Animals

[Pteryx]

OK, I've kind of painted myself into a corner here... I said I'd GM HERO, but I'm still getting familiar with the system, don't have the Bestiary, and am not sure if I can pull off the stats of a few animals should I need them (and I should, given that I'm planning to run a transworld fantasy game in a world primarily of talking animals). Any tips, links to a sample animal or two to work from, etc.? -- Pteryx

[Ben Seeman]

If you have Hero Designer, you could always buy the Bestiary character pack. It's the same content sans pictures.

[Pteryx]

Thanks for the suggestion, but I don't have that, either (nor the means by which to run it)... -- Pteryx

[Blue Jogger]

The biggest tip, unless the heroes have to fight or ride the animals, you don't really need stats.

 

These aren't official stats, but really rough estimates, feel free to adjust these depending on mood, player's strength, etc. These are probably tougher than normal animals. If they are combat trained (or used to fighting), then feel free to give them a few combat skill levels or more DEX. A combat-trained wolf (20 DEX) can take down a bear.

 

REALLY BIG ANIMAL has 40 STR, 20 DEX, 40 BODY, 100 STUN, -4 DCV

BEARS have 20 STR, 15 DEX, 20 BODY, 60 STUN, -2 DCV

HORSES have 20 STR, 15 DEX, 20 BODY, 40 STUN, 0 DCV

WOLVES have 10 STR, 15 DEX, 10 BODY, 30 STUN, 0 DCV

CATS have 5 STR, 20 DEX, 10 BODY, 10 STUN, +2 DCV

SQUIRREL, MOUSE or BAT have 5 STR, 15 DEX, 5 BODY, +4 DCV

[Ndreare]

I would follow the Blue Joggers advice. Just slide in what you need and what feels rite.

[Pattern Ghost]

Just guesstimate. You don't really need fullblown stats for combat purposes, and for non-combat encounters, you don't need stats at all. There are some animals, I believe, in the back of the 5th edition rulebook.

 

Let's say you wanted your PCs to tackle a bear, for example.

 

Bears are pretty tough, and fairly nimble for their size. They've got good noses and hearing, and average to poor eyesight. They have claws. They're huge, so they're tough to stun.

 

So, some guesstimated combat stats:

 

OCV: 5 [high enough to tag most CV 3 normals most of the time]

DCV: 3 [bears are large, but also hard to get damage past a bunch of claws and teeth, so just averaage it out to 3, pretty easy for most adventurers to tag, even odds for a normal person.]

DEX: 13 [bears are pretty nimble, and go first against most normal folks, but they're not that much above human average]

SPD: 2 [bears don't get to go more than most people, and we'll represent a flury of claws and bites another way]

DMG: 2.5d6 HKA, Red. Pen. x2 [That's a total of four 1/2d6 killing attacks. This doesn't mean add anything more for STR. This is it. Our fictional bear can run you down and maul you. A half die can do 3 body, so light armor or very heavy clothing will protect from most of the damage (but the bear will target your upper body hit location roll, so you'll need to be wearing something on your head, or else you'll be dead soon)=

Hit Location Roll: Upper body.

Running: 12" total, but only in bursts. [bears can haul bear behind and outrun almost any human in short bursts. Or so I say.]

PER rolls: Sight 8- if stationary, but add mods if target is moving without stealth. Scent and Hearing: 12-.

PD/ED: 18 [A normal person with STR 10 can haymaker for 6d6. There's no way that he's getting much STUN through to the bear. Since the average STUN on 6d6 is 21, I'm setting the DEF at 18.]

Damage Resistance: 2 or 3 pts of the DEF is resistant. [bears have a lot of hair, fat and muscle to defend themselves, but they aren't bullet proof or even arrow proof.]

BODY: 15+ {Bears are TOUGH. Theoretically, 20 falls into the top of the normal human range of BODY, so a bear should have over 20 BODY, but let's look at what it takes to kill a bear: Let's say a high powered rifle is about a 2d6+1 RKA. Average damage is 8 BODY. Double that for a good hit location roll, to 16. That should be enough to put a bear into bleeding out. For a black bear, that is. For a bigger, meaner bear, you might add a couple of BODY.]

STUN: 50 {I just pulled that number out of my rear. Bears are not easy to STUN, though. 50 STUN with an 18 normal defense should make them pretty formidable, but with only 2 or 3 resistant defense, killing attacks might KO them before they've taken significant BODY. Putting the STUN up to 50 helps alleviate that problem}

REC: I really wouldn't give animals recoveries, even post-12. It'd tend to slow things down.

 

Ok, let's do a Wolf:

 

OCV: 5

DCV: 5

DEX: 14

SPD: 3

DMG: 1/d6 K

PD/ED: 8 (pretty tough) no resistant def.

BDY: 10

STN: 25

Movement: 8" (faster than most humans)

PER: 13- (wolves and dogs are pretty alert)

Don't forget to give Wolves the advantages of Teamwork and Combined attacks. A single wolf isn't much of a threat, but a pack of them is.

 

You might want to note STR for things like knocking people down, etc. I'd give a black bear around 25, a wolf around 13. Those would just be guesses. No human is stronge than a bear, and a wolf is a bit stronger than an average couch potato human, but doesn't really approach the top of the human range. Great apes, chimps, orangutangs, and gorillas would start at 25 and go up to about 30 to 33 for a male gorilla.

 

All of this is just really rough estimates. The thing to keep in mind is whether the animal is better than a) the average human, the average adventurer or c) ANY human, in a given category. Or if it's worse. A bird probably has a STR of about -25 or thereabouts. A housecat, around a -10. Two things that are tough to gauge are STR, because animals apply it differently and have different body mechanics, and DEX, b/c a lot of people overestimate how much DEX animals have compared to an average human. (Hint: The average human is a pretty dextrous animal, including reaction times, and the ability to reason has a lot to do with reaction times.)

 

Or, you could just get the bestiary and save the work. =)

[Pteryx]

...So today, I happened to randomly open FREd to a page that happened to show a sample black bear, lion, and light warhorse. How embarassing...

 

Anyway, thanks, everyone -- particularly you, Pattern Ghost. Hopefully I can manage to do this... (And believe me, I'd get the Bestiary right now if I could, but even FREd had to be special-ordered -- plus there's the trouble of saving up the money, too.) -- Pteryx