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Spider's Silk

 

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OOC Introduction:

 

A spider's silk in the real world is a rather tough material that, by weight, is stronger than steel. One reason you have never seen spiders silk cloth in the real world is due to the fact you can't get enough silk to make anything. In the world of Anthos though five or six foot wide spiders are common, allowing for more web production. This is how and why spiders silk is able to exist. All in all it could be described as flimsy expensive chain mail with some quirks.

 

Usage:

 

Spiders silk is most useful when woven into a cloth. When this is done it may be used to make fine clothing, effective bandages, and other common fabric products. It also may be used anywhere as a sort of ductile or strong string that can handle intense conditions if needed such as bow strings or inside mechanical devices.

 

Appearance:

 

The basic silk doesn't look that grand by itself, but once it is woven into cloth it is beautiful. Light dances on it making it shimmer and somewhat sparkle, wind makes it breezy and comfortable, and overall it is a loose, smooth, soft, and otherwise luxurious material.

 

 

Behavior:

 

Toughness

 

Cloth made from a spider's silk is a quality material with a few quirks. First it is terribly tough, few things are sharp enough to actually manage to cut through it. Although this is also a drawback in itself because of how loose and free the fabric is. Because of its flimsiness, when it is hit by any significant blade it can cause blunt damage equal to the force behind it. For instance if a hefty man struck you right on the outer bone of the forearm with a long sword it could damage it to some degree. This is a bit of a trade off, as instead of losing an arm from such a blow, you end up with a slightly damaged bone or worse. To compare, if it were chain mail and such a strike hit you, the sturdy steel links would absorb more of the force than the flimsy fabric. Also all stabs of fair power and with a sharp point can stab through it.

 

Fired or thrown weapons are a bit more complicated. Spiders silk clothing is able to stop most conventional bows, although crossbows and strong longbows greater than two-hundred pounds draw weight will pierce through it. Otherwise, depending on the power, it will embed itself in your flesh, but will usually not breach the material. This will cause severe tissue damage and possibly break a bone or rupture an organ depending on where the shot landed. The projectile itself can be removed with ease, but will probably be rather painful to do so.

 

Response To Water

 

Another behavioral property of spider's silk is how it naturally contracts when it gets wet. This, plus the fabric being tightly woven, makes it waterproof to a degree. When swimming the fabric may tighten up to your body smoothly and make the swim somewhat easier and the fabric less cumbersome in the water. The downside to this is if you get out of the water it can be constrictive and slow your movement.

 

Clotting Wounds

 

A more strange quirk is its ability to clot wounds. It has been observed that when spiders silk is put inside or over a wound it clots much faster than normal, occasionally closing otherwise serious wounds. This brings up another use for cloth from spiders silk, bandages. Bandages are easy to make, even for an amateur. A loom is still required and the skill of the one making the cloth determines the actual effectiveness of it. This also works with normal clothing, where part of the clothing may be held over or simply torn off and applied to a wound. It generally won't help as well as a proper bandage though, due to the fact the bandages can be wound tighter normally and have no dye in them.

 

((OOC note: This would be superior to a normal bandage in the way that it itself helps clot the wound and can be wound even tighter due to its ductility. Also keep in mind that these bandages are not easy to get, and you must have the named item in your inventory to prove you actually have them. Also one bolt of cloth would make 3-5 bandages.))

 

Gathering And Processing:

 

 

READ <> OOC Explanation <> READ

 

 

     As this material is very strong, its main setback is its price and long process. As such it must be attained IC with a moderator present and you can only have it processed by a true master tailor. First you must go on the hunt to find a giant spiders lair. Once you find the lair you must judge the spiders size and go get a suitable prey item. Also the larger the spider the larger the prey item, which decides how much silk you get. The trade off is that a larger spider is much more dangerous and may even have smaller possibly poisonous babies.

 

      Once you do this you follow the instructions above with a moderator present. The moderator will take the roll of the spider or spiders as you go to collect the wrapped up animal, make sure to get screenshots of this entire process. If you survive you will then continue the process and take it to the warm/hot water. Over this time you can choose to either kill the animal or try and let it live and possibly ruin the silk. If you stab it though it will bleed all over the silk and possibly ruin it too, so it is best to just let it drown or something similar. This decision should be made by what your character would do, not by how bad you want it OOC'ly.

 

     So let's assume you get it, dry it, and put it in a jar. You would take it to the tailor who would make it into cloth. How much cloth again depends on how large the animal was that was wrapped up. A typical wolf, being used as an example, would give you enough for about 1 or 2 bolts(40 yards of fabric,) while something like a cow could get you at most around 5 bolts. One bolt could generally get you a single piece of normal spiders silk clothing like a shirt. Things like jackets could be more, like two or two and a half. This way it will usually take more than one trip or one very dangerous one to get a full set of clothes.

 

When the tailor finally begins making it into clothing, a moderator must be present to watch. The moderator may ask the tailor to roll for success or something else to add RP or cause difficulties in working with the tough fabric. Remember to take screenshots while you are doing this. At the very end get all of the screenshots of gathering it and working with it. To the tailor, remember to keep all screenshots and give them to the player who is having the clothing made. Show a moderator and ask for named items that are moderator approved to show it was gained correctly and in RP. The clothing could be MC'ly represented by colored leather armor.

 

So to sum it all up you have to go through this entire process with screenshots proving you went through it. You also need to have a moderator present to vouch for you that you went through it all correctly. Then you go and hand everything off to the tailor. Once he finishes his work get all the screenshots and have them approved by a moderator, preferably the same one that was with you the whole time. Then ask the moderator for the approved named items.

 

Preparation And First steps

 

Gathering the silk is complicated in a way. Generally speaking there are many ways to get the silk. Sometimes you can find small insignificant strands if you happen to kill a large spider, or you can also harvest parts of its web. However, the common and most effective way is a bit more tricky. First you must trap or buy an animal of proportionate size that the spider would prey on, for instance a dog. You put the dog near the spiders nest and wait for it to attack and take the dog away. Most spiders don't kill their prey immediately so don't worry about the dog. The spider will wrap the animal in a thick casing of webbing so that it can't get away and it can eat it later, this is where things get tricky. You can either go into the nest and kill the spider, or try and sneak in and retrieve the dog still wrapped in the casing.

 

Retrieval And Harvesting

 

Free the dog by using shears to cut the webbing holding it up. This may take some effort as the silk, as I said earlier on, is rather hard to cut. In any case, once you have the wrapped up dog you would take it to a place where there was warm water, possibly a hot spring or something similar and submerge it. The string would tighten, but the stickiness that held it all together will go away. You then unravel the dog and place the string somewhere it can dry off. Once it is dry, place it into a jar or somewhere else clean and dry.

 

(Note. The animal used may live through it. If you don't want it to die you must be careful not to let it drown while it is still stunned and you are gathering the silk. There is also the possibility it will be killed by the venom, and if not, it may struggle when it wakes up and ruin the silk. These are things to keep in mind.)

 

Production

 

Then once you have enough, take it to a skilled tailor used to working with fine materials and ask him to make it into cloth for you. This may be pricey as the material can be hard to cut and work with, but it really depends on the tailor. Once he is finished you will have spiders silk cloth and can ask the same tailor to make whatever it is you are looking to have made. It can be hard to dye sometimes for some reason, being a lighter color than intended or having small spots that appear faded where it did not dye as dark as the rest. Due to the difficulty that there is in working with it, the tailor can ask for a decent overall sum for the fabric and clothing, several hundred minas not being uncommon.


 

Options

 

You can also request that the tailor add padding, armor plates, or other modifications to it. Most tailors can pad the inside of two pieces of spiders silk cloth with linen or other relatively thick fabrics. This results in material that is bulky, warm, and absorbs blunt force well. The drawback is it really is quite bulky and awkward to move in. So it is best to leave it where no movement really occurs, but you still need the extra protection, such as your head.

 

Once the process is complete you will have a luxuriously fine set of clothes that can protect you and that have many other useful functions.

 

For Tailors

 

  Tailors, this is hard material to work with, so 300-1000 minas wouldn't be abnormal for a set of clothes, (A shirt and pants.) Generally speaking, for every bolt used you could charge 150m or so, plus whatever you want for making it into cloth. That way a flimsy shirt could be achieved for probably about 200m, of course if you wanted to charge more you certainly could. If your customer wanted something like a double lined jacket with light armor plates on the shoulders, you could ask for at least 600m. Say he also asked for double lined pants, that would cost about 300 or so. Then a padded bandana might cost 200 or 250. So for a premium set of clothes it would probably run them around 1000 or so. Also it would require about 7 bolts so the ones gathering it would have to repeat the process over and over. Also remember to take screenshots with a moderator present when doing any of this work. Preferably the same moderator that helped in gathering it.

 

Here is a rundown of how many bolts it would take to make different things.

 

1 bolt- A basic shirt, basic pants, a hat, gloves, ect.

2 bolts- A jacket, a nicer shirt, nicer pants, ect.

3 bolts- A cape, a basic cloak with no sleeves, ect.

4 bolts- A nicer cape, a cloak with sleeves, ect.

5 bolts- A full dress, ect.

 

Option Price Chart

 

Double lined-

Twice as many bolts as normal plus a premium if you want. (Makes it bulkier.)

 

Armor plates-

100-200 depending on the size and quantity. (Makes it heavier and clunkier.)

 

Padding-

50-300 depending on how much padding. (Makes it much bulkier.)

 

 

Pros:

 

-Stops arrows from going all the way through the body

-Virtually slash proof

-Waterproof to small amounts of water such as rain

-Contracts when swimming making it similar to a wet suit

-Is luxurious outwardly and when worn

-Very light in weight

-Can quickly help clot wounds if applied to them

-Can be padded with other materials such as linen to lessen blunt blows

 

Cons:

 

-Blunt damage is amplified and more common

-Stabs go straight through it

-Arrows cause severe tissue damage and possibly greater damage depending on where it lands

-Is incredibly complicated and dangerous to gather

-Is expensive and tricky to make due to the need of a skilled and experienced tailor

-Many things can happen during the process that will ruin the material

-If it gets too wet it can tighten around you and possibly inhibit movement

-If padded with other materials it becomes bulky and cumbersome, especially if it is in a moving part of the clothing such as the sleeve

-Is highly flammable

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It was common place with the Mori'quessir that spider-silk was used for their exotic apparel, however, I believe there were specific breeds of spiders that the Seamstress was to garner this silk from in order to actually weave clothing. Perhaps you can add a list of spiders that would differenciate the type of silk produced?

Otherwise, with this "spider breed" idea there can be different types that don't have the type of silk needed to make these clothes so a chance of failing would be present if you are to try to catch a random, large spider without checking it's specific traits.

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I honestly thought about it, the only reason I didn't is how complicated that would make it. If I were to try there would be so many different spider designs and species already RP'ed on the server that it would just get confusing and hopeless. To answer the problem, I wrote the lore so that you get the silk from the wrapped up prey items. This silk is always strong and resilient no matter the species, because it has to hold possibly struggling prey. This way, as long as they are giant spiders (They would all most likely be in the same taxonomy and closely related) there shouldn't be any notable issues.

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It sounds reasonably realist. Abresians, don't freak out because it's "unrealistic." We got giant spiders, and the properties he describe, are, more or less those of real life spider silk. Just now it's actually possible cause we have giant spiders.

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Maybe you could also gather the silk some the spiders eggs? but it gathers less and to gather the eggs you have to kill or atlest incapacitate the spider first. 

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I also put some thought into this too. Although it could be done it wouldn't really be worth it. You would have to deal with all the small venomous spiders emerging from the sack for instance. The method involving the prey wrapped in silk is more straight forward than tediously taking a spiders egg sack. Not to mention you wouldn't probably get much silk anyways. The last and biggest issue is the silk would probably be old, worn, and dirty compared to the freshly spun stuff that would be spun around the prey that you give it. To sum it all up all types of spiders silk can be harvested, but it will never be near the quality that you get from the explained process. (Aka, cloth made from anything but freshly spun prey wrapping silk is almost always of much lower quality and not worth the trouble.)

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i love the idea, in other stories and such with giant spiders, spiderweb silk was very very comfortable when made for clothing and because they are large this seems legit +1 for you man.

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Thanks a bunch, glad you like it! :) And thank you everyone who posted feedback! I really do appreciate it, because it helps me to make sure my lore is solid. So thanks again for taking the time to write the responses!

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I love it. It fits well with my character, and probably many others. It has real world connections and is simply amazing. You should probably request for it to be moved to either completed lore or WIP lore.

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No lore really needed for spider silk... unless for the fact that you seem to want to use it as armor.

You mention arrows, stabbing, slashes and blunt damage, which for me says more than normal interesting lore for everyday things, like a silk teabag or another way for bandaging, you seem to then plan to use it as armor which with this lore would make someone imune to slashes. You also say it's like a fabric, so anyone can just use chainmail over the silk and now he's blunt and slash immune.

So... I wouldn't myself accept or want the lore accepted.

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I think you meant plate, since chain mail doesn't stop blunt damage at all. I have thought about this too, the only thing I can really think is it is common sense that it is power gaming. Even if they put plate over it though, it would just make it hotter and a lot of sweating would eventually make the silk tighten. Which would make it even harder to move in and wouldn't help stop blunt damage at all of course. If you did mean chain mail all it would do is slightly lessen the blunt damage, but at that point just stab the person and they will die. Otherwise beat them with any actual blunt damage weapon like a mace and they will die. Of course if I ever heard of someone actually mixing armors I honestly would be very disappointed in whoever did it. 

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I think you meant plate, since chain mail doesn't stop blunt damage at all. I have thought about this too, the only thing I can really think is it is common sense that it is power gaming. Even if they put plate over it though, it would just make it hotter and a lot of sweating would eventually make the silk tighten. Which would make it even harder to move in and wouldn't help stop blunt damage at all of course. If you did mean chain mail all it would do is slightly lessen the blunt damage, but at that point just stab the person and they will die. Otherwise beat them with any actual blunt damage weapon like a mace and they will die. Of course if I ever heard of someone actually mixing armors I honestly would be very disappointed in whoever did it. 

Mixing armors is actually quite normal. Chainmail under plate, leather in parts where plate doesn't reach, and so forth. In PVP it doesn't mean a thing, in rp it does.

 

And with the post you did, you pretty much told me you want it to be armor, which then I would just have to continue to say no. I would say completely remove every single mention of anything in the lore that can be seen as being used as armor, because besides the fact that it's overpowerred and easily abusable, you would also need a LOT of it to even create armor. Just say using it as armor will be worse than using leather and leave it at that, and concentrate on the part of the lore that can make this interesting. Talk more about the healing properties, talk about how it works with water and what can be made with it (like a teabag, or even a sack which doesn't let any water in), talk about it's fire resistance, and what heat does to it more, and what that can be used for. Maybe even say that it can be used for traps, maybe fishing nets, string to make better and fancier clothes, there is so much that could be written about. Don't focus on the fighting part, it only makes the lore seem to only be to make someone more powerful.

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I don't think you really understand the point of the lore. I wouldn't be writing it if it was just about its sillier properties, since those things don't need lore. The reason I am focusing on armor is because I have been using this as armor IC since I joined. I decided to write up lore because my character wants to make clothing for another character. The reason I say I think you don't understand is I know it is powerful, that is why it is a pain to get. I made the process tedious and simply an utter pain.so that you can't just get a lot of it. Spiders silk should be a rare thing, not something that just everyone has. I have used this for three or four months now and honestly I always end up on the ground writhing in pain or simply incapacitated. It has also crossed my mind using it with other armor, which I have never and will never do, as it would be incredibly powergamey. Going back to what you said though, I wrote the properties so that they are known and people can use them for what they want. They, without the armor, don't really need lore. I mean if you saw someone putting on spiders silk bandages would you really care? I mean all I might do is think to myself where and how he got it, but it would be such a small thing I wouldn't even say anything.

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Mixing armors is actually quite normal. Chainmail under plate, leather in parts where plate doesn't reach, and so forth. In PVP it doesn't mean a thing, in rp it does.

 

And with the post you did, you pretty much told me you want it to be armor, which then I would just have to continue to say no. I would say completely remove every single mention of anything in the lore that can be seen as being used as armor, because besides the fact that it's overpowerred and easily abusable, you would also need a LOT of it to even create armor. Just say using it as armor will be worse than using leather and leave it at that, and concentrate on the part of the lore that can make this interesting. Talk more about the healing properties, talk about how it works with water and what can be made with it (like a teabag, or even a sack which doesn't let any water in), talk about it's fire resistance, and what heat does to it more, and what that can be used for. Maybe even say that it can be used for traps, maybe fishing nets, string to make better and fancier clothes, there is so much that could be written about. Don't focus on the fighting part, it only makes the lore seem to only be to make someone more powerful.

 

I have some news for you. If my and and DrDovakiin's spiderlings lore is accepted they will be able to get all the spider silk to make armor maybe it would be an event item and this lore is really good +1. link to that lore was at the bottom of this as part of m signature but that is now being called advertisement and got me a warning post.

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Spider silks tensile strength is comparable to steel.

 

Spider silks shear strength is nil, so spider's silk isn't at all resistant to slashes or cuts.

 

If you perhaps layered spider silk in a thick jacket it may stop arrows from puncturing. But it will still hurt like a *****

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