Making Animals more Dangerous

[AlexanderHowl]

One of the advantages of biological and genetic augmentations is that they can make animals much more dangerous. For example, a tiger at TL10 could be genetically modified for +1 SM, +9 ST, +2 IQ, DX+1, and HT+3 without any species modifications (SM+2 allows for larger bonuses for ST than could normally be given without species modification), for an average of ST 26, DX 14, IQ 6, HT 14, and SM+2. The resulting tiger is larger, stronger, smarter, faster, and tougher than any conventional tiger and is capable of reproducing with conventional tigers. For further levels of danger, you could implant brain grafts, bone stimulation, muscle reinforcement, neural augmentation, and nerve boosters to increase its IQ to 8, its HP to 27, its Basic Speed to 11, its Basic Move to 15, its Lifting ST to 32, and its Striking ST to 32. What dangerous animals do you use in your campaigns?

[whswhs]

Most recently, wild pigs. I didn't tweak them in any way; the PCs were TL1, and wild pigs are dangerous just as they are.

[ericthered]

Make em bigger! The most recent animal foes I've used were a literal dinosaur (sauropod) and a 3 ton bull.

[mr beer]

So one time the party ended next to the Styx in the first of the Nine Hells, where Set hangs out.

So I made more dangerous versions of real world animals: hippos with DR 10 hide and a toxic breath weapon, crocs with similar hide and fire breath and a sort of marabou stork with an armour piercing beak that could launch a flurry of armour piercing feathers, kind of like a flechette round from a shotgun.

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by whswhs

Most recently, wild pigs. I didn't tweak them in any way; the PCs were TL1, and wild pigs are dangerous just as they are.

No joke! Even at TL 8, I wouldn't want to face one without well-trained boar hunting dogs and several friends to radically outnumber the single boar I'd be hunting. Because there is never just one. Never.


I use all kinds of animals. Anything can be dangerous if the PCs aren't specifically geared up for facing that threat, and often even when they are.

[Refplace]

A lot of regular animals can be dangerous, especially with an IQ boost.
However just to make things more interesting I built martial styles for them to allow for some of the moves they are known for.
http://www.warehouse23.com/products/...-111-combat-ii

[Humabout]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

One of the advantages of biological and genetic augmentations is that they can make animals much more dangerous. For example, a tiger at TL10 could be genetically modified for +1 SM, +9 ST, +2 IQ, DX+1, and HT+3 without any species modifications (SM+2 allows for larger bonuses for ST than could normally be given without species modification), for an average of ST 26, DX 14, IQ 6, HT 14, and SM+2. The resulting tiger is larger, stronger, smarter, faster, and tougher than any conventional tiger and is capable of reproducing with conventional tigers. For further levels of danger, you could implant brain grafts, bone stimulation, muscle reinforcement, neural augmentation, and nerve boosters to increase its IQ to 8, its HP to 27, its Basic Speed to 11, its Basic Move to 15, its Lifting ST to 32, and its Striking ST to 32. What dangerous animals do you use in your campaigns?

I use a wide variety of European fawna, usually, and I've found that if you play to animal's strengths, you don't need to tweak them much - especially against normal humans.

Remember that animals have evolved for their environments. Most won't be particularly hampered by them, and that gives them a major mobility advantage over people. On top of that, their coloration usually gives a level or two of Natural Camouflage, making them harder to spot.

Animal senses are also very different from humans' and often tailored to their environments and circadian rhythms, as well. Crepuscular and nocturnal animals will have varying degrees of Night Vision - in some cases up to NV 6. Their visual acuity may be low, but they use this to spot prey and sometimes just motion. But then again, visual lines are usually quite limited in wilderness settings, making a reliance on Vision a detriment. Sucks for humans....

What animals really rely on are their senses of smell and hearing. Neither of these is terribly impacted by interceding stuff in the way that vision is. Most mammals can justify Discriminatory Smell, which basically makes it as fine tuned as sight for sake of navigation, discrimination, etc. They don't need sight to spot or track you, but you need it to fight them off. Furthermore, many animals can track and hunt by sound, and additionally, have a level or two of Parabolic Hearing for their big swiveling ears. And if that's not enough, a ton of predatory mammals have whiskers that let them fight just fine in total darkness, even without the aid of hearing or smell.

All of this combines to mean that while humans have reduced lines of sight, crappy hearing and smell, and difficulty moving around wild terrain, the animals that live there don't suffer any of these penalties. So that tiger that is stalking the party? If the party can even see through the jungle far enough to hope to spot it, it's camouflage and natural stalking instincts mean it will likely go unnoticed. If the humans run, it can run faster and less impeded than them. If the humans stay and fight, it has a good chance of taking them by surprise, and if doesn't need the benefit of light to do it, either.

So there you have it. PCs alone in the jungle being stalked by a massive predator they can't hope to spot before it attacks and that can outrun them if they flee. That's already pretty dangerous.

[AlexanderHowl]

I prefer to use augmented animals to make them more of a challenge in my campaigns (then again, I do not run games with characters less than 200 points, so my definition of challenging may be different than most GMs). In my campaigns, the average NPC is 100 points (mostly to account for their experience and training), so my PCs need to be 200 points to seem exceptional in comparison to the NPCs.

When I run campaigns at 200+ points, normal animals tend to not be much of a threat, so you need exceptional animals. Augmentation is also a nice way for animals to remain a threat against science fiction weapons and superhuman abilities. A normal tiger might have natural camouflage, but an augmented tiger with a dynamic chameleon systems is going to be much more dangerous against a team with particle beams than a normal tiger.

[Bruno]

I've sent demonic wolves after fantasy adventurers, they mostly got parried-to-death.

What's "dangerous" really depends on the PCs abilities and equipment. Even game hunters with rifles don't go large-dangerous-animal hunting in full plate (except that one guy), even when hunting known man-eaters. With the exception of sharks, but we only don armor if we decide to go in the water with them, rather than just use nets and hooks from the comfort of a boat.

On the one hand, humans are just plain reluctant to don protective gear. PCs, on the other claw, will regularly pile on as much protective gear as they can afford, and travel with shields and weapons in hand. PCs also tend to accumulate high combat skills, high alertness, good offensive weaponry, and where available exceptional abilities.

Rhinos and even elephants have stood no chance against (unarmored) poachers with military weapons.

On the gripping hand, a party of three-ish rhino poachers with military weapons was eaten by a pride of lions late last month (or early this month). I say three-ish because they found enough shoes and very scattered equipment for at least three people, but they can't be sure they found everything. There was brief visual confirmation the lions were eating people, and then the witness wisely legged it. By the time authorities got out in force hours later, the lions were quite full, and the scavengers had made off with the remains.

Travelling on foot and not paying attention can make most animals dangerous (good way to step on a snake). Travelling in a vehicle (a ute, boat, or copter) makes you nearly invulnerable to wildlife smaller than a hippo.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

No joke! Even at TL 8, I wouldn't want to face one without well-trained boar hunting dogs and several friends to radically outnumber the single boar I'd be hunting. Because there is never just one. Never.

Sangmu went up against a couple of sows and their piglets. By herself. She had a troll bow (which compared to a longbow as a longbow compared to a standard bow) and high ST, so she could attack from a distance, but she quickly figured out she'd gotten in over her head and had better back off in a hurry before they figured out her hiding place. It would have been worse if the sows had been familiar with missile weapons instead of "Hey, what just bit me?!"