CLOK BBS

In my pursuit of bushcraft I came up with a bunch of ideas that could be implemented in CLOK. This isn't a list of demands so GMs please don't take it that way. Just ideas and suggestions.

Edit: Not all of this is entirely accurate, some liberties were taken to adapt it to a game.

BONES
* Make a new command, or produce bones when BUTCHERing a corpse.
Used for hafts, arrow shafts, bone dust, fishing hooks, cudgels, carving talismans or trinkets, all sorts of things! It would be cool if Rooks could make their own Blood Talismans out of this with some kind of ritual or something.
Make it so you can BURY them, and make them disappear more quickly when left on the ground.

BONE DUST
* While holding a hammer and a bone, GRIND BONE to produce bone dust.
Can be used for filler for making pitch, possibly other things.

DUNG
* Have animal dung appear in the wilds and stables and areas frequented by beasts.
Useful for lighting fires, filler for making pitch, masking your smell to sneak past beasts easier, throwing at people you don't like.

SAWDUST
* Make it possible to collect sawdust from sawmills, or after carving or sawing something.
Useful for lighting fires, filler for making pitch.

ANIMAL FAT
* When you BUTCHER a corpse or CUT STRIPS on raw meat, produce some fat.
Useful as an additive for making pitch and potentially other things, probably cooking as well somehow.
Make it so you can BURY it and make it so it disappears more quickly when left on the ground.

ASH
* After a campfire burns up completely, ash is left behind that you can GET.
Useful as a filler for making pitch.
Make it BURYable and disappear quickly.

PITCH
* HARVEST RESIN (globules from bark) from conifer trees into a straining pot.
* PUT pot in a collecting can.
* In a room with a fire, hold pot over fire.
* Take off fire and GET pot from can. Debris will be in pot, pitch in can.
* PUT filler in can (fillers include dung, ash, bone dust, sawdust).
* PUT additives (fat, tallow, or beeswax) in pot.
* Put can back over fire.
* Take can back off and STIR.
* GET PITCH.
ratio: 10 globules, 3 fillers, 2 additives. Makes 4 portions of pitch.

TORCH
* CARVE a medium branch to remove the bark.
* While holding pitch and branch, APPLY.
Burn longer than a standard torch? Please? The store-bought kind seem to go out extremely quickly.

SPILE
* Carve medium branch to remove bark.
* CARVE SPILE.
Used to tap trees for sap.

MAPLE SYRUP
* DRILL tree with a dagger
* Holding a spile in one hand and hammer in the other, TAP the tree.
* Holding a bucket, HANG the bucket on the spile.
* Wait for sap to drip.
* GET BUCKET when sap is within.
* In a room wih a fire, BOIL BUCKET.

BRANCH-CHOPPING
* Requires 25 climbing at the very least.
* CHOP BRANCHES in a forested room. Gives a chance to find branches by climbing and chopping.
- Have a chance to fall based on climbing.
- Takes a lot of energy.
- Have a chance to disturb insects, birds, squirrels, and other things that could potentially harm you.

HONEY/BEESWAX
* Randomly make beehives in appropriate wilderness areas.
* You could simply GET HIVE but suffer a slew of stings and suffer injuries, maybe some kind of poison effect or something. And make your character look puffy and swelled for a while.
* Alternatively, FIRE or HURL something at the hive. If you hit it, it'll fall. Bees will soon sting anything in the area. After a while they'll abandon it, at which point you can pick up the hive.
* With a safe hive in the area or in hand, HARVEST HIVE to get honeycomb.
* HARVEST HONEYCOMB with a collecting receptacle in hand to get honey in the receptacle and turn the honeycomb to beeswax.
Honey could be eaten, sold at the market, used in cooking.
Beeswax could be sold at the market, used for candlemaking, and lots of other things.

FUR BLANKET OR BEDROLL
* Craft from 10 natural-tanned (fur) pelts.
It would just be cool to be able to make your own.

STAKE
* CARVE a medium branch to remove the bark.
* CARVE STAKES to produce 2 wooden stakes.
Used for pitching tents, maybe an improvised weapon of some kind, potentially lots of things.

POLE
* CARVE a large branch to remove the bark.
* CARVE POLE to produce 1 wooden pole.
Used for pitching tents, making fishing poles, potentially lots of things.

CORDAGE
* FORAGE NETTLES (or any optimally fibrous plant).
* STRIP NETTLES to remove leaves and leave you with nettle-stems.
* SPLIT NETTLE-STEMS. You need to be holding a dagger or other appropriate tool for this step, you split the stems with the butt of the dagger, not the blade.
* PEEL STEMS to get the fibres.
* TWIST FIBRES to twist them into a short length of cordage.
* You should probably have to hold two short lengths and ATTACH them and require say 12 total for a practical length of usable cordage that could be used for other things. Or make it so different cordages have different lengths and store the length somewhere in the item's data. Then make different crafting projects require certain lengths.
This should take a long time. It's a very time-consuming process and takes a lot of patience to make a useful amount of cordage. Or maybe I just suck at it.

TENTS
* Not sure which commands to use in the crafting process, maybe something as simple as CRAFT TENT when you have all the required materials.
*** Crafting requires 18 pelts, 6 wood poles carved from large branches.
Ideas for how tents work:
You can PITCH TENT. You need also 4 wood stakes and some cordage in your inventory to do it. It is not protected, anything can go in. Must be outdoors. Then you can GO TENT and go into the single room interior. Make it impossible to drag things inside so people don't drag a bunch of furniture in or something stupid like that. Maybe allow dragging of corpses in but limit the amount. If possible, limit the number of occupants to 3. Maybe make it possible to build larger tents but they require more material and weigh a lot more so are impractical for common usage.
UNPITCH TENT to pick it up. It'll have to be completely empty, no occupants or items inside.
Both pitching and unpitching should take a lot of roundtime, possibly even some kind of skill checks (but nothing too hard).

FIRESTONES
I don't know exactly what firestones are in CLOK but it would be great to be able to mine or craft them. Please!

NEEDLE
* While holding a bone, CARVE NEEDLE.
* Something else for making them from metal, I'm not a metallurgist so I won't try to come up with it.
Useful for all sorts of things.

BASKETS
--- PINE NEEDLE BASKET
Requires handfuls of pine needles (or long grass), bundles of cut sinew, needle (tool).
* FORAGE NEEDLES (or GRASS) in appropriate area.
* PUT needles in a pot with water.
* BOIL POT over a fire.
* While holding a needle (tool) in one hand, and with boiled pine-needles and bundles of cut sinew in inventory or in the room, simply WEAVE NEEDLE BASKET.
--- TWIG BASKET
* In an area with foliage or trees, FORAGE TWIGS.
* CARVE each twig to turn into a cleaned twig.
* Put twigs in a barrel of water to soak.
* With cleaned and soaked twigs on ground or in your inventory, simply WEAVE TWIG BASKET. Takes 50 cleaned twigs.
Making baskets should take a long time, and you should have to be taught the pattern before you can do it.
It should be based on a new Basketry skill.

FISHING HOOK
* While holding a bone or a branch, simply CARVE HOOK.
* Make them available somehow by blacksmithing too.

CRUDE FISHING POLE
* While holding a wooden pole in one hand and some thin cordage in another, ATTACH them. Then get a hook and ATTACH again.

Other things I've never tried but will research and post about when I learn more:

Chandlery (candlemaking)
Pottery
Weaving plant fibres into cloth
Making bandages
Rudimentary tailoring

Amen to dung.

It'd be a bit nice if you could sit on felled trees, as well as sit on logs in the room. Or even to be able to carve a seat out of a log using an axe or handsaw.

[quote=Jaster]Amen to dung.[/quote]

Seconded. I can't wait until Jaster asks for help applying it.

All cool ideas. I'd love to have more small crafting components and multiple things that can be done with them (like the ash, bones, sawdust, etc.).

I second the 'cool ideas' and will make it my mission to implement at least a few over my break in December.

I forgot the obvious concept of getting charcoal as well as ash after a campfire burns out. This is simpler than the actual process of producing charcoal but could be done if people don't want to be too picky about production. If we want to be a little more realistic it could require making a specific type of fire in a pit or kiln, for the more basic types of charcoal production. Chances of producing useable charcoal, and how much, could be based on the firekindling skill.

and the size of the fire

General bushcraft/woodcraft ideas

These are a few (simplified) ideas I had while perusing the 'net that might be nice for anyone wanting to be able to surive on the MUD without having to rely on other people, or even towns. They're ideas to allow people to walk out into the woods carrying much less than they might need, but still go without most of the 'basic tools' people think they need to take with them to survive.


*Primitive Cooking

Firepits

A firepit is a small semi-permanent 'structure' built in any area that has soil or dirt soft enough to dig; as long as a PC is in a room with one, they can redig it if it starts to crumble from disuse, but when a PC isn't in the same room, it should disappear very quickly as well as be 'buryable' like trash. A person would 'dig firepit' and after several rounds the room would have 'an empty firepit' in it. Having a firepit would increase one's chances to spark a fire in it slightly, as well as slightly increase the longevity of the fire. A firepit would also give access to several cooking options for those that don't want to carry around a skillet or a pan with them at all times. It might be appropriate to require a set amount of Firekindling before you can make Firepits, and have it so that creating a firepit does not net any gain of Firekindling, to prevent overuse for the sake of skillgain.

Stone Cooking

This is a primitive method of cooking that takes longer than using a pan. However, it also has a higher chance of success than other forms, nets very little gain in the Cooking skill, and can be done anywhere with a firepit. The basic principle is to warm a flat stone with a fire, and then place food on it to cook. This could only be used for 'chunks' and 'strips' of raw meat.

I'm not sure how one should go about getting a 'cooking' stone, except maybe to forage for one. Rooms that are hilly or rocky might have a higher chance of yielding one, and said stones could be toted like a pan, but have a lower weight (and lower capacity) than skillets and pan. It also might be nice if the rock had to cool for several minutes before it can be picked up again. If left in a room unattended, a stone would eventually disappear to prevent clutter and spam.

Plank Cooking

This actually doesn't make use of 'planks' as the MUD knows it. Essentially, one takes a split log (barked or debarked), and 'carves' a 'slat' out of it. Then one takes a small stave and 'carves' 'stakes' to gain a 'handful of short wooden stakes (x)', X replaced by a number variable based on one's woodcarving skill.

Next, with a hammer in hand or on a belt, and one 'stake' per piece of meat on a container you're wearing, you take a piece of raw meat (strips or chunks) and 'pin meat to slat'. This will induce roundtime, and echo your character hammering the 'stake' lightly into the meat to pin it to the slat. When the slat is to capacity, it can then be placed on a fire built in a firepit, which induces roundtime just like cooking. At the end of the roundtime, the character either successfully retrieves the slat, the meat burns, or the slat could even be burned beyond further use.

This would be a more complicated way to cook, but should have a decently (if not significantly) higher capacity than a cooking stone or even a basic skillet. It should take longer, and perhaps be a little more difficult than cooking with a pan. It would also take several steps, but reward people with higher cooking and woodworking skills. A slat of wood would last several cooking sessions before becoming too charred for use.

Ash Cooking

This is an easy, but unwieldy, way of cooking that will only allow a person to cook a couple of chunks of meat (or an appropriate amount of strips equal to a couple of chunks) at a time. It's slower, but much easier to do in terms of cooking skill checks. It also would not require any special tools other than a knife.

One would have to find an area with Foliage, and Forage Leaves. This would produce several leaves large enough to wrap around the food in question. Wrapping the food requires leaves, cordage (see below CORDAGE section, or refer to Skjotur's post about cordage), and meat. One takes a leaf, and puts chunks or strips of meat into it just like a pan. Then with cordage and a knife in your inventory, you 'wrap leaf with cordage'. This begins a short process of wrapping, tying off the cordage, and cutting excess away from the leaf. Seasonings can also be added to the leaf prior to cooking.

The next step requires a firepit that's relatively close to dying down. Simply hold the wrapped meat, and 'cook leaf on fire' to begin the process of cooking. This induces roundtime, and at the end of the process, the character automatically retrieves the bundled meat. This method is the easiest of the three, with the lowest overal yield. However, the meat can also be kept in the leaves, and preseasoned before being cooked. To get the meat, hold the bundle and 'cut' it with a knife. This renders the container useless any further, however.

Stick Roasting

This would be relatively easy, with a decent amount of yield. It also would have the fewest ‘prep’ steps out of the other methods. Simply take a small stave and carve it into a skewer. Place meat on it, and COOK over a fire. After too much use, the skewer would eventually most likely be unusable.

Post-Cooking Seasoning

A downside to two of the three above cooking methods is that it would be harder to properly season the food. Therefore, I think it would be nice if food herbs could be placed into a mortar, and ground. Grinding them produces 'a handful of seasoning' equal to how many herbs were put in. It would be nice if multiple herb types could be ground up at once. After a food is roasted on a skewer, stone cooked, or plank cooked, but before the food is removed from the 'container', one could hold a handful of seasoning in one hand, the container in another, and 'rub seasoning onto food'. This would allow for spiced strips and chunks of meat.




*Cordage

Skjotur touched on the basics of making cordage, so I thought I would just list different plants from different ‘environments’ that could be used to make cordage. Cordage can be used for a number of things: bowstrings, wrapped weapon hilts, the above ‘ash cooking’ leaf bundles, or for making simple belts.


Desert Plants

Despite the ‘hostile’ nature of deserts, they still have plants even if they are few and far between. Things like Yucca and Agave are very easy to gather, and can be split into rough fibres with just one’s thumbnail. For more fine fibres and cordage, the leaves of Yucca and Agave can be pounded lightly with a mallet to break them apart, then cleaned of chlorophyll in water.

Swamp Plants

Any fibrous plant that grows in a swamp or marshland would be good. The only specific plant I found much information on was the Swamp Milkweed.

Forest Plants

Dogbane is an excellent material found at the edges of forests and in forest clearings. The leaves are poisonous and must be removed, but the stems can be separated quite easily into fibres, which the bark then needs to be cleaned off of. Leatherwood is a kind of bush that grows deep in forests. When the leatherwood is foraged, the bark must be stripped off of the twigs. No other special preparation is required. Simply strip the bark off and split it into fibres. Finally, basswood tree bark provides another good source of cordage material. Bark can be carved off of split logs, and then instead of being written on, it can just be stripped into a number of fibres to be twisted into cordage.

Plains Plants

Anything fibrous that grows in plains will work for cordage. Specifically, however, field grass can be gathered for a cheap, and lower quality cordage.


*Weaponry

These are just a few examples of some simple and easy to make weapons that would make for both good overall starting equipment, as well as an excellent way for someone who wants to be a survivalist to start out their ‘career’ as it were on Clok. They should break even more quickly than the stone tipped equivalent.

Wooden Spears

A couple of spear variants, made purely with woodworking. These would be a good way to start hunting small game, as well as a cheap source of thrown weapons. They wouldn’t do much damage, and would have a lower durability even than stone weapons, but would be quick and easy to make. They’re all made in similar ways. Carve a stave, then carve the appropriate spear from the stave. Then heat the spear tip over a fire, to harden it.

Throwing spear

This is a shorter spear that is designed for flight, making it rather fragile and easy to break. It can be used in melee at a penalty to accuracy (and does not confer the dodging bonus), and does a fair amount of damage when thrown. This weighs the least of the three, and can fit into a back worn quiver designed specifically for throwing spears.*

*Throwing spears could also be something a Trader could make, using special metal heads and spear hafts.

Spears

These are simply standard spears, without a metal or stone head attached. They do less damage than a standard metal/stone tipped spear, have a lower durability, but are otherwise identical.


Cudgels

It would be nice if simple clubs and cudgels were carvable either from split logs or staves.

This is just a quick little suggestion, for an addition to foraging. It would be nice to be able to find insects with foraging. The insects could be used for quick and easy food (and have no market value), eaten raw or cooked for added nutrition.

This could even add into the future poison system. Some insects could be very dangerous, and perhaps examining them would give you a chance to identify the insect based on your herbalism skill. So you might forage "A bright pink and blue beetle". Examining it would reveal if it was poisonous or not, and if you failed your herbalism skill check it might tell you a poisonous insect is safe, and vice versa.

Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww

It'd be more nutritious than eating the lichens found at Barrow Hill!


Probably about as tasty too.

There is at least one bug that you can eat.