[OK] New Beastie: Dilhorn or Grey Horn

[JohnK]

Hullo, folks,

One of the things that I wanted to create for my game is a series of beasties and feondas that can be encountered by the player characters during their travels, but aren't totally going to overwhelm a group of starting characters if they encounter them (and end up in combat with them!, which I hope they won't).

Bear in mind that I've only seen the French version of Book 0 - Prologue, so had to base the creature statistics on the guidelines (if you can call them that) found in that supplement. Also note the comments in brackets for the Characteristics; these offer my thoughts on why these numbers are as I've chosen them.

Here's the first of them. Comments, thoughts, and critiques are welcome. Hope folks like this.


DILHORN
The Dilhorn also known generally as the Grey Horn, is a creature native to Esteren and the continent that has made its way to the Peninsula, and is found at the edge of forests and lightly wooded areas where hills and mountains can be found. A cross between an armadillo and a wild boar or perhaps a rhino, the creature stands some 3 feet long, and masses up to 180 lbs. Dilhorns tend to have dark or mottled brown fur with fine, dark brown bristles that grow so thickly as to create a form of hide, have sharp teeth used for eating vegetation and small insects, and a pair of beady little black eyes that give them decent vision. Their most distinguishing feature is their foot-long horn of dark, thorny bone that makes for an effective weapon in the event that they might be considered prey.

Solitary creatures by nature, the dilhorn has a somewhat vicious temper, but is generally not all that antagonistic unless its territory is threatened. The creatures are very territorial, and are provoked by any incursions into their perceived domains. Relatively slow of foot, they are surprisingly agile, and their weight allows them to trample smaller creatures with impunity.

Characteristics
Attack: 12 (Nasty beast)
Damage: 3 (When you get hurt, it hurts!)
Defense: 9 (Not the sort to defend all that often)
Protection: 2 (Bristles and hide)
Speed: 6 (Not that fast)
Stamina: 10
Health Condition: 29/21/13/7
Skills: Feats 10, Perception 9
*****

[Clovis]

It can be a very good idea to create your own creatures for your campaign setting... as long as they don't become too omnipresent! However, you seem to be well aware of this fact.

The Dilhorn you propose seems logical and not-too-powerful enough to qualify for a plausible animal, so I have no particular remark to make about the flavour.

As for the characteristics, 18 seems a lot for such a creature. After all, it equals to a very spirited warrior (Combativeness 5) who has been very extensively trained in a weapon (Close Combat Discipline of 13, no less!). For a 3-foot-long creature, that seems a lot! Something like 8 would seem better to me: enough to be seriously threatening, but a skilled hunter can still kill it.

It also has a lot of Health Points for such a (relatively) small animal. A maximum between 15 and 20 would be more logical to me: very tough, but not more than a regular human being, who is after all bigger than it.

[JohnK]

Hullo, Clovis,

It can be a very good idea to create your own creatures for your campaign setting... as long as they don't become too omnipresent! However, you seem to be well aware of this fact.

I like to think I am aware of this fact. That said, I have almost nothing to base the game statistics on, and since there are no guidelines anywhere for creating creatures and animals, and having seen very few game stats for beasties (only those in the three scenarios in Livres 0 - Prologue in fact), have almost nothing to go on to stat animals up.

The Dilhorn you propose seems logical and not-too-powerful enough to qualify for a plausible animal, so I have no particular remark to make about the flavour.

That was exactly what I was going for, Clovis.

As for the characteristics, 18 seems a lot for such a creature. After all, it equals to a very spirited warrior (Combativeness 5) who has been very extensively trained in a weapon (Close Combat Discipline of 13, no less!). For a 3-foot-long creature, that seems a lot! Something like 8 would seem better to me: enough to be seriously threatening, but a skilled hunter can still kill it.

It also has a lot of Health Points for such a (relatively) small animal. A maximum between 15 and 20 would be more logical to me: very tough, but not more than a regular human being, who is after all bigger than it.

You raise some good points here, Clovis, but the problem for me is that I have nothing to guide me in how to write up animal statistics and the like. I gave the Dilhorn the Attack of 18 simply because this creature needs to survive in the low hills near foothills and mountains. I can likely reduce the Attack to 12 or so, but I think the Defense should then go up as well to 10, perhaps? What do you think?

The Health Condition should perhaps come down, since there are no guidelines for this sort of thing. What would you give a large boar for Health Condition?

[Clovis]

I can likely reduce the Attack to 12 or so, but I think the Defense should then go up as well to 10, perhaps? What do you think?

Well, 12 still seems like a lot: it means that the Dilhorn is, for example, as deadly as a Colossal fighter (+2 in Close Combat) who is very energetic (5 in Combativeness) and who has had good training in weapons (5 in Close Combat). Moreover, with its 4 in Damage, it is as powerful as the aforementioned warrior with a claymore. Should it really be that powerful?

Of course, that's all up to you, but to get a clear idea of the abilities of a creature, simulate a combat: "Okay, let's say we have Joe, who is a hardy hunter with a Close Combat rating of 10, a Defense of 13, etc. How strong should my Dilhorn be compared to Joe?"

The Health Condition should perhaps come down, since there are no guidelines for this sort of thing. What would you give a large boar for Health Condition?

For a large boar I'd probably say something like 29/21/13/7. I'm not a wildlife expert, but I think boars are very sturdy creatures that can take a lot of punishment, and do not go down easily, hence why it would have more Health points than a human. Since a Dilhorn is smaller than your average boar, I'd give it less than that, but that's up to you.

[JohnK]

Hullo, Clovis,

I can likely reduce the Attack to 12 or so, but I think the Defense should then go up as well to 10, perhaps? What do you think?

Well, 12 still seems like a lot: it means that the Dilhorn is, for example, as deadly as a Colossal fighter (+2 in Close Combat) who is very energetic (5 in Combativeness) and who has had good training in weapons (5 in Close Combat). Moreover, with its 4 in Damage, it is as powerful as the aforementioned warrior with a claymore. Should it really be that powerful?

Of course, that's all up to you, but to get a clear idea of the abilities of a creature, simulate a combat: "Okay, let's say we have Joe, who is a hardy hunter with a Close Combat rating of 10, a Defense of 13, etc. How strong should my Dilhorn be compared to Joe?"

This is part of the problem though, isn't it? Since the game system has no guidelines on how to create beasties, it's very subjective. There's no indication anywhere in the rules that creatures have Ways and Skills, is there? Well, other than a few creature that I've seen in fan-produced material. (And maybe a scenario or two from the French line of books.) Furthermore, since there's no "Strength" per se in the game, other than a Strong or Weak Advantage or Disadvantage, that makes it difficult to equate with the strength value for creatures, regardless of their size in height/length and mass.

That also raises the question of how does the bear or any other natural animal survive in a world with Feondas? Or do they just "eat" humans?

The Health Condition should perhaps come down, since there are no guidelines for this sort of thing. What would you give a large boar for Health Condition?

For a large boar I'd probably say something like 29/21/13/7. I'm not a wildlife expert, but I think boars are very sturdy creatures that can take a lot of punishment, and do not go down easily, hence why it would have more Health points than a human. Since a Dilhorn is smaller than your average boar, I'd give it less than that, but that's up to you.

Actually, I thought the average wild boar was about 3 feet long, and massed around the same as the Dilhorn, but I agree about your rating, and will cut the Health Condition down.

[iznurda]

That also raises the question of how does the bear or any other natural animal survive in a world with Feondas? Or do they just "eat" humans?

Hi !

feondas hates humans but I like the idea some of them lives as common animals. They are not enough numerous to represent a threat to all wildlife. I'm not really worried about animals, there is not a feond behind every tree trunk ^^

iz

[Clovis]

Indeed, animals don't have Ways, since they have no complex thought patterns and therefore no real personality. They just have ratings in the appropriate Skills (almost exclusively physical ones), combat characteristics, and a Health Conditions, since things such as Trauma points and Faults don't apply to them.

It's true the system gives no definite idea of the characters' strength; it's one of these points where common sense applies. However, that does not mean that you cannot give proper stats to non-human creatures: as I said, just choose the numbers according to how dangerous it would be for a human being.


As an example, I'll take an elephant... which is obviously not a creature you expect to find in Tri-Kazel, but the purpose is to be illustrative:

Attack: 7 (Not a deft creature, but it can still trample and flail around to defend itself)
Defense: 6 (Very big and bulky)
Protection: 3 (Very tough hide)
Speed: 4 (Not made for quickness)
Damage: 7 (Can do massive damage with its weight)
Health Condition: 80/58/36/19 (Huge size)

The idea here is that this animal is not a predator, and therefore fares rather poorly in combat. However, with its enormous bulk and natural armor, it is far from being an easy pray and can easily kill an attacker if provoked.

Of course, once more, I'm not a zoologist, so these are just estimates, but I hope this will be of assistance!


As for your question regarding Feondas and animals, iznurda is right: Feondas remain something rare, so they do not represent that serious a threat for animals. Moreover, these creatures being apparently some sort of anomality, one can consider that animals flee them instinctively, taking care not to stand in their way!

[JohnK]

Hullo, Iz,

That also raises the question of how does the bear or any other natural animal survive in a world with Feondas? Or do they just "eat" humans?

Hi !

feondas hates humans but I like the idea some of them lives as common animals. They are not enough numerous to represent a threat to all wildlife. I'm not really worried about animals, there is not a feond behind every tree trunk ^^

While I like the idea that some feondas live as common animals, if these creatures were not all that numerous, than why is there such a fear mentality about them among Tri-Kazelians? (The business of living as common animals must have been partially an inspiration for Brenn and Pitche's scenario, "Feond in the Kennel", which I've recently translated into English.)

I agree that there likely isn't a feond behind every tree trunk, but there's so little about animals and the like, other than some elements found in Book 1 - Universe (and I don't have the PDF of Book 2 or any of the French supplements, so don't know what's in those), that it's really hard to judge these things.

That said, the emphasis in Book 1 - Universe is for the player characters to be dealing more with human menaces, rather than feondas (which I assume will be part of the goal in the Secrets book, whenever that comes out in French. And yet so many of the fan-made scenarios that I've seen have been oriented around feondas in one fashion or the other. *sigh* (Hmm, perhaps this should have gone into a different, new thread, but I'm feeling lazy about this at the moment.)

[JohnK]

Hullo, Clovis,

Indeed, animals don't have Ways, since they have no complex thought patterns and therefore no real personality. They just have ratings in the appropriate Skills (almost exclusively physical ones), combat characteristics, and a Health Conditions, since things such as Trauma points and Faults don't apply to them.

The idea that animals don't have complex thought patterns is not something that I'm comfortable with, since elephants and dolphins have a remarkable intelligence as far as science is concerned these days, and I'm sure that there are others that this applies to as well, since I've not been keeping up with things these days. However, this certainly applies to most animals out there. So we'll let that one go by the wayside.

It's true the system gives no definite idea of the characters' strength; it's one of these points where common sense applies. However, that does not mean that you cannot give proper stats to non-human creatures: as I said, just choose the numbers according to how dangerous it would be for a human being.

I would also have assumed that common sense comes into this as well. That said, why is it necessary to choose numbers for cratures according to how dangerous they are for a human being? After all, animals in the wild don't just have to contend with humans, they have to contend with animals (and other creatures) that prey on them...or that they prey on.

As an example, I'll take an elephant... which is obviously not a creature you expect to find in Tri-Kazel, but the purpose is to be illustrative:

Attack: 7 (Not a deft creature, but it can still trample and flail around to defend itself)
Defense: 6 (Very big and bulky)
Protection: 3 (Very tough hide)
Speed: 4 (Not made for quickness)
Damage: 7 (Can do massive damage with its weight)
Health Condition: 80/58/36/19 (Huge size)

The idea here is that this animal is not a predator, and therefore fares rather poorly in combat. However, with its enormous bulk and natural armor, it is far from being an easy pray and can easily kill an attacker if provoked.

Thanks for posting the example of the elephant, though as you say they're not likely found in Tri-Kazel. It's given me a few things to think about. I do think that elephant tusks can be used as weapons by the creatures, but not very often. Though I have to wonder whether with that Speed the elephant can actually trample anyone.

So I take it that Attack does not take into account strength and size, endurance of creatures is not taken into account in Characteristics, that sort of thing?

Of course, once more, I'm not a zoologist, so these are just estimates, but I hope this will be of assistance!

Definitely.

As for your question regarding Feondas and animals, iznurda is right: Feondas remain something rare, so they do not represent that serious a threat for animals. Moreover, these creatures being apparently some sort of anomality, one can consider that animals flee them instinctively, taking care not to stand in their way!

Hmm, that's not something I had considered, although there's evidence for it in some of the fan-written scenarios I've looked at. See my comments to Iznurda in that reply for more on the feondas and rarity and stuff for more.

[Clovis]

I would also have assumed that common sense comes into this as well. That said, why is it necessary to choose numbers for creatures according to how dangerous they are for a human being? After all, animals in the wild don't just have to contend with humans, they have to contend with animals (and other creatures) that prey on them...or that they prey on.

Well, human beings should naturally not be the only reference point for creating animals. However, since the basic rules are obviously fitted for human beings, this seems like a good reference point to me. For example, we know that someone with a total rating of 15 in the Running Discipline is a very good sprinter, probably of the level of a professional athlete. So where does that take us compared to a hare, an ostrich, a horse, etc.?

Though I have to wonder whether with that Speed the elephant can actually trample anyone.

Common sense dictates that it can, of course, but it's one of these elements that's difficult to include in something as schematic as a game's characteristics.

So I take it that Attack does not take into account strength and size, endurance of creatures is not taken into account in Characteristics, that sort of thing?

Actually, if that helps, you can set strength bonuses in the fashion of the "Strong" Advantage. For example, off the top of my head, I'd probably consider an elephant to have a "Strong x6" Advantage, but since animals directly have their statistics without Ways being involved, that would not actually be very relevant.

Strength can be shown in the Damage of the animal, size in its Health Condition, Endurance in its Stamina, etc. I think you can always find a way to portray an animal's abilities with a modicum of realism if you are imaginative in making use of the system.