I thought of a swift way to get common items real fast. This is for 2k3, but I'm sure you can apply this to XP/VX.

http://rpgmaker.net/tutorials/450/

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Quick Common Items
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Are you tired of having to put the same coding over and over for every treasure chest, item bag, etc? Stuff like "add item, message comes up saying you got the item"? Well here's a quick and easy way to take care of that.

If you're going to have items that you find quite frequently, then do this.

1. Make a common event, and set it to call. EX. Common.Item
2. Make a switch for the specific item you're getting. EX: Switch:1 Get.Potion
3. Make a conditional branch in the common event that is triggered by the specific item switch.
4. When the specific item switch is turned on, in the conditional branch of the common event, add the item to your inventory, and bring up a message that said you got the item. (you can also add a charset change/animation showing your character lifting the item up over their head, like in Lufia 2.) After that, turn the specific item switch off.

Now to activate this... when you approach the chest with the item, have the chest open up, then turn on the specific item switch, then call this common event, then turn on a switch that said this chest has been opened, so it can't be opened again.

That's it.

You can call this common event 'Common.Item', and you can set up multiple branches for each type of item that you would find often within this common event. You can name your switches EX: Get.Potion, Get.Antidote, Get.EchoScreen, etc.

If you're going to have items that re-spawn when you leave the map (like fruits, mushrooms, herbs, etc), then no switch for having the item never come back will be required. Simply erase the event after the common event is called. Copy and paste around as needed.

You can also use this method for lots of other common things. Like cutting bushes, etc.

Hope this helps! and if there's a even faster, easier method than this, please tell me, because I'm always up for learning how to make things in RPG Maker more quick and convenient.

PS: I'm pretty sure this method works on XP/VX, and is probably a lot easier because of the self switches.