Carpentry

Carpentry is building things out of wood: tools, chests and cabinets, carts and wagons, huts and corrals, the beams and scaffolding a growing province needs, and the kits that repair its buildings. Carpentry is also the name of the skill behind it; see the carpentry skill below.

Becoming a carpenter

The carpenters' halls stand together in Atherton. The Apprentice Carpenters take members who have joined the Master Artisans, and every carpenter starts there. Four halls open off theirs:

• the Fine Woodworkers for joinery and fine furniture,
• the Timber Masters for heavy timber and the parts of province buildings,
• the Artists of Wood for finishing and carving,
• the Toolwrights for making and keeping tools, once you have finished the Apprentice Carpenters.

Members carry a carpenter's square; look at it for the commands.

Designs

You can only build what you hold a design for. A design is a drawing on paper, and there are three ways to get one:

• Buy it from the design rack by the door of the Apprentice Carpenters' hall: say designs to read the plates, and buy <name> design.
• Claim it. The Timber Masters and the Fine Woodworkers give their members designs as they rise: claim designs in your own hall.
• Copy it. design my own <thing> redraws any design you hold in your own hand.

design <thing> refines a design of your own, and everything you build from it afterwards comes out better. A design in someone else's hand must be copied before you can refine it. help designs in the game lists every design and where it comes from.

Tools and wood

A carpenter needs a full kit: chisel, drawknife, drill, mallet, plane, ruler, saw, scraper and spokeshave. The guild halls have their own benches and tools, so you can work there with only a design and the wood. Anywhere else you must bring the whole kit, and a kit short of tools will not do. Carpenters make their own tools from the bench-tool designs on the rack, with blades and blanks from Qox's counter in the Toolwrights' hall. check tools shows their state and maintain tools sharpens, cleans and mends them.

Lay the planks or timbers on the floor where you work. Most designs take any wood, but the province parts want one kind: oak for beams, yew for trusses, larch for panels, maple for joinery. The work waits until the right wood is there. Loggers fell and saw the wood; see Logging.

Building

work on new <thing> starts a piece from your design, and work on <thing> carries on with one left unfinished.

What comes out depends on the wood, the state of your tools, your skill and where you work. The guild halls are training floors and give plain work. A province building lets the same work come out finer, and the higher its tier, the finer the work; an Advanced sawmill has a carpentry workstation of its own.

Work for the provinces

An Advanced province building wants carpentry the stores cannot supply: a scaffolding set, and beams, trusses, panels or joinery depending on the building. The upgrade preview at the building names the bill. Carry a piece into the province and deliver <component>, or sell it at the storehouse yard out on the lot (sell oak beam to province). Only good work earns the full price.

Repair kits mend a building without the stores, a hammer or standing. Stand at the building and apply <kit>:

• a hasty patch wants any plank and a little skill,
• a carpenter's repair kit is the everyday journeyman's patch,
• a master's bracing wants fine wood and a master's hand; its design comes only from the Fine Woodworkers.

help repair kit in the game has the details, and Province construction covers building and repair.

The carpentry skill

Affiliated stats: wisdom (primary), dexterity (secondary) and strength (tertiary).

The skill works by itself whenever you work on a piece. The Apprentice Carpenters teach it with knowledge of wood, joinery, finishing, timber construction, sharpening and craftsmanship, and the four halls beyond take their own crafts further.

See also

• Apprentice carpenters, for the guild
• Logging, for the wood
• Homes, for the strongboxes, cabinets and herb stores a home takes
• Province buildings
• Crafting, for the other crafts