Another use for Feathers

[DeanF]

It would be nice if there were another use for feather.  I always seem to accumulate huge amounts of them.  The problem is that I can't think of many.  Down clothing, perhaps?  And a down bed.  Down clothing would be warmer than furs or almost anything else, but less durable.  A down bed would just be warmer.  Maybe other feather clothing, like headdresses and the cloaks that the Aztecs used to wear?

But none of these will consume huge numbers of feathers.

Perhaps we could make fishing flies that last a bit longer than using worms or stinkbait?  Then fly fishing would work differently than other fishing- you'd have to land your cast near a fish for one to strike.  A fly fishing simulator would be pretty neat

Otherwise, I'm coming up empty.

Edited Saturday at 10:32 PM by DeanF

[Bruno Willis]

Fishing flies would be cool, but I think a down duvet would be a really cool way to add sleep duration to a bed when you want it (winter with long nights) and take it off again when you don't want it (short summer nights). 

At the moment I use a hay bed to sleep most of the time, and a real bed only in winter. I'd prefer to have one bed which lets me sleep 6 or so hours, and then put an extra feather duvet over it in winter to sleep 8 hours. It'd also add a good cozy feeling to winter if you had to go and pull your feather duvet out of storage and put it on your bed for winter. 

Edited Saturday at 10:42 PM by Bruno Willis
Grammar

[cjameshuff]

None of these are really a long-term sink for large numbers of feathers, though. I've just been finding traders who will buy feathers, maybe additionally add trades for things like down pillows/coats/etc that would take large numbers of feathers to create.

[Facethief]

Feather soup (delicious)

or just mass-produced arrows.

[cjameshuff]

3 hours ago, Facethief said:

or just mass-produced arrows.

The thing is, how many arrows do you go through? Even if you can sell them to a trader, which are you going to run out of first, feathers or metal for the heads? If you're raising chickens for meat, you'll quickly start filling chests with feathers.

[The Lerf]

Perhaps the problem instead is that we receive too many feathers when harvesting chickens. There reaches a point in the game where I just stop grabbing them, and let the body despawn. What if instead of a singular 'feather' item (that we can find up to 16 of per chicken), it became a 'bundle of feathers'-esque item, where less of them get harvested from the chicken but it still carries the implication of receiving many. 

Think how when harvesting cattails, you don't receive (1) Cattail, you receive (1) Cattails, and the icon is a small bundle of them.

Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be many practical/functional uses of feathers historically, besides as fletching and bedding. Their main usage was decorative and ceremonial, so perhaps Tailor classes could get some more special feather-based clothing items to craft, but it's a bit of a struggle to think of something they could be regularly used for. The aforementioned down duvet idea is nice, and could be a late game item that goes for a high price at the luxury trader, which leans feathers towards a more 'money-maker' type trade item and is the closest analogue to feathers being a typically fashion-style thing IRL.

[LadyWYT]

I like the feather bed idea. It could be really useful for making more comfortable beds that allow the player to sleep longer(do we really want to rely on beds that have been collecting who-knows-what for years in a dirty ruin?), as well as be a useful survival tool in colder climates, where the lack of warm bedding might put the player more at risk of catching cold.

[Farmore]

Pillows, cushions, that would be cool decor. Something along the lines of decorative items. Maybe you could use them to insulate clothing and increase their temperature...? Like a crafting upgrade?

[runnybabbit]

IRL having even a small-scale poultry setup for meat production really does net you with a TON of feathers. Granted, not all of them are very useful, since arrows require specific feathers found on the wings. 

I like the idea of a duvet increasing warmth when sleeping as well as sleep time. I've woken many a winter morning completely freezing despite leaving the fire stoked

Edited 18 hours ago by runnybabbit