Item Intelligence
Every warrior knows a sharp sword and battle-tested armor gives him the best chance at winning a battle, and Ultima X:Odyssey will provide plenty of opportunities to discover unique equipment for your character. In addition to dealing or preventing damage in combat, many items will offer additional benefits, such as increasing resistance to various attacks, reducing power costs for other abilities, increasing attack speed, and more. Of course, the more powerful items will usually require a higher character level to use those items, so finding the best item for your character's level will sometimes be a challenge. That's where the advantage of intelligent items comes in!

In rare instances, dying creatures may choose to cheat death by allowing their life essence to be transferred into a magic ether gem. When placed in an item, this gem imbues the item with the creature's intelligence, although the process also causes the creature to lose much of its memory. Over time, as the item experiences battle in the hands of an adventurer, the creature's memory of the thrill of combat can return, making the item more powerful in the process.

Intelligent items possess greater strength than normal items, but only if their potential is achieved by gaining levels for the item itself. An intelligent item has a maximum level, current level, and experience point total associated with it. Each time a character earns combat experience with an intelligent item equipped, the item will also gain an equal amount of experience. Since the item is participating in the battle, it gains its own experience, rather than taking any experience from the adventurer wielding it. Items level on the same curve as characters, but at a somewhat faster rate. Intelligent items can be weapons, armor, jewelry, and even clothing.

Each property on an intelligent item (such as fire resistance, damage bonuses, luck, etc.) increases as the item levels, increasing its effectiveness without increasing its character-level requirement. This means that intelligent items can eventually become more efficient in combat than even the most powerful item you could normally use at your character-level.

Although intelligent items often start out weaker than an equivalent non-intelligent item, their ability to grow and surpass normal items makes them very valuable and highly sought after. Those heroes willing to put in the time to train their intelligent items will find the rewards are well worth the effort.