Making Tools Useful in 5e: Weaver's Tools
Weaver’s Tools! Today, we get to go over creating outfits, costumes, and maybe even a fashionable, skin-tight wetsuit. Weaving clothes is about taking bolts of fabric, trimming them, and sewing the pieces together to make clothing… Which… I mean, duh. That’s how clothes get made. At first, I thought this tool was for basket weaving and was struggling to think of a huge variety of baskets you could make and how that would work… Thankfully, outfits are a lot easier to come up with!
Weaver’s Tools
Alright. My favorite part of these is talking shit about Xanathar’s Guide to Everything, so without further ado… here we go on page 85:
Weaver's tools allow you to create cloth and tailor it into articles of clothing.
Components. Weaver's tools include thread, needles, and scraps of cloth. You know how to work a loom, but such equipment is too large to transport.
Arcana, History. Your expertise lends you additional insight when examining cloth objects, including cloaks and robes.
Investigation. Using your knowledge of the process of creating cloth objects, you can spot clues and make deductions that others would overlook when you examine tapestries, upholstery, clothing, and other woven items.
Repair. As part of a short rest, you can repair a single damaged cloth object.
Craft Clothing. Assuming you have access to sufficient cloth and thread, you can create an outfit for a creature as part of a long rest.
Alright, Xanathar, let’s talk about what we have here. Components are always good, I suppose, which, you know… maybe I shouldn’t be so rude to Xanathar… it does give me components that I sometimes modify, so you know what… Xanathar gets a gold star for the components it creates… on the other hand… the rest of it is pretty boring. It’s the same shit all the other tools get, oh when looking at something magical that is part of your niche tool, you can get additional insights.
I’ve no idea what these additional insights are, but I suppose in certain campaigns it can be pretty handy. But does a weaver really know anything about a magical tapestry? I suppose your character is supposed to be made of different stuff than a normal weaver, or else why would you go adventuring… but still. It just seems… like a bit of a stretch. A normal weaver probably never deals with magic unless you are in a high-magic world or there is an abundance of magical cloth out there. The only thing I find useful in this is that Craft Clothing is assumed to take a single long rest… which seems like a stretch, but sure… why not? Making an outfit is faster than cobbling shoes or painting something glamorous. We can work with that.
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Let’s Make It Better
So, how do we make this tool better? Well, the idea of making outfits and garments and whatnot is pretty close to cobbling shoes. Certain shoes go with certain outfits, and you need a variety of outfits and shoes to really make it all work, though if you look at my wardrobe and my single pair of shoes, I obviously don’t think that in reality.
But speaking of cobbling shoes, I think that it is a great mechanic for what we are doing here, and it flows well. If someone wants to create fancy outfits, it wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility for them to also be a cobbler or at least have some knowledge of cobbling some beautiful shoes. So we will take that, where we are creating outfits for specific situations and getting minor benefits from it.
The only major difference between the two tools is that, according to Xanathar, making outfits is fast. Like during a Long Rest fast, and as most people also add in sleep to their Long Rest, that’s like you can make an outfit in 2 hours fast. I’m not sure that that is realistic even for a fantasy game, so we are going to increase that a bit, but outfits are going to be faster to produce than shoes are… on the flip side, they are going to cost more as you need more materials for it and as a type of balance. Sure, shoes are cheaper but they take longer to produce, while outfits are more expensive but are faster to produce. There is a weird type of symmetry for creating outfits, and if you are in a game with a lot of downtime, this is the perfect time to make sure you are still fabulous while climbing a mountain.
Creating Outfits
So how does this all work? First, our weaver must come up with their design, and I offer several ideas though players should always work with their GM to create something perfect for their situations, and they begin sewing and weaving. For every day of progess they make on their outfit, it is assumed they spent 4 hours that day working on it. Now, if the DM allows it, you could spend far longer creating your outfits. Before the new Warforged was released in Eberron: Rising from the Last War, Warforged could’ve been working night and day on an outfit in an attempt to get it done in time for the ball… now, the best are the elves who only need 4 hours of trancing, then they have 20 hours of time to be sewing their fingers off!
The baseline for making clothes is similar to the baseline for making shoes, and that can be found in the Common Clothes equipment. These 5 sp clothes are simple, probably not super comfortable and are worn by the general population with little variance in their styles.
Because the shoes from our previous tool cost 1 sp to make, the outfit itself cost 4 sp to produce. See? Outfits will be more expensive! It will take 3 days or 4 hours of work to produce a common clothes outfit, which is faster than 7 days it would take to cobble some shoes. Again, outfits will be faster to create but cost more.
Special Qualities
Just like our shoes, our outfits also have some special qualities, and you can always work with your GM to produce an outfit to get the desired result if you talk with them and everyone agrees on stuff. Our outfits, like the Cold Weather Outfit, can protect you from cold environments, or the Assassin’s Outfit can get you advantage on stealth checks in dim light or darkness… so long as you aren’t wearing armor and only wearing that outfit. There are some trade-offs to being sneaky, and that’s having an AC of 10 plus your Dexterity, which is really only 1 less than if you were wearing leather armor, so it might be worth it if you are being super sneaky.
Weaving In and Out
And that’s the basics of our Weaver’s Tools. It creates outfits; certain outfits do more or less depending on what you need, and it costs a bit of a coin to do so. As you go throughout your world, you may find a variety of uses for disguising yourself in costume clothes, then again… you might create excusees to build a few more outfits than you really need to just show off your skills.
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Other tools: Painter’s Supplies, Calligrapher’s Tools, Jeweler’s Tools, Carpenter’s Tools, Forgery Kit, Disguise Kit, Herbalism Kit, Glassblower’s Tools, Navigator’s Tools, Leatherworker’s Tools, Cobbler’s Tools, Poisoner’s Kit, Cartographer’s Tools, Alchemist’s Supplies, Mason’s Tools, Gaming Sets, Tinker’s Tools, Healer’s Kit, Brewer’s Supplies, Smith’s Tools & Cook’s Utensils.
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