CC Skills Crafting Category

**Craft** skills are professional trades or pastimes that require skilled work for the production of particular products. Before the advent of manufacturing, this was the backbone of business trade. This is generally accompanied by some business and artistic skill, and sometimes by some small amount artistic and/or engineering skill.

Base skill rating points instill the fundamentals of identifying needs, gathering resources, and direction to develop the sub-skills for actual production. After 10 points, select a sub-skill. Here's a basic list:

* Basket weaving: the construction of useful items by the drying and weaving of vegetable matter. Although in America, the big College joke is that only the underwater version is taught, the skill is pure money in some countries, and most practitioners specialize in one or two items. The product is most often for export, but can be a handy survivalist skill, especially for fashionable troops stationed in the jungle. Skills of 10 or better can fashion a functional bit of non-load bearing furniture. Skills of 20 or better have a grasp of structural integrity and can create load-bearing items (chairs, beds). At skill of 30 or better, you can make it look nice. At skills of 50, even Ethan Allen would carry the bamboo piece.
* Carpentry: the art and trade of cutting, working, and joining timber. The base levels of this skill are reserved for learning the dynamics of the wood, the strengths and weakness of various types, and the use of the tools of the trade, from the hammer and nails, to planes, chisels, awls, pliers, screwdrivers, levels and saws (crosscut, rip, tenon, dovetail and keyhole). Most start crawling up the learning curve with manual tools, but most professional work is done with power tools. The biggest area for carpenters is small structures (wood framed single family dwellings), and framing can be done competently at a skill of 25+ (from studding the walls to joisting the floors). After that, every ten points of skill can add another specialization, such as Joining for interior work (decorative, as opposed to structural, joining. Think door frames, cabinets, etc.). Other possibilities include temporary formwork and shuttering for concrete construction, and fine craftsmanship (curios and furniture, which may involve additional tools from lathes to lasers). Bob Vila probably has a skill upwards of 70.
* Leathering: Skinning, tanning, and decoration of animal hides (larger animals) and skins (smaller critters), of which the final products are called leathers. The leather is then fashioned into usable items, from jackets to boots to seat covers for a Chrysler. This skill also includes fur work, which involves many of the same tanning processes, but goes on to the address peculiarities of working with the color and texture of the fur, and the eventual glazing of the finished product. Not a fashionable skill, but a well-paying one and handy to have if you're marooned in Siberia. A skill of 10+ will keep the carcass from rotting off your back, while 30+ will get your product sold like hotcakes in Juarez leather shops.
* Masonry: Construction with brick, clay, stone and concrete (block, poured, regular and reinforced). Each medium is it's own specialty, and an increase in skill reflects ability to construct more complex engineering. A skill of ten can make a low wall without it falling over. Skill of 25+ is to know compression techniques to build larger structures (arches for bridges, aqueducts, vaults for ceilings, etc.). Civil Engineers require at least a 25+ skill, as do certain materials researchers. The average foreman at a multi-level parking structure site will have a skill of 50+ (concrete).
* Pottery: Construction of clay vessels and containers, from earthenware to porcelain and the glazes that make them great. While this isn't much of an operational skill, it is a great bread-and-butter skill for folks the grew up in outlying areas, folks with an interest in antique Chinese or Greek porcelain, folks that work for Currier and Ives, or people interested in recreating a scene from "Ghost". Skills of 10+ will keep an earthenware bowl from falling apart, while a skill of 80+ can produce a convincing forgery of a Ming vase.
* Tailoring: construction of clothing for durability, style, and comfort. This is more than just the guys at the suit shop, it is the fundamental skill of seamstresses and designers. A low skill indicates you can reattach a button back to your pants (this about my skill level). A 15+ says the character knows his way around a sewing machine and a 30+ indicates an excellent grasp of textile materials. Calvin Klein, as well as the designers of CMC Rescue Harnesses have skills upwards of 60.