Absolutely!

Love to see what you can put together, Will. I want to believe there's a place for an adventuring alchemist. Personally, I see this guy as sort of a MacGyver, who's good at improvising potions, poisons and powders of various qualities from random ingredients he may find on the journey, whether plant, mineral, animal or monster. Maybe he can make infravision potions from the eyes of slain creatures that have infravision, a flesh to stone potion from basilisk blood, a spider-climbing potion or cure poison potion from spider bits, a protection potion from a ground up hydra scale and so on. Same with interesting plants or unique rocks and such. Everything encountered could potentially have a use for him! He'd also be able to cook up neat things in his lab back in town, of course. Maybe the latter would be higher quality, being more potent, lasting longer or both, and have less chance of failure or something, who knows.

Thanks, Handy!

I wrote a 50,000-word module for Gary Gygax's Castle Zagyg: Yggsburgh that never saw the light of day, because his widow cancelled all his creative works and that of his developers. In that module, The Grand Temple and College District, I created some loose guidelines for an alchemist class, designed for the C&C game. In case you are curious, here is what I came up with back in Late 2005 / Early 2006:

APPENDIX D: Alchemist Class  

The alchemist should be considered an NPC Class, for it is not their wont to venture from the laboratory, but in the rare instance that a player should express a desire to play one of these characters, the following guidelines are suggested:  

Alchemists may be considered a sub-class of the wizard or illusionist.  They share the same hit dice, weapon restrictions, armor restrictions, experience point progression, and the ability to cast spells.  However, the alchemist can not begin casting spells until fourth level and will remain three levels less in ability throughout his or her respective career.  The alchemist can, however, brew all manner of potions, including arcane and divine.  In this capacity, they function as though they were three levels higher, as per the rules presented in Monsters & Treasure.  Thus, a fourth level alchemist can begin brewing arcane potions and a sixth level alchemist can begin brewing divine potions.  All other rules presented in said volume apply.  

The alchemist brews ambrosias, balms, elixirs, philters, potions, salves, simples, tonics, unguents, and more.  The alchemist becomes an expert with herbs and ingredients magical and mundane, and where in nature the these ingredients are derived. He spends the bulk of his life cooped up in the lab and lives a very sedentary life, and as such may suffer poor constitution over time, but such is the sacrifice for his craft.  He can not perform his craft on the road adventuring!  He needs access to his lab which contains a fireplace, workbench, brazier, bellows, an analysis kit, and dozens of alembics, apothecary jars, beakers, flasks, dishes, mortar and pestle, retorts, and vials.  Without access to these, he is no more than a deficient mage.

The alchemist researches using formulae of a complex and arcane sort that no other class can read.  He delves in the research of metal, stone, and gems and the magical properties thereof, including reactions to activators and inhibitors in the creation of alchemical mixtures.  He works with all manner of flora, including ferns, fungi, grasses, herbs, moss, shrubs, trees, vines, weeds.  For an in-depth treatment of all these mineral and organic ingredients and their associated functions both magical and mundane, please refer to Gary Gygax's World Builder by Gary Gygax and Dan Cross.

Ghul wrote:

might as well be you, Handy!

Secret of my success!