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Scalenex
2018-06-07, 11:30 AM
In the interest of coming up with interesting treasure I came up with silverwood.

Short version. It's wood that is solid to incorporeal beings.

During a great cataclysm when the world was beset by multitudes of energy draining demons from the Void, the Void demons created many incorporeal undead from their victims who joined their armies.

Unable to confront the Void demons directly but unwilling to abandon their mortal worshipers, the gods raised the silver trees and this helped the mortals fight off the undead minions of their foe.

Towards the end of the cataclysm the Void Demons figured out the threat that silverwood trees, they tried to destroy them when they could find them, but a few survived.

Now in more peaceful times, groves of silvertrees are considered a valuable resource guarded jealously by kings, druids, and dragons among many others.

The silver trees are not literally silver but their bark has a silvery gleen under the right light and when processed into boards one an see silvery veins. The wood is rot and pest resistant but other than being solid to incorporeal beings has extreme qualities.

Adventurers who cannot afford more expensive solutions can use quarterstaffs and clubs to battle shadows and similar enemies. Wealthy people like to put their dead in coffins made of silver wood believing that it would prevent their dead from becoming undead. I figure clerics of all stripes would like to carry holy symbols carved from silver wood and a variety of lay people would like carrying around silverwood good luck charms. I also figured when spellcasters figuratively burn gold to make magical items they could be making fires out of silverwood. Some fortresses, particularly dating back to the cataclysmic invasion would have sheets of silverwood in the walls to keep incoporeals out.

If there is any other good for silverwood, I'm open to suggestions.

I'm thinking of modeling silverwood trees after cedar trees but there are a lot of good mythos based on trees, so if someone has a better idea I'm open to suggestions.

My main sticking point is I need to figure out how much it should cost. What would a club or quarterstaff cost? What would a small carved trinket cost? How much would a pound of mulch be worth?

aimlessPolymath
2018-06-07, 12:05 PM
Price: In theory, you want to work out the price by weight of the material- how rare are these trees compared to (say) adamantine veins, and how much wood do they produce?

In practice, you usually price it as a magic enchantment. Ghost touch items are at minimum +6,000 gp, but this precludes the use of AC-negating metals, making it a fourth "golf club" - I'd say +3,000 gp is fair-ish.

JNAProductions
2018-06-07, 12:18 PM
It's neat. No idea on the pricing, but I like the idea.

Props to you, good person.

jqavins
2018-06-07, 03:43 PM
Cedar is both a softwood and a soft wood. I'd suggest modeling it after lignum vitae (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lignum_vitae) (LV) or some other super hard species (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Janka_hardness_test); since the gods created it to made into weapons, they'd have wanted to give it every chance. Take a look at the picture of LV on this page (https://www.globalwoodsource.com/lignum-vitae-wood-lumber/); in person that color variation is even more striking, with hints of lighter green and even blue or red. This could easily be adapted to hold the silver veining.

Here are some other possible uses for your consideration:

Wooden shields
Inlays on metal armor and shields to provide partial protection.
If the wood is hard enough (or can be enchanted to become harder without losing its ghost touch-like ability) then bladed weapons could be made from it.
Arrows could also be made. Discussed a bit more below.
A ghost proof room or cage can just as well keep them in as out.
The silver veins you describe would make it desirable simply for decorative use.
Luxury items could also be made from it purely for the sake of conspicuous consumption.
Paper made from Silverwood pulp.
A stone or metal arrow head adds what we model rocket builders call "nose weight" and is an important part of good stable flight, so you'd still want that. The front end of an arrow shaft is usually either split to hold the arrowhead or blunt and inserted into a socket on the head. What you could do here is use the socket, but with both the shaft and the socket pointed. Then, the head is there for weight, and hits corporeal targets first, but the shaft is pointy where it hits an incorporeal target.

COST

For its use in weapons, He Who Must Not Be Aimed is using impeccable logic and comes to a reasonable answer. For armor, the same logic gives what I think is unreasonable answers. Ghost Touch is a +3 ability for armor and shields. That means a minimum price adder of +15,000 gp. For a wooden shield the benefit is fully realized. For inlaid metal armor or shields the benefit is partial so you could use half, 7,500 gp. But those really seem too high. Maybe just stick with The Aimless One's 3,000 gp figure across the board. Or maybe 5,000.

For other uses, something like 10 to 100 times the price for other woods. Since I don't think there are authoritative figures for things like lumber by the board-foot or wood mulch by the pound it's hard to say.

brian 333
2018-06-07, 04:00 PM
Has no one considered the use of the leaves of the tree?

The silver leaves are bright when they unfurl, but slowly blacken as tarnish sets in. In time they fall to the ground and tarnish into silver oxide and various salts. The use of these decayed leaves, powdered and mixed in an ointment, can prevent many kinds of wound infections, allowing speedier healing, (though not instant healing. This is a boost of +1 or +2 HP per day of rest, and possibly a +1/day bonus when not resting.)

Picking the new leaves and polishing them preserves them. They are naturally sharp and can be used with very little modification as arrow heads.

In addition, they can be used as coinage if the tree is unique or part of a small, protectable, grove.

Finally, one should not overlook the potential for use against lycanthropes.

I propose these trees require moonlight rather than sunlight to grow, and that while sunlight makes them glare like lighthouse beacons, moonlight gives them a soft white luminescence.

jqavins
2018-06-07, 04:50 PM
The silver trees are not literally silver but their bark has a silvery gleen [sic] under the right light and when processed into boards one an see silvery veins.Brian, my friend...


Has no one considered the use of the leaves of the tree?

The silver leaves are bright when they unfurl, but slowly blacken as tarnish sets in. In time they fall to the ground and tarnish into silver oxide and various salts. The use of these decayed leaves, powdered and mixed in an ointment, can prevent many kinds of wound infections, allowing speedier healing, (though not instant healing. This is a boost of +1 or +2 HP per day of rest, and possibly a +1/day bonus when not resting.)

Picking the new leaves and polishing them preserves them. They are naturally sharp and can be used with very little modification as arrow heads.

In addition, they can be used as coinage if the tree is unique or part of a small, protectable, grove.

Finally, one should not overlook the potential for use against lycanthropes.

I propose these trees require moonlight rather than sunlight to grow, and that while sunlight makes them glare like lighthouse beacons, moonlight gives them a soft white luminescence.I think you're taking the silver thing a little too far.

Maat Mons
2018-06-07, 07:09 PM
So, it's like serren wood (Book of Exalted Deeds, p. 38), except it's not limited to bows, arrows, and bolts? I don't see why it couldn't keep the same price (+4,000 gp).

As far as armor and edged weapons, there's always the ironwood spell. You could price armor the same as astral driftmetal (Planar Handbook, p. 70), since it would have the same benefit.

aimlessPolymath
2018-06-07, 09:24 PM
...Huh. I was pretty close.

nonsi
2018-06-08, 12:56 AM
Brian, my friend...

I think you're taking the silver thing a little too far.

And why is that a bad thing?
What is too far in RPG, when it's not interfering with game balance or breaking suspension of disbelief?

Scalenex
2018-06-08, 02:15 AM
It's neat. No idea on the pricing, but I like the idea.

Props to you, good person.

Thank you!


Price: In theory, you want to work out the price by weight of the material- how rare are these trees compared to (say) adamantine veins, and how much wood do they produce?

In practice, you usually price it as a magic enchantment. Ghost touch items are at minimum +6,000 gp, but this precludes the use of AC-negating metals, making it a fourth "golf club" - I'd say +3,000 gp is fair-ish.

I think that's a little steep, and that point you might as well go a little bit higher and just get a ghost touched metal weapon. Unlike admantine and the like, silverwood trees would be a renewable resource (though probably slow growing). I figure lots of people would try to actively cultivate them.


Cedar is both a softwood and a soft wood.

The reason I was thinking cedar is because cedar is an evergreen and evergreens are a bit hardier than deciduous trees. Cedar is rot and pest resistance to an extant and it's often used with conspicuous consumption. Also since I envision this breed of demons having a lot of cold based attacks (I created a subbranch of demon fighters called Winter Demons), evergreens would be more likely to survive the cold.

But your point stands that a hard wood makes more sense. I should base silverwood trees off of some kind of hard wood.



Here are some other possible uses for your consideration:

Wooden shields
Inlays on metal armor and shields to provide partial protection.
If the wood is hard enough (or can be enchanted to become harder without losing its ghost touch-like ability) then bladed weapons could be made from it.
Arrows could also be made. Discussed a bit more below.
A ghost proof room or cage can just as well keep them in as out.
The silver veins you describe would make it desirable simply for decorative use.
Luxury items could also be made from it purely for the sake of conspicuous consumption.
Paper made from Silverwood pulp.
A stone or metal arrow head adds what we model rocket builders call "nose weight" and is an important part of good stable flight, so you'd still want that. The front end of an arrow shaft is usually either split to hold the arrowhead or blunt and inserted into a socket on the head. What you could do here is use the socket, but with both the shaft and the socket pointed. Then, the head is there for weight, and hits corporeal targets first, but the shaft is pointy where it hits an incorporeal target.

I figured rich people would use it for conspicuous consumption or decorative items (especially after ghost attacks become a lot less common). I figure a lot of Art objects would involve silverwood. Even someone who doesn't know anything about art can figure the painting with the silverwood frame must be worth a fortune.

I am kicking myself for not thinking of shields and armor inlays.

A ghost prison is a very intriguing idea...I wonder if a ghost would degenerate or lose it's mind if imprisoned long enough turning into a darker undead. It'd be a good take on "Release the Kraken!" to have a necromancer with some twisted mad incoporeal monster in his lair.

Paper from silverwood pulp could be interesting too. It'd be a good way to justify "where did the money go?" when you spend hundreds of gold pieces to scribe a scroll at least.



COST

For its use in weapons, He Who Must Not Be Aimed is using impeccable logic and comes to a reasonable answer. For armor, the same logic gives what I think is unreasonable answers. Ghost Touch is a +3 ability for armor and shields. That means a minimum price adder of +15,000 gp. For a wooden shield the benefit is fully realized. For inlaid metal armor or shields the benefit is partial so you could use half, 7,500 gp. But those really seem too high. Maybe just stick with The Aimless One's 3,000 gp figure across the board. Or maybe 5,000.

For other uses, something like 10 to 100 times the price for other woods. Since I don't think there are authoritative figures for things like lumber by the board-foot or wood mulch by the pound it's hard to say.


Brian, my friend...

I think you're taking the silver thing a little too far.


And why is that a bad thing?
What is too far in RPG, when it's not interfering with game balance or breaking suspension of disbelief?

I am not inclined to use many of Brian's ideas verbatim, but his out of the box thinking has spurred excellent brainstorming for me!


Has no one considered the use of the leaves of the tree?

The silver leaves are bright when they unfurl, but slowly blacken as tarnish sets in. In time they fall to the ground and tarnish into silver oxide and various salts. The use of these decayed leaves, powdered and mixed in an ointment, can prevent many kinds of wound infections, allowing speedier healing, (though not instant healing. This is a boost of +1 or +2 HP per day of rest, and possibly a +1/day bonus when not resting.)

Picking the new leaves and polishing them preserves them. They are naturally sharp and can be used with very little modification as arrow heads.

In addition, they can be used as coinage if the tree is unique or part of a small, protectable, grove.


I like the idea of using the leaves for something, but maybe a bit less literal to real world silver. Preserved leaves being minor art objects (worth a couple gold pieces, popular as good luck charms), maybe ground up leaves being used in potions.



Finally, one should not overlook the potential for use against lycanthropes.

The reason I called them silvery is my game setting has a symbolic mythos that silver "if of the gods" and cold iron is "of Turoch." Turoch is the original god that the current gods overthrew and slain aeons ago. Turoch's bones fell to the earth as iron ore. That's why cold iron is especially harmful to the god's minions (outsiders). The gods used a barrier of silver to keep Turoch's essence from poisoning the world (or releasing the Terrasque as physical embodiment of Turoch's desire for vengeance), so silver is especially harmful to his surviving minions (demons and lycanthropes among others). The gods used the essence of silver in these trees out of metaphor more than chemistry.

I do not like the idea of silverwood counting as silver for the prospects of hurting lycanthrope, but I could use silver wood trees instead of wolve's bane. Maybe make a few leaves of silverwood trees be involved as a material component to anti-lycanthrope and anti-demon spells.

If I decide to make silverwood trees evergreens I could replace "leaves" with "a bunch of needles" but it's not as thematically resonant


I propose these trees require moonlight rather than sunlight to grow, and that while sunlight makes them glare like lighthouse beacons, moonlight gives them a soft white luminescence.

I'm not sure I want to do this with silverwood trees, but I was thinking of giving every god and goddess a favorite tree. I could easily use this idea for some other type of blessed trees in holy places to the moon god and sun goddess.

Solaris
2018-06-08, 05:07 AM
I would go with yew over lignum vitae. More mystical connections, still a crazy-hard wood (it breaks tools and laughs at you if you don't know what you're doing), and it's quite poisonous. Also, it's an evergreen that grows in temperate climates.

brian 333
2018-06-08, 05:07 AM
As a visual image, have you ever come across an aspen grove in the winter?

Most pictures show them in fall foliage, but in winter they create a shocking contrast to the pine trees among which they grow, like the ghosts of trees which appear suddenly in front of you. I'm imagining that they would have a similar contrast when encountered, and winter aspens do appear to glow a bit in the bright moonlight.

khadgar567
2018-06-08, 05:15 AM
Speaking of magical silver threes why not go bit of modded minecraft and put node of special magic in the trunk of the three were a it wards against outsider corruption b give a reason to wizard to cultivate the three as part of his tower both as reserch and safety.

Maat Mons
2018-06-08, 05:19 AM
I think that's a little steep, and that point you might as well go a little bit higher and just get a ghost touched metal weapon.

Bear in mind, the ghost touch property can add as much as 38,000 gp to the cost of a weapon. And if your weapon is capped out, that's +1 effective enhancement that could have gone to something else.

No, if you're looking to upgrade, you'd go with a lesser truedeath crystal. That gives the ghost touch ability to any +1 weapon you decide to pop it onto. It only costs 5,000 gp, and you never loose any of that investment when you ditch your old sword for a new one.

If you want to create an affordable option for dealing with ghosts, the closest comparisons are ghost oil and ghostblight capsules. The former is 62 gp for two rounds of ghost touch, while the latter is 100 gp for 3 rounds of ghost touch. Actually, how would you feel about just declaring that both those things are nothing more than sap from a silverwood tree?

Scalenex
2018-06-08, 08:52 AM
Bear in mind, the ghost touch property can add as much as 38,000 gp to the cost of a weapon. And if your weapon is capped out, that's +1 effective enhancement that could have gone to something else.

No, if you're looking to upgrade, you'd go with a lesser truedeath crystal. That gives the ghost touch ability to any +1 weapon you decide to pop it onto. It only costs 5,000 gp, and you never loose any of that investment when you ditch your old sword for a new one.

If you want to create an affordable option for dealing with ghosts, the closest comparisons are ghost oil and ghostblight capsules. The former is 62 gp for two rounds of ghost touch, while the latter is 100 gp for 3 rounds of ghost touch. Actually, how would you feel about just declaring that both those things are nothing more than sap from a silverwood tree?

I certainly like the idea of ghost oil being silverwood sap. I'm thinking ghost touch is a bit expensive. And since I'm planning to use a lot of incoporeal foes in my upcoming campaign it would be nice to the players if maybe I halved the base cost of ghost touch enchantments. After all the very presence of silverwood would mean the raw materials to do the enchantment would be more available (and thus cheaper) than a strictly by the book D&D world.

I'm thinking a masterwork club or quarterstaff crafted from silverwood would run for 1500, that's 300 gold pieces for the masterwork and 400 gold piece a pound. For comparison platinum bars are 500 gold pieces a pound.

Lets assume the wood you make a weapon out of is the most valuable parts of the tree, so I'm thinking.

Good lumber 300 gold pieces a pound
Mulch, wood chips 50 gold pieces a pound

EDIT: I figure unworked silverwood and most worked silverwood would qualify as trade goods. Adventurers wouldn't have to buy it at full price and sell it half price.

So non-weapons would be worth whatever the cost of masterwork X is plus the weight of good lumber. Because, if you don't limit your silverwood to master artisans you are criminally wasteful.

A solid silverwood coffin would probably run a whopping 50,000 gold pieces. Maybe a silverwood lined coffin would be about 10,000 gold pieces. It'd be more common to symbolically bury someone with a small carved silverwood holy symbol worth about 50 gold pieces.

I'm thinking maybe having silverwood trees would take a century from planting to be able to harvest any reasonable amount of useable lumber from meaning it could be cultivated by people with long-term views of things and an iron grip on their territory: druids, dragons, churches, royalty.


Speaking of magical silver threes why not go bit of modded minecraft and put node of special magic in the trunk of the three were a it wards against outsider corruption b give a reason to wizard to cultivate the three as part of his tower both as reserch and safety.

That's a good idea.


As a visual image, have you ever come across an aspen grove in the winter?

Most pictures show them in fall foliage, but in winter they create a shocking contrast to the pine trees among which they grow, like the ghosts of trees which appear suddenly in front of you. I'm imagining that they would have a similar contrast when encountered, and winter aspens do appear to glow a bit in the bright moonlight.

They are gorgeous. It's moderately tempting to make them based on aspen just for the aesthetic alone.


I would go with yew over lignum vitae. More mystical connections, still a crazy-hard wood (it breaks tools and laughs at you if you don't know what you're doing), and it's quite poisonous. Also, it's an evergreen that grows in temperate climates.

My understanding from poking around wikipedia and Google is that yew is pretty bendy as woods go, baking it great for bows. I'm not sure if a bendy wood is the best for making a weaponized blunt object.

Maple, ash, and birch are the three go-to woods for making baseball bats, especially maple. All three can either splinter and dry out or accumulate moisture over time and baseball players break bats fairly often. Maybe a bendy wood would resist breaking better.

Unfortunately I couldn't find much online about what woods made the best clubs online because of golf clubs.

I searched for quarterstaff and I couldn't find an online consensus but ash, hickory, sycamore, and yew all came up. Oak was the most commonly mentioned but nothing was dominant.

Oak trees are certainly predominant in Western art Variations of the oak tree live in a huge variety of latitudes and climates.

Ash trees have a special place in my heart because I grew up with a lot of ash trees in my neighborhood but as an adult a lot of them died. I can certainly visualize ash trees easily in my mind.

Maple trees are among my favorite to look at. Especially in the Fall. They fit well with the idea of Maat Mons idea of collecting magical sap because tapping maple trees for sap is such a part of Western culture, a maple leaf is on the Canadian flag.

Solaris presented a good case for yew, so I guess that's the front runner, but there are so many good choices I'm practically paralyzed by indecision.

Yews have berries that are delicious but the seeds are REALLY poisonous so it's almost like the plant world's version of blow fish. Oak and hickory trees have nuts. Humans can eat acorns though few choose to. Hickory nuts are more commonly eaten. I guess I want to figure out if the nuts or berries would be used for anything. They'd be a good material component for spells if nothing else. Assuming they had a long shelf life they might sell for 1 to 20 gold pieces each depending on how many one mature tree produced. Or maybe not. Not every part of the tree needs to be monetized.

I guess in the world of fantasy I can mix and match seeds. I could make a yew like tree that grows apples or coconuts if I wanted to.

jqavins
2018-06-08, 02:25 PM
A ghost prison is a very intriguing idea...I wonder if a ghost would degenerate or lose it's mind if imprisoned long enough turning into a darker undead. It'd be a good take on "Release the Kraken!" to have a necromancer with some twisted mad incoporeal monster in his lair.I was thinking both of prison and zoo. Holding ghosts and other incorporeals for display and/or research. I don't know if maybe that's a little darker than you want to go.


I guess in the world of fantasy I can mix and match seeds. I could make a yew like tree that grows apples or coconuts if I wanted to.Yes. On reflection, I retract my LV suggestion. I was going to suggest that you stay away from trees that are too common, like oak, maple, etc. because it could interfere with the fantastic quality to say "it's like an oak except it's solid to incorporeals." Then I realized that being like LV or yew except... is really just as bad; it may be fewer people are familiar with those, but we're not the only few. Just make up something new.

AtlasSniperman
2018-06-09, 05:12 PM
If I might be so bold:

"Before you stands a grand tree, its canopy rolling as a willow and glittering silvery green in the moonlight. A heavy sheet of vines hangs from the branches at all heights, simultaneously making the shadow of the tree dark, and strangely shiny. No trees grow in its proximity save one lone cedar, gripped by vines falling from the tree that are strangling it. The cedar looks dead, only standing by the tension of the vines that are robbing its carcass of nutrients"

It's fantasy; combine whatever wood strength you want, with whatever tree appearance you like. A weeping willow might be cool for symbolism(Weeping for the dead?) with some good strength and low heartwood flexibility(making the heartwood great for swords and full armour) with good branch flexibility for general wood weapons like bows. If you like the description above, may I also suggest "Silverwood wrapping"; a vine that is corded and wrapped around bashing weapons to imbue them with the ghosttouch ability? Maybe looking like silvery veining on the weapon(similar to how a tree looks when being covered with vine). Such would also allow for "Silverwood rope" if you're interested. For binding ghosts and the such if you think that might come up in your world.

Solaris
2018-06-09, 06:06 PM
My understanding from poking around wikipedia and Google is that yew is pretty bendy as woods go, baking it great for bows. I'm not sure if a bendy wood is the best for making a weaponized blunt object.

Thicker branches aren't so much flexible as they are resistant to breaking when abused. Yew makes for a pretty good walking stick, club, or staff for just that reason.

I'm also liking the "yew sap is poisonous" - "silverwood sap is ghost oil" connection.


I guess in the world of fantasy I can mix and match seeds. I could make a yew like tree that grows apples or coconuts if I wanted to.

Which reminds me - have you seen any pictures of albino redwoods?

jqavins
2018-06-11, 10:02 AM
Back on the subject of conspicuous consumption with no other purpose or effect, leaves (or needles) chopped up (or crumbled if dry ones are used) and sprinkled on food. In the same manner that it's done IRL with gold leaf. Its both totally harmless and totally useless except in showing off one's willingness to throw money away.