Sentient Weapon

Sentient Weapons is a mechanic for epic/legendary content, introduced in Update 37 that allows players to upgrade weapons with sentience, gaining roleplay effects (weapons commenting your actions) and mechanical benefits (increases to various abilities). Sentience is gained by adding a Sentient Jewel to an eligible weapon then adding filigrees to gain the desired mechanical benefits.

The Sentient Weapon can make comments to the player as the weapon is held and used. There is a Gameplay tab option to turn off voice, text, or both.

Creating and Modifying a Sentient Weapon
To create a Sentient Weapon, you need: Once you have both items in your inventory, you can create a new sentient weapon: Once you have a sentient weapon, you can add filigrees to it to grant it additional power Please Note:
 * an eligible weapon (ML 20 or higher) that accepts sentience (see below)
 * a sentient jewel
 * On the right hand side of your inventory panel there is a red square (located in the middle, above the pet stable's "paw" link)
 * If you mouse-hover over the red square, a blue icon is added to it with the words "Modify your sentient items"
 * Open this panel (as shown on the right) and drag the weapon you want to modify to the square at the top left of the panel
 * Drag your sentient gem to the square on the top right of the panel to create your new sentient weapon
 * Filigree slots are shown below the large gem on the sentient weapon panel
 * Open up the sentient weapon panel, then drag a filigree from youe inventory onto an open filigree slot
 * To open new filigree slots, see the section on sentient jewels, below
 * You cannot add the same filigree to a weapon twice (with or without rare bonus)
 * Filigrees from different sets that grant the same bonus can be added to the same weapon
 * Slotting a sentient jewel to a weapon does not change the weapon's minimum level
 * An Unbound named item (or BtCoE but not yet equipped) becomes BtA if a Sentient Jewel is slotted into it (because Sentient Jewels are BtA)
 * BtCoA weapons remain BtC
 * BtCoE weapons that have already been equipped remain BtC
 * You cannot modify a weapon that is currently equipped
 * You cannot replace old jewels or filigrees simply by adding new ones to an occupied slot
 * Old jewels and filigrees must be removed (or destroyed) using the appropriate tool (see subsection at bottom) to clear the slot before a new jewel or filigree can be added to that slot

Eligible Weapons
Only minimum level 20 or higher named weapons can gain sentience:
 * An item that accepts sentience will say "Accepts Sentience" under its name if you cursor over it
 * All weapons from the L20 Cannith Challenge trader can accept sentience (they say "Accepts Sentience"; not tested if they actually do and what happens if you upgraded a L16 item to L20)
 * L20 and L24 Cormyrian Weapons from Eveningstar Challenges can accept sentience
 * Crafted / upgradeable weapons generally cannot accept sentience (most notably Temple of Elemental Evil, Legendary Green Steel and Thunder-Forged weapons)
 * Pet collars do not accept sentience. Sentient hand wraps cannot be converted to collars.

Please note:
 * Sentient weapons cannot be placed in your off-hand slot.
 * This also seems to apply to cosmetic weapons created from a sentient weapon.

For the list of ML 20+ named weapons see: Sentient Weapon/Base item‎.

For the list of ML 20+ named weapons that should accept sentience, but appear not to, see: Sentient Weapon/Ineligible weapons.

Sentient Jewels
Sentient Jewels are essences that carry an intelligence and personality. You must slot the jewel in a weapon to awaken its sentience. You can also pry out the jewel out of an existing weapon and transfer it to a different weapon.

Each Sentient Jewel comes with its own personality. The name of a Sentient Jewel and its personality have no effect on game play, nor does it modify or limit slotted filigrees in any way. The jewel does change the in-game voice characterisation and vocal comments made by the weapon when equipped. Sentient jewel voice volume can be adjusted by opening Options ( Ctrl + o ) and going to the Audio tab.

Sentient Jewel Experience
Players can build Sentient Experience (sXP) by feeding named items to their Sentient Jewel:
 * This is done by opening the Sentient Item panel and dragging the item to the slot to the right of the large Jewel icon
 * There is no confirmation box when feeding items to the Jewel

All sXP is tied to the jewel itself, and not the weapon
 * When you unslot a Sentient Jewel:
 * All sXP the Sentient Jewel has gained stays with the Jewel
 * No sXP remains with the Weapon
 * When you slot a Sentient Jewel containing XP to a new weapon:
 * All sXP is applied to the Weapon

Sentient Jewels have a cap for sXP
 * The default sXP cap for a jewel is 61,000 sXP - 1,000 more than is needed to unlock 7 slots
 * The extra 1,000 sXP is there as a buffer so people don't inadvertently end up feeling that they wasted sXP when getting to the 7th slot with a high level item when they only needed 5 sXP or so
 * increases the cap to 101,000 sXP, enough to unlock 8th slot

Sentient food and its value
The main source of sXP is to feed Named Items to the sentient weapon. Each named item will add a number of sXP to the jewel based on the minimum level required to use it. The actual numbers are as follows: For example: In addition to feeding named items to a Sentient Weapon:
 * a named item of ML 20 would add 20 sXP (20 x 1)
 * a named item of ML 21 would add 105 sXP (21 x 5)
 * a named item of ML 30 would add 300 sXP - the (current) maximum possible
 * There are consumables on the Daily Dice rewards list that can be consumed for sXP:.
 * A Sentient Jewel can be fed to another Sentient Jewel. It will give any accumulated sXP from the 1st jewel to the 2nd, plus an additional 50 sXP.

Restrictions on feeding named items to a Sentient Weapon: You can feed any named item that isn't specifically tagged as being worth 0 sXP. The list of ineligible items includes, but is not limited to, the following categories:
 * Sentient Weapons will not consume named items that currently contain Augments in augment slots
 * Removing all augments will allow the item to be fed to a Sentient Weapon (assuming it is otherwise eligible)
 * Sentient Weapons will not consume other Sentient Weapons slotted with a Sentient Jewel
 * Removing the Sentient Jewel will allow the item to be fed to a Sentient Weapon (assuming it is otherwise eligible)
 * Items that drop on logout, death or leaving an area
 * Items that are destroyed on death or logout
 * Items that are stackable
 * Items that cannot be sold to a vendor
 * Any item with a duration
 * Any item that is destroyed when it is empty/out of charges
 * Any item that is locked with the Inventory lock icon
 * A small number of individual items which have specifically identified as non-feedable for various reasons
 * e.g. The three Slave Lords blank items that drop like candy and don't ransack
 * Sentient Weapon/Non-food lists named items that can not be fed to sentient jewels:

Opening filigree slots
Costs (in exact sXP and approximate # of named items) to open Sentient Filigree slots are as follows:
 * * These values approximate a "typical" item, and are the simple numerical averages of : Items ML 1-20 average 10.5x1 = 10.5 sXP each; items ML 21-27 average 24x5 = 120 sXP each; items ML 28-30 average 29x10 = 290 sXP each. n.b. This is a very general estimate, and does not reflect their drop-rate in-game.
 * This means that, if a character is feeding their jewel with average items (for each category), they will need approximately 1,900 named items of ML 1-20 OR 166 named items of ML 21-27 OR 69 named items of ML 28-30 (or some combination of that) to reach 20,000 XP and open 5 Filigree slots. Less items per category would be required if the ML of items fed was higher than the average for the category, more items if the ML was lower.
 * Slots 6 and 7 are as expensive again for each slot as it was to open slots 1-5; Slot 8 costs twice as much again as opening slots 1-5, after slot 7 is opened

Sentient Filigrees

 * A Filigree is an augment-like ingredient that you can add to a sentient weapon, assuming you have a free filigree slot.
 * A weapon can only have one of each Filigree. You cannot slot two of the same Filigree in one weapon.
 * Filigree sets have their own rarity; some sets will be less common than others. In addition, each Filigree has a rare chance to drop with an upgraded bonus, which has an additional effect on it.
 * Unless specifically noted, all bonuses listed are unique bonuses and stack with everything, including each other.
 * A single weapon can benefit from multiple Filigree Set Bonuses simultaneously.
 * Sentient Filigrees can be obtained from chests in Ravenloft, Disciples of Rage and White Plume Mountain for now, and could appear in more chests in the future. Higher difficulty settings have an increased chance to provide Filigrees. Filigrees are unbound, and can be traded and auctioned.
 * Filigrees can be (auto-)collected into an augment bag, and can be found under "Item Augments" in the Auction House and Shard Exchange.

See available filigrees here: Sentient Weapon/Filigrees‎

Tools

 * - Destroys a Filigree or even a Sentient Jewel to open up the slot for a new piece. Simply drag the tools onto the Filigree or Jewel slot to destroy the contents and free up the slot. You can purchase destroyers for Platinum from tools vendors throughout DDO; for example in the Marketplace.
 * - Unslots a Filigree or Jewel.
 * You can purchase unslotters for DDO Points from the DDO Store: for 1,  for 5,  for 10.
 * Sentient Toolkits can be obtained from the same chests where Sentient Filigree can be found. (BtA)

You cannot destroy or unslot a jewel unless all filigrees have been removed from the weapon first.

You cannot slot or unslot Sentient Jewels or Filigree from within a quest.

PnP information

 * 3.5 SRD - http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Intelligent_Items
 * 5E SRD - http://www.5esrd.com/gamemastering/magic-items/sentient-magic-items/