new packmasters

[89er]

Say, it has been a while, so let's review what has been cooking

Premier and Slappy:
Gore Felines
Gore Baboons
Kirins
Gluttons
And lord only knows what else...

So any updates on your ends fellow splice-heads?

[taalismn]

Killer Kittens.
Needs more Killer Kittens.
Those wide-eyed fuzzy harbringers of doom.
Hearts melt before their gaze. Computer keyboards(and the computers behind them) go screen-of-death upon their touch.
Love the Kitten. Fear the Kitten. Dread the Kitten.

[krispy]

Killer Kittens.
Needs more Killer Kittens.
Those wide-eyed fuzzy harbringers of doom.
Hearts melt before their gaze. Computer keyboards(and the computers behind them) go screen-of-death upon their touch.
Love the Kitten. Fear the Kitten. Dread the Kitten.

they lower your guard with their cuteness then.....attack when there is no possible means to defend

dont forget gorebunnies......oh but it is an evil rabbit

[Snake Eyes]

Evil Cuteness........a Wolpertinger

(look it up, a Jackalope with bat wings)

[krispy]

Evil Cuteness........a Wolpertinger

(look it up, a Jackalope with bat wings)

i just looked it up....and that is so cool it looks like a taxidermist got a bit mixed up with what goes with which animal

[Snake Eyes]

Evil Cuteness........a Wolpertinger

(look it up, a Jackalope with bat wings)

i just looked it up....and that is so cool it looks like a taxidermist got a bit mixed up with what goes with which animal

[Guy_LeDouche]

Evil Cuteness........a Wolpertinger

(look it up, a Jackalope with bat wings)

This thing is awesome! It reminded of the "Bunnicula" children's books from way back when.

[Premier]

Say, it has been a while, so let's review what has been cooking

Premier and Slappy:
Gore Felines
Gore Baboons
Kirins
Gluttons
And lord only knows what else...

So any updates on your ends fellow splice-heads?

Things are actually wrapping up for me & Slappy for the Splicers scripts so it will be in the hands of Palladiumbooks soon enough. From there, we will see what makes the chopping block. I know some of these, however are slated for later books and "maybe" a few we might just post on here as freebies or submit for a future Rifter's Article.

[Snake Eyes]

Evil Cuteness........a Wolpertinger

(look it up, a Jackalope with bat wings)

This thing is awesome! It reminded of the "Bunnicula" children's books from way back when.

OMG, Bunnicula, that brings back memoies

[Aramanthus]

What about enlarged insects such as "Praying Mantises?"

[The Reaper Man]

After watching a recent blockbuster movie how about this idea

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deinonychus

and GO!

[SlaytheDragon]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deinonychus

and GO!

There definitely needs to be more to the packmaster. Honestly there should be like a monster tamer/controller. Why would the human resistance create all these war mounts and not utilize the technology to just create all manner of monsters bred to hunt and kill robots and the Machine other than just gore hounds?

I had planned on making a more in depth Monster Tamer O.C.C. or some equivalent title, maybe saying that one of the houses specializes in bio-organism war machines, with some insane Engineer that creates all kinds of hostile monstrous bio-organisms whose sole purpose is to destroy robots and support humanity.

As far as the idea for a dinosaur type mount like the raptor, I think it needs to be a little more mutated to add to the feel of Splicers. It should be able to breathe fire, blend into its surroundings, have two heads or two tails and covered in feathers or something to make it unique to the whole gene splicing bio-organism feel of Splicers.

[The Reaper Man]

I completely agree I was just tossing an idea into this gene pool so to speak.

[Shark_Force]

probably they stuck with dogs for the same reason the CS uses mostly dog boys in spite of the fact that other animals could add an interesting variety of abilities.

domestic dogs can easily accept a human as the leader of the pack. they are not a completely alien intelligence like colony insects, but they are more likely to lay down their life for a "superior" on average than any other animal that humanity has domesticated. they are natural predators that work well in groups, and feature extreme loyalty.

these all provide excellent building blocks to start from. you might be able to modify other animals to be more dangerous, but the basic loyalty and pack mentality are pretty important. i know i would want to start from an extremely stable platform if i was going to start adding powerful bio-weapons to autonomous creatures.

i mean, look at the rest of the warmounts... a couple like humans in general and might even help humans in trouble on their own, but the rest of them don't really care for humans (unless you're a packmaster or outrider). for whatever reason, it seems like it's easy to genetically program hatred for an enemy (they all hate the machine), but not so easy to program them to like humans.

finding something that is going to be as widely accepted to replace the packhound is just not going to be easy. something like a cat, you're not going to get the same loyalty and obedience. and as far as combat power, well, if they wanted more they could probably give more... the packmaster's budget can potentially go mostly to one hound, which means that presumably any of the hounds could handle that much modification if it was desirable. if anything, i'd say dogs are probably much less resource-intensive as a starting point because the mental behaviours you want to create are already present in large amounts, and the reason they aren't more powerful is a cost-savings measure, a deliberate decision regarding the allocation of resources.

[SlaytheDragon]

probably they stuck with dogs for the same reason the CS uses mostly dog boys in spite of the fact that other animals could add an interesting variety of abilities.

domestic dogs can easily accept a human as the leader of the pack. they are not a completely alien intelligence like colony insects, but they are more likely to lay down their life for a "superior" on average than any other animal that humanity has domesticated. they are natural predators that work well in groups, and feature extreme loyalty.

these all provide excellent building blocks to start from. you might be able to modify other animals to be more dangerous, but the basic loyalty and pack mentality are pretty important. i know i would want to start from an extremely stable platform if i was going to start adding powerful bio-weapons to autonomous creatures.

i mean, look at the rest of the warmounts... a couple like humans in general and might even help humans in trouble on their own, but the rest of them don't really care for humans (unless you're a packmaster or outrider). for whatever reason, it seems like it's easy to genetically program hatred for an enemy (they all hate the machine), but not so easy to program them to like humans.

finding something that is going to be as widely accepted to replace the packhound is just not going to be easy. something like a cat, you're not going to get the same loyalty and obedience. and as far as combat power, well, if they wanted more they could probably give more... the packmaster's budget can potentially go mostly to one hound, which means that presumably any of the hounds could handle that much modification if it was desirable. if anything, i'd say dogs are probably much less resource-intensive as a starting point because the mental behaviours you want to create are already present in large amounts, and the reason they aren't more powerful is a cost-savings measure, a deliberate decision regarding the allocation of resources.

Fair enough point. I still don't see a reason why they couldn't incorporate more beasts to the gene pool and create monstrous organisms to serve as the tanks, and other vehicle substitutes for the human resistance. While I understand their ability to control comes from that pack mindset of the canine, the intelligent beings that the Engineers are should be able to isolate this gene and be able to use this in all their creations, giving the same loyalty of a dog to a monstrous lion or other feline like creature. That's just my opinion though. I understand how the pack mentality and loyalty explains the reason for their not being more monstrous creations of Engineers and Librarians in the core book, but it shouldn't limit them to only canine creations being advanced genetic scientists and their ability to create bio-organisms.

[Shark_Force]

well, like i said, the engineers and librarians seem able to handle physical attributes quite easily, but have a much harder time mucking around with mental stuff.

the existing selection of warmounts suggests that, and the fact that biotics aren't all completely stable individuals with a willingness to give up their lives for the cause and a strong desire to follow orders and please their superiors suggests that.

which is probably for the best, really. i mean, if your librarian goes megalo, it's nice to know that he didn't program all the stuff he's worked on for the last several years to refuse to attack him. or worse yet to obey his commands and turn on your own soldiers.

in any event, they do create lots of different creatures. they just pair them up with humans on a one-to-one basis. considering what happened the last time they turned over full control without human supervision to autonomous entities that they created, i would frankly find it extremely unusual for them to *not* be paranoid about the possibility of their creations turning against them.

remember, NEXUS worked for quite a while without slaughtering humans. it wasn't until they decided to cram a bunch of instructions into the robotic mind and stop observing it and adjudicating conflicts it encountered and such that a horrible disaster that claimed the lives of most of the humans on the planet happened, and you gotta figure the select few who survived through those times were the ones who didn't rely fully on NEXUS to take care of their needs; iirc, the book mentions that by the time NEXUS went haywire many people didn't know how to operate their own technology anymore and as a result couldn't use what limited resources they had available to resist NEXUS, making a bad disaster into an even worse one as people couldn't escape using vehicles or didn't know how to reload their guns or clear a jam.

and the ones that survived have grown up on stories about what happens when you let your creations take the driver's seat and don't keep a watchful eye on it.

sooo... yeah. i can definitely see them being pretty uncomfortable about letting uncontrolled unsupervised creations handle things for them. and frankly, if those creations are anywhere near as good at being a soldier as a trained human can be, they're likely going to be able to realize that you've basically created them as slaves to send off to their deaths.

[Premier]

probably they stuck with dogs for the same reason the CS uses mostly dog boys in spite of the fact that other animals could add an interesting variety of abilities.

domestic dogs can easily accept a human as the leader of the pack. they are not a completely alien intelligence like colony insects, but they are more likely to lay down their life for a "superior" on average than any other animal that humanity has domesticated. they are natural predators that work well in groups, and feature extreme loyalty.

these all provide excellent building blocks to start from. you might be able to modify other animals to be more dangerous, but the basic loyalty and pack mentality are pretty important. i know i would want to start from an extremely stable platform if i was going to start adding powerful bio-weapons to autonomous creatures.

i mean, look at the rest of the warmounts... a couple like humans in general and might even help humans in trouble on their own, but the rest of them don't really care for humans (unless you're a packmaster or outrider). for whatever reason, it seems like it's easy to genetically program hatred for an enemy (they all hate the machine), but not so easy to program them to like humans.

finding something that is going to be as widely accepted to replace the packhound is just not going to be easy. something like a cat, you're not going to get the same loyalty and obedience. and as far as combat power, well, if they wanted more they could probably give more... the packmaster's budget can potentially go mostly to one hound, which means that presumably any of the hounds could handle that much modification if it was desirable. if anything, i'd say dogs are probably much less resource-intensive as a starting point because the mental behaviours you want to create are already present in large amounts, and the reason they aren't more powerful is a cost-savings measure, a deliberate decision regarding the allocation of resources.

Sharkforce is absolutely correct with his assessment.

Canids, especially domesticated canids are easier to train and maintain a desired pack hierarchy with a domesticated affinity for human leadership than any other intelligent species. This is not to mention the versatility in performances that canines bring to the table. They bring a major bonus of a phenomenal pulmonary stamina that allows them to course adversaries at a good, steady speed or rate. Wild canids are one of the most efficient and successful (80% African wild Hunting Dogs) hunters outside of man.

Source - \

http://ngureco.hubpages.com/hub/Worlds-Greatest-Hunters-Best-Animal-Hunter-African-Wild-Dogs
"Hunting is the pursuit, capture and killing of wild animals as prey for food. Efficiency in hunting is considered as the catch per unit of effort. An animal having a success rate of 30% of the time it attempt to catch a prey is efficient. The African wild dog has a success rate of 80% which rank the African wild dog as one of the world’s greatest hunters. Contrast this with 55% for the Great White Shark and 30% for the African lion.

Source - Wiki
"L. pictus hunts by approaching prey silently then chasing it in a pursuit clocking at 66 kmph for 10 to 60 minutes. The average chase typically only goes as far as 2 km, during which time the prey animal, if large, is repeatedly bitten on the legs, belly and anus until it stops running, while smaller prey is simply pulled down and torn apart. L. pictus hunting strategies differ according to prey, with wildebeest being rushed at in order to panic the herd and isolate a vulnerable individual, whereas territorial antelope species, which defend themselves by running in wide circles, are captured by cutting off their escape routes. Medium-sized prey is often killed in 2–5 minutes, whereas larger prey like wildebeest may take half an hour to pull down. Male wild dogs usually perform the task of grabbing dangerous prey, such as warthogs, by the nose. Small prey is eaten entirely, while large animals are stripped of their meat and organs, with the skin, head, and skeleton left intact. The African wild dog is a fast eater, with a pack being able to consume a Thompson's gazelle in 15 minutes. In the wild, the species' consumption rate is of 1.2–5.9 kg per African wild dog a day, with one pack of 17–43 specimens in East Africa having been recorded to kill three animals per day on average. The African wild dog is a highly successful hunter.[29] Nearly 80% of all wild dog hunts end in a kill; for comparison, the success rate of lions, often viewed as ultimate predators, is only 10%."

source - http://www.bwmag.in/the-wild-dhole-chase
"Being social animals, dholes hunt together and this makes them very efficient. They are successful in catching prey up to 80% of the time that they go on a hunt, while tigers have a success rate of only 5%. "

They are able to maintain a nice speed to cover a wide range of ground better than any other land animal.

For those who tend to overlook a "pet" animal or become desensitized to it, simply because it is domesticated, let us not forget what specialized breeding can excel in. Specialized breeds selectively bred for desired functions such as hunting, guardwork, police work, combat (against wild animals of various scale (from numerous rats to cougars, leopards, to the likes of wild boars, bear, bulls & buffalo, gladiatorial, pest, etc.), are proven traits in canids.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pD2LJBhxLfU

And that is a Saluki that maxes out at 44 mph/77 kph; not a 450-500 pound, nearly 6-foot tall on all four, MDC Gorehound moving at 100+mph, armed with advanced Biotech weapons and defenses, let alone a pack of them.

They have automatic keen senses of smell, hearing and communication. Sure there are other species that might excel in one category over a canid. However, in a wide range of categories, this is where the versatility of the canid prevails, imho.

Felines have more explosive muscles, but tire quick and are not long distance runners, so they would be hard pressed to maintain a high speed chase or cover a large vast area of ground with out requiring significant rest. Plus they are certainly not as easy to train and are more solitary in nature. Even a pride of lions (the most social of the panthera felines) is extremely dangerous to contend with in their intra-guild fighting, especially at feeding time. Just imagine trying to share a kill among other Warmounts with a pride of Bio-Lions. Talk about breaking up unnecessary fights, all the time.

The same can be said for many Reptiles. Large carnivore reptiles such as crocodilians/Dinosaurs provide fantastic bone crushing jaws (the highest bite force recorded in the animal kingdom) and some explosive speed. However, they also suffer from severe lactic acid build up when doing intense physical activities and this is why land predators such as tigers and lions and even leopards predate on crocs when caught on land. They wear them out. the same can be said for mustelids (like Ratels, Giant otters, badgers, etc., and mongooses who also tire out caiman, monitors, anacondas, rock pythons and poisonous snakes.

I say all this to say, sure there are many species and creatures that we could add to the setting to make things "spicy" for the Packmaster OCC, but we should be careful not to usurp the core OCC by making things in such a way that it introduces munchkin seeds and makes core things obsolete, nor should they override a desired function and practicality in its uses. There are just very few animals that have the total package that the canid brings to the table.

[Premier]

probably they stuck with dogs for the same reason the CS uses mostly dog boys in spite of the fact that other animals could add an interesting variety of abilities.

domestic dogs can easily accept a human as the leader of the pack. they are not a completely alien intelligence like colony insects, but they are more likely to lay down their life for a "superior" on average than any other animal that humanity has domesticated. they are natural predators that work well in groups, and feature extreme loyalty.

these all provide excellent building blocks to start from. you might be able to modify other animals to be more dangerous, but the basic loyalty and pack mentality are pretty important. i know i would want to start from an extremely stable platform if i was going to start adding powerful bio-weapons to autonomous creatures.

i mean, look at the rest of the warmounts... a couple like humans in general and might even help humans in trouble on their own, but the rest of them don't really care for humans (unless you're a packmaster or outrider). for whatever reason, it seems like it's easy to genetically program hatred for an enemy (they all hate the machine), but not so easy to program them to like humans.

finding something that is going to be as widely accepted to replace the packhound is just not going to be easy. something like a cat, you're not going to get the same loyalty and obedience. and as far as combat power, well, if they wanted more they could probably give more... the packmaster's budget can potentially go mostly to one hound, which means that presumably any of the hounds could handle that much modification if it was desirable. if anything, i'd say dogs are probably much less resource-intensive as a starting point because the mental behaviours you want to create are already present in large amounts, and the reason they aren't more powerful is a cost-savings measure, a deliberate decision regarding the allocation of resources.

Fair enough point. I still don't see a reason why they couldn't incorporate more beasts to the gene pool and create monstrous organisms to serve as the tanks, and other vehicle substitutes for the human resistance. While I understand their ability to control comes from that pack mindset of the canine, the intelligent beings that the Engineers are should be able to isolate this gene and be able to use this in all their creations, giving the same loyalty of a dog to a monstrous lion or other feline like creature. That's just my opinion though. I understand how the pack mentality and loyalty explains the reason for their not being more monstrous creations of Engineers and Librarians in the core book, but it shouldn't limit them to only canine creations being advanced genetic scientists and their ability to create bio-organisms.

I agree that some functions do warrant or open the door for other creatures into the mixing pot to get certain desired results, but as Sharkforce mentioned, mixing certain physical traits to get a desired outcome is one thing, doing it on a mental/instinctual genetic level is something totally different. The Librarians and Engineers seem to grasp genetic manipulation/gene splicing and bioengineering for physical traits, but doing it to obtain or to balance mental traits is a another story.

For example, certain gladiatorial dog breeds have a high prey-drive and tolerance to pain that works well for a combatant. Some Librarian/Warlord -might- want to have in their ranks a soldier that will fight possibly to the death if need be or to endure massive amounts of pain in-order to accomplish a feat. However, the genetic make up that causes this is also hard to balance mentally. Some of the dog breeds that exhibit this insensitivity to pain is due to their brain chemistry. Their body releases endorphins as a natural painkiller, and this is higher through the selective breeding process for this trait. However, that is only part of the equation when fielding soldiers. You also have individual personality traits that have to be factored in and how they correspond with these brain chemistry genetics in order to furnish a desirable stable, focused soldier in the field among your infantry ranks.

This is why you see some mental traits wear off on different Host Armor pilots based on their armor's metabolism or so many insanities when the brains are tampered with. With the more Kamikaze DNA blends of traits like the Grendel you get a vicious blood thirsty killer versus a large, protective puppy like Behemoth.

[89er]

Guess we now know why we shouldn't mold any chimeras without supervision.