Harvesting Poison from Dead Animals

[Dagger]

Something came up in my game that I've never dealt with before. Is it possible for an Assassin to harvest poison from a dead animal that has a poison attack such as a spider or snake? A player in my group wanted to chop up a giant spider to find its 'poison sac' and harvest the poison for coating weapons. Biology is an area that I don't have much knowledge in and I couldn't find any rules for this. Is this a brilliant idea that should be rewarded or a sly player trying to pull the wool over my eyes?

[thedungeondelver]

Something came up in my game that I've never dealt with before. Is it possible for an Assassin to harvest poison from a dead animal that has a poison attack such as a spider or snake? A player in my group wanted to chop up a giant spider to find its 'poison sac' and harvest the poison for coating weapons. Biology is an area that I don't have much knowledge in and I couldn't find any rules for this. Is this a brilliant idea that should be rewarded or a sly player trying to pull the wool over my eyes?

No; it's a good idea and if the players want to do it I let them roll with it. However, a few things to consider:

1: there's a danger inherent in handling large quantities of poison. Unless they specify they are taking measures to avoid contamination (heavy gloves, cloth around their mouth & nose, etc.) everyone handling the poison should make a save to avoid being poisoned again.

2: having the likely large amount of poison on their persons would, in most civilized, lawful (or at least good) societies arouse mistrust and suspicion, unless they're taking it to an apothecary to have curatives made.

3: the use of poison is an evil act; good and most certainly lawful good types in the party would (or at least should) eschew such harvesting

[grodog]

My 2 coppers:

1: there's a danger inherent in handling large quantities of poison. Unless they specify they are taking measures to avoid contamination (heavy gloves, cloth around their mouth & nose, etc.) everyone handling the poison should make a save to avoid being poisoned again.

I don't know if I'd go quite that far, unless the PC was stupid, but for dumb PCs, then yes, roll that d20 baby

2: having the likely large amount of poison on their persons would, in most civilized, lawful (or at least good) societies arouse mistrust and suspicion, unless they're taking it to an apothecary to have curatives made.

Also, carrying around large quantities of poison should be difficult and/or hazardous: what is the PC storing this in---a glass or stone container? a wineskin? a steel flask? Item saving throws should definitely be used regardless, and if the PC were to fall into a pit, or whatever, and have his wineskin of cobra venom burst, then they should definitely suffer the effects!

3: the use of poison is an evil act; good and most certainly lawful good types in the party would (or at least should) eschew such harvesting

Unless of course they were trying to prevent the usage of such venom by evil doers: properly destroying sources for poison should be well-within the rights on that front; in some cases, poisons may even be legitimate ingredients in potions, for example, so insuring that the poisons are used properly is probably OK too (as long as the potion isn't a lichdom potion or somesuch ).

[grodog]

Three good articles on poisons were Charles Sagui's "Poisons From AA to XX" TD 32, Larry DiTillio's "Poison: The Toxins Of Cerilon" in Dragon 59, and "Taking the Sting Out of Poison" by Chris Landsea in Dragon 81. I don't recall offhand if any of the three of those dealt with harvesting poisons from slain animals, but those are the first places I would go look (after the DMG and PHB, of course).

[DuBeers]

I seem to recall that venom harvested in such a way would lose potency fairly quickly. If you want to reward the player for good thinking but not "give away the farm" you could use this to limit the player form acquiring a very large supply of poisons.

It's just a thought.

[Wheggi]

I dunno, but I think that it may be hard for the novice poison collector to actually locate the poison sacs on large monstrous creatures. I know if you told me to 'find the poison producing organ on this here giant scorpion, extract it, and then make it usable on normal weapons', I'd be at a total loss.

- Wheggi

[Chainsaw]

Another possibility might be ruling that the poisons lose significant toxicity or are impossible to harvest if the target beast is dead. Not sure I've ever seen any snakehandlers take toxin from dead snakes, but... that's just based on watching the Discovery Channel, heh.

Besides, this is a magical world where the normal rules don't necessarily apply. Harvesting poison from dead 'magical' beasts might be even be impossible (make up beast specific reasons).

[Algolei]

Venomous animals usually have a limited supply of poison stored in their sacs (something that isn't taken into account in the rules, of course), so you wouldn't be able to harvest many doses. My first thought would be, how would you handle an envenomed weapon with a small dose of venom on it, or one with a large dose? Bonuses or penalties to saving throws seem to be the most obvious answer. Would a double dose of centipede venom cancel out the saving throw bonus you normally get from it?

Assassins are trained in the use of poison, so I would expect them to be the most likely characters to have training in extracting it from dead animals.

Accidentally poisoning oneself should always be a hazard. I'd suggest having the person with an envenomed blade roll a save if their attack roll comes up a natural 1, to represent a minor cut that wouldn't normally cause any problems.

I know some venoms break down when exposed to air, but I believe there are some that don't. It's easiest to treat them all the same, however, so I'd say a failed extraction process should either ruin the venom or cause it to have only a few hours of effectiveness before becoming inert.

And finally, ...uh, I forget my last point. It seemed important to me just moments ago, but now my mind's a complete blank. Hey look! A flashlight! Mmm, shiny. On. Off. On. Off. Wheeeeeeee...!

Oh, I remember what it was! (Wow, the flashlight brain distraction trick worked!? ) Some venoms only work when they hit the blood stream, and others work on contact. Some even have different effects depending on whether they're injected or just contacted with exposed skin. Since it's hard to rule which way to go with any given fantasy poison, I'd say that a poison is only effective when injected unless the creature in question is able, in its creature description, to spit the poison. (Generally speaking, a poison that can only be delivered with a penetrating bite wouldn't need to have a contact effect, so [evolutionarily speaking ] it shouldn't have one.)

For the record, I did research venoms for my campaign world, but it was more than ten years ago. In fact, I'll bet I still have the notes I took. Probably on the old computer, in a WordPerfect 5.1 file.

[axemental]

Consider too this is a game, such a ruling might change the feel of the game in a negative way.

Also consider the dose would be wrong, as would be the consentration and method of application. For instance, a spider bites deep into your system and injects a large dose, I doubt spider venom would even stick to a sword blade, never mind make it into the blood stream in a large enough dose (to have the same save apply or act as quickly). Also, IRL I don't think animal poison was considered the best choice. I recall plant poisons being what were/are typically used (for both injested and inflicted wounds).

I have in the past, allowed PCs to bring giant poison animals (spiders, scorpians, snakes) to witches or assassins skilled in such brewing to make such poison. But that was part of an adventure, and not a routine deal (PCs don't go into the collecting poison business).

[Sacrificial Lamb]

Any character I run might harvest poison from dead animals for the sake of creating antitoxins. It's a dirty job, but somebody's gotta do it....