Would a 9 lb sapient spider producing 1/10 lb of silk a day suspend your disbelief?

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by Apache

*grabs a flamethrower and a 10-lb bowl of butter*

They're apparently slow enough to be basically harmless - local kids like to flip them over with sticks.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by roguebfl

It should be noted the larger arachnids are all (IIRC) hunting spiders not web layers.

But that being said "That scream in the dark is either some who just discovered a large harry spider crawling up their leg, or just discovery they are crawling up the leg of a larger hairy spider." (now i wish i remember where i heard that)

My girlfriend loved that quote.

Many large spiders still produce silk even if they don't make actual webs with it.

Would it make much of a difference if they weren't sapient but well trained farm animals? Would that be enough to make silk cheap-ish?

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Would it make much of a difference if they weren't sapient but well trained farm animals? Would that be enough to make silk cheap-ish?

Why do they have to be giant? Small animals usually have a higher metabolic rate relative to their mass, and would therefore be relatively faster, plus there seems to be an advantage (in terms of silk grade) to smaller spinnerets. In any case, realistically it would probably be possible to have a critter that produces silkworm-quality silk at a somewhat lower price than conventional silk (there are inefficiencies in the silkworm process), or spider-quality silk at a higher price (good quality and fast don't go together well), what you mostly need is a silk producer that can be farmed.

[Flyndaran]

I suppose having simply a normal large omnivorous sociable spider would work more easily and plausibly.
I just thought it would be neat to have a spider character that produced cheap silk.
None of this precludes having a spider race and a farmable normal spider and make it a common misconception that they are the same.

[Ze'Manel Cunha]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

I suppose having simply a normal large omnivorous sociable spider would work more easily and plausibly.
I just thought it would be neat to have a spider character that produced cheap silk.
None of this precludes having a spider race and a farmable normal spider and make it a common misconception that they are the same.

You could build them as life-stages, sociable infancy normal sized spiders until adolescence who make farmable spider-silk, sociable adolescence of domesticated animal level intelligence who make a farmable silk comparable more to silkworm than spidersilk, sociable mature 9 lb intelligent spiders who extrude a spider "milk" which they feed the infants.

[Flyndaran]

That raises the question of what the juveniles need silk for if they get their food from mamas/papas. But an interesting idea to expound upon. I give you that. :)
How about infants weave webbing in order to stay on the back of their mothers? In modern-ish times they don't need it because of cribs, backboards,etc.
Youths use it for hunting before they would have had the intelligence to use more complex strategy.
Adults may produce some as a vestigial but slightly marketable trait.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

I just thought it would be neat to have a spider character that produced cheap silk.

I don't think that your gaming preferences actually fit with gritty realism. If you want giant silk-producing spiders, and your players aren't going to look too closely, go for it.

[Flyndaran]

But I waaaaaaaaant it. ;)

I'm good at BS-ing, so getting any hypothetical players to believe stuff is unlikely to be problem.

Extinct race of bio-engineers made many of the races from simple animal stock for certain purposes. Tailor spiders, human farmers, shoe making leprechauns... see it all makes sense now, doesn't it? :)

[Alden Loveshade]

Originally Posted by LemmingLord

What do you mean - an African or European sapient spider-like creature?

I literally loled on that one.

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

...9lbs may be too small for sapience but that's pretty fuzzy....

Try telling that to the mother of a new-born baby.

Also assuming that the GURPS UT estimate that 1 Terabyte could hold the contents of a human brain is accurate, I don't see a problem imagining a spider with a type of brain construction that could work at that size.

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

That raises the question of what the juveniles need silk for if they get their food from mamas/papas....

This to me is the biggest move away from known reality. Most spiders are solitary. A few "hang together" in groups, but no known spider shows signs of true social behavior. They also start with their adult-behaviors "hard-wired," so don't need to learn from Mommy. Technically, the beings you're describing probably wouldn't be classified as spiders. But if it looks like a spider, swims like a spider, and quacks like a spider....

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Alden_Loveshade

I literally loled on that one.



Try telling that to the mother of a new-born baby.

...

My mom didn't consider us, her kids, people until we started doing stuff like my sound effect jokes at 2 months. But she's odd.
Human babies are more like primate fetuses than proper infants.
But with some species of parrots being sapient, like the Kea, I don't see how odd it would be to have a more intelligent animal 4 times its size.