Imbuing and Glyphs

What it is

Imbue stores a spell instead of casting it. Put it in a sword and your next three hits burst into flame. Write it onto a door or a patch of floor and it becomes a glyph: a trap that goes off when someone steps on it, opens it or breaks it.

How to get it

Imbue is a Tier II link that costs 3 mana and needs a Copper Cord or better. Craft it from a Blank Rune, an Experience Bottle, 2 Lapis Lazuli and a Gold Ingot. See Rune Recipes.

How to use it

Imbue splits the spell in two:

• Before Imbue: a shape that picks what holds the magic. Self means the item in your hand, or, with both hands empty, the block you’re looking at. Any other shape means the block it touches.
• After Imbue: the part that’s stored and goes off later.

Self · Imbue · Burst · Fire stores Burst · Fire in the item in your hand.

Charges and price

• Everything imbued holds 3 charges. You pay for all three up front: three times the stored part’s mana, plus Imbue itself.
• Releasing costs nothing. It hits with your Heart Circles, Cord enchantments and affinities, but not charging or rhythm.
• One shared cooldown. After any imbued item or glyph goes off, none can go off again until that spell’s cooldown has passed (at least half a second). It’s kept when you log out.

Items

Item	Goes off when	Where
Weapons	You hit a creature	At what you hit
Tools	You break a block or hit a creature	At the block or creature
Bows and crossbows	You shoot	Where the arrow lands
Armour and shields	Something hurts you	At whoever hurt you
Blocks	You place it	It becomes a glyph
Anything else	You use it	At what you’re looking at, up to 24 blocks away

• Helpful magic goes to you. A sword imbued with Heal heals you as you fight.
• A crossbow’s Multishot spends one charge, and only one arrow carries the spell.
• From a stack, only one item is imbued. Imbuing an item again replaces its magic.
• Up to 6 imbued items. A seventh makes your oldest one fade.
• Cords, runes, Knots and Spell Scrolls can’t be imbued.

Glyphs

Any block can hold a glyph. Make one with a shape that touches a block (Touch · Imbue · Root · Frost), a shape that hits a creature (the glyph goes under it), Self with empty hands, or by placing an imbued block. You need build rights there.

A glyph goes off when a creature steps on or touches it, someone uses the block (door, button, lever), something shoots it, someone else breaks it, or redstone powers it.

• It knows friend from foe. A harmful glyph only answers enemies, a helpful one only you and your allies.
• It re-arms no faster than its spell’s cooldown, and never in under 1 second. A creature standing on it is caught once, until it steps off.
• Up to 12 glyphs, across all dimensions. A 13th makes your oldest fade.
• Glyphs sleep while you’re away: offline, dead, spectating or in another dimension.
• Portable traps. Break your own glyph and the block keeps its spell and charges, so you can place it elsewhere.

Inside a stored spell

• A stored part starting with an effect lands on whatever set it off. One starting with a shape casts from there: Self · Imbue · Burst · Explode in a sword bursts around what you hit.
• Echo repeats only the stored part. Combo never fires. An Imbue can’t store another Imbue.
• A spell imbues once, even if a mana storm, Focus of Echoes or wild surge repeats it.

Tips and counterplay

Spell	What you get
Self · Imbue · Burst · Fire (holding a sword)	Three hits that burst into flame.
Self · Imbue · Lightning (holding a bow)	Three arrows that call lightning.
Self · Imbue · Heal (holding a helmet)	Heal each time you’re hurt, three times.
Touch · Imbue · Root · Frost	A floor trap that holds and freezes.
Self · Imbue · Shock (empty hands, at a door)	A door that jolts whoever opens it.

• Watch the ground. Everyone within 24 blocks sees a glyph’s faint circle.
• Imbuing earns the feat Imbuer and an advancement. Having a glyph go off earns Tripwire.