Magical potions and salves are a staple of classic fantasy. In addition to providing a convenient way to keep adventurers in play after taking one too many swords to the gut, they make great plot devices and quest hooks (the wizard's guild is in need of two score rabbits' feet and the heart of a dragon), as well as making for more interesting tactical decisions. Do we use the invulnerability potion now, or later? Do I poison my arrows with demonbane or spider's venom? Though these considerations usually won't make up the core of a party's tactical repertoire, they can provide a little extra boost to a party in a pinch, and can provide a way for weaker party members (or enemies!) to stay helpful even without fireballs and greatswords.
Faced with such utility, the alchemically inclined player might want to have a go at brewing their own elixirs. There's plenty of precedent for it in video games such as Skyrim or The Witcher; GURPS Dungeon Fantasy alludes to it obliquely in rules about collecting monster bits, and template skills like Alchemy and Herb Lore, and there's abstract rules for making "bush potions" in DF16 - make a Herb Lore roll and Bob's your uncle, here's a 2d healing potion in a pinch. But being so abstract loses a lot of the charm of alchemy, at least in my mind. I don't want to have a big bag of Alchemy Ingredients, $300, 2lb: I want to mix a pinch of ginger root, a bugbear's spleen, and milk of redgrass! So, should we expand the alchemy system? Why wouldn't we do that? And will I go insane writing it? Let's find out.
