I have just started running the Kingmaker AP, and the party managed to capture a giant trapdoor spider at the request of the wizard.
Said wizard wants to keep said spider alive and milk it for its venom. I don't the he has any realisitic chance of it - the only relevant skill he has is Craft (alchemy). However, I don't want to ban the attempt outright - the character can try. I just want ideas on all of the ways he can fail - spectacularly or otherwise.
Currently I have:
1) Trapdoor spiders can dig - they may not have a burrow speed. That kind of rules out keeping it in an earthen pit or some such.
2) They (and I) don't know how much to feed it. Any idea on how much it would it eat? There is a character with Knowledge(nature) so they might be able to figure that out.
3) "Milking" the spider is likely to be very difficult & dangerouse - at least if it is conscious.
Any other ideas?
Figure that the spider probably eats a pig a week or thereabouts. Shouldn't be a problem for most players, though you could have some people protest about keeping a dangerous animal around. (Like, oh, Grigori, everyone's favorite Kingmaker bard).
Keeping it in an iron cage should prevent digging attempts.
Milking it should be fun, and dangerous. I don't think Handle Aimal works on vermin, who are also mindless and therefore immune to most mind-affecting spells. Enjoy.
In the interests of pity, I'd suggest that Craft (alchemy) or Survival include how to extract venom from the spider. If nothing else, have it bite a big tied to a rope, the yank the pig back and extract the venom from its flesh
Hard on the pig, admittedly.
Well - I have already decided that they aren't going to be able to keep it at Oleg's.
We haven't gotten to book 2 yet, but thanks for the suggestion about Grigori. Wonderful idea >:-)