popular in all cultures. Here it is widely used in utility wares (especially pots, plates, bowls and braziers), architectural ornamentation, furniture and ceremonial objects. It is popularly used throughout for funnel-shaped musical instruments (horns). It is rarely used in weaponry, but some armor plates may be constructed of beaten brass (more for looks than effectiveness).


Bronze
A reddish to dark gold colored metal alloy made from copper and tin, bronze is an attractive metal but still inferior to common iron and steel. Like copper, bronze is beautiful when cared for properly. Easy to emboss with crests or insignia, well-worked bronze shines like gold and can be polished to the sheen of a mirror.
Lore/Uses: Some cultures use bronze extensively due to its greater availability and cheaper cost than steel. It was once used throughout southern and eastern hemispheres for weapons and armor, before the widespread adoption of steel. Bronze plate armor pieces are still found in some of the older kingdom's armories. These cultures have developed the skill of forging bronze into a high art, making armor that looks like gold but wears like steel. The softer metal is often worked into a decorative design. Today, bronze is many used for statuary, jewelry and ornamental objects. As the earliest alloy developed by many cultures (and so the first metal suitable for many craft and military uses), it has a special place in many popular lore, and so features in the ceremonies of many older religious faiths.


Chromium
Chromium is refined from chromite, a rare ore mined from widely scattered deposits in the world and in some (mostly dwarven-held) areas of the Underdark. Chromium is a steel gray, lustrous, hard metal that polishes to a mirror-like finish, with it being slightly lighter than iron, it is very hard and brittle.
Lore/Uses: Chromium is seldom used in pure form, due to its rarity and cost; and because it is so beneficial when alloyed with other metals. Chromium is primarily used in pyrochrome form (fired with carbon) to harden and give corrosion resistance to alloys, especially steels. It is thought to be a principle component in the everbright process. It is also used to color glass (giving a distinctive green).


Copper
Found in most types of rocks and ore veins, the copper-bearing rocks often have a green coloration due to copper presence (it is occasionally found in pure form). Copper is mined throughout, but most especially in the North. In metal form, it has a distinctive pinkish or red-gold sheen.
Lore/Uses: One of the first metals to be used in the making of armor, weapons, and various other utensils, copper is a relatively soft metal compared to iron. Today copper is mainly used for utility wares, jewelry, ceremonial objects, in magical and alchemical experimentation, and as a base metal (alloyed with tin to make bronze or with zinc to make brass). Gold and silver is often alloyed with a small amount of copper to increase their durability and stain resistance. It is also used for plumbing and tubing, roofing, wire, tanning and as a spell component.


Gold
A distinctive soft, dull yellow metal. Found as a pure metal in rock sequences associated with quartz and pyrite, and in alluvium (especially as nuggets in river beds). Occurs in veins, sometimes associated with silver and with copper ores. Can be a by-product of copper smelting. Mined throughout the world, especially in the North. It is the softest, most malleable and ductile of workable metals.
Lore/Uses: The most renowned and traditional of precious metals, gold is normally used in jewelry, art objects, ceremonial items and in coinage. Despite its high value, it is relatively common and is favored for use in ornamentation and in the making of magic items.


Graphite
Is a soft pure form of carbon found in nature, called “lead flower” by miners, and occurring in black to dark gray foliated masses with metallic luster and greasy feel. Found in metamorphic rocks such as crystalline limestone, schists and gneisses. The deposits are rarely large and are easily mineable. Graphite is used by scribes as a writing tool, and as a dry lubricant in dwarven and gnomish machinery. Important component of steel and alloy manufacture in the Underdark, due to the shortage of wood (charcoal or coke being the usual source of steel carbon on the surface).
Lore/Uses: Often used as the carbon component in making special steels (quality grade and better) and in making refractories (heatproof objects).


Lead
Lead is derived from the mineral galena which is silver colored and forms cubes, found in ore deposits throughout the world in association with zinc and sometimes iron ores. Usually found in large deposits in limestone rocks as veins or masses, which are then smelted to obtain pure lead and zinc.
Lore/Uses: In everyday life, lead is used for pipes and tubing, as a solder, and cast into weights for fishermen's lines, shot for slings and firearms, and as ballast. Powdered lead is used as a white pigment in paint and powders, and to make fine quality glass (both “crystal glass” and lead-lighting). Lead is famous for is use for shielding against magic, and so is used on walls and other surfaces to prevent scrying and teleportation in wizard abodes, fortresses and royal chambers. It is often alloyed with tin to make pewter (and in this form is not dangerous).


Magnesium
Magnesium is a light, ductile, soft, silver white metal. It is refined from brines or seawater by wizards, who use lightning spells to separate out the tiny amounts of magnesium. Magnesium burns with a dazzling white flame (“a magical fury”) and fierce heat both in air and under water (water does not douse the flames).
Lore/Uses: Small amounts of magnesium is added to zinc, steel and halrulite to aid their workability. Magnesium is an important ingredient used in pyrotechnics (crackers, sparklers and flash powder used by performers; in the fireworks, and possibly in smoke powder. It is also used in paints and some alchemical formulations.


Mordakur (Curse-bearer, Doomrock)
Name given type by dwarves and gnomes to a dark brown and yellow banded rock and also a dark gray silvery ore (these two ores are often associated). Sometimes associated with rich sedimentary gold deposits.
Lore/Uses: Mordakur has a cursed reputation amongst miners, supposedly causing a wasting disease with effects not unlike mummy rot. The symptoms are frightening and only powerful magical healing or supplications to the gods can cure a miner exposed to the metallic ore. Its association with some rich gold underground deposits is well remembered and feared in the annals of dwarven history. Some daring dwarven and gnomish smiths have tried to refine the ore, but only to get a more potent cursed metal that kills its bearer with gruesome effect within a ten day. It is reputed to be refined and cast into fell weapons (that can confer upon those hit the debilitating curse) by some darker Underdark races.


Nickel
Nickel is a hard, silvery white, ductile and malleable metal, which can be polished to a lustrous finish. It is mined in scattered deposits throughout the surface and the Underdark in conjunction with copper deposits, and refined from its ore form, niccolite. Meteoric iron contains small amounts (5–20%) pure nickel, which contributes much of its hardness and corrosion resistance.
Lore/Uses: Nickel is mainly used in making alloys, to add hardness and durability to soft, malleable metals. By far its major use in the world is in coinage, where the nickel is added to copper, silver, gold or platinum to increase their wear resistance (and to lower cost). Nickel is also used by dwarves in some metal treatments, especially those involving harnessed electricity (electroplating). In the Underdark, it is used as coinage in pure form.


Platinum
Quite rare, platinum is a very dense, beautiful silvery-white metal, like pale silver but harder. Once erroneously called ‘moonsilver’, platinum is found very occasionally in nuggets in river beds (placers), or as veins in mountain ranges (in ophiolite or sperrylite ore).
Lore/Uses: Platinum is used in various alloys, in laboratory devices, for jewelry, and in alchemical studies.


Quicksilver (Mercury)
A heavy, silver-white metal, remarkable for being liquid at normal temperatures. Quicksilver is found in natural form as a liquid or as cinnabar (a vermillon-red ore), usually in recently cooled volcanic rocks and geothermal vents. Quicksilver is the only common metal found naturally in a liquid state. It only solidifies in extremely cold conditions, or when subjected to cold-inducing spells.
Lore/Uses: Mercury is used as a poison, pigment, in salt form as an antiseptic, and as part of many alchemical and magical preparations. It is used in small amounts to soften other metals, to facilitate their use in cements and decorative work.


Silver
A famous metal with a brilliant white metallic luster. Found in pure veins or in ores such as argentite, sometimes associated with gold and with lead and zinc ores. In natural form a black surface coating forms over time in contact with air. Silver is mined throughout the realms, but mostly in the North and the northern Underdark.
Lore/Uses: Silver is widely used in jewelry in all kingdoms, ornamentation, utility wares (especially mirrors) and coinage, usually alloyed with small amounts of other metals (especially copper). Very few items are made from pure silver, as the metal’s physical properties are improved significantly by only a small amount of alloying, without affecting the beneficial magical properties of the metal.
This relatively common valuable metal is known to the elves as “the sheath and shield of Art” because, of all metals, it is the most associated with and suitable for magic. Some folks in the world believe silver is the hardened tears of the goddess Selune. In the eldest dwarven tongues, the name for silver meant “the blood of alloys,” referring to its versatility in alloying with other metals (the Deep Folk are known to combine silver with other metals (especially mithril) to make many special alloys).
Many dwarves use silver in various alloy formulae of their own devising (or that have been handed down through clans for generations). Most of the beauty of metalwork down through the ages has been associated with the gleam and hue of mirror-polished, untarnished silver, and it has always been associated with the adornment of magical items. Certain elven folk are known to command secret processes that exploit the magical benefits of silver.


Tin
Tin is a soft white shiny metal derived from an ore form called cassiterite, which is found in veins near granitic rocks or in pegmatite. Tin is similar in weight and appearance to silver, though it is whiter, much softer and more crystalline. It is common in the mountains.
Lore/Uses: Tin is mostly alloyed with copper to produce bronze for general use; or with lead to make pewter, for use in fine utensils. A small amount is used in pure form for utility wares, in thin sheets for mirrors, for ornamentation and as a roofing material.


Zinc
Zinc is a bright bluish-white lustrous metal, usually found in ore deposits associated with lead and/or copper. Zinc occurs in a range of minerals, most importantly sphalerite (which is translucent and pale yellow or russet red) and calamine silicate. Usually deposits are found in limestone rocks as veins or masses, which are then smelted to obtain pure lead and zinc.
Lore/Uses: Too brittle to be used as coinage in pure form, zinc is often used as a plating or alloy for coins and other items. Most zinc is alloyed with copper to make brass; in combination with copper and nickel to make nickel-silver, or as a component of electrum. It is also used as a protective plating over iron in metal sheeting or cladding for roofing, nails, tabletops and altars (where its protects and slows the corrosion rate of iron and steel). The dwarves alone know of the secrets of galvanising, whereby a fine coat of zinc is attracted by electricity onto the surface of other metals, providing efficient long-lasting protection from corrosion. Some dwarven metallurgists also use zinc in combination with other metals for creating electrical currents. The corrosion product zinc oxide is used in paints, inks and dyes.