Tailoring, Weaving, Spinning, Wilderness Stuff etc.

[Rhoswen]

This is going to be a long post so please bear with me. Also, some of these may have been suggested before and I apologize for any redundancy or lack of credit for those ideas. Please, please, please add any feedback or other ideas.

Branches: There seems to be a limitation on how many branches you can get from a room, but you can still forage forever unsuccessfully. It would be great if there was a fail message that stopped you from continuing to forage once branches were depleted.

Bowyering: It would be nice to be able to craft different kinds of bows other than flatbows. Medium branches could be used for bows and shortbows, long for longbows.

Woodworking: Fishing rods, hafts for stone trowels or hoes, cards (for processing wool/cotton/fur), knitting needles/crochet needles, spinning spindles (as opposed to the firestarting spindles)

Kapping: Currently this profession is extremely limited in application. It would be great to make additions to this so we could have stone tools for farming. Trowels and hoes or picks for tilling.

Travois: Handcarts and wagons are available for those with horses or willing access to town and gobs of riln, but since they aren’t really available for us wilderness folk, it would be great to be able to create a travois that could be pulled. It could be crafted from large branches, leather, a woven mat, or a blanket, and use sinew/leather strips for binding. It could hold less than a handcart, but would be very helpful with gathering branches or keeping your possessions handy without encumbering yourself. It should also be a permanent-type item that wouldn’t disappear like wagons and handcarts, but could have a chance to be disassembled, packed up, and worn on success and discarded on a fail. I don't know what skill this would fall under, but hopefully not carpentry.

(Yes I understand the Chapterhouse possibly has handcarts, but I still think this would be neat to build)

Bandages/cloths: From what I can tell, the only place to get bandages without riln is the trading post which is pretty far from anywhere else. They don’t sell cloths for poultices. It would be amazing if other places (maybe some of the hamlets) would accept a similar barter system for bandages or cloths.

Alternatively, could clothing be looted from the fallen, cut into cloths, and washed to make our own cloths for poultices?

Healers: I understand that poultices can eventually be made with enough skill, but until that time, the only way to get healing is to hope for a kind monk’s ministrations or hope that you have enough riln to purchase healing. It would be great if there was a healer willing to barter for services in exchange for herbs or other goods.

Sinew: Right now sinew can be used to bind things in fletching, but it can’t be used to bind knapped tools. You need to use leather strips. I’ve found you can barter for strips at the trading post, but it seems one can’t actually make their own leather without the use of facilities which are all located in towns or otherwise inaccessible. Would it be possible to make it so sinew is more versatile or interchangeable with leather strips? If not, would it be possible to have a chance to recover a leather strip from knapped tools that become unusable due to wear?

Trainers: Again this comes down to riln and availability. For someone who would like to try to stick away from towns, it’s incredibly difficult to find a decent trainer. I understand that it’s not necessary to get training to raise skills, but it is certainly handy. I recently discovered that the one knapping trainer listed on the wiki doesn’t actually offer knapping. It would be awesome if there was some old hermit out in the woods somewhere who could teach things like knapping, woodworking, fletching, bowyering, fishing, herbalism, and other general wilderness skills that was 1) not guild-affiliated and so not restricted to teaching only guild members and 2) able to barter for services – maybe based on reputation if you’re worried about people not spending riln appropriately.

Weaving: I think this has the potential to be a great new little profession and could be limited to those with certain reputations or with the savvy to find a proper trainer out in the wilds. I don’t think this would be very prevalent even among such organizations as Tse Gaiyan (as they seem more militant and less domestic – even in the druidic end of things) and might be used more for people like Dunwyr or possibly Snowpiners or those friendly with such organizations since it’s a bit more primitive of a skill. Since it isn’t very intuitive, it would likely require at least 1 point of training to pick up.

I kept the list of craftables to things that aren’t very fluid in nature (such as clothing) as the materials can become rather stiff when using a weaving process. Reeds or grasses could be foraged from near rivers or on grassy plains. You could also use yarn for different results.

Reed/grass
•Quivers – could be woven for either back or belt slots
•Conical back-baskets – large backpack type containers
•Hand baskets – open ended (can’t be closed), but can hold items up to large
•Picnic baskets – closeable, medium in size
•Mats – sleeping mat, travois mat, decorative mats for houses (more custom options with greater skill)
•Jewelry – bracelets/wristcuffs, headbands,
•Light armor – woven armor for the chest, leg and arm slots would be fantastic. Made from reeds cut near rivers or grasses gathered from plains.

Yarn (requires sub-profession - Spinning)
•Satchels
•Totes
•Pouches
•Blankets
•Mats
•Ponchos
•Cloaks
•Robes

Adornments could be made from feathers, beads, leather strips, or ribbon

Spinning:
•Collect fur/harvest cotton
•Wash material
•Dry material
•Card material to worst the fibers and remove debris
•Put the fiber on the spindle or on spinning wheel and spin

Tailoring: Someone mentioned tailoring in a recent post so I wanted to try and expand on it.

•Materials: Yarn, bolt of cloth, crochet needle, thread, needle, knitting needle, knife/dagger/scissors, dye, chalk
•Items made: basic clothing (custom options with more skill), blankets, pillows/cushions (possibly could be combined with carpentry for padded furniture), toys, containers, potholders, veils, doilies etc.
•Items could be crafted with bolts of cloth purchased in stores and needle/thread
•Items could also be crafted with yarn and either crochet needle or knitting needle
•Crafting with bolts and thread would maybe give less skill than knitting or crocheting, but would also go faster and have a higher success rate of higher quality. With more skill crochet/knit would have much higher value.

Steps for Sewn objects – based on yardage – impossible to fail, but easy to make indiscernible or terrible quality with low skills

Sewn Clothing: trace cloth (pattern), cut cloth, sew (depending on size of the piece, anywhere from .5-3 yards of cloth)

Stuffed toys: trace cloth (pattern), cut cloth, sew, stuff cloth/finish (dolls, animals, puppets – 1-2 yards)
Blankets: trace cloth (pattern), cut cloth, sew (hems the edges to a nice finish)

Quilts: cut cloth strips/triangles/squares (each yard could give multiple pieces from cutting), place strips/triangles/squares (puts the pieces on a table or the ground),trace cloth, cut cloth (for back) add padding, sew

Quilting would be somewhat like cooking or poultices where different combinations of triangle #, square #, strip # resulting in different patterns and could use something like 10 pieces of cloth for the pattern side each. For example… something with 5 triangles and 1 square and 4 strips might turn out to a sunburst pattern.

Sub-skill - Knit clothing: hold yarn and needles, knit (pattern)
Sub-skill - Crocheted clothing: hold yarn and needles, crochet (pattern)
Sub-skill – Tatting: hold needle and yarn or thread – tatt (pattern)

With knit and crochet the time factor comes from many small RT attempts to a finished product rather than using multiple steps to get started. Based on the size of the project, it will take more rounds of knitting/crocheting to complete. There would be a chance to fail where you have to pull out stitches and continue (thus adding to total time to finish the product), but not to fail completely.

Tailoring can be embellished with beads, feathers, embroidery, buttons, ribbons, shells, bone.

Miscellaneous craftables or craft materials (not sure where these could fit):
•Needles (sewing): bone, stone, metal (crafted)
•Knitting needles: bone, wood, sold
•Crochet needles: bone, wood, sold
•Beads: used to embellish crafted goods like gems or metal can– made from shell, wood, stone, glass (imported), bone, gem
•Thread: horsehair (craftable), wool/cotton (purchased or crafted)
•Yarn: wool, linen, cotton, fleece, angora (Yup, rabbits!), cashmere, silk, camel (if there are camels), buffalo, wolf, bear etc. Fur would have to be harvestable as separate from tanning – maybe shaving the fur before tanning the leather and then it couldn’t be tanned natural. Would require spinning or some other method of creation or could be purchase in stores.
•Spinning wheels (possibly with woodworking or carpentry)
•Drop spindles (for hand-spinning – would take much longer to get processed yarn than a spinning wheel)
•Scissors - sold or possibly crafted with general smithing
•Card/comb – used to worst wool or other materials so the fibers align and can be spun – could be crafted from wood
•Wild cotton/farmable cotton
•Chalk – found or purchased
•Horsehair – used for fishing line, binding, thread, possibly for instrument-making if that ever becomes a thing
•Ribbons – sold in stores
•Buttons – sold in stores or crafted from bone/wood/stone/shell
•Shells - sold or foraged from the beach
•Bone/antlers/horns – from hunting or foraged

[baerden]

Candles from animal fat too. :D

Salves from the fat as well!

[Rhoswen]

Oh yes! How could I forget! Thanks, Baerden.

[Rhoswen]

Candlemaking:

Requires string, animal fat, heating source, mold (clay, metal, stone)

Steps - cook fat, put string in mold, put fat in mold, allow to cool

Obviously it could be made more complicated or use other materials like beeswax if available.

*edited to alter step order*

[baerden]

http://www.instructables.com/id/Fat-Candle/

http://www.theprairiehomestead.com/2014 ... ndles.html

[Rhoswen]

If reeds are added you can split them for weaving or pierce them to make whistles or other reed instruments.

[qinweiqi]

I must say that I love everything that has been posted thus far. Candle making and more versatile sinew use would be fantastic.

As far as feedback, I do have a minor bit of correction, as I crochet myself and my wife is an avid knitter. For crochet, the implement is actually a hook (singular). Also, knitting needles and crochet hooks can be made of metal, however those and sewing needles would likely require a very detailed smithing skill (much like jewelry).

Sub-skill - Crocheted clothing: hold yarn and needles, crochet (pattern)

Miscellaneous craftables or craft materials (not sure where these could fit):
•Needles (sewing): bone, stone, metal (crafted)
•Knitting needles: bone, wood, sold
•Crochet needles: bone, wood, sold

Sub-skill - Crocheted clothing: hold yarn and hook, crochet (pattern)

•Knitting needles: bone, wood, sold, metal (crafted)
•Crochet hooks: bone, wood, sold, metal (crafted)


As a fun side note, I've seen a knitting needle as an in-game object, though I suspect it isn't usable.

[Jaster]

Yea, I think those knitting needles are fluff objects sometimes found in boxes.

[Rhoswen]

Knitting needles *are* found in boxes, yes, but I think right now they're considered junk items because they never come in pairs. I also crochet, but I'm trying to keep things simple and I could actually see the GMs just rolling those two items (hooks and knitting needles) into one tool even if it is technically incorrect. I definitely appreciate the feedback! Please keep it coming.

[Jaster]

So glad you affirmed my suspicions. I R TEH SO NOOBZ LOL!

[jilliana]

I love all of the ideas. Some of them have been mentioned before, but obviously they bare reementioning.

I completely agree that there could be better ways to support those characters who wish to live in the wilderness and avoid towns altogether.

[jilliana]

I just remembered that yes, there is a way that one knows that there aren't any more branches. You just have to forage forever and a half and then some to get the "you can't find what you're looking for" message.

[Rhoswen]

With other foraging though it eventually stops. You can get that message repeatedly and it still keeps trying to auto-forage and even sometimes succeeds. I'm not sure if that's supposed to be how it works or if the find-chance is just so low at that point it's not actually a total fail. Either way it seems off.