Cattle (VGtM)
The cow says moo.
Cattle are a collection of bovine beasts of burden. Often used as livestock for their meat, milk, hide, bones, and dung. They may also be used as riding and/or draft animals, and can be found pulling plows or carts all over the land. Cattle are likely to be the most valuable thing a commoner owns, which means being paid with them isn’t out of the question. Just be wary of trading them in for beans. There are an innumerable number of human farmhands turned fighters who have started on their adventuring path thanks to the humble contributions of cattle, and it’s a little odd that they weren’t included in the core MM due to this pedigree.
All of these creatures have the Cattle subtype, which could be alluding to a possible wild-west style adventure path. Or it could just be a handy way to make a Cowboy subclass in the future for anyone interested in making 3rd party content. But most likely it's a way to have non-beast animals, as shown by one of the entries below.
Interestingly enough, the domestic cow, despite having stats in VGtM, isn’t stated up in this book!
In combat, all cattle (with one notable exception) function largely the same, they will use their gore attack, in conjunction with a charge for extra damage. Cattle aren’t particularly fast, so when backed into the corner, expect them to fight to the death, if simply due to a lack of other options.
All cattle had their Gore attack and Charge ability merged into one entry for their statblock.
Auroch
Aurochs are the primal ancestral stock from which modern cattle descended. Of course, in D&D dinosaurs still roam the planet, so why not aurochs? Orcish farmers are particularly fond of these beasts, and sometimes they can even be pressed into wartime service. Aurochs are the fastest and strongest kind of cattle, with 50’ of movement speed and a gore strong enough to knock the enemy prone.
Deep Rothé
These are magic cattle that live in the underdark, and communicate with each other using their
Dancing Lights spell. Apparently, having magic on cattle is unique enough to grant them the use of an “é“. They are smaller than other forms of cattle, presumably due to living in the Underdark. The Dancing Lights spell isn’t directly useful for combat, but can be used to alert any other members of the herd, or their ranchers, to threats from intruders. Allowing them to function as a sort of guard animal. It is worth noting that they have Darkvision, and do not need the lights to see.
Deep Rothé lost their innate spellcasting ability, but gained the Dancing Lights ability, which lets them cast
Dancing Lights anyway. They also lost their language blurb, which makes them no longer suitable to become an Expert or Spellcaster sidekick. A small loss only a few people will care about.
Ox
Oxen are bigger than the traditional cow, and are valued more as a beast of burden. I don’t have much to say about them that wasn’t already covered. Though their inclusion does make me wonder why the standard cow wasn’t.
Stench Kow
The Hell Cow, no relation to Keith Baker. These creatures are actually a type of unaligned fiend that the Lower Planes use as a replacement for traditional cattle, in every way that implies. You can find Stench Kow cheese in Avernus, for example. Their innate resistances to cold, fire, and poison, would make them somewhat desirable on the Material Plane, if not for their noxious stench (from which they get their name). Said stench isn’t insurmountable, lots of peoples (like dwarves) have a resistance to poison, and perhaps some hags will keep a herd of them alongside their Catoblepas?
In combat, said stench can be used to poison any melee aggressors, which would be handy in any environment that wasn’t the Lower Planes.
