Mortal Shell Item Guide: All Item Effects And Familiarity Bonuses

A big part of Mortal Shell is exploration. You’ll wander the land of Fallgrim and dive into its temples in search of treasures, while also uncovering the memories of the shells you inhabit and learning about their pasts. You’ll even have to uncover the secrets of the items you discover in the game world; Mortal Shell doesn’t tell you what its items do when you first pick them up.

What you know about items is determined by a system called Familiarity–the more you use an item, the more you learn about it, and the more you can take advantage of its effects. Uncovering what different objects do in the heat of battle (or at opportune and inopportune moments) is a big part of the Mortal Shell experience. It’s our recommendation that you spend some time learning about the items on your own if you want to go in unspoiled.

But there are sure to be players who bristle at the prospect of losing important items just to find out what they do, or of using an item at the wrong time and wasting it. For those folks, we’ve got a complete Mortal Shell item guide right here. This is a complete list of the consumable items you can find in the game and what they’ll do, as well as the bonuses you’ll earn once you use them enough to max out your familiarity with each one.

We’ve got more Mortal Shell info for you: check out our beginner’s tips to help you survive in Fallgrim, and don’t forget to check out our Mortal Shell review.

Mortal Shell Consumable Items

Most of the items you find in the world of Mortal Shell will be consumables–things you can eat to heal yourself or to gain Resolve or Stamina, or use to protect yourself from harm. Most of these become more powerful the more you use them, so it pays to max out your familiarity with most of these consumables as soon as you can. Below, you’ll find a rundown of what each item does when you use it once, and the bonus you receive for maxing out your Familiarity with that item.

Health Items

Baguette

• Restores a small amount of health.
• Familiar: Restores more health.

Roasted Rat

• Restores 35 health over 10 seconds, but costs some Resolve.
• Familiar: Gets 10 more health.

Rotten Food

• Restores a small amount of health, but costs large amount of Resolve.
• Familiar: Reduces the Resolve cost.

Weltcalp

• Restores 30 health over 30 seconds.
• Familiar: Speeds up the healing effect.

Script of Euphoria

• Your next parry restores health.
• Familiar: Restores even more health.

Mortal Token

• When hardened, the damage a strike would have dealt to you is converted to health.
• Familiar: Gain even more health.

Stamina Items

Boiled Frog

• Increases your Stamina regeneration speed for three minutes.
• Familiar: Increased Stamina regeneration lasts for five minutes.

Resolve Items

Golden Bell

• Increases Resolve gains from combat for three minutes.
• Familiar: Increases timer.

Inferior Moonshine

• Grants Resolve, but costs a small amount of health.
• Familiar: Decreases health cost.

Superior Moonshine

• Grants a large amount of Resolve with no penalty.
• Familiar: Provides even more Resolve.

Script of Defiance

• Your next parry refunds Resolve.
• Familiar: Get even more Resolve back.

Status Effect Items

Tarspoor

• Deals you 40 poison damage over 16 seconds.
• Familiar: Provides poison immunity for 120 seconds. (This is the only poison protection we’ve found, so it’s worth eating some Tarspoors to gain the bonus.)

Attack Damage Bonus Items

Script of Repent

• Your next parry lights your enemy on fire.
• Familiar: Increases the duration and damage of the fire.

Script of Despair

• After a successful parry, your next attack deals bonus damage.
• Familiar: Increases the damage bonus.

Script of Ardor

• Your next parry against an enemy adds poison damage.
• Familiar: Increases the poison strength.

Spectral Token

• Getting struck while hardened gives a damage bonus to your next attack.
• Familiar: Your damage bonus is increased even more.

Defense Bonus Items

Ornate Token

• After being struck while hardened, the damage done by the next hit you receive is reduced.
• Familiar: After getting struck while hardened, the damage done by the next hit you receive is completely negated.

Bonus Life Items

Ethereal Diapason

• Restores the ability to reclaim your shell on death, essentially giving you an extra free life.
• Familiar: You also gain some Resolve when using the item.

Summon And Travel Items

Untarnished Mask

• Recalls you back to Sester Ganessa without costing glimpses.
• Familiar: You also gain some Resolve from using the mask.

Effigy of Harros

• Summons the Harros shell, allowing you to switch shells without being at the Tower, but at the cost of some damage to the shell. The effigy won’t work until you’ve discovered the shell’s name by upgrading it with Sester Ganessa, though.
• Familiar: The shell takes less damage when you summon it.

Effigy of Solomon –

• Summons the Solomon shell, allowing you to switch shells without being at the Tower, but at the cost of some damage to the shell. The effigy won’t work until you’ve discovered the shell’s name by upgrading it with Sester Ganessa, though.
• Familiar: The shell takes less damage when you summon it.

Effigy of Tiel

• Summons the Tiel shell, allowing you to switch shells without being at the Tower, but at the cost of some damage to the shell. The effigy won’t work until you’ve discovered the shell’s name by upgrading it with Sester Ganessa, though.
• Familiar: The shell takes less damage when you summon it.

Effigy of Eredrim

• Summons the Eredrim shell, allowing you to switch shells without being at the Tower, but at the cost of some damage to the shell. The effigy won’t work until you’ve discovered the shell’s name by upgrading it with Sester Ganessa, though.
• Familiar: The shell takes less damage when you summon it.

Bonus Drop Items

Bronze Bell

• Gain 10% bonus Tar from killing enemies for six minutes.
• Familiar: Adds a 10% chance of enemies dropping an extra glimpse when defeated.

Miscellaneous Items

Simple Lute

• Allows you to play music, although you’ll play poorly until you become more familiar and the lute can break after a few uses.
• Familiar: Draws enemy aggression from a fairly long distance (thanks to your “sheer audacity”). Useful for kiting enemies to fight you on more advantageous ground.

Tainted Nektar

• Kicks you out of your current shell (but doesn’t kill you).
• Familiar: Provides you with one single drop of Tar.

Mortal Shell Unlimited Use Items

There are a handful of items you’ll find in Mortal Shell that won’t be consumed when you use them. Though you can still max out your Familiarity with these items, you won’t generally get any bonuses–but you will unlock some extra lore entries on those items. You’ll generally find these items hidden in the three temples you’ll have to venture into to get the Sacred Glands you need to advance in Mortal Shell, or in the locked frog chests in Fallgrim. These chests are only accessible after you’ve completed a temple and brought fog to Fallgrim; after doing this once, you can talk to an NPC in the tower to activate or deactivate the fog by spending glimpses.

Tarnished Mask – Returns you to Sester Ganessa, but costs you all your glimpses.

Tattered Vestment – Summons the Hallowed Sword weapon to you once you’ve unlocked it.

Disciple’s Rag – Summons the Smoldering Mace weapon to you once you’ve unlocked it.

Martyr’s Shawl – Summons the Martyr’s Blade weapon to you once you’ve unlocked it.

Sester’s Binding – Summons the Hammer and Chisel weapon to you once you’ve unlocked it.

Impervious Lute – An unbreakable version of the Simple Lute. You’ll need to increase your Familiarity to play it well, and you’ll be able to draw enemies to you with it the same way you can with the Simple Lute.

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