Table of Contents

Woodcarver's Tools

Shaping and forming wood, you can carve wood and morph it into shapes useful for not only combat but art as well.

Woodcarver's Tools

Woodcarver's tools consist of a carving knife, a gouge, a small mallet, and a small saw. Your tools weigh 5 lbs and costs 2 gp.

Woodcarving

Carving wood into beautiful art or deadly weapons requires that you have materials present; because your expertise and tools are designed for wood, you must have wood handy. There are some types of wood, like hardwoods or magically enhanced wood, that might be more difficult to craft or have special properties you can impart into your projects. When carving; you must succeed on a Dexterity (Woodcarver's Tools) check, and you can add your proficiency bonus if you are proficient with the tools.

Creating your Project

Woodcarving can be a very short process if you are crafting a simple statue that fits in your palm or it can be a week long endeavor to create beautiful designs on a man-sized totem. To carve wood, you must spend at least 10 minutes, or more depending on the project. A small wooden figure of a horse may only take a skilled carver 10 minutes, while a throne fit for a king may require several weeks or months.

Most simple projects require up to an hour to complete, the more elaborate the design, or the size required, the longer the piece takes to complete per the DM's discretion. Examples are given below.

Carving wood can be defined into 2 broad categories, detailed and scope.

Detailed

The detail of your carvings effects the length of time to complete your project. There are three categories for your projects: Vaguely, Lightly or Heavily detailed.

Vaguely detailed projects require at least 5 minutes to work an appropriately sized piece of wood plus the time it requires for the scope of the project. A vaguely detailed project consists of arrow shafts, a door wedge or other basic shapes.

Lightly detailed projects require at least 1 hour plus the time it requires for the scope of the project. Lightly detailed projects consists of multiple basic shapes combined to create figurines or slightly complicated designs like creating figurine of a horse but not showing any details like fur, hooves or similar.

Heavily detailed projects require at least 8 hours to carve plus the time it requires for the scope of the project. Heavily detailed projects consists of carved patterns or intricate shapes, like feathers on a bird or adding in the wrinkles on a wooden face.

All times represent the minimum for each project, and at the DM's discretion may take longer.

Scope

The scope of the project effects the length of time to carve out the shape in wood. The scope represents the size of your creations and there are three categories for the scope: Minute, Substantial or Immense.

Minute projects require at least 5 minutes to carve plus the amount of time it requires for the detail of the project. A minute project is something small enough to fit or be handled easily with a single hand. This includes things like figurines, arrow shafts or objects that weigh below 2 lbs.

Substantial projects require at least 1 hour plus the amount of time it requires for the detail of the project. A substantial project is something large size that can easily be handled with two hands, a shield or objects that weigh below 30 lbs.

Immense projects require at least 8 hours to create plus the amount of time it requires for the detail of the project. An immense project could be a throne, a pulpit, a wooden wall or anything that requires a lot of effort to move or multiple people to move about.

All times represent the minimum time to create projects of its scope, and at the DM's discretion may take longer.

Creating the Project

After the project is completed or 8 hours of work has been finished, whichever comes first, the crafter must succeed on a Dexterity (Woodcarver's Tools) check, adding their proficiency bonus if they are proficient in the tool. On a success, they make progress on their creation or the project is finished and ready to be used or adored. On a fail of 10 or less, they make no progress on the project, on a fail of 11 or more, they have broken or damaged the project in such a way as to decrease its value or must start over again on the project.

The DC for carving a project is dependent on the Detail and Scope of the project, DC starts at 8 plus the detail and scope bonuses. A Vaguely detailed project adds +1, Lightly detailed +3, and Heavily detailed +6. A Minute scope adds +1, Substantial scope +3, and Immense scope adds +6.

The DM may decide that certain details or sizes may raise or lower the DC, or adjust how often or how little you need to roll on a project. If you are creating a massive and immense throne, making a check every 8 hours maybe too much and you only need to make a check every 24 hours or so on it. The number of checks required is only a recommendation.

Limited Tools

To make the tools easy to carry around on your travels, you have very few tools and may not be able to work on projects of Immense size due to your tools and how heavy an object like that could be to carry.

If you have access to a workshop with a full set of carving tools, the DM may decide that on all checks you have advantage when carving projects or that it takes you a shorter time as you aren't limited by your tools.

Searching for Materials

Before you can begin a project, you must first acquire your materials before you can begin. To create your project, you must find a suitable chunk of wood that is approximately the same size as the project you wish to create. You can always take wood away from a chunk, it is much harder to laminate additional material on to make it larger.

Unless you have some other means of gathering your material, you must journey through forests searching for the right chunks to use in your projects. The DC is dependent on the type of forests around you and the size of the project. A few examples are provided on the next page.

Exotic Materials

Not all wood is the same, and certain materials, like hardwood, have special properties that is added to the project. A few examples are provided below.

Searching for Materials Example DCs

DC Density/Type of Forest
5 Extremely Dense, Lots of Trees Minute
8 Thinning Forest, Mostly New Growth Minute
10 Forest Dying to Disease, Mostly Saplings Minute
10 Extremely Dense, Lots of Trees Substantial
13 Thinning Forest, Mostly New Growth Substantial
15 Forest Dying to Disease, Mostly Saplings Substantial
15 Extremely Dense, Lots of Trees Immense
18 Thinning Forest, Mostly New Growth Immense
20 Forest Dying to Disease, Mostly Saplings Immense

The quality of the forest and the scope of the project can make it very difficult to find the right size of wood needed for your projects. There is the potential that you can buy the required chunk of wood in town with the following example prices provided.

Material Pricing

Type of Wood Weight Cost
Softwood 1 lb 2 cp
Hardwood 1 lb 1 gp
Petrified Wood 1 lb 2 gp
Dragon Burned 1 lb 5 pp

Softwood

Softwood is the typical wood used by most woodcarvers for their projects, it is cheap and easy to come by. It has an AC of 10 and 5 Hit Points per inch of thickness.

Softwood breeds include Birch, Fir, Teak, and Walnut.

Hardwood

Hardwood is a common type of wood that is harder than regular wood, make it ideal for long lasting designs and even for weapons. If a weapon is made out of hardwood, it deals +1 damage on top of its normal damage. It has an AC of 10 and 10 Hit Points per inch of thickness.

Hardwood breeds include Mahogany, Oak, and Pine.

Petrified Wood

This wood has been petrified, either by a basilisk, somehow, or through a long process of fossilization. Due to how hard it is, when wielded as a weapon, and when you score a critical hit with it, it deals one additional die of damage; do not double that die. It has an AC of 15 and 3 Hit Points per inch of thickness due to its brittleness.

Dragon Burned

When a forest scoured by dragon fire, some trees are so enveloped in heat that some of the magic of the dragon's breath doesn't destroy it but rather infuses the wood with fire. When wielded as a weapon, this magical wood deals fire damage instead of its normal damage type. It has an AC and Hit Points of its original breed of wood but gains no other benefits from that breed.

Example Projects

Project Detailed Scope Time to Carve DC Number of Checks
Arrow Vaguely Minute 10 min. 10 1
Temple Pulpit Heavily Immense 16+ hours 20 2+
Quarterstaff Vaguely Substantial 1 hour 12 1
Shield Vaguely Substantial 1 hour 12 1
Figurine of a horse Lightly Minute 1 hour 12 1
Owl Statue Heavily Substantial 9 hours 17 2
Intricate Whistle Heavily Minute 8 hours 15 1
Small Carving Board Vaguely Minute 10 minutes 10 1
Throne for a Sprite Heavily Minute 8 hours 15 1