Talking Animals?

[fanboy2000]

One of the things I've noticed over the years is that while talking animals are a fantasy staple, talking animals don't seem to be a staple in D&D. I don't use them often, but when I do, my players seem surprised. It's almost as though no one's ever seen a talking animal in any fantasy story.

I had a panther in the feywild talk to one of the players, but hasn't talked sense leaving the faywild. (You know, just to mess with his head.) And when that panther talked, the expression on his face was priceless.

So how often have use encountered or used a talking animal in your game? Do you think they make a game less serious? Any cool talking animal stories?

 

[TwinBahamut]

I am having trouble responding to this poll... To be honest, I have never seen or used that concept, but I would really like to. Talking animals are indeed a really useful and fun concept, and a major staple of fantasy. I honestly wonder why they don't show up more in D&D.

 

[Mouseferatu]

One of the things I've noticed over the years is that while talking animals are a fantasy staple, talking animals don't seem to be a staple in D&D.

I think a reason for this, at least in part, is that talking animals tend to be a staple of either

A) Older fantasy stories, with which modern readers may be less familiar, and/or

B) Fantasy stories geared for younger readers.

Those two aspects combined, I believe, make it harder for the average modern fantasy reader/role-player to take the concept seriously.

And I do not exclude myself from that list. It's still one of the things that bothers me most about The Hobbit, even though that's both an older fantasy and one aimed at younger readers. (Of course, part of my problem with it in The Hobbit is that it's used as a deus ex machina. It's not just that it's a talking animal, it's that it's--with all respect to Tolkien, who I normally like--bad writing, at least by modern standards of storytelling, his efforts at making it feel mythic notwithstanding.)

I think it's less out of place in campaigns based on certain other cultures, for the record. Talking animals appear in certain mythologies, so campaigns based on those mythologies could--perhaps even should--make use of them. But standard "Western" fantasy, as viewed by the modern fan? I can see the notion being somewhat alien to them.

 

[Agamon]

Talking animals belong in kids' movies (way, way, way too many kids' movies). That said, I had a memorable raven familiar in my RttToEE game (and they speak a language by the RAW, so it wasn't really my idea). But that's about it.

 

[Wik]

It's funny, I was just talking to Blargney about this. My favourite NPC, ever, was a Talking Horse. And it wasn't intentional, at all.

In 2e days, our cleric had some kit or something that gave him one free use of Speak With Animals a day. And he never got a chance to truly use it. So, at the end of every day, he'd cast it on one of the draft horses pulling the group's wagon. And they'd have a conversation.

I played the horse as rather intelligent, if horsey in his view on life. He kept trying to offer oats to the cleric, and would always speak of "leaving his mark" on the world (he was determined to "plop" on every road in the world). He was a very fun character that started as a reaction to a player's sudden whim.

Eventually, I made the mistake of having the horse get caught in a wild magic zone (it was in the Realms, the one time I ran a game there) and having this speak with animals effect become permanent. It sucked because it a) once again made the PC's power useless and b) made the Horse NPC more frequent, and therefore, less fun.

Still, my favourite NPC ever was a talking animal.

Also, I'm a fan of talking familiars - which are written right into the game, after all! But I'm thinking they don't count for this question?

Finally, I use talking animals rarely, but always to good effect. During STAP, there's a bit that revisits The Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan that I expanded upon. I added the talking crayfish and hermit crab "Gods" from the original adventure, and that was a lot of fun. One of the high points of the AP.

 

[Crothian]

Talking animals are in my campaign setting, but only after a nature goddess was killed and her divinity was passed on (by means of a massive awaken spell) into the local wildlife.

 

[Agamon]

I think it's less out of place in campaigns based on certain other cultures, for the record. Talking animals appear in certain mythologies, so campaigns based on those mythologies could--perhaps even should--make use of them. But standard "Western" fantasy, as viewed by the modern fan? I can see the notion being somewhat alien to them.

That's a good point. A Chinese or Native American based game, it would work, for sure.

 

[Celebrim]

I consider the Grimm's Fairy Tales to be in many ways my biggest influence. All the animals in my campaign world talk, you just have to be able to speak the language. You can't very well 'speak with animals', if the animals have nothign to say.

Very very few of them though are 'talking animals' in the sense of, can speak the PC's language. Those that are 'nature spirits in animal form' than talking animals, or possibly persons acting under a curse (the beautiful princess, cursed to take the form of a swan, sort of thing).

My biggest problem the last I used the concept was players that wanted to treat everything as an opportunity to kill something and take its stuff. Somehow it never even occurred to them that the white spirit wolf might possibly be helpful.

I miss my older groups. (Geez, I'm morose today.)

 

[Ed_Laprade]

Discounting familiars, and not many of those, I think I've seen more talking magic items than talking animals!

 

[Stoat]

There was an adventure in Dungeon long, long ago that featured a talking fish.

Coincidentally, the paladin in the group I was DMing for had decided to specialize in the harpoon.

And that was the last time I ever put a talking animal into my game.