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FoE
2010-01-04, 03:42 PM
This is one for the DMs. I'm primarily a 4E DM, but I think this topic spans editions.

One of the weirder things players have asked me following a battle is if he can skin the monster they just killed. In one case in particular, the player wanted to skin the huge bear they just killed. Even after I explained to him that the pelt was probably worthless because they just poked a bunch of holes in the bear, he just wanted the pelt to wear. My response was "Okaaaaaaaay ..."

Anyways, I've seen this topic come up indirectly in other threads, when someone asked about using dragon scales in armour or incorporating ghoul claws into weapons. I'm sure you've experienced it in some form or another.

My question is: how do you handle it? I'm not an experienced hunter, but I imagine it's gotta take some time to skin a large animal and dry its pelt. Like, you don't do it in five minutes. Plus, there's got to be some specialty tools involved. (4E DMs: Do you just resolve this sort of thing by way of a couple skill checks and an extended rest?)

Feel free to share your stories, by the way. I'm sure I can't be the only DM that's come across this situation in gameplay. But please: no discussion about cruelty to animals.

(The title is a reference to the trope (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/NemeanSkinning), by the way.)

Zaydos
2010-01-04, 03:48 PM
I use 3.5 + house rules myself. For skinning things I use Survival skill (it involves hunting so) or Craft (Alchemy) (gathering components) and addapted it from Dragon Magazine #317's power component rules which I half remembered. I allowed the PCs to use this to get power components even, but they never bothered to use them (except once to perform a special ritual that was completely out of game rules). They still have bits of pure necrotic mass, and blood. In another game they had the bones of an avatar of an elder god for 6 levels (they turned its skin into a magical cloak that combined Ring of Protection and Cloak of Resistance as per DMG guidelines).

nekomata2
2010-01-04, 03:51 PM
My Binder killed a Goth, a mini-beholder, and wore it as a hat for awhile. My DM didn't implement any special rules for it, just let me do it. I had to give it away eventually, so now I wear a Mind Flayer's head as a hat, and carry 2 severed Mind Flayer heads to walk around town Speaking with Dead with. But yeah, no real rules, just had a knife, let me do it.

Zaydos
2010-01-04, 03:58 PM
I actually did similar as a player in a B/E/C/M/I game. I was an elf and I had a knife and I'd take a trophy from my every kill. I had a gnoll head cap (it was Level 1 and a one-shot).

The Glyphstone
2010-01-04, 04:10 PM
My Binder killed a Goth, a mini-beholder, and wore it as a hat for awhile. My DM didn't implement any special rules for it, just let me do it. I had to give it away eventually, so now I wear a Mind Flayer's head as a hat, and carry 2 severed Mind Flayer heads to walk around town Speaking with Dead with. But yeah, no real rules, just had a knife, let me do it.

...thanks, Neko, now I can't get the image of a Gauth in black face(body?) paint repeatedly shooting itself with Inflict Moderate Wounds...have a Girl Scout cookie.
http://blog.nj.com/parentalguidance/2008/01/small_cookie.jpg

nekomata2
2010-01-04, 04:10 PM
Also relevant to this is the Trophy Collector feat from PH2, which actually sets out rules for making trophies from defeated enemies using Craft(taxidermy).

Edit: Cookie...YEAH!

dyslexicfaser
2010-01-04, 04:20 PM
If you just skin a beast and don't treat the skin correctly, it'll start to smell really foul after awhile.

That shopkeeper isn't even going to want to get close enough to you to take your money.

EDIT: But then, perhaps this is a time when the Rule of Cool subverts reality.

jmbrown
2010-01-04, 04:26 PM
It only takes about 10 minutes to fully skin a small creature like a dog or rabbit. I'd say 30 minutes for one man to fully skin something bear-sized. All you need is a simple, sharp knife to skin a creature. For clothing, salt is added to the thin membrane of skin under the fur to reduce the growth of bacteria. You'd wash the excess fat and blood of the membrane and dry it before a fire which would probably take 1-3 hours depending on the size.

As for making weapons like reinforced gloves, it wouldn't really work. The natural weapons of animals, even monsters, couldn't realistically be applied to a pair of gauntlets or something and still be effective on their own. You would have to reinforce or engineer them with metal of same kind after which case you basically have the equivalent of a spiked gauntlet.


...thanks, Neko, now I can't get the image of a Gauth in black face(body?) paint repeatedly shooting itself with Inflict Moderate Wounds...have a Girl Scout cookie.
http://blog.nj.com/parentalguidance/2008/01/small_cookie.jpg

I hose girl scouts who don't have thin mints in stock >:(

Dimers
2010-01-04, 04:31 PM
Relevant Crafts for skins might include Leatherwork, Armorcrafting and Tannery.

I don't have any issue with accomodating this kind of activity. If the player wants to invest the effort, have them use the gentle repose spell/ritual or its equivalent to preserve the remains, take it back to civilization, pay a tanner to work it up (pay extra to have it ready sooner), and then write it on their sheet. Survival should be quite sufficient for careful skinning; wilderness survival often relies on making use of all available resources. (Or heck, just create a new spell to remove and instantly tan the hide, and mend the holes and scorch marks while you're at it.) Wherever you keep notes about social interactions, show that the skin gives a +2 with people impressed with feats of might and courage, and -2 with druids and people who like cleanliness.

Evard
2010-01-04, 04:35 PM
In 4e i made them take a rest, time depends on what they were skinning (one time it was a rat -_-). I make them make a check against a set DC to find out not only if they make it correctly but also the quality (never over 1 silver)

Tequila Sunrise
2010-01-04, 04:37 PM
I don't even use skill checks for this type of thing: it has no impact on game balance and there's no penalty for failure, so why even roll a check? If a character wants to, he can skin the bear. If he has the Nature skill, he can do it well and then preserve it so that it doesn't rot, given a couple of hours.

FoE
2010-01-04, 04:38 PM
In 4e i made them take a rest, time depends on what they were skinning (one time it was a rat -_-). I make them make a check against a set DC to find out not only if they make it correctly but also the quality (never over 1 silver)

OK, bears and wolves and tigers and crocodiles I get ... but a rat? Why would anyone want to skin a rat? Were rat-skin gloves in vogue? :smalltongue:

Another_Poet
2010-01-04, 04:39 PM
@Face of Evil: I don't see what the big deal is. Wearing pelts, fur-lined cloaks, horned helmets, fang necklaces, etc. are all traditional signs of victory and badassery. Let your players do it.

It sounds like you have a few concerns for balance purposes, so I'll tell you how I would handle each of them and let you (of course) decide what to do in your own game.

Holes in pelts - Okay, so the players shot or hacked the animal to death. So what? Most real pelts will have holes in them, either from the arrows used to take down the prey or from accidentally tearing the thinner parts of the hide during skinning. It happens. You can either use the non-damaged parts (which can be quite large areas even on a deer, just think of the hide of a Huge creature!) or you can mend the holes. Heck, a 0th level spell handles this for free in D&D.

If your players used excessively destructive means such as a couple of fireballs or a mob of zombies to kill the prey, then maybe rule that the hide is no good. Even then, expect them to simply use Make Whole to get a nice hide.

What rules to use - In 3.5 it would be Survival to skin and Craft to cure/tan the hide (or just roll both into a single Craft check) and a set of artisan's tools would be needed. A plain dagger could be used instead but it would impose a penalty as "improvised tools."

You run 4e so think of the most appropriate skill and have them roll it. It's really not hard to skin and cure a hide, in fact very simple with even a little instruction. If they want to do fancy taxidermy sure, make it hard; otherwise assume anyone who has hunted (=everyone a pseudo-medieval world) can do it with a basic roll.

The great thing in 4e is you can actually make it a fun skill challenge on a really large, unusual corpse. Imagine the series of nature, athletics, acrobatics, alchemy etc checks you could require in the process of taking apart a purple worm corpse.

Wealth by level - As your players what they intend to do with the pelts. If they want to wear them to look cool, don't worry about the cost. Making your clothing pretty or fierce is not game-breaking. If they want to sell the pelts or rare parts, then come up with a simple pricing scale. Count the pelts/trophies toward their loot just like you would count gold pieces or art objects.

Here's a sample chart I made up off the top of my head.


Maximum value of monster's pelt/hide/horns:
CR*20 gp for animals
CR*100 for rare animals
CR*500 for other other creatures native to plane
CR*1000 for extraplanar creatures
Undead, humanoids, and giants normally not purchased

Actual values may be much lower depending on craft check; DC 10 check will get 25% value, DC 15 50%, DC 20 75%, DC 30 100%.

What about creatures with special powers? Powers fade shortly after the creature's death. Cut the head off a medusa and you can petrify the giant in the next room, but within a few minutes it's lost its power.

Even if players use magic to preserve the corpse, there's no reason to think its magical/extraordinary/supernatural abilities need be preserved. Preserve a medusa head and you have a very ugly, very well-preserved head that still can't petrify anyone.

Exception: some critters have body parts that are valuable spelled out in their monster entries. In 4e, the rust monster is a good example. In 3.5, dragon scales are a good example. In these cases uses the cost and special powers the body part is said to have in the rules.

But it takes forever - No it doesn't. Figure a half hour of "game world time" for one deer-sized corpse. Double it for something bigger, or say it takes all day for a full grown dragon. In any case, it only takes 30 seconds to roll the dice and see what their 30 minutes - 8 hours of work accomplished. If they're on a timer (the castle will explode in 2 hours!) then remind them of that and let them make their decision.

Hope this helps!

:)

ap

Zaydos
2010-01-04, 04:40 PM
Wherever you keep notes about social interactions, show that the skin gives a +2 with people impressed with feats of might and courage, and -2 with druids and people who like cleanliness.

I find the penalty with druids a little odd since they normally go around wearing animal skins themselves (hide armor is made from several layers of tanned animal hide). Also it's the druids in my game that usually end up cutting things into bits (although usually at the bequest of wizards, unless they want a pretty hat).

FoE
2010-01-04, 04:52 PM
It's not so much I have balance issues; it's just that it takes me by surprise. I mean, looting corpses for treasure is one thing. I've even cut open monsters just to see if there's any undigested gold or jewels in their bellies. It just strikes me as weird when the PC says he wants to keep this (relatively) worthless animal pelt. I guess I'm not one for trophy-collecting.

Also, I have no experience with skinning animals in real life, so I can't say "OK, it'll take you X hours to skin that wolf" because I have no clue how long it takes. I didn't even know you were supposed to salt the hide; I thought you just cut it off and dried it.

TheCountAlucard
2010-01-04, 04:57 PM
I hose girl scouts who don't have thin mints in stock >:(Now I want thin mints!

Anyway, yeah, I have a couple of players like this, only they're in the habit of taking teeth. Oh, and one time the PCs killed a hydra, and they decided to try and make as much of it as possible into jerky. :smallconfused:

FoE
2010-01-04, 04:59 PM
Oh, and one time the PCs killed a hydra, and they decided to try and make as much of it as possible into jerky. :smallconfused:

Well, clearly they read this strip. (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0326.html)

jmbrown
2010-01-04, 04:59 PM
You don't have to salt the hide, that's just a cheap method of preserving it for travel. You could dry it out right after skinning but most hunters have multiple snares to check and don't stop for the day after skinning a single rabbit.

subject42
2010-01-04, 05:10 PM
OK, bears and wolves and tigers and crocodiles I get ... but a rat? Why would anyone want to skin a rat? Were rat-skin gloves in vogue? :smalltongue:

Pseudonatural Paragon Dire Rat?

TheCountAlucard
2010-01-04, 05:13 PM
Well, clearly they read this strip. (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0326.html)Actually, out of the group, I'm the only one who reads Order of the Stick. Besides, the hydra in the comic is unconcious, while the party killed theirs.

oxybe
2010-01-04, 05:27 PM
just let them.

if there is anyone in the group with nature training, let them do it "right" and skin it. a dragon can provide an enough scale for a suite of armor sized for 1 creature smaller then itself (so 1 large dragon = 1 medium armor). if the skinner wasn't trained, it's 2 sizes smaller. so to make 1 suite of medium armor you would need 2 improperly skinned large dragon hides

if they're looking to sell it and it's a rare/valuable hide/parts, have it be worth 1 parcel if skinned properly, half a parcel if not.

nekomata2
2010-01-04, 05:31 PM
As put into existence by the feat i mentioned, taxidermy is a Craft skill, which makes sense since it creates a product...masterwork taxidermy....nice...my previously mentioned Binder actually put a few ranks into it, because of his penchant for harvesting creature bits.

Thurbane
2010-01-04, 05:37 PM
In 3.5, I would say this could fall under Survival, Craft (Taxidermy) or Profession (Hunter/Trapper/Furrier). In fact, I would say some of these should give synergy bonuses to the others.

In one game I played, I specifically took a Fighter with all of these skills specifically so I could butcher/skin monsters after they were defeated. :smallbiggrin:

Evard
2010-01-04, 05:40 PM
Oh god... I just remembered that a friend of mine said that in a 3.5 campy he taxidermied a human kite... Aparently his character didn't know the meat/flesh was made from human.... his paladin ended up loosing all his class features lol.

Swordgleam
2010-01-04, 05:43 PM
4E DMs: Do you just resolve this sort of thing by way of a couple skill checks and an extended rest?

Exactly. Though for more valuable items, it takes a check or two every rest for a couple of days - one of my players wanted to make some scale mail out of dragon scales, and that took a while.

Fhaolan
2010-01-04, 06:37 PM
It depends on what kind of detail and realism you're willing to go into. This seems like a perfectly reasonable thing for Barbarians, Rangers, Druids, or anyone who's an outdoorsman-style character who is used to self-sufficient survival. Normally in 3.x I handle this kind of thing as a craft check that takes a week or so to produce a clothing-grade hide to hand off to a tailor.

How long: Depends on the size of the creature. Fully skinning an elk could take somwhere around a half-an-hour to an hour if you've done this kind of thing before. Much longer if this is your first time. You can do this *fast* with just one sharp knife, two lengths of rope, a tree, and a horse, but I don't recommend that unless you don't care about the condition of the hide afterwards and just want it for trim and other piecemeal work (which might apply anyway if the animal has been chopped to bits in melee combat). If you're wanting to put effort into it you'll need several special knives with differing curves, hooks, and temper.

Once the animal is skinned, you have to prepare it for treatment (tanning). This involves a dull knife or scraper to make sure the hide is 'clean' of the flesh. The treatment can be done many different ways, but all of them take time. Simple drying can work in some climates, but in others you need to dry after having rubbed the hide with the brains of the creature, salt, wood ash, and/or teas of oak leaves and other plants, etc. This can an unreasonably long amount of time for an adventurer. This is can take upwards of a week. (again this is all for an elk-sized hide.)

Oh, and fireballs, cones of cold, and the like? Those will probably ruin the hide entirely as the damage that kind of stuff will do to the skin will likely make the hair/fur fall out very fast as there's no chance for the surface damage to heal before the animal is dead.

Talyn
2010-01-04, 07:00 PM
In 4e, you can probably figure that anyone trained in Nature can make a Nature skill check to skin the hide off of something. DCs would be based on the origin of the creature:
DC (Natural): 5+creature's level
DC (fey): 10+creature's level
DC (aberrant):15+creature's level

How long it would take would be dependent on it's size. My uncle hunts, and he can skin a deer in about half an hour, and scrape/cure the hide in about 4 hours. Use those numbers for medium or large-sized creatures, cut them in half for every size category smaller (15 minutes to skin and 2 hours to scrape and cure a Small creature), and double them for every size category larger (2 hours to skin and 16 hours to scrape and cure a Huge creature).

As for their value... eh, it depends. You could make it easy on yourself and treat the hide as a gem/art object of the creature's level, or you could come up with a sophisticated system based on the rarity and beauty of the hide.

(edit: for clarity)