Beasts of Burden and War.

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Beasts of Burden and War.

Post by Username17 »

One of the things about kitchen sink fantasy that I think gets underused in fantasy settings is that having a whole lot of fantasy cultures with completely different development and evolution implies a whole lot of different domesticated animals. Also, a whole lot of different domesticated grains and vegetables, but that's probably a different thread.

AD&D actually touched on that a little bit when they described the camp and village contents of the various races. Dwarven villages apparently have tamed wolves and brown bears. Wood Elves apparently have giant owls and giant lynxes in their camps. Gnomes train giant badgers and wolverines. Kobolds have boars and giant weasels in their dens. Even Giants got in on the action, with Frost Giants having winter wolves as guards, Cloud Giants having spotted lions as pets, and Hill Giants having dire wolves and giant lizards as guard animals.

This kind of thing really helps the races be more than just humans in face paint. When Dwarves have brown bears as pets, they aren't just Jews or Vikings or even Jewish Vikings - they are a fantasy culture that keeps fuck brown bears as pets. In the original writeup, Gnolls were a crossbreed of Gnome and Troll (don't think about it too much), but once they got hyenas as pets they ended up turning into the lazy beastmen we know and love today.

From a practical standpoint, it is desirable for races to have mounts and guard animals. But because fantasy adventure gaming is tiered, it is also important for races to have access to magical and flying mounts. The mounted warrior archetype requires level appropriate mounts, and as they go up in tiers they are going to need new mounts. The wolf that a Goblin rides into battle at first level is simply not going to cut the mustard at 6th level. They'll need a worg, and eventually something with wings.

To an extent, this seems like it could easily end up with an over-proliferation of magical riding beasts. And if done in an undisciplined manner, that's exactly what could happen. For example: in 2nd edition AD&D, there were regular Unicorns of course, but in order to produce unicorn flavored riding beasts for various factions there were separate writeups for Brown Unicorns, Red Unicorns, at least two flavors of Black Unicorns, at least two flavors of Gray Unicorns, Tan Unicorns, Spotted Unicorns, Striped Unicorns, and so on and so on. Clearly, that's stupid. Also exceedingly unnecessary. I really wish I was making up any of the Unicorn flavor colors on that list.

There are, I believe, plenty of potential riding beasts such that one doesn't have to delve into ridiculous palette swaps to bring culturally appropriate knights of different races onto the battlefield at different tiers of play. To a first approximation, people can ride giant versions of pretty much anything. Giant Goats are saddle ready in canon, and Kobolds can go to war on giant weasels to their heart's content.

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Kobolds on giant weasels? Why not?

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You can get miniatures of Gnomes on giant ferrets.

Guard animals at the low end are similarly available. Giant animals can be pretty much arbitrarily giant, so even non-threatening animals like hamsters can be powerful beasts of war.

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As this Gnome's giant hamster clearly demonstrates.

The top end is, I will admit, fairly limited. When it comes down to it, you are going to be riding a Dragon. You might be riding an Undead Dragon or a Mechanical Dragon or whatever, but it's going to be your character on a Dragon when it comes time to to joust with the Lich Emperor for the fate of the Time Shards. That's just how it goes. However, that's actually fine, both because there are a lot of dragon flavors to choose from and because most characters don't get that high level in the first place.

Where things get a little fuzzy is when the pool begins to get deep. Obviously you aren't going to be able to fight a Dragon on horseback, because the Dragon fucking flies and breathes a cone of flame that wipes everything as weak as horse off the battlefield as an afterthought. In the mid range, characters will need a couple of mount upgrades, but that's still in the range where characters should logically be getting their mounts from the high end stables of major cities rather than as gifts from gods. This means that there need to be magical mounts and flying mounts that are available for purchase.

If you go through the monster manual, that has apparently always been the case. A Griffon has costed 5,000 gp since before I was born. But it's not enough for such beasts to have a cost, they also have to be somewhere you could buy them. Which means that races need to have domesticated medium and high end riding beasts associated with them. Like how Goblins get their wolves, but then they also get worgs and guulvorgs and shit. Only hopefully not like guulvorgs, because those are slightly embarrassing. Maybe Manticores or something.

Drow: The Drow are pretty easy. They have actually a whole fuck tonne of crazy shit at their disposal and can actually get cut down a bit. I mean, do we really need that thing with all the legs and consonants? They get several flavors of giant spider (including the immensely powerful Phase Spider), and several flavors of evil black horse (Black Unicorns and Nightmares, for example), they are doing fine.

Dwarves: Dwarves are usually not shown mounted at all. That being said, you can get pretty far with Bear Cavalry that they have apparently been kicking around since before I was even born. Thematically, they seem like they would be drawn to wide and stable mounts like Basilisks in blinder helmets or Giant Spiders. Duergar, of course, are known to ride giant tarantulas into battle, and it seems like there's nothing stopping other flavors of Dwarves from doing similarly. Sooner or later they are going to need something that gets them off the ground though.

Halflings: The basic Riding Dog goes obsolete pretty fast, but there's a lot of life in Blink Dogs and Giant Eagles. They'd like something tougher, but they have mobility nicely handled.

Gnomes: With their innate ability to talk to burrowing mammals, and the effectively limitless size of burrowing mammals in D&D-worlds, Gnomes have a pretty sweet selection of giant animals for use as beasts of burden, guards, and mounts. But while Giant Space Hamsters are admirably tough, they're ultimately going to need something with mobility powers. I don't know. Flying badgers or some fucking thing.

On the flip side, there are a lot of monsters that would make good mounts but simply aren't assigned anywhere that you could plausibly get them in-game to use as such. There are places to get Giant Eagles and Giant Owls, but where exactly are you supposed to get Hippogriffs, Griffons, Manticores, Wyverns, Unicorns, Pegasi, Displacer Beasts, Carrion Crawlers, Chimerae, Gorgons, Dinosaurs, or Rocs?

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Post by radthemad4 »

There's always the option to go out there and wrangle one. Flying around on a quetzalcoatlus would be sweet.
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And spellcasters already have summon monster.

Edit: Where magical beasts can be found seems like a setting specific thing. There should probably be some interesting creatures in the various planes though.
Last edited by radthemad4 on Wed Jul 02, 2014 8:16 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Post by darkmaster »

Since you're giving dwarves spiders why not some kind of flying bug, like a monstrous wasp or dragonfly, not the most sturdy choice but very agile.
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Re: Beasts of Burden and War.

Post by Josh_Kablack »

FrankTrollman wrote:Dwarves: Dwarves are usually not shown mounted at all. That being said, you can get pretty far with Bear Cavalry that they have apparently been kicking around since before I was even born. Thematically, they seem like they would be drawn to wide and stable mounts like Basilisks in blinder helmets or Giant Spiders. Duergar, of course, are known to ride giant tarantulas into battle, and it seems like there's nothing stopping other flavors of Dwarves from doing similarly. Sooner or later they are going to need something that gets them off the ground though.
Seems like the best options here are likely
  • Steampunk / Golem-y mechanical versions of flying beasts
  • Dire Bats. The furry fliers have cave dwelling in common with dwarves, and that could make for cultural linkage.
  • Elementals. While D&D Dwarves tend to be associated with Stone and Fire, there's no real reason those can't be part of a magicultural heritage that also domesticates Air Elemental creatures for flight. Plus "Air Bear" could seriously be a thing here.

Gnomes: With their innate ability to talk to burrowing mammals, and the effectively limitless size of burrowing mammals in D&D-worlds, Gnomes have a pretty sweet selection of giant animals for use as beasts of burden, guards, and mounts. But while Giant Space Hamsters are admirably tough, they're ultimately going to need something with mobility powers. I don't know. Flying badgers or some fucking thing.
Giant Flying Squirrels? Chimeras? I want to suggest Sphinxes, since D&D has a boatload of them and their riddliness could be made to jibe with Gnomish inquisitiveness, but Sphinxes are fully intelligent, which might rule out use as mounts / beasts of burden

There are places to get Giant Eagles and Giant Owls, but where exactly are you supposed to get Hippogriffs, Griffons, Manticores, Wyverns, Unicorns, Pegasi, Displacer Beasts, Carrion Crawlers, Chimerae, Gorgons, Dinosaurs, or Rocs?
Also Pterodactyls
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Post by Prak »

Actually, I really like the idea of dwarves breeding monstrous bees and wasps for their flying mounts. Monstrous bees can be more pack animals, and when the dwarves go to war against the drow, especially a covert war, they break out the monstrous wasps and attack their enemy by attacking their enemy's mounts. The fact that bees, wasps and hornets all have ground dwelling varieties that would be comfortable in dwarven mines (given proper ventilation) is a bonus.

I would say that giant bumblebees are used as mounts, while giant honey bees are kept more akin to normal bees, purely for honey, from which the dwarves make mead.

Doing yard work today, I saw a hummingbird pretty closely, and noticed how much it's beak looks like it would fucking hurt if it had a mind to use it, even at it's normal size, and how much a giant hummingbird with a reason to attack people would ruin someone's day, so I totally think there should be giant hummingbirds that someone in D&Dland rides.
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Post by darkmaster »

Problem with giant insects for covert ops is that they're actually really fucking loud in flight. But they do have darkvision and shit, so that's a plus.
Last edited by darkmaster on Wed Jul 02, 2014 8:34 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Prak »

Diversion tactics? Send Dwarf!Bond in to make a bunch of fuss and noise far from the spider burrows so that your giant spider wasps can fly in and eat/implant eggs in the enemy's cavalry mounts?


Also, with the Winged Template, there's a large number of low and mid level ground mounts which can be phlebotinumed into flying mounts. Like goblins can use dusk stones to pokevolve their wargs into those warg bat things from WHF, or gnomes can pokevolve blink dogs into flying blink dogs.
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Post by Josh_Kablack »

Prak_Anima wrote:Doing yard work today, I saw a hummingbird pretty closely, and noticed how much it's beak looks like it would fucking hurt if it had a mind to use it, even at it's normal size, and how much a giant hummingbird with a reason to attack people would ruin someone's day, so I totally think there should be giant hummingbirds that someone in D&Dland rides.
And then someone else could use giant versions of these
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Post by Username17 »

Fully Sapient creatures are totally appropriate as high level mounts. Not so much as low level mounts. At low levels, characters get a horse the way they get a pair of boots or a quiver of arrows. It likely doesn't have a name and may not get mentioned for several sessions despite being on the character sheet. But a high level mount is like a cohort - it has a name and is one of the character's most interesting "possessions." With 3e style items, it's likely to be absolutely the most interesting thing the character has. But it's not actually a problem that a player character is riding around on an Int 10 Pegasus or an Int 13 Nightmare, just as it isn't a problem for them to be riding around on a Red Dragon later in life. So things like Sphinxes and Shedu and such are actually totally fine as available high level mount fodder, even though they'd be kind of gross as a starting mount or basic warbeast.

So basically, I'm looking for something like this:
RacePowerful MountFlying Mount
DrowPhase SpiderNightmare
ElfUnicornGiant Owl
DwarfBear?
Gith??
GoblinWorgManticore
GnomeGiant Hamster
HalflingBlink DogGiant Eagle
Human?Pegasus
KoboldDinosaurPterosaur
OrcRazor BoarWyvern

Obviously, with something as kitchen sinkish as D&D, there's going to be a lot of room for other factions with different riding beasts. Like, what are the Kuo-Toa or Gnolls riding into battle?

But the races that people don't get to play don't matter as much. We may well see a contingent of Troglodytes on Cave Drakes or something, but it's not really important what a Troglodyte or Grimlock might field as a high level mounted option because none of the player characters are going to be Troglodytes or Grimlocks.

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Post by Prak »

Just to pick out one thing, I think Kuo Toa should have giant mudskippers as ground mounts and for flying mounts, there's something appropriate from Peter Jackson's King Kong:
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yes, it's a frog with wings.
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Post by nockermensch »

It's hard to imagine that the high level flying mount for dwarves and gnomes won't be some kind of construct, but if we're not going with steampunkish races, then giant bats could probably work well for dwarves, giant owls for gnomes and giant eagles for elves.

High level halflings get to ride blink dogs dressed in wing suits (their flying routine every round being "dimension door X meters up then glide down", so they can keep indefinitely in the air). Aviator goggles for both halfling and dog are optional but totally recommended.
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Post by Prak »

nockermensch wrote:Aviator goggles for both halfling and dog are optional but totally recommended.
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Post by virgil »

This is help for your table. Elite githyanki ride red dragons, humans riding chocobos (or ostrich horses) have a long a storied tradition, dwarves and gnomes are known for using technological means of taking to the skies

Other flying mounts include
  • gryphon
    hippogriff
    peryton
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Post by Aryxbez »

Prak_Anima wrote:Actually, I really like the idea of dwarves breeding monstrous bees and wasps for their flying mounts.
Same here as well, it works well with doubling as mounts and ingredients for their alcohol. Plus, Dwarf mininig areas can kind look like Hives already (especially for the Tolkien-esque visuals that RPG fans like to touch themselves to), so it seems like it'd work out.

As for the Gith, they already have Red Dragons as flying mounts straight up (well, the GithYANKI do anyway). Tis possible Githerzai and their anti-Psionism could be pulling a flying sleigh chariot of a Sentient or Hollowed out Beholder/Gauths. Oh, and looking up creatures for Gith(yanki), there's these Giant "Aoa Spheres" Huge Size, and 50ft fly Speed (Perfect), also totally anti-magic type creatures so they're an ideal mount right there (found on Fiend Folio, pg16).
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Post by Wiseman »

In my games, Archons and paladins of Celestia form friendships with Couatl and ride them into battle.
Aryxbez wrote:
Prak_Anima wrote:Actually, I really like the idea of dwarves breeding monstrous bees and wasps for their flying mounts.
Same here as well, it works well with doubling as mounts and ingredients for their alcohol. Plus, Dwarf mininig areas can kind look like Hives already (especially for the Tolkien-esque visuals that RPG fans like to touch themselves to), so it seems like it'd work out.

As for the Gith, they already have Red Dragons as flying mounts straight up (well, the GithYANKI do anyway). Tis possible Githerzai and their anti-Psionism could be pulling a flying sleigh chariot of a Sentient or Hollowed out Beholder/Gauths. Oh, and looking up creatures for Gith(yanki), there's these Giant "Aoa Spheres" Huge Size, and 50ft fly Speed (Perfect), also totally anti-magic type creatures so they're an ideal mount right there (found on Fiend Folio, pg16).
Githzerai live in Limbo so they should totally have Slaad mounts.
Last edited by Wiseman on Wed Jul 02, 2014 9:50 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Stahlseele »

i now imagine giants riding around on dinosaur sized mounts.
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Post by deaddmwalking »

For a flying mount for dwarves, I think they should use a typically land-locked mount in a novel way. Specifically, I think they should use ultra-powerful rams with the equivalent of horseshoes of flying, probably combined with chariots. Not totally unlike the Ducktales episode 'Maid of the Myth'. It could at least work for a land-based vehicle if the rams can't fly - but since it evokes Norse mythology, it's a pretty evocative option.

I think you could also justify not having a Dwarven Air Cavalry on the basis of their defensive earth works - flying creatures don't pose much threat when you have massive fortifications that the flying creatures can't reach. If the Dwarves had air cavalry in the past, they may have been completely eliminated - they've been forced to cede air superiority to other races.

Gnomes and hot air balloons seem like a good fit - I know it isn't a particularly 'tough' creature, but it worked for Avatar, so it could work for them. They can be combined with giant flying squirrels for fun. That could actually work pretty well for scouts.

For humans, I think hippogriff and/or griffon (or really most races) could work for flying mount. Humans already use elephants as a 'tough mount' - and as Return of the King has shown us, you can advance those to oliphant size.

There's an issue of disconnect - you'd expect larger creatures to be tougher - but if you make a creature too large it doesn't make a good mount for a single creature.

Having the ability to advance monsters helps address those issues. While there may not be any advancement listed for horses, there's no reason there COULDN'T be.
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Post by Stahlseele »

"I think they should use ultra-powerful rams with the equivalent of horseshoes of flying, probably combined with chariots"
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Post by erik »

nockermensch wrote:It's hard to imagine that the high level flying mount for dwarves and gnomes won't be some kind of construct
It feels like forcing it if we insist every race has a special bond/beast of burden for flight.

I think gnomes/goblins/dwarves could get by on industry- air machines of various types. Stone airships (crafted from magically buoyant stones) for dwarves, gyrocopters for gnomes, and jet packs for goblins.
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Post by Night Goat »

Since the Gith fight Illithids a lot, it seems like they'd want mounts that are immune to mind-affecting attacks - maybe constructs for Githzerai and undead for Githyanki.

I know it varies by setting, but I think of Dwarves as being agoraphobic. I'm not sure they'd have flying mounts.
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Post by nockermensch »

Dwarves could have modified Earth Elementals or some breed of Xorn that allowed a dwarf rider inside them for earth-gliding cavalry. It makes for worse art than flying mounts because the scenario will be rocks and shit instead glorious landscapes below, but it'd be brutally effective against any kind of land-based folks.

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Post by TarkisFlux »

If high level characters are all going to end up on a dragon of some color anyway, why are you concerned with every race getting a 'flying' mount? Every PC likely needs access to one, but it seems odd to say that all of the underground races have flying mounts for burden and war. Wouldn't climbing, tunneling, or earth gliding mounts be more culturally useful and appropriate?
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Post by brized »

nockermensch wrote:Dwarves could have modified Earth Elementals or some breed of Xorn that allowed a dwarf rider inside them for earth-gliding cavalry. It makes for worse art than flying mounts because the scenario will be rocks and shit instead glorious landscapes below, but it'd be brutally effective against any kind of land-based folks.
You could take it further and give the mount advanced earth gliding: it can exaggerate the effect such that it free falls through the earth and it can decrease the effect within a shaped radius of its appendages to simulate rails. The mount free falls and then creates rails to redirect its momentum, like a roller coaster cart that launches out of the ground and into the air. It activates the free fall earth glide as it lands, starting the process over. You could get pretty high with mountain peaks as your starting point but would be limited in non-mountainous areas.

It could be a bitch to rule in game in any detail, though. And the higher you need to go in the sky, the longer it takes to build and then redirect sufficient momentum. But a whole combat could take place in the course of one aerial trip, especially if the mount can load a whole party of casters, ranged attackers, and/or flying/gliding combatants. Rings of feather fall could be sufficient. It would be like a mobile artillery platform or inverse dropship. In the latter case while airborne it could even fling passengers at intended targets, so long as they had means of gliding/flight. Dwarven airforce.
Last edited by brized on Thu Jul 03, 2014 3:00 am, edited 2 times in total.
Tumbling Down wrote:
deaddmwalking wrote:I'm really tempted to stat up a 'Shadzar' for my game, now.
An admirable sentiment but someone beat you to it.
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erik
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Post by erik »

Yeah, the more I reflect on it, the less important the flying bit seems, for any race. It's not like X race's society all need flying mounts. That's just adventurers and they're their own demographic that supersedes race. On the fringes there may be the elite elven rangers riding giant eagles, but there's just as much room for those to be gryphons, couatl, giant owls.

Maybe some drow do ride Nightmares, but that's what makes those drow special, not standard.

Racially preferred beasts of burden is cool and adds flavor to make races differentiated. Trying to bring it forward into high level play or required flight may be a step too far.
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OgreBattle
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Post by OgreBattle »

By default, I like how Warhammer does it, here's an incomplete list of somewhat distinct mounts per faction:

Humans- Horse, Demigryph, Hippogryph, Gryphon
High Elves: lions, eagles, dragons
Dark Elves: Horse, lizard, manticore, dragon (with hydra as war-beast)
Ogres: Rhinos, a bed of goblin things
goblins: mushrooms with feet, spiders
Orks: Boar, fat wyvern
Dwarves: Other dwarves

and so on


With creating one's own setting though you can just make a list of monsters of different genus and assign them as appropriate mounts. Like...

Furred creatures
terrestrial pet: canine
terrestrial mount: horse
terrestrial monster: elephant

Flying pet: bat
Flying mount: big bat
Flying monster: manticore

Aquatic pet: otter
Aquatic mount: dolphin
Aquatic monster: toothy whale

Scaled creatures
terrestrial pet: snake
terrestrial mount: horse-sized raptor
terrestrial weapons platform: triceratops

Flying pet: lil' wyvern thing
Flying mount: horse-sized pteranodon
Flying monster: wyvern

Aquatic pet: lil' turtle
Aquatic mount: Seadra
Aquatic monster: sea serpent

Beaked creatures
terrestrial pet: cassowary
terrestrial mount: horse-sized terrorbird
terrestrial weapons platform: elephant sized elephantbird

Flying pet: hawk
Flying mount: horse-sized eagle
Flying monster: roc

Aquatic pet: penguin
Aquatic mount: larger penguin
Aquatic monster: gigantic platypus

exoskeletal creatures
Image
Gigantomakhia
terrestrial pet: dog-sized grasshopper
terrestrial mount: horse-sized spider
terrestrial weapons platform: gigantic scorpion

Flying pet: eagle-sized dragonfly
Flying mount: horse-sized rhino-beetle
Flying monster: dragon-sized beetle with lots of horns

Aquatic pet: crab buddy
Aquatic mount: horse sized mantis shrimp
Aquatic monster: gigantic boss crab

----

I really like the image of naga with their tails curled up on the back of a regally decorated crustacean, stylized the way that Indian kings look on elephants.
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