Why not a gradual purification involving multiple quests, sort of like Shelyn with Zon-Kuthon's old glaive?
A holy lake / pond in the middle of a forbidden forest with evil creatures and such surrounding the pond, but never venturing onto the hallow grounds. Players must make it to the lake / pond alive, dunk the artifact (unless it could be damaged by water).
(Optional) This releases a fairly powerful malevolent spirit that was corrupting the artifact and it wants to duke it out with the party, even in the weakened state that the holy lake / pond bestows upon it.
They leave the pond, battle back through said forest and bing, bang, boom. They have a cleansed artifact.
Just a thought though.
Go with blackblood's suggestion or something similar.
Bathe it in the blood of the innocent to absorb their purity....
Take it as part of a pilgrimage (must walk, pilgrams walk).
How did the dragon corrupt it? Do the opposit.
Spam "Break Enchantment" on it until it fails a saving throw?
Must be washed by some good Outsider or some sacred hermit or someone like that?
Is the taint sentient?
If so it would resist any attempt to be cleansed with both its and the artifacts power. That means you'd need a power greater than both to remove.
If no such power is available to the players we will get into the fun plans.
If the taint is sentient it will most likely have the same instinct to reproduce as most other living things. If the tainted object is placed close to something that would be very tempting for it to corrupt it might let go of the artifact long enough to spread to itself. At this point it would not have the full power of the artifact and would be easier to attack or cleanse.
Would also add to the tension to have to risk either some powerful item or risk having whatever person or creature serves as bait be consumed by the taint if they are not quick enough or fail the attempt.
This way they might have to fight a "formerly pure hearted unicorn maiden" and I think that is worth it in the end.
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(Optional) This releases a fairly powerful malevolent spirit that was corrupting the artifact and it wants to duke it out with the party, even in the weakened state that the holy lake / pond bestows upon it.
I like this part, particularly, handling it through a combat, rather than just going somewhere and dunking it in something (although requiring research to discover the place where the ritual of cleansing can be performed, the steps needed, and then getting there with whatever materials are needed should also be a part of the arrangement).
Perhaps, instead of battling a specific manifestation of the corruption, they must attempt to purge it by resisting it's attempt to corrupt them, leading to a mirror-of-opposition-style fight against evil corrupted duplicates of themselves (with reversed abilities, in some cases, such as a Paladin's evil duplicate being an equal level Antipaladin, or a good Cleric's duplicate channeling negative energy and casting reversed versions of [good] descriptor spells).
Each victory over one of the evil duplicates weakens the corruption (as it has failed to corrupt that PC), while each dupe defeating a PC leads to possible alignment change as they are corrupted, and must be subdued and cured of the corruption via atonement spell and some sort of mini-quest, dispersing the corruption that has taken root within the PC (and, until that happens, the crystal remains tainted).
It's possible that an evil act must be made to open oneself up to the corruption, and starting the whole process. Nothing quite so heinous as killing someone, but something more symbolic, like striking an ally or saying something cruel to a companion.
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Donate Crystal artifact to a child care center (aka preschool.) as a TOY!
After a month/year of coming into constant contact with the innocent touch of hundreds of pure-hearted children, that artifact better be purified!
On a side note, ever since I help look after 2 baby cousins... I realized that not ALL kids are good and innocent... some just want to suck the life out of you... :P
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I am DMing a campaign that relies on a minor artifact that has been corrupted by an evil dragon(Necropyre crystal, powerful crystal was tainted by the evil dragon). I have always found it lame how easily things get corrupted in fantasy settings with no clear way to remove the corruption. So I am trying to think of a good way to have my party purify it(Perhaps Wish + using the item for good).
Any ideas?
BoED says first step dispel (suppress) it evil magic. Thereafter, redemption similar to process of creating magic items. 8 hours prayer/mediatation per day, spend 1 day per 1000 gp of base price (ie 1/2 of market price).
Example, Demon Armor becomes Angelic Armor: Still +4 Full plate with 1d10 claw attacks (strike as +1 weapons), affect targets DC 16 will negate (wis/cha damage according to magnitude of evil:
1d6 if Evil creature below level 10, Evil Elemental 2 HD or less, Evil Outsider 1 HD, Cleric of Evil Diety 1 HD
1d8 if Evil creature level 11 to 25, Evil Elemental 3-8 HD , Evil Outsider 2 to 4 HD, Cleric of Evil Diety 2-4 HD
2d6 if Evil creature level 26 to 50, Evil Elemental 9-20 HD, Evil Outsider 5 to 10 HD, Cleric of Evil Diety 5-10 HD
2d8 if Evil creature level 51+, Evil Elemental 21+ HD, Evil Outsider 5 to 11+ HD, Cleric of Evil Diety 11+ HD)