AzureKnight
2013-11-14, 08:24 PM
Looking through old dragon magazines led me to this... Enjoy.
101 Uses for a Wet Blanket!
Forget your towel -
do you know where your blanket is?
by Spike Y. Jones (Dragon Magazine issue #228)
Along with the all-important swords, scrolls, torches, and money-pouches on the average fantasy PC’s equipment list, there are usually a few other items put there just to spend a few coppers and because they felt "proper." Sadly, while these items appear on everyone’s character sheets, few gamers ever make use of their tallow candles, holy symbols (wooden), small mirrors, and sprigs of wolvesbane. Yet these "extraneous" items can be among the most versatile and important pieces of adventuring equipment, if only players would realize how to utilize them.
Case in point: many years ago in my AD&D® campaign, Malshazzit the Mage (although "the Apprentice" would have been more accurate) was traveling alone, on foot, through dense wilderness, when he encountered a ravenous giant beetle. Realizing that his one spell, affect normal fires, would be of little use in this situation, and that his pair of daggers were no match for the beetle, he cast about for another weapon. Then the player (Mike Sinardi) noticed the blanket on his character sheet. Bravely (or foolishly, depending on who narrates the story), Malshazzit dived at the beetle and, with an exceptionally lucky roll, wrapped the cloth around the beetle’s head, blinding it long enough for him to work his way around to the beetle’s back where he could then plunge his daggers into the beetle’s vitals, killing an opponent that I, as DM, had expected him to run away from. There must be, I said to him then, over a hundred uses for a simple blanket. The following are the rest: or use it to drive away smell-sensitive people or creatures.
2. (Dry): As a simple disguise, such as a makeshift robe or, with a hole cut in it, a poncho.3. (Dry): As a complex disguise involving cutting, sewing, dying or staining (think The Great Escape).
4. (Dry): As padding for use under a disguise to create the illusion of pregnancy, obesity, or muscularity depending on the distribution of material.
5. (Wet): As a makeshift weapon; wet it to add weight and swing on a rope. Damage is minimal and subdual only, but if it’s all you’ve got...
6. (Wet): As part of a trap; water adds some weight and while it won’t be as effective as a net, it can hamper something long enough for you to get close and thump it.
7. (Dry): Work a bunch of threads loose to use as kindling for a fire.
8. (Dry): As "firewood" after #7.
9. (Dry): To make smoke signals. Of course, for the signals to be properly understood, a code has to be worked out in advance; but, even if one isn’t, smoke signals provide unambiguous signs of where you are in case you’re lost and need to help rescuers find you. And they might scare away people who interpret them as evidence of a stronger fighting force than one miserable mage alone in the woods.
10. (Dry): As a thread-source for tying fishing lures, marking paths through labyrinths, etc.
11. (Dry): To hide things. Dark blankets work best in the woods or at night, while light ones are best in the desert.
12. (Dry): As a fake ghost. White blankets work best, but it’ll take more than just a single sheet flapping in the breeze to scare a hardened orcish hunting party; better practice your spooky noises as well.
13. (Dry): As spell material components or substitutes; check the Players’ Handbook. There must be some.
14. (Wet): Depending on the material, it may stink when wet, so it could be used to attract or repel creatures with sensitive noses. Some careful experimentation will reveal which.
15. (Dry): As the world’s worst pipeweed. Give it to a "friend,"
16. (Dry): As the key component of a kite. The blanket had better be thin, or the winds strong, for this one.
17. (Dry): As emergency bandages and tourniquets. Best used for tying clean bandages to the wound, as they are highly unlikely to be sterile, especially if already used.
18. (Wet or Dry [depending on personal preferences]): As a strangling cord. This works best with thin blankets.
19. (Wet): For towel-snapping. The victim’s skin must be exposed if this is going to cause even minimal subdual damage, but even if not, it still makes an interesting noise and can be a shock.
20. (Wet): As a subdual club. Try tying a handful of iron spikes inside to give it some heft.
21. (Dry): For concealing secret messages. You can do this by inserting scraps of cloth (better than paper, as the texture will be correct) into a lining, if there is one. It’s more likely to be prepared well in advance by weaving a coded message into it during its manufacture, with or without the knowledge of the bearer.
22. (Wet): As a seed bed to grow grass on. What you want the grass for is your concern, but see #13 and #15.
23. (Wet): As temporary protection for running through walls of fire and the like.
24. (Dry): As a throw rug. Primarily appropriate indoors, but a blanket can be used in the wilderness as a welcome mat in front of a tent, or as a rug inside. If an enemy steps on your “rug,” you can turn it into a weapon by pulling it out from under him.
25. (Wet): It’ll conduct a shocking grasp so that the caster doesn’t have to touch the behemoth in the suit of plate mail. Either lay it on the ground to be stepped on, casting the spell from nearby concealment, or use it as a wet whip, casting the spell just before. The damage is reduced by 1 point either way, and the blanket may be singed in the process (see #15 for discussion of the smell).
26. (Dry): To wrap clanking metal bits to muffle the sounds they’d make during a stealthy approach or retreat.
27. (Dry): To chop up and feed to a cow; they can digest just about anything.
28. (Dry): Combine it with a staff, an empty scabbard and some other odd pieces to make a scarecrow.
29. (Dry): To make imposing shadows, with the afore-mentioned staves, etc. to give it a framework and to move it around menacingly.
30. (Wet or Dry): For putting out fires.
31. (Dry): As a makeshift canvas for anything from a sign or shield blazon to a fine painting. Unfortunately, the warmer and fuzzier the blanket is, the more difficult it will be to paint on.
32. (Wet – with oil, not water); As makeshift sailcloth. As with #31, heavier blankets don’t necessarily make better sails. Oiling is necessary to make a lighter blanket airtight.
33. (Wet): As an abrasive scrubbing material. (Some of the blankets I've had to use have been about as scratchy as steel wool and almost as tough.)
34. (Dry): As a polishing cloth. (Some of the blankets I’ve used have been a trifle softer.) You want to look your best when you’re presented to the king, even if its only the king of the goblins.
35. (Dry): As the main component of a small tent or lean-to. It may not keep the rain out well, but snow, hail, and wind will be warded off somewhat.
36. (Dry): As rope. If only a single blanket is available, it’ll have to be a short one, unless the blanket is cut into strips, which can reduce its strength dangerously.
37. (Dry): For instant accessorizing! Unlike using it for a disguise, this can be used to enhance ones appearance, not to cover it up.
38. (Dry): As a makeshift saddle on a stolen horse.
39. (Dry): To keep that stolen horse warm at night in the wilderness.
40. (Wet): In a particularly cold climate, mold it into shape and let it freeze to form a makeshift toboggan.
41. (Dry): As a summer grass-sliding toboggan.
42. (Dry): As a flag. A white blanket can be used to surrender or to call for a parley, or it can be painted or stitched to approximate a real flag. Darker blankets can be made into pirate colors with white paint or stitchery. A plain brown or gray blanket-flag may just foster confusion, or could accidentally be reminiscent of an ogrish battle-banner.
43. (Dry): To cover nettles, barbed wire, or other pointy or scratchy impediments. Multiple blankets (or alternating a pair of blankets) can make a pathway. (Also useful at picnics; if the picnic runs long, the blanket can be converted to other uses, such as #35, #45, and #101.)
44. (Dry): Wrapped around hands (or other body parts) to prevent rope-burns, or as “armor” before breaking a window with your fist.
45. (Dry): Folded repeatedly to form a pillow for sleeping on.
46. (Dry): Folded repeatedly to form a pillow which can be used as a silencer for a gun. Of course, this isn’t much use in standard fantasy campaigns (although you could use it to muffle screams), and see prior comments about the smell of burning blankets.
47. (Dry): As a cape to wave at charging bulls. Despite centuries of tradition and misconception, it’s not the color of a matador’s cape that enrages the bull, but its movement. Thus, any color blanket will work, as long as the user remembers to stand aside and let the bull pass through the blanket, not through his own midsection.
48. (Wet): In conjunction with some plaster of Paris (or maybe just mud or clay if there’s no Paris in your fantasy campaign world) it can be used to wrap and protect fragile dinosaur fossils (or other fragile items such as pottery if dinosaurs are living creatures instead of fossils in the campaign world),
49. (Dry): As a decorative wall-hanging (patterned blankets are best), possibly concealing a secret door, a safe, a peephole, a trap, or some other surprise.
50. (Dry): As a surface to display portable wares on. Very convenient since the “table” can be easily folded into a carrying sack for those same wares.
51. (Dry): To provide some discretion when enjoying a private moment with an attractive royal ward.
52. (Dry): Hung over a clothes-line it can form a room divider.
53. (Dry): As a unique fortune-telling implement. The adept (or charlatan) could learn to read omens in the folds formed when it is thrown to the ground.
54. (Dry): As a gag for a talkative prisoner. If you’re not worried about other people hearing the prisoner’s cries but you are worried about the possibility of doing him some harm, you can cut off strips to use for ear-plugs.
55. (Dry): Filled with gunpowder and various pointy things, with a strip cut off and soaked in a gunpowder solution before being dried to form a wick, it could be used as a relatively weak bomb. In a modern-era setting, if the pointy things are all ordinary household items, the bomb may even be able to pass through an airport x-ray machine without any questions being asked.
56. (Dry): As the raw material for any item of clothing if a little scratchiness (or a floral print in a modern-era campaign) isn’t going to cause too much discomfort.
57. (Dry): To cover the eyes of horses when you don’t want them alarmed or distracted by something they may see in front or beside them.
58. (Dry): As a fake flying carpet for sale to a gullible novice adventurer (he had better be gullible, because even a mage with a levitation spell will have trouble explaining away the blankets plain, threadbare, and definitely nonmagical appearance).
59. (Dry): As the primary material component in the manufacture of a real flying carpet. Unfortunately, a poor quality blanket will make a poor quality flying carpet.
60. (Dry): As a makeshift stretcher, either by holding the corners or by cutting holes along the edges and inserting sturdy poles in them. (The stronger the blanket, the better.)
61. (Wet): As cooling headgear in the desert. You’ll have to keep re-wetting it as the water evaporates, but remember not to wet it immediately before sunset, as you’ll want it dry and warm for those cold desert nights.
62. (Dry or Wet): As a source of quick cash. (Use this article as proof that it’s highly versatile and worth every copper piece you’re demanding.)
63. (Dry): Roll it around a broken limb to partially immobilize the injury, or roll it up and then tie the limb to it as a temporary splint.
64. (Dry): Folded and tied, it can serve as a sling for that broken arm.
65. (Dry): To immobilize an entire person. The easiest way is to use it as rope to tie his hands and feet together, but blanket-knots are notoriously insecure. If the victim is small (such as a baby or a gnome) you can use it as a swaddling cloth, bundling the victim up as tightly as a parcel ready to be mailed.
66. (Wet [although Dry is always possible if you’re not too concerned about starting a fire]): To conceal a lit lantern (or candle, but again there’s that fire hazard). Folding the blanket a couple of times will allow a thin blanket to work as well as a thick one, and lifting and lowering the blanket repeatedly can turn the lantern into a signaling device.
67. (Dry [although not when you’re done with it]): As a towel to dry yourself off after a swim or to sop up spilled water, oil, or blood.
68. (Wet): Cut into strips and tied to a pole as a mop.
69. (Dry): With people holding it around the edge, to throw a person standing in its center upward. Although normally only seen used this way as an entertainment for children (or Frankie and Annette in bad 1950s beach movies), it could also be used to throw a halfling over a wall.
70. (Dry): Rolled up to smuggle some hidden treasure like an Egyptian princess or some really good salami (with results depending a good deal on the size and thickness of the blanket).
71. (Dry): As a pot-holder or (if wet) as an oven mitt.
72. (Dry): As a method of transmitting diseases like smallpox to a the indigenous population of a region your country is attempting to expand into.
73. (Dry): As an entertainment device. If the blanket is white you can set up a lamp in front of it and make shadow-animals on it, and if it’s white and thin, you can put the lamp behind it and put on a shadow-puppet play. (A plain, white blanket will make a good screen for a slide or movie projector in a modern-era campaign.)
74. (Dry): As improvised clothing for use after swallowing a growth potion (the size of the blanket and the modesty of the user determining what items of clothing are improvised).
75. (Dry): To make toys for children. A little cutting and sewing, some colored thread and a few buttons or some paint can quickly turn a blanket into a (somewhat plain) stuffed animal or rag doll.
76. (Dry): As a portable checkers/chess set. If the blanket already has a checkered pattern all that has to be done is to cut out and label the pieces.
77. (Dry): Either suspended on a frame or stiffened with shellac, to make lightweight, movable, Japanese-style wall panels.
78. (Dry): As a source of all-purpose rags.
79. (Dry): As a burial shroud.
80. (Dry): As a curtain or door.
81. (Dry): To turn a properly-arranged pile of boxes or bricks into a chair, couch, or bed. Multiple blankets are needed if you want the furniture to be comfortable, but if you’re just using it to conceal stuff from casual inspection, you just need enough to give the furniture a less “angular” appearance.
82. (Dry [but not for long]): As diapers.
83. (Dry): As writing “paper.” (You’ll want a fine-weave blanket and thick, non-running ink for this.
84. (Dry): As a relatively clean surface to perform surgery or deliver a baby on.
85. (Dry): As the covering over a pit trap. It won’t be very convincing in the wilderness or in a rock-hewn dungeon, but in a house (over a trap door) or with numerous cushions and rugs in a tent (over a jar of acid or snakes buried in the sand), it has a chance of blending into the surroundings.
86. (Dry): As quilting material to turn one blanket into another blanket. This may sound like a waste of time, but you make the quilt out of the multiple remnants of blankets you’ve nearly destroyed for all of the other uses.
87. (Dry): Tie the corners together to make a bag to hold things in (thicker ones are better for struggling things with claws).
88. (Dry): As an apron (if kept wet, a thick blanket can be used in lieu of leather for a blacksmith’s apron).
89. (Dry): As a dust or sand filter in a desert wind-storm.
90. (Dry): As a pasta strainer, or to filter some of the grit out of muddy water.
91. (Wet): As a water-lifting device. Lower the blanket (either by a corner or on a rope, depending on the distance to the water) into a deep well or from a ledge overhanging a stream, and then raise the water-logged “bucket” for use.
92. (Wet): As a counterweight on a thrown rope, to take it over a wall, for instance.
93. (Dry): Cut-up and painted, or strung along with berries and popcorn as festive decorations.
94. (Dry): As a dust-cover or drop-cloth to prevent nice things or delicate alchemical equipment getting messed up.
95. (Dry): As packing material, either shredded or whole, for boxes and bags full of delicate loot.
96. (Wet): As a fish-catching device; either braid threads to make a fishing line (hook not included), or cut a few small water-escapement holes in it and stretch it across a stream as a net.
97. (Dry): As the source of lots of little cloth strips, useable to tie bags (made from the same blanket, naturally) closed, to make ribbons, to tie weapons and tools to a belt, or as bootlaces.
98. (Dry): As a soft and warm liner for a pair of boots. Especially useful for padding a pair of over-sized hand-me-downs until you can grow into them.
99. (Dry and threadbare [which your blanket may well be after all you’ve done to it so far]): Hung up as mosquito netting.
100. (Dry): As a source of fibers to reinforce mud bricks, as something to stick plaster, stucco, or concrete on when repairing a major hole in a wall, or as a texture mat to make interesting patterns on the plaster, stucco or concrete.
101. (Dry): I’d almost forgotten this one: as something to sleep on or under!
101 Uses for a Wet Blanket!
Forget your towel -
do you know where your blanket is?
by Spike Y. Jones (Dragon Magazine issue #228)
Along with the all-important swords, scrolls, torches, and money-pouches on the average fantasy PC’s equipment list, there are usually a few other items put there just to spend a few coppers and because they felt "proper." Sadly, while these items appear on everyone’s character sheets, few gamers ever make use of their tallow candles, holy symbols (wooden), small mirrors, and sprigs of wolvesbane. Yet these "extraneous" items can be among the most versatile and important pieces of adventuring equipment, if only players would realize how to utilize them.
Case in point: many years ago in my AD&D® campaign, Malshazzit the Mage (although "the Apprentice" would have been more accurate) was traveling alone, on foot, through dense wilderness, when he encountered a ravenous giant beetle. Realizing that his one spell, affect normal fires, would be of little use in this situation, and that his pair of daggers were no match for the beetle, he cast about for another weapon. Then the player (Mike Sinardi) noticed the blanket on his character sheet. Bravely (or foolishly, depending on who narrates the story), Malshazzit dived at the beetle and, with an exceptionally lucky roll, wrapped the cloth around the beetle’s head, blinding it long enough for him to work his way around to the beetle’s back where he could then plunge his daggers into the beetle’s vitals, killing an opponent that I, as DM, had expected him to run away from. There must be, I said to him then, over a hundred uses for a simple blanket. The following are the rest: or use it to drive away smell-sensitive people or creatures.
2. (Dry): As a simple disguise, such as a makeshift robe or, with a hole cut in it, a poncho.3. (Dry): As a complex disguise involving cutting, sewing, dying or staining (think The Great Escape).
4. (Dry): As padding for use under a disguise to create the illusion of pregnancy, obesity, or muscularity depending on the distribution of material.
5. (Wet): As a makeshift weapon; wet it to add weight and swing on a rope. Damage is minimal and subdual only, but if it’s all you’ve got...
6. (Wet): As part of a trap; water adds some weight and while it won’t be as effective as a net, it can hamper something long enough for you to get close and thump it.
7. (Dry): Work a bunch of threads loose to use as kindling for a fire.
8. (Dry): As "firewood" after #7.
9. (Dry): To make smoke signals. Of course, for the signals to be properly understood, a code has to be worked out in advance; but, even if one isn’t, smoke signals provide unambiguous signs of where you are in case you’re lost and need to help rescuers find you. And they might scare away people who interpret them as evidence of a stronger fighting force than one miserable mage alone in the woods.
10. (Dry): As a thread-source for tying fishing lures, marking paths through labyrinths, etc.
11. (Dry): To hide things. Dark blankets work best in the woods or at night, while light ones are best in the desert.
12. (Dry): As a fake ghost. White blankets work best, but it’ll take more than just a single sheet flapping in the breeze to scare a hardened orcish hunting party; better practice your spooky noises as well.
13. (Dry): As spell material components or substitutes; check the Players’ Handbook. There must be some.
14. (Wet): Depending on the material, it may stink when wet, so it could be used to attract or repel creatures with sensitive noses. Some careful experimentation will reveal which.
15. (Dry): As the world’s worst pipeweed. Give it to a "friend,"
16. (Dry): As the key component of a kite. The blanket had better be thin, or the winds strong, for this one.
17. (Dry): As emergency bandages and tourniquets. Best used for tying clean bandages to the wound, as they are highly unlikely to be sterile, especially if already used.
18. (Wet or Dry [depending on personal preferences]): As a strangling cord. This works best with thin blankets.
19. (Wet): For towel-snapping. The victim’s skin must be exposed if this is going to cause even minimal subdual damage, but even if not, it still makes an interesting noise and can be a shock.
20. (Wet): As a subdual club. Try tying a handful of iron spikes inside to give it some heft.
21. (Dry): For concealing secret messages. You can do this by inserting scraps of cloth (better than paper, as the texture will be correct) into a lining, if there is one. It’s more likely to be prepared well in advance by weaving a coded message into it during its manufacture, with or without the knowledge of the bearer.
22. (Wet): As a seed bed to grow grass on. What you want the grass for is your concern, but see #13 and #15.
23. (Wet): As temporary protection for running through walls of fire and the like.
24. (Dry): As a throw rug. Primarily appropriate indoors, but a blanket can be used in the wilderness as a welcome mat in front of a tent, or as a rug inside. If an enemy steps on your “rug,” you can turn it into a weapon by pulling it out from under him.
25. (Wet): It’ll conduct a shocking grasp so that the caster doesn’t have to touch the behemoth in the suit of plate mail. Either lay it on the ground to be stepped on, casting the spell from nearby concealment, or use it as a wet whip, casting the spell just before. The damage is reduced by 1 point either way, and the blanket may be singed in the process (see #15 for discussion of the smell).
26. (Dry): To wrap clanking metal bits to muffle the sounds they’d make during a stealthy approach or retreat.
27. (Dry): To chop up and feed to a cow; they can digest just about anything.
28. (Dry): Combine it with a staff, an empty scabbard and some other odd pieces to make a scarecrow.
29. (Dry): To make imposing shadows, with the afore-mentioned staves, etc. to give it a framework and to move it around menacingly.
30. (Wet or Dry): For putting out fires.
31. (Dry): As a makeshift canvas for anything from a sign or shield blazon to a fine painting. Unfortunately, the warmer and fuzzier the blanket is, the more difficult it will be to paint on.
32. (Wet – with oil, not water); As makeshift sailcloth. As with #31, heavier blankets don’t necessarily make better sails. Oiling is necessary to make a lighter blanket airtight.
33. (Wet): As an abrasive scrubbing material. (Some of the blankets I've had to use have been about as scratchy as steel wool and almost as tough.)
34. (Dry): As a polishing cloth. (Some of the blankets I’ve used have been a trifle softer.) You want to look your best when you’re presented to the king, even if its only the king of the goblins.
35. (Dry): As the main component of a small tent or lean-to. It may not keep the rain out well, but snow, hail, and wind will be warded off somewhat.
36. (Dry): As rope. If only a single blanket is available, it’ll have to be a short one, unless the blanket is cut into strips, which can reduce its strength dangerously.
37. (Dry): For instant accessorizing! Unlike using it for a disguise, this can be used to enhance ones appearance, not to cover it up.
38. (Dry): As a makeshift saddle on a stolen horse.
39. (Dry): To keep that stolen horse warm at night in the wilderness.
40. (Wet): In a particularly cold climate, mold it into shape and let it freeze to form a makeshift toboggan.
41. (Dry): As a summer grass-sliding toboggan.
42. (Dry): As a flag. A white blanket can be used to surrender or to call for a parley, or it can be painted or stitched to approximate a real flag. Darker blankets can be made into pirate colors with white paint or stitchery. A plain brown or gray blanket-flag may just foster confusion, or could accidentally be reminiscent of an ogrish battle-banner.
43. (Dry): To cover nettles, barbed wire, or other pointy or scratchy impediments. Multiple blankets (or alternating a pair of blankets) can make a pathway. (Also useful at picnics; if the picnic runs long, the blanket can be converted to other uses, such as #35, #45, and #101.)
44. (Dry): Wrapped around hands (or other body parts) to prevent rope-burns, or as “armor” before breaking a window with your fist.
45. (Dry): Folded repeatedly to form a pillow for sleeping on.
46. (Dry): Folded repeatedly to form a pillow which can be used as a silencer for a gun. Of course, this isn’t much use in standard fantasy campaigns (although you could use it to muffle screams), and see prior comments about the smell of burning blankets.
47. (Dry): As a cape to wave at charging bulls. Despite centuries of tradition and misconception, it’s not the color of a matador’s cape that enrages the bull, but its movement. Thus, any color blanket will work, as long as the user remembers to stand aside and let the bull pass through the blanket, not through his own midsection.
48. (Wet): In conjunction with some plaster of Paris (or maybe just mud or clay if there’s no Paris in your fantasy campaign world) it can be used to wrap and protect fragile dinosaur fossils (or other fragile items such as pottery if dinosaurs are living creatures instead of fossils in the campaign world),
49. (Dry): As a decorative wall-hanging (patterned blankets are best), possibly concealing a secret door, a safe, a peephole, a trap, or some other surprise.
50. (Dry): As a surface to display portable wares on. Very convenient since the “table” can be easily folded into a carrying sack for those same wares.
51. (Dry): To provide some discretion when enjoying a private moment with an attractive royal ward.
52. (Dry): Hung over a clothes-line it can form a room divider.
53. (Dry): As a unique fortune-telling implement. The adept (or charlatan) could learn to read omens in the folds formed when it is thrown to the ground.
54. (Dry): As a gag for a talkative prisoner. If you’re not worried about other people hearing the prisoner’s cries but you are worried about the possibility of doing him some harm, you can cut off strips to use for ear-plugs.
55. (Dry): Filled with gunpowder and various pointy things, with a strip cut off and soaked in a gunpowder solution before being dried to form a wick, it could be used as a relatively weak bomb. In a modern-era setting, if the pointy things are all ordinary household items, the bomb may even be able to pass through an airport x-ray machine without any questions being asked.
56. (Dry): As the raw material for any item of clothing if a little scratchiness (or a floral print in a modern-era campaign) isn’t going to cause too much discomfort.
57. (Dry): To cover the eyes of horses when you don’t want them alarmed or distracted by something they may see in front or beside them.
58. (Dry): As a fake flying carpet for sale to a gullible novice adventurer (he had better be gullible, because even a mage with a levitation spell will have trouble explaining away the blankets plain, threadbare, and definitely nonmagical appearance).
59. (Dry): As the primary material component in the manufacture of a real flying carpet. Unfortunately, a poor quality blanket will make a poor quality flying carpet.
60. (Dry): As a makeshift stretcher, either by holding the corners or by cutting holes along the edges and inserting sturdy poles in them. (The stronger the blanket, the better.)
61. (Wet): As cooling headgear in the desert. You’ll have to keep re-wetting it as the water evaporates, but remember not to wet it immediately before sunset, as you’ll want it dry and warm for those cold desert nights.
62. (Dry or Wet): As a source of quick cash. (Use this article as proof that it’s highly versatile and worth every copper piece you’re demanding.)
63. (Dry): Roll it around a broken limb to partially immobilize the injury, or roll it up and then tie the limb to it as a temporary splint.
64. (Dry): Folded and tied, it can serve as a sling for that broken arm.
65. (Dry): To immobilize an entire person. The easiest way is to use it as rope to tie his hands and feet together, but blanket-knots are notoriously insecure. If the victim is small (such as a baby or a gnome) you can use it as a swaddling cloth, bundling the victim up as tightly as a parcel ready to be mailed.
66. (Wet [although Dry is always possible if you’re not too concerned about starting a fire]): To conceal a lit lantern (or candle, but again there’s that fire hazard). Folding the blanket a couple of times will allow a thin blanket to work as well as a thick one, and lifting and lowering the blanket repeatedly can turn the lantern into a signaling device.
67. (Dry [although not when you’re done with it]): As a towel to dry yourself off after a swim or to sop up spilled water, oil, or blood.
68. (Wet): Cut into strips and tied to a pole as a mop.
69. (Dry): With people holding it around the edge, to throw a person standing in its center upward. Although normally only seen used this way as an entertainment for children (or Frankie and Annette in bad 1950s beach movies), it could also be used to throw a halfling over a wall.
70. (Dry): Rolled up to smuggle some hidden treasure like an Egyptian princess or some really good salami (with results depending a good deal on the size and thickness of the blanket).
71. (Dry): As a pot-holder or (if wet) as an oven mitt.
72. (Dry): As a method of transmitting diseases like smallpox to a the indigenous population of a region your country is attempting to expand into.
73. (Dry): As an entertainment device. If the blanket is white you can set up a lamp in front of it and make shadow-animals on it, and if it’s white and thin, you can put the lamp behind it and put on a shadow-puppet play. (A plain, white blanket will make a good screen for a slide or movie projector in a modern-era campaign.)
74. (Dry): As improvised clothing for use after swallowing a growth potion (the size of the blanket and the modesty of the user determining what items of clothing are improvised).
75. (Dry): To make toys for children. A little cutting and sewing, some colored thread and a few buttons or some paint can quickly turn a blanket into a (somewhat plain) stuffed animal or rag doll.
76. (Dry): As a portable checkers/chess set. If the blanket already has a checkered pattern all that has to be done is to cut out and label the pieces.
77. (Dry): Either suspended on a frame or stiffened with shellac, to make lightweight, movable, Japanese-style wall panels.
78. (Dry): As a source of all-purpose rags.
79. (Dry): As a burial shroud.
80. (Dry): As a curtain or door.
81. (Dry): To turn a properly-arranged pile of boxes or bricks into a chair, couch, or bed. Multiple blankets are needed if you want the furniture to be comfortable, but if you’re just using it to conceal stuff from casual inspection, you just need enough to give the furniture a less “angular” appearance.
82. (Dry [but not for long]): As diapers.
83. (Dry): As writing “paper.” (You’ll want a fine-weave blanket and thick, non-running ink for this.
84. (Dry): As a relatively clean surface to perform surgery or deliver a baby on.
85. (Dry): As the covering over a pit trap. It won’t be very convincing in the wilderness or in a rock-hewn dungeon, but in a house (over a trap door) or with numerous cushions and rugs in a tent (over a jar of acid or snakes buried in the sand), it has a chance of blending into the surroundings.
86. (Dry): As quilting material to turn one blanket into another blanket. This may sound like a waste of time, but you make the quilt out of the multiple remnants of blankets you’ve nearly destroyed for all of the other uses.
87. (Dry): Tie the corners together to make a bag to hold things in (thicker ones are better for struggling things with claws).
88. (Dry): As an apron (if kept wet, a thick blanket can be used in lieu of leather for a blacksmith’s apron).
89. (Dry): As a dust or sand filter in a desert wind-storm.
90. (Dry): As a pasta strainer, or to filter some of the grit out of muddy water.
91. (Wet): As a water-lifting device. Lower the blanket (either by a corner or on a rope, depending on the distance to the water) into a deep well or from a ledge overhanging a stream, and then raise the water-logged “bucket” for use.
92. (Wet): As a counterweight on a thrown rope, to take it over a wall, for instance.
93. (Dry): Cut-up and painted, or strung along with berries and popcorn as festive decorations.
94. (Dry): As a dust-cover or drop-cloth to prevent nice things or delicate alchemical equipment getting messed up.
95. (Dry): As packing material, either shredded or whole, for boxes and bags full of delicate loot.
96. (Wet): As a fish-catching device; either braid threads to make a fishing line (hook not included), or cut a few small water-escapement holes in it and stretch it across a stream as a net.
97. (Dry): As the source of lots of little cloth strips, useable to tie bags (made from the same blanket, naturally) closed, to make ribbons, to tie weapons and tools to a belt, or as bootlaces.
98. (Dry): As a soft and warm liner for a pair of boots. Especially useful for padding a pair of over-sized hand-me-downs until you can grow into them.
99. (Dry and threadbare [which your blanket may well be after all you’ve done to it so far]): Hung up as mosquito netting.
100. (Dry): As a source of fibers to reinforce mud bricks, as something to stick plaster, stucco, or concrete on when repairing a major hole in a wall, or as a texture mat to make interesting patterns on the plaster, stucco or concrete.
101. (Dry): I’d almost forgotten this one: as something to sleep on or under!