» Advertisement « By needle and thread I make my bread .... Och! I know what yer thinkin' right enough. Tailor!? Who'd want to be a tailor when there's more excitin' things to be doin' with my time? Tailor! Phaw! What a sissy profession! Ye must be daft. Well lads and lassies, I'm here to tell ya that ye'd be runnin' 'round in the altogether if it weren't for us 'sissy' tailors! Where do ye think all them fancy duds ye're wearing come from, eh? They don't grow on trees I can tell ya that. Furthermore, until ye're up there with yer fancy warrior or — heaven forfend — magery skills, ya gotta eat and ya gotta buy supplies. They don't grow on trees neither. Yez kin call me a sissy all ya wants and I'll just go off cryin' to the bank. It's possible for us 'sissies' to bank 3-4k (sometimes more when ye're in the groove) per hours work. So go ahead and laugh all ya wants. Ostwind, GM tailor. Of all the professions in this fair land, tailoring is, next to mining, the most profitable profession by far. It's certainly a deuce of a lot safer than mining. And Ostwind is right — it is possible to make large sums of money tailoring if you put your mind to it. But even if GM Tailor is not your goal in life, Tailoring can keep you in beer and skittles and more importantly — armour, weapons and reagents. I recommend it as a secondary skill for all players just starting out and also recommend adding one to your UO team. This essay is about how to build a character whose primary emphasis is on tailoring but since it is not really possible nor is it a good idea to build a 'pure' anything — this treatise will discuss additional skills and attributes which have been chosen to enhance the tailoring aspect and maximize the profitability of the character. In his 'infinite wisdom' (an oxymoron), The Great God OSI through his avatar Lord British, has decreed that the cost of raw materials such as thread, bolts, etc., will be raised forthwith. Consequently, thread has gone from 3 gp/spool to 21 gp/spool! A seven-fold increase! At the same time, the prices NPC's will pay you have not budged. Hence, tailoring is not as profitable as it once was but can still turn a pretty coin withal. All hail OSI! (not!) Some of this material is slanted to the raw beginner or — as they are sometimes called — the clueless newbie. Too bad for you 'experts'. Just skip over the 'simple' stuff. Of course there just might be something here even you jaded 'old-timers' might find useful or — heaven forfend — didn't even know. clueless newbie Someone who has yet to grasp the basic fundamentals of a milieu, process or skill; a neophyte; all of us at one or more times in our lives. Also: a term of disparagement applied to a neophyte by someone who has just learned to count to 10 with his/her shoes on and who is now lording it over the other person who hasn't yet accomplished that feat. I am a GM Tailor (I'm also a GM Lumberjack and close onto being a GM Carpenter — all skills acquired whilst sewing up a storm) and have spent months of hard work to get to that level. And if you are planning on hitting the money making levels hinted at by Ostwind, you should prepare yourself for a lot of hard work — very little of which you'll be able to 'macro'. A word or two about macroing: OSI, in its 'infinite wisdom' has decreed that unattended macroing is verbotten — forbidden — and have instituted certain measures including banning. Hence we will not discuss methods for relieving the drudgery of repetitive tasks such as looming which lends itself well to macroing. OSI has 'fixed' things so that each time you succeed in making things from cloth, the stack of cloth moves to a random place within your backpack which makes it next to impossible to 'power sew'. So be it. That doesn't happen with hides. Whether you choose to macro or not is up to you. We will say no more about the subject within this treatise. Except to urge you to set up one in-game macro — Lastobject. I recommend F12 for that purpose. Then when you are tailoring having once selected your sewing kit or yarn/thread, simply hitting F12 will get you a targeting cursor. This is a real time saver make no mistake. Starting attributes For someone starting a new character, these are the attributes I recommend: STR -- 50 INT -- 20 DEX -- 10 Whether this is a primary or secondary (mule) character makes no difference in choice of physical attributes (STR;INT;DEX). The primary attribute for a tailor is STR but don't neglect INT. You need at least an 11 INT in order to cast 4th Circle spells and you will need one particular 4th Circle spell — Recall — if you intend to be a successful tailor. Forget about DEX — make that the lowest; yes you'll need it later but DEX has a way of skyrocketing whilst you are beavering away with needle and thread; DEX has absolutely nothing to do with tailoring. I've experimented with characters started with high DEX and low DEX and each had the same number of successes and failures which were wholly dependent upon the Tailoring skill at the time. You need STR to be able to carry the materials that are necessary to make things. Tailoring has been changed to require you to have the materials within your pack and hides are very heavy. You can hold up to 400 stone — but wont be able to move which doesn't do you a lot of good since the tailors move around within the shop. Stripped to your undies at 50 STR you will only be able to carry about 205 stone (excluding your 10 stone of body weight). So 190 spools of thread — plus or minus a few — will be all you can manage in that state (see below for why not 205 spools). At 100 STR you should be able to carry about 370+ thread while stripped down. There are many ways to build STR but the best — in my opinion — is by Maceing and Lumberjacking. Which is why you should buy a war axe. There are many reasons for this — not the least of these is that's it's fast and hits hard — but the other reason I suggest this is for the fact that the war axe is the only ambiguous or dual weapon on the list. That is, it is classified as a Mace weapon but has a blade edge. The latter means that you can skin animals and shear sheep with it. You can also chop wood with it (without worrying about dulling the edge. For some reason edges only wear in UO when whacking living beings that bleed). Hence while chopping you build STR twice as fast and improve two other skills into the bargain. Besides — it makes a great whooping sound as you wield it against monsters and the like. Note: there is a quirk in tailoring that has not been fixed that you need to be aware of. Each bolt of cloth weighs 5 stone. You would think that when you are successful in making a clothing article that your weight would decrease slightly since some material is always wasted when making something. At least this is true in RL. But not in UO! Instead, if you are successful, your weight will increase, usually by a stone or two! Deal with it and pay heed to it to avoid overloading yourself. Beginning skills Naturally you will choose Tailoring -- 50 as your primary skill. What you choose next is dependent upon your plans for this character. If he/she is to be simply a 'worker bee', then your choices are narrowed to skills that will enhance the characters revenue enhancing abilities. I recommend Magery -- 49 as the second skill. Note: Yes I know! Some of you are probably saying: Whoa Stitch! You must be smoking too much wackie tabaccy! Magery!? Forsooth! Forsooth indeed. But the fact is that you're going to need Recall and that spell requires at least a 26 Magery to even hope to cast it (and only a 2% chance at that). At 49 you will increase your chances to about 40 - 50%. Spend your last point on Carpentry, which choice will give you a carpentry tool. Why choose that? Because with the changes in UO, it's possible to make House Add-ons. Tailoring can be combined with Carpentry to make:   House Add-on's Item Name Supplies required Carpentry Tailoring Dressform 25 Wood 10 Cloth 63.1 65.0 Loom 85 wood 25 cloth 84.2 65.0 Small Bed 100 wood 100 cloth 94.7 75.0 Large Bed 150 wood 150 cloth 94.7 75.0 Pickpockets Dip 65 wood 60 cloth 73.6 50.0 Spinning Wheel 75 wood 25 cloth 73.6 65.0 Training Dummy 55 wood 60 cloth 73.6 50.0 Of course you wont be able to make diddly with 1 in Carpentry but the tool is free. You will buy Carpentry later and when you get to 50 in that skill you can start to make Wooden Shields which not only are a good money maker (with which to buy tailoring supplies) but will advance your Carpentry skills quite nicely. However, we're getting ahead of ourselves. The city of beginning You next will choose a place to be born; I recommend Vesper at the Youth Hostel. Most people choose Britain. To be sure Britain's a nice city and there are 2 tailor shops there as well as a tannery and a carpentry shop but it's a dangerous place for a new character and the fact that so many people like the place makes it hard to get started as a tailor. It can be done and if you've got your heart set on Britain — go ahead knock yourself out. Vesper has two tailor shops and a carpentry shop as well; it also has a nice partly guarded forest near The Spinning Wheel tailor shop — north bank. And the Spinning Wheel will be your temporary headquarters. The fact that The Adventurer's Supplies provisioners is right next door to the tailor shop is a big plus. As soon as you show up outside the Youth Hostel — hightail it to the bank and drop off everything but your gold and your sewing kit and cloth. Ditch the useless candle, the book and the equally useless dagger unless you have formed some sentimental attachment to these articles in your short jaunt from the Hostel to the bank. Just dump them near the bank; you can't sell them and they wont last long on the ground anyway. Now skeddaddle across the North Bridge to The Spinning Wheel (look on the map. Do I have to tell you everything?) and find the tailor. Buy two more sewing kits and all the thread he/she has in stock subject to your weight limits and your current bankroll. Remember my admonition about weight gained through tailoring above and the number of thread you buy should be evenly divisible by 5. As an aside — when you buy thread, buy as much as you can in one single transaction. If you don't, the greedy NPC's will kite the price on your next purchase and will keep it at that level or higher until they're out or reset. The nitty-gritty of tailoring The sewing kit is the main tool of the tailor; his/her materials are: cloth and leather (in the form of hides). I usually keep at least 3 kits in my backpack unless I plan a 'full court press' in which case I carry 5 (they do wear out you know). I drop each one into the open pack by targeting the extreme upper right-hand corner of the pack. That way they drop right on top of one another and are always in the same place. The other important tools you will be using are the loom and spinning wheel (see below). Which really makes the PC a Tailor/Weaver, whilst the game distinguishes between these two skills in the NPC's. Note — It's important for you to make this distinction as well since you can only buy and sell cloth and yarn to the Weaver; whereas the Tailor will buy and sell it all. On the other hand, the Tailor Guildmaster/mistress will do neither but will train you up to and sometimes exceeding the usual maximum which is 25. There was a time when paying at least 100 gp more than they ask for would pop you up to 30+. That may still work but if your character is already at 50 don't bother. Tools of the trade Using the sewing kit: first understand that the latest changes to the Tailoring skill require that the material needed to make any tailored item must be in your backpack. Double left click on the kit and a windowed menu will pop up from which you may select the desired item to make. Tailoring is now skill based which means that you will only see those objects that you have any hope of making. Which is not the same thing as saying that you will succeed. You won't know that until you target the cloth (it is not necessary to target hides). If you succeed, the sound of scissors snipping will be heard and the item will appear within your backpack. When you fail — not if you fail — some material (cloth or leather) will be lost. The lower your skill or the tougher the item you're trying for, the more material will be lost. As your skill improves so will your failure rate go down. Not only that but so will the amount of material that you will lose; in some cases you will fail but no material will be lost in the failure. The new interface looks for material within your pack. If you have both leather and cloth — you will see both leather and cloth objects to make. It also looks to see how much material you have. If you don't have enough to make anything at all — UO will tell you so and somewhat rudely. If you have the skills but not enough material to make those items — you'll only be shown those things it is possible to make with the materials at hand. Using the wheel: Double left click on the raw material (flax, cotton or wool) and target the wheel hub (see the rebus below). One pile of wool yields 3 yarn, whereas a bundle of flax/bale of cotton each yield 6 thread. We will discuss this aspect in more detail further on (see: Maximizing profits). Using the loom: Double left click the stack of thread/yarn and target the loom near the lower crossbar (see the rebus below). After selecting the loom, you will get a progress message. Keep double clicking the thread/yarn and selecting the loom. If your thread or yarn is in a stack, you can just use the "Lastobject" macro that you were advised to set up using F12 (you did remember did you not?). After the fifth spool or ball, the bolt of cloth will appear in your backpack. It is possible to stack bolts, but they will not automatically do this unless you start the process. Five thread/yarn will produce one bolt of cloth and it doesn't matter if you mix thread and yarn. We will discuss this aspect in more detail further on (see: Maximizing profits). Note — if anyone else is standing near the loom — make sure that they're not using it. There is nothing more frustrating than contributing your thread to someone else's bolt of cloth. The following rebus shows the basic flow in the tailoring process: Note: scissors cannot be used for shearing sheep anymore. Maximizing profits The primary rule of any merchant is: buy low and sell high. That's the ideal at any rate. How can we do that as a tailor in UO? Firstly — let's talk about what not to do: Don't: buy raw materials (cotton, flax, hides, or wool) buy yarn buy bolts of cloth dye bolts Let's start with the last one in the list: dyeing bolts. The NPC doesn't give a hoot whether the finished product is dyed or not — it makes no difference in the buying price. The vendor will pay you only 50% of the retail price +/- a few gp depending upon market. Hence a fancy shirt will bring 26-28 gold. Only the players care if it's dyed or not (we'll discuss selling to players anon). But, if you dye the cloth, unless you always dye it the same color each time you'll waste remnants. That is when you're down to 1 or 2 pieces of cloth, starting on a new bolt will stack the cut bolt onto the remnants only if they're the same color. So the first rule is: don't dye bolts. Bolts of cloth run anywhere from 120-135 gp for 50 yards of cloth each (1 yard can be purchased for 3 gp). Which means that a bolt will yield five 10 yd items if you succeed each time. Hence each item costs you anywhere from 24-27 gp to make. However, it's better to weave your own bolts. Lets do the math: Thread will cost you anywhere from 19-21 gp each (if you've paid attention you will buy as much as you can carry at one time when the price is at 19 gp). It takes 5 thread to make 1 bolt. Thus, a bolt will cost from 95-105 gp if you weave it yourself (I suppose that it's possible to fail at weaving but I've never heard of it happening). Worst case — that's a savings of 15-25 gp/bolt (best case it's 30-40 gp). Now those same 10 yard items have only cost you 19-21 gp each. So if you sold each one of those for 28 gp, rounding off, you profited 7-9 gp each or 35-45 gp/bolt. If you add in the savings/bolt, you've actually earned 40-85 gp/bolt. The second rule, therefore, is: weave your own bolts. A ball of yarn will cost you anywhere from 21-35 gp each and it takes 5 yarn to weave 1 bolt. Hence a bolt woven from purchased yarn will cost you from 105-175 gp/bolt. Get the picture or do we have to do the math again? The third rule then is: don't buy yarn. The typical cost of a pile of wool is 74 gp — sometimes it's more — for a yield of 3 yarn or 25 gp/yarn. It takes 5 yarn to weave 1 bolt; hence it takes 2 wool bundles to yield 1 bolt with 1 yarn left over. Buying 5 wool to yield 15 yarn (3 bolts) costs you 125 gp/bolt. Don't buy wool either. A bale of cotton typically runs 122 gp/bale; a bundle of flax runs 109-122 gp/bundle. Each will yield 6 spools of thread or roughly 18-21 gp/spool. Which puts your cost per bolt at around 90-105 gp/bolt — better but not great and only if you get the flax cheaply; cotton is no bargain. Whereas you can go out and pick the cotton in the New Lands for free (well ... that was true for awhile but someone built a stone fence around the fields in Delucia; try behind the Orc Fort. I believe that I've already said that OSI has a sense of humor, however warped it may be) or shear sheep; also for no cost. Therefore, the fourth rule of tailoring is: gather your own raw materials whenever possible. Though only the Great and Powerful OSI knows where in blazes to harvest flax. The following table summarizes this discussion: Raw Materials Chart Raw Material Price Use on To make Pile of Wool 74g Spinning Wheel 3 balls of yarn Bale of Cotton 122g Spinning Wheel 6 spools of thread Flax Bundle 122g Spinning Wheel 6 Spools of Thread 5 balls of yarn 125g(25g per) Upright Loom A bolt of cloth 5 Spools of thread 105g(21g per) Upright Loom A bolt of cloth Note — A word about shearing sheep. It only requires a sharp edged tool. This can be a dagger or other edged weapon, or — strangely enough — a war axe (this is one reason I urge you to buy a war axe as your primary weapon). Equally strangely it can no longer be a scissors — which will come as a surprise to my Aussie friends no doubt but there it is. The Great God OSI through his avatar Lord British has decreed that scissors are not for shearing. Go figure. Double click the weapon/tool (but not scissors) and then target the unsheared sheep. Make sure that you're not in WAR MODE when you do this else you kill the sheep. In the event that you do kill the sheep (klutz!!), skinning it will yield wool. But the wool you get that way is not normal wool! Take a close look at the accompanying illustration: Look at pile "A" and compare it with pile "B". Note that pile "B" has a slight pinkish hue to it (stained with blood from the poor sheep no doubt). Spinning a pile of tainted wool will only yield 1 yarn which yarn will not stack with yarn made from sheared wool. Whereas wool pile "A" (sheared/normal) will yield 3 yarn. Therefore, there is no excuse to murder sheep (unless you just can't stand their bleating or your pet dragon is hungry in which case — get the wool first). Okay — we've talked about don'ts. What are the do's? Do: weave your own cloth obey the Rule of 3's tour Britannia gather your own hides The first "Do" is primary: weave your own cloth (I know I've said that twice now. Get a grip!). To do that you have to gather your own wool/cotton and/or buy thread while prices are low. Most will do the latter, taking advantage of opportunities to shear sheep or harvest cotton as occasions present themselves. In order to buy low or buy enough you have to be prepared to travel — which subject we'll get to in a minute. There can be a problem with buying thread quite aside from availability and price, however. Take a look at the following illustration: Warning Will Tailor! Warning! When you see this on the NPC's listing, there's a better than even chance that those spools are bugged. When you buy them they will stack within your pack. However, odds are — when you double left click on the stack — nothing will happen; that is no targeting cursor will appear. When that happens, take 1 spool at a time off the stack and double click on it. You may or may not get a targeting cursor. If you do, either click on the loom or press ESCape to cancel and stack that spool separately. When you find the one (sometimes two or more) spools that are bugged — give them to the tailor for 'brownie points'. Do not sell them to him since that's how he got them in the first place; some player probably found a spool on a monsters corpse. Making your own thread seems to work but when you sell any such spools to the tailor something happens to some of them. I've done some experimentation and found that maybe half will be bugged after selling them to the NPC shopkeeper. It's no big deal as long as you are alert to the existence of this bug. The Rule of 3, is a simple rule and simply followed. Simply stand next to the tailor and make 3 fancy shirts and sell them — don't bother with plain shirts unless you're absolutely desperate for cash (hence the red 'X' through the plain shirt in the rebus above). If he/she buys them, immediately make 3 more and sell those. Continue until he/she will buy no more (they will generally buy 10-20 of any item but sometimes someone will have beaten you to it and then they will buy less or none at all) then switch to plain dresses. Make 3, sell these and repeat until the market dries up. When it does, do robes and repeat. The reason you make them in 3's is that 3 items fit on the selling list without scrolling which moves the process along much more quickly. Also — quick transactions serve to root the tailor in place. Each time you talk to him/her and/or do a transaction, their movement timer is reset. Simple concept. This way you also end up with less surplus stock since you will not likely have over-produced. Note — the NPC Tailors never seem to get enough skullcaps. You can make and sell them all day to the same NPC Tailor if you wish. Also, plain shirts are profitable again so ignore the red "X" through the shirt in the rebus above. Clothing Profitability Chart Clothing Cloth Price Profit * Unit Profit Plain Shirt 8 28-30 gp 66-78 gp 11-13 gp Fancy Shirt 8 25-28 gp 48-66 gp 8-11 gp Plain Dresses 10 28-30 gp 35-45 gp 7-9 gp Robe 16 36-40 gp 6-18 gp 2-6 gp Skullcap 2 6 gp 50 gp 2 gp Long Pants 8 19 gp 12 gp 2 gp Body Sash 4 10 gp 24 gp 2 gp Kilt 8 18 gp 6 gp 1 gp Doublet 8 18 gp 6 gp 1 gp Half Apron 6 14 gp 8 gp 1 gp Cloak 14 30 gp 3 gp 1 gp Skirt 10 17-19 gp -15 gp -2.1 gp Fancy Dress 12 15 gp -40 gp -10 gp Tunic 18 18 gp -40 gp -20 gp Jester's Suit 24 33 gp -38 gp -19 gp Bandana 2 ** Full Apron 10 ** * Assumes bolt of cloth(50 yards) at a cost of 105gp ** Tailor won't buy currently (may change) The peripatetic tailor The problem with tailoring is that you can't stay in one place and expect to market your goods in volume; leastwise not in a timely manner. The NPC Tailors will only buy a certain amount of any single item before they "fill up" and stop buying until the next Sosarian day (about two hours in the real world). You can do several things about this. First, make several different items, but even that only goes so far because, generally, the maximum amount of a single item that they will buy from you is usually ten. Hence, you're going to have to travel and visit many different tailor shops to sell your wares. To do this effectively, you must be able to Recall because the facts are that traveling on foot is not only time consuming but downright dangerous not to say foolhardy and some places cannot be reached except by boat or through Magery. This is why I recommended that you take a high skill in Magery as well as the 20 in INT to begin with. So, the formula I use to 'power tailor' is to make as many high return items that I can possibly hold (fancy shirts, plain dresses and robes), then travel around selling them to all the tailor shops in the land. And while you are visiting the shops, buy as many spools of thread you can as well, so you will be able to return and make more items to sell. As soon as you build up a pile of gold beavering away there at The Spinning Wheel spend some of it on the following: 2 Mark scrolls, 2 unmarked runes, 1 Recall scroll and 20 of each reagent. If you know someone or find a player vendor selling lockable small boxes (the red kind) buy one. Then read over Elowan's Guide to Adventurer's Backpacks in The Way of the Warrior under Professions about the use of that box and take heed of the advice therein. While browsing through the player vendors wares take notice of any runes for sale. Buy any that are marked for tailor shops or if none be found, for cities which have tailor shops. A reasonable price for a City Rune ranges from 100-150 gp. You must have runes to each of the tailor shops in the realm if you are to be successful in your trade. A normal price for a Mark scroll is 65 gp — no more; 55-60 for Recall; there should be scroll vendors close by or in Vesper itself. Seek one out. Mark one rune within the bank in one of the back rooms. Mark the other within the bedroom at the tailor shop. Drop the Recall scroll onto your spellbook. Now to go to the bank and back — use Recall; 'tis much safer and faster that way. You'll fizzle at first but you'll get better at it as you go along. The following table lists the locations and names of tailor shops throughout Britannia and The New Lands: Britannian Tailors Location Shop Name Britain The Right Fit ----- The Lords Clothiers Jhelom Adventurer's Needle ----- Jhelom's Fine Tailoring Magincia Stitchin' Time Moonglow The Scholar's Cut Nujel'm Tailor of the Isle Ocllo A Stitch in Time Serpent's Hold Silver Serpent Tailors Skara Brae Shear Pleasure Trinsic Adventurer's Clothing Vesper The Spinning Wheel - city ----- The Spinning Wheel - north bank Delucia Tailor Papua Tailor Any player in the game has easy access to the major cities on the main land. Few have the means to visit other islands. If you can get to another island and set a rune it would allow you access to a less trafficked tailor's shop. Ocllo, Jhelom, and Skara Brae have tailor's shops that do not get very much traffic. I would not suggest starting off on an island as you would have the same trouble with access to the mainland. Getting to know how to use the moongates can be a definite advantage early in your career. Once you have acquired a rune for a few cities and especially for Ocllo, I recommend that you relocate to that city. It's less crowded than is Vesper or even Jhelom (though Jhelom has two tailor shops) making it easier to sell your wares. The provisioners is across the street; the inn is next door and the bank is not far away. It has a lot more wooded areas as well which will become important for working up your Carpentry and Lumberjacking. It's a pleasant place withal and once you start venturing out for hides — is a much safer venue. Venturing into the wilds There will eventually come a time when you will need to start tailoring hides. It is possible to never touch a hide and do well monetarily but if you intend to advance very far in the skill — you must tailor hides. The down side is you have to find and hunt down the hide bearing animals. This takes time, it takes arrows if you are an archer or proficiency if you are a warrior, and you have to travel around searching for prey. It also takes a greater Tailoring skill to make leather items than it does to make cloth ones. There was a time — long ago it seems — when the tanneries in Britain and elsewhere carried quantities of hides. Buying these up and then leaving them beside you on the floor, you could tailor up a storm. Nowadays you cannot tailor material outside one's pack and hides are harder to find. There's nothing for it but to break out the trusty war axe and go hunting. Venturing out into the unguarded areas is not without hazard, even on the island of Ocllo. Occasional vermin such as orcs have been known to spring up in the southern forests from time to time on the island, and lizardmen and even ogres are not unheard of. Occasionally, a water elemental may go astray and come ashore but such occurrences are few and far between. Still, an enraged bull or even a Great Hart can beat the snot out of you if you are unprepared and inexperienced or have insufficient STR. Therefore, it's a good idea to wear some sort of armour protection. At first — at least until your STR reaches 60 — you'll have to content yourself with wearing chainmail. Until you can wear full plate (tunic [breastplate] and legs), I recommend a GM grade Archers Set. There are two varieties — Light and Heavy. The Heavy set substitutes plate arms for the ringmail sleeves in the Light set and boosts your AR 2 points from 28 to 30. These sets tend to be pricey and range from 1300-1600/set, however. You also need to know a thing or two about preparation for battle. I suggest that you take a look at Elowan's The Way of the Warrior for some further tips on the subject. There are 4 different kinds of leather (hides) that a warrior can cut from a monster's corpse: Leathers Plain Spined Horned Barbed Animals Yielding Normal Hides Animal Yield Animal Yield alligator 12 gorilla 1* bear, brown/black 12 llama 12 bear, grizzly 16 hart, great 15 bear, polar 3 hind 8 bull 15 horse 10 cat 1* panther 10 cougar 10 rabbit 4 cow 12 snow leopard 1* goat 8 walrus 12 goat, mountain 12 wolf, timber 5 * message is: don't kill these creatures Bears and llamas used to give fur but fur has disappeared from UO — at least temporarily though I have seen a furrier in Britain and Nujel'm from time to time. Perhaps furs will come back when (and if) OSI ever gets weather straightened out. Then having fur or even wool will make more sense, but for now such things are for collectors. Monsters Yielding Normal Hides Monster Yield Monster Yield Bullfrog 4 Mongbat, strong 6 Dire Wolf 7 Swamp Dragon 20 Giant Rat 6     Monsters Yielding Spined Hides Monster Yield Monster Yield Alligator 12 Lava Lizard 12 Dire Wolf 7 Lizard Men 12 Giant Ice Serpents 15 Pixies 5 Giant Serpent 15 Ratman 8 Giant Toad 12 Ridgeback 12 Imp 6 Small Hellcat 10 Large Hellcat 10     Monsters Yielding Horned Hides Monster Yield Monster Yield Deep Sea Serpents ? Sea Serpents 10 Drake 20 Unicorn 10 Ki-rin 10 Wyvern 20 Monsters Yielding Barbed Hides Monster Yield Monster Yield Ancient Wyrm 20 Nightmare 10 Dragon 20 White Wyrm 20 As you can see, the tougher monsters also yield a tougher kind of leather. A full set of exceptional studded normal leather armor gives you an AR of 18. The same set made of spined leather gives you an AR of 27, horned gives 29, and barbed 32. If you add some bones to the mix, and create sets of exceptional barbed bone armor, you can tailor armor with an AR of 48. Not bad for some needlework eh ? Monsters Yielding Bones Monster Yield Monster Yield Giant Serpent * Shadow Wisp * Horde Minion * Zombie * more monsters to be added later * The type and number of bones found on these monsters varies. Note: Bones found when fishing for treasure chests, or found in dungeon chests can also be used by tailors. Raw bones will not do a tailor any good. To convert raw bones into usable bones, use a scissor on them. You will end up with femur bones, which are stackable. The bone types that you can cut up are: Bones, Jaw Bones, Pelvic Bones, Bone Shards, Spines, Rib Cages and Bone Piles. You cannot cut up skulls, body parts or bone containers to get tailor usable bones. Skinning a hide animal (by double left-clicking on a bladed object — such as your war axe — and targeting the dead animal) will also produce some raw meat in the form of ribs. Provisioners will not buy the raw meat though the butcher may. Provisioners will buy the cooked meat. This is a good way to raise all 3 stats to higher levels instead of discarding the carved ribs. Within hours of hunting you will have gained several stat points that way. Cooking and Camping skills can be just allowed to atrophy later.. However, if you don't wish to take the time to do this don't just leave stuff lying on the ground! OSI frowns when people litter the countryside with cast-off bits. He manifests this displeasure by instructing his minion the Spawning God to reduce the number and frequency of new creatures being manifest within the Land. To please him, place your castoffs onto the corpse so that they and it may be recycled quickly into the Land and be reborn more quickly. 'Tis thy civic duty in any event. I also recommend that you tote a pair of scissors. Hides are very heavy. However, double left-clicking on the scissors and targeting the pile of hides will result in a pile of leather weighing considerably less (1 stone/hide). The leather counts as hides do in making items. Note: currently the scissors will only convert 50 hides at a time into leather. That should not create a problem, however, so don't write any nasty letters to the priests of OSI. At your current Tailoring skill of 50, you should be comfortably able to stitch boots, sandals, shoes and thigh boots and earn a profit at it. These will have to be sold to the cobbler(s) found in most provisioners shops. I say most because occasionally no cobblers are to be found there. The city of Wind is one such place. At one time there was a tailor (there's a tailor shop, albeit only a sort of one since there is no loom or spinning wheel there), a cobbler, and a provisioner. For some reason these NPC's have gone missing (at least on Great Lakes and I suspect the other shards as well) in Wind. But unless you have a magery of 72 and a fondness for dealing with liches (not really in the tailoring line and liches have no sense of fashion) you will not likely visit the fabled city. By far, the highest return on investment is leather armor, because unless you buy the hides, which few people do, it is 100% profit. You sell leather armor at armorer's and provisioners. In my youth you could always tailor a suit of female plate armor. Such an item would fetch from between 100-125 gold. Alas, this choice is denied you now. And unless and until you shall have reached the 64th degree of Tailoring skill — perhaps somewhat sooner but unlikely — you will not be able to make female armour at all. I am grateful to the good Sweet who points out that a mere 56.8 skill level (which should not take you long to achieve having started at 50) will permit you to stitch leather gloves which are, in point of fact, the most profitable item a tailor may make. They take but 3 hides and sell for 24-30gp each; a return of 8-10 gp/hide. Selling price for Leather Items Item # of Hides Selling price Gold per Hide Leather Armor Gorget 4 37g 9g Gloves 3 30g 10g Sleeves 4 40g 10g Leggings 10 40g 4g Tunic 12 52g 4g Female Armor One piece 8 52 gp 6 gp Shorts 8 34 gp 4 gp Skirt 6 43 gp 7 gp Bustier 6 57 gp 9 gp Footwear Boots 8 20-28g 2-4g Sandals 4 10g 2-3g Shoes 6 16g 2-3g Thigh Boots 10 28g 3g   Selling price for Studded Items Item # of Hides Selling price Gold per Hide Studded Armor Gorget 6 37g 6 gp Gloves 8 40g 5 gp Sleeves 10 45 gp 5 gp Leggings 12 52 gp 4 gp Tunic 14 64 gp 5 gp Female Studded Armor One Piece 10 72 gp 7 gp Bustier 8 55 gp 7 gp Recently, because of sun spots no doubt, if you possess only those hides sufficient to tailor a particular garment, the tailoring will result in one hide left over. I do not know why this is so, suffice that it may only take 7 hides for a suit of armor, 9 hides for leggings, etc. Save the remaining one to re-stack and thank the Great God OSI for his largess. When you become more proficient with tailoring — studded armor tunics and leggings provide good return as do bustiers. Some experts aver that the bustier is the most profitable amongst the choices, but as Sweet points out — correctly — recently and at 30 gp/3 hides, gloves are more so, with leather sleeves and gorgets a close second; bustiers are close but still in third place. Note — when venturing outside the safety of the town guards, always keep your pack open and visible. Be prepared to jettison your extra hides should flight become necessary. Remember this, however: "Running is not a plan; running is what you do when a plan fails." Running is good for the soul; it is certainly good for your health. Nor is it unseemly. It is easy to gauge how far to run by bringing up the vision of your pursuers stats. As you run, when the stat bar disappears, your pursuer has been outrun. Which is not the same as saying it has stopped chasing you nor are you necessarily safe from being cast upon. Running will be come even more important in the future. The Great God OSI has taken heed of his supplicants prayers. I have it on the authority of the Priests of OSI that the range of spells will soon be limited so that there will be a safe distance beyond which one cannot be struck by, say, a fireball. It will still not be possible to outrun such a spell, however. If you can manage it, try to venture out with someone of your own level and someone with whom you have developed a trusting relationship. Do not go with just anyone who asks you to do so. I regret to say that even if they are entitled with the appellation: Great Lord, some of these are of such stripe as not to scruple to lead the unwary into an ambush by evil doers and afterwards sharing the spoils with them. On the other hand, most neophytes are relatively safe from this scourge since they own little of value. Which is a hint: if you go hunting, wear old clothes and leave your Gucchi backpack within the bank. What to make and when to make it To raise your tailoring skill, you should make items that you have about 70% chance of success with, according to the Tailoring Skill list (actual skills required may vary somewhat depending upon the phase of the moon, the mood of DD's cat and 'fixes' to the software). However, these items often don't have the greatest return value monetarily. Plus, once you get into leather items, they tend to be heavy. After a certain point, I was leaving everything I made on the animal corpses, because returning to town and selling was taking too long; if you're on Ocllo that won't be necessary since the town is not that far away. Arcane Clothing Skilled tailors have the ability to use Arcane Gems on some pieces of clothing and thus create Arcane Clothing. (Frontal view, backside view) To use the arcane gems, double-click a gem and then target the piece of clothing you wish to make arcane. You must already have an exceptionally crafted piece of clothing, and it must be one of the following: Robe, cloak, leather gloves, or thigh boots. Arcane clothing items receive a maker's mark automatically, even if the tailor who crafted them is not a GM tailor... it's not optional. The arcane clothing lets you use charges of it in place of reagents. When you cast a spell without sufficient reagents, the clothing will lose one charge per spell. Charges will only be drawn from the clothing if the wearer does not have sufficient reagents for a spell in his backpack. When the charges are gone, the arcane item loses the special appearance it was given when it was made arcane, although the label remains (complete with maker's mark)... It can be recharged by targeting it with another arcane gem, but you won't necessarily recharge it fully with one gem even though only one gem is required to enhance a piece of clothing. Arcane clothing is charged with 24 charges for a Legendary Tailor(120). For each 5 points lower, one charge is deducted. So from 115.0 to 119.9 skill, only 23 charges will be applied and so on. By combining a robe, cape, thigh boots and leather gloves you can be equipped with 96 charges maximum. You do not have to be a tailor to recharge an Arcane clothing item that has run out of charges. However, the higher your tailoring skill, the more charges will be added (with a maximum of 24). Arcane clothing can be dyed like regular clothes , but it cannot be blessed. Also, do not change blessed clothing into Arcane clothing since the blessed status will *not* be retained.