What Animals Do They Keep?

[I'm A Banana]

You can tell a lot about a group of folks based on the animals they domesticate. This is true in the Real World as much as it could be true in our games of whimsical fantasy.

So my question to you is, what is the relationship between a group of creatures and a species of their domesticated animals, in your games?

Here's my usual default:

• Kobolds: They work with rats. Rats are clever and hardy, and can be bred in great quantities. Kobolds train them to run the mazelike warrens quickly and efficiently, delivering messages and warnings all over the lair whenever some trespasser comes knocking. The creatures are fast and agile enough to reach small switches and to chew through ropes holding traps in place, making sure the trigger goes off at the exact right moment. Dire Rats are used as protectors, treated as favored family members. Swarms surge in a kobold's spike-pit-trap, ready to "clean up" after a victim is impaled. Wererats work with them as well, often rising to positions of leadership in the community.
• Goblins: They domesticate wolves. Creatures of the night, right on the edge of civilization, ready to take whatever they can from farmers and shepherds, the goblins and the wolves have formed a mutually beneficial relationship. Rather than a master/pet kind of relationship, the two function as a team of equals. Worgs often lead the "wolf faction," in a goblin camp, and goblin beastmasters will organize packs of fighting wolves, even equipping them with armor to better protect them. Dire wolves, a rare treasure, carry several goblins on their backs into combat, but they don't act as mounts. They are more vehicle, transporting three or four goblins into the thick of combat, and then remaining, one enemy becoming five. Werewolves are treated harshly, their bloodlust cultivated like a fighting dog, caged and enraged until dropped in the middle of an enemy's camp.
• Orcs: Orcs are pig-farmers. Well, more specifically, boar farmers. The animals' tenacity and ferocity are points of pride for many orc tribes, as is their ability to survive on nearly any kind of food. Orcs ride dire boars into battle as mounts, much as people use horses, but the creatures are wild and unpredictable. Wereboars hold a religious position, and are often the first into combat, and the first killed. Their flesh is later consumed by the tribe, trying to internalize its strength and toughness.

Moar on the civilized races later....but tell me what you have! Elk? Whales? Horses? Dire Elephants?

And it doesn't need to be "domesticated" in the strict definition -- just ways animals influence your people is great!

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Clever idea for a way to flesh out races. I sort of like the D&D default of kobolds and giant weasels -- how many games would remember that giant weasels existed, otherwise? -- but this is an interesting tack rarely taken.

It's interesting to think that Gygax apparently looked at elves and said "you know what? These guys need big, smart DOGS," instead of cats, which I think every major creator of elf lore has done since. (Other than the Pinis, who went with wolves and, later, dolphins.)

 

[Wik]

My campaign doesn't really have much in the way of animal husbandry, but I'll list the ones I can think of:

1) The Otterfolk raise Clams. As in, lots and lots of clams. Their various weirs have all grown to develop various breeds of clams, most famously the "healing clam" which is the primary component for most healing potions in the Shattered Isles. Naturally, these clams are the primary economic trade item for the Otterfolk.

2) The Selvarene (Think the Wood Elf equivalent of Eladrin) raise giant owls. However, these intelligents beasts are not "domesticated" but are instead treated as partners, and are only rarely called upon to serve as mounts - to transport small strike teams over relatively short distances in a quick amount of time.

3) Not really domestication, but the halflings, who are well regarded as sailors in the isles, have worked out ways to primitively communicate with the pods of killer whales in the region, by dropping fish in certain areas to discourage curious whales from rubbing against a halfling catamaran. There are legends that halflings have used this technique against orc drommonds, and it is certainly true that the orc pirates always give the halflings a wide berth - the only race they ignore, which gives some credence to this theory.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Somewhere on these boards is a thread in which I suggested to a worldbuilding poster that a nifty Plains Indian style culture (of humans) would be cool if centered around giant flightless predatory birds (like moas or the fictional Axe-Beaks) instead of horses.

(Another suggestion in there revolved around packs of small dino-raptors used like dogs or hunting hawks.)

Found it: http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/256063-what-would-society-look-like.html

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

It's interesting to think that Gygax apparently looked at elves and said "you know what? These guys need big, smart DOGS," instead of cats, which I think every major creator of elf lore has done since. (Other than the Pinis, who went with wolves and, later, dolphins.)

Eagle-Riding elves are a popular trope, too.

 

[Kaodi]

Just to nit-pick a bit, it is not necessarily the case that all animal/humanoid relationships are ones of domestication. Often in fantastic settings the relationships are ones of cooperation between intelligent species.

 

[Raven Crowking]

In the land of the Houyhnhms, the animals domesticate Y(aho)o!


RC

 

[Theo R Cwithin]

Heh, I just recently djinned up a tribe of orcs that domesticates boars, too, albeit on a fire-dominant plane, and mainly as a punchline. Rumor has it that a troop of these fire-orc barbarians and their attack-boars can be summoned with a spell called (you guessed it) "Baconstorm".

A few other things I've seen or used, off the top of my head:

Goblins raise spiders as mounts & food. Also, "spirit goblins" use phase spiders, though in that case, it's less clear who's domesticating who. There's also an isolated/ostracized forest goblin clan that raises songbirds, mainly for trade, but also for divination purposes.

A wandering halfling clan routinely harvested the eggs of wild & domesticated shorebirds and wild cliffbirds for food and trade-- at least up until they stumbled across some petrified zombie pterodactyls that turned them all into undead. Now they use the eggs (which they putrify with negative energies) as ammo.

Desert folk use great wild sand worms for transport (and, of course, for spice).

Intelligent undead keep maggots on hand to clean up their fresher skeletal guards, and make them nice and shiny. [edit] Similarly, at least a few liches are known to use maggots or ants to keep their teeth pearly white.

An earth cult-- counting among its members gnomes, elementals, dwarves, gargoyles, and others-- cultivates oozes to aid in extracting rare minerals needed for religious rites & communication with their god. Similarly, a town of dwarves exiled on the Plane of Earth has followed the example of the native Terran tribes, and domesticates local elemental beings of animal intelligence ("flintelope"), also for the purpose of extracting minerals.

And of course, halflings + velociraptors = win.

 

[Fifth Element]

It's interesting to think that Gygax apparently looked at elves and said "you know what? These guys need big, smart DOGS," instead of cats, which I think every major creator of elf lore has done since.

Catshee rather than cooshee, then?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

In the land of the Houyhnhms, the animals domesticate Y(aho)o!


RC

Hmmmmmm...the Equiceph Empire takes shape...