Outdoor Survival

Skill Overview

The City of Iridine is but a small place in a vast, mostly untamed, world. There are those who make their living in this uncharted wilderness, however. Woodsmen, or foresters, spend much of their time in the wild, learning how to track wild animals, hunt them, and bring their pelts in for money. They are skilled in surviving in the wild lands, knowing the best places to find firewood, sweet water, and food with but the barest of clues.

Foresters live in an unusual position in the everyday business of the metropolis. Finding themselves on the outskirts of high culture and mainstream life, many are disdainful of city life and visit town only to sell their wares and shop for provisions. City folk, while acknowledging the value of their skills, are often distrustful of the wild-looking, strange-smelling men of the outdoors. Despite this, everyone recognizes the value of having a good forester on a journey through the wilderness. Many caravans employ woodsmen to help them negotiate uncivilized terrain and protect themselves from animals along the journey.

For most foresters, knowledge does not come from books or learning but from the harsh tutelage of their elders and the even harsher lessons of Mother Nature. A form of lore has grown amongst hunters, passed from generation to generation through word of mouth and through experience. Though uncodified and rarely standard, this lore represents the accumulated knowledge of many generations of hunters, kept alive through imaginative tongues and campfire tales.

This skill set is best complemented by knowledge of Hunting.

Skill Info Ranks Taught by Trainer
Skills/Actions Difficulty **Krimalus Fern Tauruu Shantaz Jarla
Outdoor Survival Easy 80 100 150 150 200
Dig Firepit Easy 60 100 120 125 150
Craft Basic Torch Easy 60 100 120 125 150
Stoke Fire Easy 60 100 120 125 150
Firebuilding Easy 60 100 120 125 150
Find Firewood Easy 60 100 120 125 150
Find Sapling Easy 60 100 120 125 150
Basic Camp Cooking Easy 60 100 120 125 150
Outdoor Climbing Easy 60 100 120 125 150
Shelter Building Difficult 60 100 120 125 150
Survival Rope-Making Average 60 100 120 125 150
Berry Foraging Easy 60 100 120 125 150
Soil Foraging Average 60 100 120 125 150
Survival Foraging Easy 60 100 120 125 150
Grass Harvesting Easy 60 100 120 125 150
Craft Fishing Pole Average 60 50 100 125 150
Forester Conceal Average 60 100 120 125 150
Survival Weaving Average 80 - - - -
Whittling Difficult 80 - - - -
Outdoor Survival Lores Ranks Taught by Trainer
Lore Name Krimalus Fern Tauruu Shantaz Jarla
Advanced Camp Cooking Lore 25 - - - -
Survival Cordage Lore 25 - - - -

Directions to Fern (Vetallun): Walk to Vetallun Road, Walk to Vetallun Crossroads, Sx1, Wx1
Directions to Krimalus (Wilderness): Near the cliffs in the coastal forest north of the Iridine. Krimalus is not a typical trainer, see Reputation Guide for details.
Directions to Tauruu (Town of Rock Valley): Walk to Hospice, wait for drover to appear, follow drover, Ex12, Nx2, Ex20, Nx2, Ex2, Nx5, Ex1, Nx1, Wx3
Directions to Shantaz (Seld): Walk to Seld (Town Square), Wx8, N, E
Directions to Jarla (Stromheim): Travel to Stromheim through the Rock Valley wilderness.

Notes on Learning

  • **Krimalus will only teach you once you have given him his requested item for the day. Ask him to teach or train you to know which item(s) he's looking for. See Reputation Guide for details.

Skill Details

#Dig Firepit dig firepit

In the outdoors, it can be hard to predict the behavior of a campfire, and even harder to control it. The best means for an outdoorsman to do so can be found through building his fire in a small pit. Using this skill, you do exactly that. A fire pit is necessary in order to build a fire, and after some time, the fire pit will no longer be suitable for fire building. You will need a shovel, trowel, or similar implement to dig a firepit.

When you see this in use you see:

> dig firepit
[Success: 1, Roll: 27] You find a suitable location and dig a crudely dug hole suitable for a firepit.

#Craft Basic Torch make torch [with] <tinder>

Using a small dry piece of deadwood or other tinder, typically found using the Find Firewood skill, the outdoorsman carves and whittles in it such a way as to make it suitable as a light-bearing torch, to either use personally, sell to other adventurers, or sell to the many supply shops throughout Iridine. The more skilled you are at making torches, the finer your torches will look and the longer they will burn; higher quality torches will also provide more light than poorly crafted ones.

When you see this in use you see:

> make torch with deadwood
[Success: 1, Roll: 2] You successfully convert one of your pieces of deadwood into a well-crafted torch.

#Stoke Fire stoke fire [with] <tinder>

A fire can use up a great deal of fuel, be it twigs, branches, or anything else that will burn, and as such will need to be rekindled from time to time with new materials. You can stoke a fire with just about anything that will burn, including clothing, wooden items, and, of course, branches and twigs. The size and dryness of the tinder will determine how effective of a fuel source it is.

When you see this in use you see:

> stoke fire with deadwood
[Success: 1, Roll: 62] You carefully work a small dry piece of deadwood into the fire but notice that it isn't overly helpful.

#Firebuilding build fire [with] <tinder>

Aside from a sharp survival knife, there's nothing more useful to an outdoorsman than a camp fire. Whether it's being used to cook food or keep away predators, a fire will always be helpful. To build a fire, you'll need a firepit and a piece of tinder, with some tinder being more effective than others. Many things can be used as tinder, including deadwood, twigs, torches, or other wooden objects.

With at least 30 ranks in Firebuilding and 50 ranks in Outdoor Survival, you can also set fire to large piles of wooden refuse or twigs using 'light <group of wooden items>' to create a bonfire. Twigs are one of the most common items used to create bonfires, and a minimum of 100 twigs is needed to light a bonfire. However, other items can also be set on fire, such as a pile of at least 50 torches. The larger the pile of tinder lit, the longer the bonfire will last; bonfires can also be stoked just as a normal camp fire. When naturally extinguished, a bonfire will leave behind a pile of charcoal. This command can also be used by characters that have the Aestiva Signalfire Lore.

When you see this in use you see:

> build fire with twigs
[Success: 1, Roll: 96] You place the tinder on the ground and bring it to flame after a little effort.

#Find Firewood find firewood

Whether being used to make torches, keep your camp fire going, or for use as a construction material, it's a lot harder to find suitable firewood than one would imagine. Using this skill, you will find deadwood and branches from your surroundings, assuming there are branches to be found. A resourceful hunter will carry an axe with her while gathering firewood, which increases the amount of tinder found.

When you see this in use you see:

> find firewood
[Success: 1, Roll: 89] You search the area, finding some wood that looks promising, and gather it as you go.
[Success: 1, Roll: 52] You search the area, finding some wood that looks promising, and gather it as you go with the help of your axe.

#Find Sapling find sapling

Flexible, lightweight, and reasonably strong, pine saplings can be extremely valuable to the outdoorsman for a multitude of construction purposes. Valued for its use in furniture, weaponry, and even home construction, even those other than the outdoorsman will have a demand for such things.

To find a sapling, you'll need to be in an area with a lot of trees. You can find various types of saplings depending on the type of trees growing in the area, such as pine, oak, walnut, cedar, and others.

When you see this in use you see:

> find sapling
[Success: 1, Roll: 81] You have found a suitable looking pine sapling and proceed to unearth it.

#Basic Camp Cooking cook <food>

While many things you forage for or skin may be fine to eat raw, there are countless others which will need to be cooked. Using this skill, you will roast the item over a heat source such as a camp fire or stove. Some items are harder to cook than others, though, so make sure you keep an eye on your dinner!

When you see this in use you see:

> cook meat
[Success: 1, Roll: 64] A piece of raw alligator meat sizzles as you hold it over a brightly glowing fire.

#Outdoor Climbing climb <object|location>

As an outdoorsman you might encounter terrain which seems impassible to the normal person. But through extensive study of the land, the knowledgeable woodsman will be able to find a way up or down such obstacles. Beware, though, for some obstacles are harder to climb than others, and while a tumble down a grassy hill may not seem too harmful, falling down a stone mountain will not be pleasant.

When you see this in use you see:

> climb cliff
[Success: 1, Roll: 35] You climb down a cliff.

#Shelter Building build shelter

There are times, either because of weather, dangerous predators, or simply to better mark your outdoor territory, that you'll wish to build a small temporary home for yourself. With this skill, you can use saplings, rope or cordage, grass, and twigs to build yourself a lean-to, which you can access by using the go <shelter> and leave commands.

These makeshift shelters will degrade over time, with their lifespans dependent upon how skilled you are at building shelters. After being built, lean-tos are mentioned as part of the area description of the location they are built. Someone who is not looking carefully for the lean-to might easily pass it by if they are not reading each room's description.

Required Materials

  • 5 saplings
  • 20 twigs
  • 100 blades of grass
  • 2 ropes (or 8 cordage)

Notes:

  • To find the twigs you'll need to build a shelter, use the "gather twigs" command.
  • The inspect shelter command will let you know if it is starting to degrade and might fall down soon without repairs. It will also tell you what supplies you'll need to repair the shelter.
  • You can repair a shelter with the repair <shelter> command.
  • You can dismantle your shelter by using the dismantle <shelter> command. This only works on shelters that you have built.
  • A masterfully crafted lean-to can last several in-game years after being built or freshly repaired (~6 months real time).

When you see this in use you see:

> build shelter
[Success: 1, Roll: 88] Your shelter is finished. You stand back to admire your masterfully crafted lean-to.

#Survival Rope-Making make rope with <grass>

Rope is useful as a capturing agent, a snare component, a construction material, and for countless other things, and your ability to make your own will not only save you time, but also quite a bit of coin. Using grass foraged from the outdoors, you can use this skill to make a lightweight grass rope.

When you see this in use you see:

> make rope with grass
[Success: 1, Roll: 62] You finish weaving your rope, and are left holding a crudely braided grass rope.

#Berry Foraging find berries

Iridine's vast fields and forests are covered with a great deal of foliage, with much of it bearing fruit and berries ripe for the taking. With this skill, you will wander the area, gathering what you can find. Be careful, though, because some berries will have adverse effects on you, with different berries doing different things.

When you see this in use you see:

> find berries
[Success: 10, Roll: 99] You walk around the area, picking berries and small fruits as you go. You soon come up with a handful of them.

#Soil Foraging find grub

Even in areas where the foliage seems completely barren, there is usually food to be found below your boots. Using this skill, you dig through the soil, looking for insects, roots, and other subterranean delights. Just as with berries, though, some things are less edible than others, so be careful and learn from experience.

When you see this in use you see:

> find grub
[Success: 26, Roll: 65] You dig through the earth and manage to scrounge up a reddish-brown root.

#Survival Foraging find resource

Far away from home and all alone in the wilderness, the hunter is often challenged to find resources that can help her survive. Survival foraging can help you to find food, tools, building supplies, crafting materials, or things that can be used to trap prey. Although anyone can forage for resources, learning the skill will make it a lot easier, and will increase the variety of things that you can find.

The types of things you'll find while foraging for resources varies widely depending on the type of environment you are in, whether that be a swamp, forest, grassland, mountain, riverbank, or ocean. You can even forage for resources while swimming underwater. Branches, reeds, twigs, thorns, and turtle shells are just a few examples of the kinds of things you might stumble upon if you're looking carefully enough.

The difficulty of this skill varies depending on the environment where you are trying to use it. It is more difficult to forage in inhospitable terrain, such as mountains or underwater.

Foraging can be affected by tools your character is holding, depending on the type of resource foraged. For example, if you forage in a swamp and are holding a knife, it will increase the amount of reeds that you forage during each attempt. Similarly, if you hold a woven net bag (made with Survival Weaving) while foraging underwater, you'll be able to find a greater variety of resources and the items you find are automatically stowed in the bag 1.

When you see this in use you see:

> find resource
[Success: 1, Roll: 37] After searching the area a while, you find a length of thin but sturdy vine.

#Grass Harvesting find grass

One of the best resources you have at your disposal in the wilderness is the endless fields of grass. Useful as a construction material and as a burning agent, you'll have no trouble finding things to do with it. The amount of grass you gather will be greatly increased if you have a harvesting tool of some kind available, such as a knife, a sickle, or a reaping hook. Some hunters have even been known to carry a full-sized scythe into the fields with them when they need to gather a large quantity of grass.

As your ranks in Grass Harvesting improve, you will be able to gather a greater quantity of grass. The Rank Details table below indicates the average amount of grass you'll gather with each attempt, depending on your skill level and the harvesting implement used.

When you see this in use you see:

> find grass
[Success: 1, Roll: 4] With a sickle in hand, you start quickly harvesting handfuls of the nearby grass, gathering them together as you go.

#Craft Fishing Pole craft pole with <sapling>

Of all the hunter's pastimes, nothing is quite as nostalgic as a long, relaxing day of fishing. A skilled hunter knows that the fishing is only as good as the fishing pole, and takes pride in crafting a perfectly balanced pole that can stand the test of time. Creating a fishing pole requires a knife in-hand, a sapling, some cordage (made with Survival Cordage Lore or found in certain areas using Find Resource), as well as a suitable hook of some kind (such as one you've whittled, or a barbed thorn you've found by foraging around in the wilderness).

When you see this in use you see:

> craft pole with sapling
[Success: 18, Roll: 33] You measure out the length of the sapling and carve a grip at the fat end. Then, trimming the small end of the pole to fit the line and hook, you attach them and manage to create a rough oak fishing pole.

#Forester Conceal conceal <item>

There are times when you'll need to hide the things you find away, and using this skill you can conceal small objects from the prying eyes of your neighbors. Further skill in this move will allow you to conceal larger objects, and the number of objects you can hide in an area will be dependent on the amount of cover present. You can find concealed objects by using the search command.

When you see this in use you see:

> conceal torch
[Success: 37, Roll: 81] You find a passable place in which to hide a finely crafted torch and place it behind a very thick web of vibrant green and brown vines with wide leaves.

#Survival Weaving sweave <material> into <object>

Your ranks and the material used (twigs, grass, and reeds) determine what items you can attempt to weave. Simply attempt to weave your material into something to be given a list of what you can weave at the moment. More ranks open up more options to weave things into up to rank 100. In the Rank Details table below, the number in parenthesis will indicate the amount of materials required to craft the item.

When you see this in use you see:

> sweave twigs into bowl
[Success: 1, Roll: 94] You carefully weave some assorted twigs into a masterfully woven bowl.

#Whittling whittle <material> into <object>

You’ll start with Branches, but if you choose to rank the skill high enough, you’ll open up more options for branches, but also open access to ribs, leg bones, and more as possible whittling materials. Simply attempt to whittle your material into something to be given a list of what you can whittle at your current rank. Options keep opening up all the way to rank 100, as noted in the Rank Details table below.

The whittle command doesn't like having two words for the subject of the command: eg, whittle fish bones into hook does not work, but whittle fish into hook does. Same applies to leg bones and other items.

When you see this in use you see:

> whittle rib into hook
[Success: 45, Roll: 48] You carefully whittle an adder rib into a very poorly carved bone fishing hook.


Lores

#Advanced Camp Cooking Lore blacken <food>, sear <food>, broil <food>, roast <food>

There are a few ways you can cook something over an open flame to give it a better flavor than just meat heated until it isn't raw any more.

These advanced cooking techniques will imbue your food with many interesting flavors and really impress anyone who is lucky enough to be sitting around the campfire with you.

This skill has a chance of naturally increasing a character's ?? "You feel as if you've learnt a better way to think about that.".

Blackening

The first and easiest way is to blacken it. You heat the food closer to the base of the fire, where it's hottest to blacken the outside, heating just center just enough so as to not be raw, and allowing the outside to crisp and blacken.

Requires 20 ranks of Camp Cooking.

Searing

The second, slightly more difficult way is to sear it. This is a lot like blackening, but instead of charring the outside, you simply cook the outside quickly, a little closer to the base of the fire, in order to seal in the flavor. After the outside is cooked, you simply ease back and allow it to cook through slowly, careful not to burn the outside at all.

Requires 40 ranks of Camp Cooking.

Broiling

This method requires a simple broiling rack, which can be woven from several twigs: a flat crosshatch rack to hold the food well over the fire itself. Holding the rack (and the food) above the fire, you let the heat rise to meet the food, rather than forcing the food near the fire. This is a slower method, but very effective at adding a smoky flavor without charring the outside like blackening.

Requires 60 ranks of Camp Cooking.

Required Materials: Broiling Rack.

Roasting

The last, and most difficult way to cook something is to roast it. This is trickier, and is something to be done with small field-dressed animals (such as rabbits and small game birds), fish, a haunch of meat, or a raw wing. Unless you're cooking a haunch of meat or a wing (that has it's own bone you can use as a handle), requires you to use a skewer that you can whittle from a sapling.

Holding the skewer and the food in question (or just the food, if it's a haunch or wing), you hold it over the fire and turn slowly, giving it a nice, even cooking on all sides until cooked through. A nice even turning allows the juices to slide around the food, giving it a nice roasted flavor instead of simply dripping off into the fire.

Requires 80 ranks of Camp Cooking.

Required Materials: Skewer (except haunch of meat.)


When you see this in use you see:

> blacken meat
[Success: 1, Roll: 42] A wildcat heart sizzles as you hold it over a brightly glowing bonfire.
[Success: 1, Roll: 69] A wildcat heart sizzles as you hold it over a brightly glowing bonfire. It appears to be done cooking.

> sear meat
[Success: 1, Roll: 18] A piece of raw rattlesnake meat sizzles as you hold it over a brightly glowing fire.
[Success: 1, Roll: 58] A piece of raw rattlesnake meat sizzles as you hold it over a brightly glowing fire. It appears to be done cooking.

> broil meat
[Success: 1, Roll: 93] A piece of raw porcupine meat sizzles as you hold it over a brightly glowing hearth.
[Success: 1, Roll: 46] A piece of raw porcupine meat sizzles as you hold it over a brightly glowing hearth. It appears to be done cooking.
A finely woven flat rack of twigs is destroyed.
You drop a finely woven flat rack of twigs as it is destroyed.

> roast wing
[Success: 1, Roll: 7] A raw pheasant wing sizzles as you hold it over a brightly glowing bonfire.
[Success: 1, Roll: 87] A raw pheasant wing sizzles as you hold it over a brightly glowing bonfire. It appears to be done cooking.

#Survival Cordage Lore cord <rope>

This command allows you to create cordage by unweaving a larger length of rope. Cordage can be used to create Cord Snares and is also sometimes required to craft certain weapons, fishing poles, and other implements.

To make proper survival cordage, carefully untwist the fibers of a rope.
Once untwisted, retwist the fibers tightly in a cross-hatch pattern, always crossing diagonal from the last fiber.
Tie in a new length of fiber well before the last runs short.

When you see this in use you see:

> cord rope
You carefully separate the fibers of a simply braided grass rope into a pile of fibers.
Carefully re-weaving the fibers tightly with a zig-zag pattern, you tie in new fibers well before the previous fibers have ended, producing some usable cordage.
You continue to repeat this process with the remaining fibers, ending up with two pieces of cordage in total.

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