There were plenty of "real world" animals in the original Monster Manual, but I rarely think about using "normal" animals as foes, even giant versions.  Do you use them? In what context?

What's the relationship between Monsters and Animals in your campaigns?

Quote from: Spinachcat;1110978There were plenty of "real world" animals in the original Monster Manual, but I rarely think about using "normal" animals as foes, even giant versions.  Do you use them? In what context?

What's the relationship between Monsters and Animals in your campaigns?

In 3/3.5 days, I remember using dire wolves a few times. I also used some giant (or were they dire too) crocodiles to attack the PCs when they were boating along a shallow river through a marsh. There were also some war elephants with riders, and one character got thrown into a water-filled pit that had sharks in it. Otherwise, animals in combat have largely been something the druid wild shapes into or summons.

In sci-fi games, normal fauna can be pretty cool, especially if it is something that would not have any fear of people (at least initially) and might behave unpredictably ("Is it trying to eat us or fuck us?").

Quote from: Spinachcat;1110978There were plenty of "real world" animals in the original Monster Manual, but I rarely think about using "normal" animals as foes, even giant versions.  Do you use them? In what context?

What's the relationship between Monsters and Animals in your campaigns?

Yes.

Boars and orcs go surprisingly well together. As a focus for an orc tribe, I had a boar eat the finger of a dead wizard which had a Ring of Regeneration on it. I decided that the magic would still work on the boar as the ring and finger bone got lodged in its stomach. So the orcs worship this boar because they can carve meat from it and the flesh will grow back which shows how the tribe is favored by the Gods.

A herd of buffalo or deer can put a serious dent in a low level adventuring party.

The perspective I take for science fiction is more along the lines of where does this critter belong in the ecology and if it really doesn't belong, then where did it come from?

Greetings!

Yes, my friend, I use natural animals all the time, as well as giant animals, prehistoric animals, mutant animals, and Fey Animals. Some of these can have an otherwise unusual or "magical" attribute, especially the Fey animal and mutant animals, of course. In the main though, I use normal, giant, and prehistoric animals all the time, scattered in various populations and zones throughout the campaign world, as appropriate. Player characters often encounter such animals while traveling through the wilderness, exploring, or while hunting for food, or seeking out valuable animal furs and ingredients, such as various body organs, claws, teeth, horns, eyes, feet, all beyond the otherwise known value of a particular kind of hide or fur. Meat as well, is valuable, besides providing food for the group, such meat can be preserved and sold for good profits in local villages, towns, and markets.

Various kinds of normal or giant animals are also sought out for gladiatorial arenas, as well as by guilds of professional animal trainers and breeders. Such animals are also eagerly sought for for use as valuable work beasts, pack animals, mounts, as well as being professionally trained war beasts. Player characters and NPC's alike highly value many such animals for all of these purposes. Then, of course, there are individual wizards as well as magical guilds that seek out such animals for use in harvesting for a variety of different spell components, and for experimentation in magical research and the crafting of a wide range of magical items.

In addition, there are a wide world full of detailed crustacians, fish, marine mammals, and amphibians that are all used and valued for the same such purposes.

I also have a diverse catalogue of insects and birds, all detailed with meat, resources, special attributes and market valuations.

The various animals and creatures in my world provide an endless diversity of food, dangerous opponents, as well as valuable mundane and magical resources. Entire economies, or specialized sections of economies, both for tribal and civilized realms, depend on such animal resources in a variety of ways. Furthermore, access to such animal populations, as well as the cultivation of distinct domesticated breeds, have far reaching financial impacts, in addition to political and military influence and strategic considerations. Through a complex web of cultural and religious customs, many such animals contribute crucially to a wide range of cultural practices as well as religious ceremonies, rituals, clothing, and spiritual life.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

Usually only when under the control of intelligent creatures - humans & horses, goblins & wolves (but usually worgs) etc, or somehow enchanted. Occasional wilderness encounter with eg a brown bear, but they don't attack any more often than IRL. There was a scripted ambush attack by a sabretooth tiger in one Primeval Thule adventure I ran - Thule has particularly dangerous natural wildlife to fit the Primeval feel. One time the PCs fled from a giant sloth that then ate their camp bedding. But usually natural animals are only fought in the Fighting Pits.

Does a family of Brown bears scare the living shit out of a low level party in the woods?

Quote from: Spinachcat;1110978There were plenty of "real world" animals in the original Monster Manual, but I rarely think about using "normal" animals as foes, even giant versions.  Do you use them? In what context?

What's the relationship between Monsters and Animals in your campaigns?

You mean strictly in D&D?

You walk into a cave, suddenly a female short-faced bear (Arctodus simus) runs at your party trying to protect her cubs. What do you do?

As you traverse the thick brush a pack of Dilophosaurus surrounds you. What do you do?

Of course in my campaigns they have other names not the scientific ones, but used the scientific ones so everybody knew what I'm talking about.

Still not that frequently in a Fantasy campaign, now in my totally not Conan playtests? All the time, again lots of prehistoric beasts, sometimes some artistic freedom has been taken to make a scary looking vegetarian into a ravenous carnivore.

I like snakes and wolves, in particular. The former provoke surprisingly visceral reactions in the players - maybe because we're all Australian and we live around some of the most dangerous snakes in the world?

Quote from: AikiGhost;1111011Does a family of Brown bears scare the living shit out of a low level party in the woods?

There should be a way to give XP.

I use them all the time; in fact, in general I prefer to use them more often than truly monstrous "monsters." When players encounter a troll, a mimic, or something similarly unnatural I prefer it to feel like a relatively unique or at least uncommon and memorable occurrence. When you have slain your fifth troll of the day it begins to lose some of its shine; this is also a reason I like having dragons be rare and powerful (though to keep some murderous flying lizards around, I do like to employ their smaller bastard cousin Drakes).

Now, there are exceptions to this (if the players go to the famously cockatrice-infested bog, it would be weird if cockatrices aren't a relatively common occurrence; similarly with stirge-ridden caverns, fire elementals around the volcano, etc. etc.) but I find that traditional animals or approximations thereof make for fine threats on their own and somewhat 'ground' the average encounter table. Plus, there are all sorts of freaky and dangerous 'ordinary' animals in real life!

When I think of 'natural' animals though, this does still include things like giant snakes, wolf variants (wargs/dire wolves), etc. Depending on the local fauna this may also include "run of the mill" monsters which are considered to be mundane animals by the local populace; griffins in some places, oversized terrestrial riding chickens in others, six-legged venomous boars, whatever.

I think animals have interesting encounter potential due to the fact that most will instinctively avoid direct combat, but still represent danger such as stalking, potential pack tactics, ambush and similar as well as the fact that they may simply be uninterested or afraid of conflict with PC's in general unless desperate, starving, whatever. They can't be reasoned or negotiated with in the same way sentient monsters can be, although they can be ferociously cunning or clever in their own right.

Yep I use them quite a bit at low levels.  Hunting quests or component gathering, clearing an area of dangerous beasts (like protecting a farm from a pack of wolves), I've done the whole "infestation of rats", though in that case it was a sign of a larger issue and was a whole arc.  There's animals under enchantment or control of a druid who sees civilization as an affront to nature and who is guiding them to try to wipe out a village or homestead, there's areas of the woods that are dark and twisted where the animals are vicious and attack without warning.  There's animals which are trained accompaniments to other enemies, like the aforementioned orcs and boars, or goblins with wolves or spiders, or a hunting party of some race on giant eagles, and so on and so forth.  Lots of reasons why they might be hostile.  

However sometimes they're not hostile, just notable.  I use animals on random encounter charts when traversing wilderness areas, and sometimes it's as simple as there being a family of bears in the middle of the road, not messing with anyone or hostile, just chilling there playing and it's on the players to decide:  Do they approach and hope the bears clear way for them rather than perceiving them as a threat?  Do they try to take the carts and horses through rough terrain to go around them, and how much time does that lose them?  Do they have any way of communicating with them or convincing them to mosey along?  Or do they just attack and gain a bunch of bear meat and hides to sell at the next town?  Not every encounter has to start with that which is encountered being hostile to the players, sometimes the choice to initiate combat or not is in their hands.

Personally I get too tempted to buff up and 'make interesting' tons of what should be low level enemies.  Kobolds are pathetic and easily dispatched in the open, but their dens are trap infested mazes wherein even experienced adventurers can easily find their death.  Goblins are masters of stealth, poison, and murder in my world, and take the kind of role normally adopted by Drow (who take a very different role).  Animals serve an important role for me in filling in low power level, relatively basic foes, which PCs can often choose to engage with or not, which helps make lower levels less brutal.  Even then, they don't have to be vanilla or boring.  I created a new animal, which hatches from pods which grow in trees which ooze blood instead of sap, and which burrow into the ground when near death, with a new tree sprouting from their corpse.  They're vicious and carnivorous, and the more meat they consume and the larger they grow, the bigger and faster-growing the tree is which sprouts.  It's weird, creepy, and going into their part of the woods is a tense and hair raising affair, but they're still low level opponents and their territorial nature gives the option of avoiding them entirely unless you're going there for a reason.

Once when the PCs were camped in a cabin, the one on guard heard definite scratching at the door.  

He promptly freaked out and woke everyone up.  About half an hour later, it happened again.  

Everyone was pretty freaked out at that point.  

Turned out to be a normal badger.

Quote from: Giant Octopodes;1111078However sometimes they're not hostile, just notable.  I use animals on random encounter charts when traversing wilderness areas, and sometimes it's as simple as there being a family of bears in the middle of the road, not messing with anyone or hostile, just chilling there playing and it's on the players to decide:  Do they approach and hope the bears clear way for them rather than perceiving them as a threat?  Do they try to take the carts and horses through rough terrain to go around them, and how much time does that lose them?  Do they have any way of communicating with them or convincing them to mosey along?  Or do they just attack and gain a bunch of bear meat and hides to sell at the next town?  Not every encounter has to start with that which is encountered being hostile to the players, sometimes the choice to initiate combat or not is in their hands.

That is how I mostly use them.  It's a chance for cautious players to avoid trouble, reckless players to get into it, and clever players to eke out some advantage.  Of if none of those player traits are on at the moment, it provides a little color to the game.

Quote from: Spinachcat;1110978There were plenty of "real world" animals in the original Monster Manual, but I rarely think about using "normal" animals as foes, even giant versions.  Do you use them? In what context?

I normally play RQ/D100 games, so use their Bestiaries rather than the Monster Manual, but I have used normal animals as foes in the past.

For beginning, or not very powerful, PCs, a pack of wolves, a lion, boar or bear are dangerous opponents. They are good to throw at PCs, especially in a wilderness trip or when hunting through ruins. At medium level, the PCs are more organised and better equipped to deal with such foes and I sometimes use them to show how far they have advanced. At higher levels, i don;t usually bother, unless the animal is magical in nature.

Quote from: Spinachcat;1110978What's the relationship between Monsters and Animals in your campaigns?

For me, a Monster is something that is harmful. An Animal is not sentient, in RQ terms it has Fixed INT. Some Monsters are Animals, other Monsters are intelligent. Similarly, some Animals are Monsters and some are not, as they are harmless.

So, a cow standing in a field is not a Monster, but a bull charging at you is.

I do use normal animals, at least depending on the system. I actually haven't used them that much in my RuneQuest play, in part because RQ1 and RQ2 don't have many normal animals in the bestiary (though the Gateway Bestiary adds a bunch, and other BRP based resources I have have more). I WOULD count things like RQ's Rubble Runners as normal animals.

One thing I would love game systems and their bestiaries to do is give better information on what circumstances an animal would attack humans (some may attack lone humans, but not groups for example). I'd also love some discussion on how animals would react to humans in a world where adventurers reach heroic levels (which of course depends on if there are enough heroic adventurers for the animals to even develop any sense that not all humans are as easy targets as the farmer's wife who is out in the woods berry picking).

Frank

I've used them extensively in RoleMaster. And my players long ago learned that many normal animals are much more dangerous then they ever expected.

In other systems I don't use them much since they tend to be very weak in everything else.