Need hundreds of feathers to make arrows

[BOZ]

I'm playing a 15th-level druid as part of a party in a 3.5 campaign. I have been tasked with obtaining hundreds – if not thousands – of bird feathers so that a small town can mass produce arrows to defend against a small army. Assuming that it would be difficult to purchase the necessary quantities, and that I have a little over two weeks to obtain as many feathers as I can, what possible methods could I use? I was born a gnome, but was recently reincarnated as a pixie. Also in the party are a wizard, bard, paladin, rogue, and cleric.

 

[n00bdragon]

Summon Nature's Ally (I-whatever) to summon owls. Butcher owls for feathers.

 

[BOZ]

Thought of that, but don't the bodies disappear when they die?

 

[n00bdragon]

Fine, pluck them while they are alive and then dismiss them.

 

[billd91]

Plucking alive or dead wouldn't matter much - the feathers should still disappear when the duration ends.

 

[Scrivener of Doom]

What about spamming baleful polymorph? You could turn all sorts of critters - mice, snails etc... - into chickens (assuming chicken feathers work for arrows). At 15th-level you should be able to spam that quite a bit each day.

Also, at 15th-level you can cast control winds with enough power to cause tornado force winds over a massive area. (By the way, that's the only spell you need to destroy a small army. Forget the feathers!) Would your DM allow you to use that to wipe out every bird within the spell's area of effect and bring their bodies to you? If he won't allow that, just tell him you wiped out his army using the same spell.

 

[radja]

wildshape into a bird and provide the feathers yourself? To be honest, I'd do this the traditional way: have the town's kids collect feathers and bring them to you. Shouldn't take them more than 2 or 3 days.

 

[Stormonu]

If you can't find birds, consider using leaves or paper. You simply need something thin and slightly flexible to stabilize the arrow's flight; feathers are just the traditional item to use, not mandatory. (Heck, you could leave the feathers off entirely, but that will greatly decrease range - you're basically making the bows into spearchuckers).

 

[Quickleaf]

The European way: buy several whole dead geese at the market for chump change, or go out geese hunting.

The American way: shoot or barter for a couple big bull turkeys.

The Hawaiian way: make a sticky paper trap for little birds around a lure/feeder, then once they're trapped pluck only a few feathers from each one, then let them go. Repeat. A lot.

 

[MarkB]

The D&D way: Sneak into the small army's camp and steal their arrows.