Serpentine Bloodline and Bottling the Poison

[Malacki]

We had a question come up in our game about bottling the poison from the fangs of the Serpentine Bloodline Sorcerer and then applying it to weapons.

Seems like a slippery slope but I was wondering if there were any rules for taking the poison out of something poisonous and applying it to weapons.

The discussions that came up included:
1) Making the poison only potent the day it was produced
2) Requiring someone with craft(alchemy) to process it to an injury poison
3) Just saying it doesn't work like that

Any thoughts or official rulings?

[Jeff1964]

Last I saw rules for extracting poisons was in a Dragon magazine (sorry, I don't remember the issue). For my game, it requires Craft (either Alchemy or Poison-making) to extract and to process any 'natural' venom-based poisons. If the character doing the extraction doesn't have something like the Alchemist's Poison Use ability (the one that allows him to put poison on a weapon without affecting himself) then they have to make a Reflex save DC 10 to avoid poisoning themselves in the extraction process. If you want to limit the amount of poison that your PCs can milk (so to speak) from this process, say it takes multiple doses of the raw material to make a sufficiently potent poison that can be applied to a weapon.

[Slaunyeh]

Now I imagine a serpentine sorcerer turning angrily on his friends, shouting "I will NOT let you milk me!" :p

[HappyDaze]

The option of allowing it but having the poison only be good for a short time (perhaps only a few minutes) once exposed to air (without alchemical treatment to refine it into a more typical poison) seems best to me.

[Slaunyeh]

Alternatively, you could pick the Envenomed bloodline that let you do this from level 3.

(or at least steal the rules from there, as inspiration for how to handle it)

[Malacki]

Slaunyeh wrote:

Now I imagine a serpentine sorcerer turning angrily on his friends, shouting "I will NOT let you milk me!" :p

That was how the conversation started... "How much would you charge me to let me milk you?"

"Depending on what kind of milking you are doing I may need to pay you."

"Milking your poison from your fangs ..."

"Oh..."

[Malacki]

Slaunyeh wrote:

Alternatively, you could pick the Envenomed bloodline that let you do this from level 3.

(or at least steal the rules from there, as inspiration for how to handle it)

I missed the envenomed alternate bloodline. I think if there is a particular power that lets you do it then you probably shouldn't be able to do it without that power.

Thanks for the feedback everyone.

[Tharg The Pirate King]

It should be possible since it is venom and should be harvestable with a craft(alchemy check). Also I would handle it like the Poison Azure Lily Pollen which states:

It’s possible to harvest the toxic pollen from these lilies with a successful DC 30 Survival check and 10 minutes of stressful work (failure causes the lily to burst), but once taken from the plant, the raw pollen becomes inert after a week unless crafted into refined poison with a DC 15 Craft (alchemy) check.

using this example I would probally create a DC 20-25 check or the venom from fangs becomes inert after few minutes. Since there is a presedence for making a posion last longer there should be no reason to deny it. is it broken? no, I would only allow so many does per use of the power and its no differnet than any other posion.

[Dragonchess Player]

Malacki wrote:

I was wondering if there were any rules for taking the poison out of something poisonous and applying it to weapons.

Core Rulebook pg. 557-560; specifically, on pg. 558: "Poisons can be made using Craft (alchemy). The DC to make a poison is equal to its Fortitude save DC."

Core Rulebook pg. 91-93 has the rules for the Craft skill.

Estimate the market price of the poison from the serpentine sorcerer based on black adder venom, deathblade, or greenblood oil as the closest equivalent (depending on the sorcerer's level). The only real benefit the bloodline gives is ready access to the base venom (although the GM can also give a cost break for raw materials, if desired).