Mounts
 

Horses are okay, but boring. Camels stink, and spit. There are some good alternatives in ITL, but nothing that jumps out as all that weird. (Gryphons strike me as the coolest of what's listed.) Anybody have any good House-created riding animals of a fantastic nature?

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Which race or culture rides the diatryma? ITL 90

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ITL has Walker Lizards and other riding lizards... and flying carpets... how much more weird are you looking for?

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My own 'creation' for my world of Goranth.

Bronze Bull
ST 30 DX 10 IQ 5 MA 20 Prot 5
Attacks: adjDX Dmg Effect
Gore 10 3+3 melee
Charge 10 3+3 double damage.
Desc: This creature looks like a bull, but it’s ‘skin’ is bronze plates with burning red something in between them, flaming red eyes, and large, forward facing bronze horns. Bronze bulls charge, then sting about goring anyone who is silly enough to stand close by. Most weapons simply bounce off their skin.
Bronze Bulls take ½ damage from fire, electricity, and force spells, but double damage from water and triple damage from cold.
Bronze Bulls are magical constructs created a very long time ago, at least those currently on Goranth are ancient. They are made from the same bronzish metal as Stone Folk doors and animated by a spirit with the intellect of an animal.
A ‘live’ Bronze Bull is worth thousands of Pips, but dead one is still worth a thousand, since there is so little known about them.

Camelopard (actually a medieval interpretation of a giraffe.)
ST 24-28 DX 15 IQ 5 MA 22 Prot 0
Attacks: adjDX Dmg Effect
Gore 15 2+1
Bite 13 1+2
Desc: 2-hex creature with a long neck and sharp horns and teeth. They have long legs and run with an awkward gate. Their hide is golden like a lion with large irregular tan spots.
Camelopards can be seen eating birds in high trees.

Horgle Hippogriff
ST 26 DX 16 IQ 8 MA 20/26 Prot 1
Attacks: adjDX Dmg Effect
Bite 14 1+3 HTH
Claw 16 1+2 grounded
Dive claw 16 2+2 flying
Desc: Horgles look like horses, but have the head, front legs, and wings of a bird of prey. They are slightly bigger than riding horses.
Horgles live in mated pairs, though a solitary horgle is not unheard of. They prefer inaccessible cliffs for their nests, but have been known to build nest in the top of a very large tree.
They hunt by diving down and snatching their prey in their front claws and biting as they carry the prey away. On the first round they snatch, which is a charge where the horlge uses half it’s move to get to the target and the rest to fly away. The horgle makes a 4/DX attack roll and on a success it carries off the prey. On a failure it makes a claw attack, but fails to grip the prey and just flies off empty clawed.
Horgles are smarter that horses and dogs, and if you could befriend one they would made a powerful ally. They also hate Norks, Gobblings, and Grey Gobblings and will attack them on sight, even though they won’t eat them. If a horgle or pair of horgles saw any of these three races doing anything they may attack just to kill them, but they will not risk their lives just to kill them.

Re: Mounts
 

That's a good Question. Perhaps I shall concoct an Answer.

I had to look up the word "diatryma" (of course), and the picture I found on Wikipedia gave me a flashback: when I was very young (five? six?) I had a set of small plastic Prehistoric Creatures, mostly dinosaurs but with some later things as well, like a mammoth, a sabertooth tiger… and THAT vicious-looking bird.

I never knew what it was called, back then. Decades later, now I do. So thanks!

Flying Carpets wouldn't qualify: I'm looking for something you can breed, and have enough for a whole army to ride.

The Walker Lizards aren't bad at all, but they're the kind of thing I might dream up on my own. I was just curious to learn whether anybody had dreamt up anything weirder, something that would never have occurred to me.

Those are all cool, but the Hippogriff is the best. That's a classic, and if SJG ever does a Bestiary, the Hippogriff should be in it.

I suspect that it's hard to tame though, or domesticate and breed on a large scale. I imagine Hippogriffs are naturally wild and strong-willed, much as I also imagine Gryphons to be.

Plus, flying mounts seem just slightly cheaty to me, if you've got a whole army's worth of them. ;)

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I mainly want the difficulties of gonzo riding arrangements taken into account, which often seems to get overlooked in people's excitement to mount things on other things.

That said, I think my favorite (from Illwinter's great Dominions games) was goblin moose-riders.

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Well, okay — the Moose certainly qualifies as weird enough that I wouldn't have thought of it myself.

But I couldn't use Moose(s?) as mounts, because the temptation to invent a race of Giant Squirrels just to ride them would be overwhelming. ;)

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A big slime wrapped in a plastic bag.

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Ring of Goo Control

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I'm pretty sure saddles wouldn't work on Slimes or Goos.

But if you like slimy, slow-moving mounts, then perhaps I should go with Gnomish Snail Riders. It'll take them a month and a half to cross the battlefield, but boy, once they reach the other side, those Elves are in for a fight.

Unless they brought salt.