What exactly are Hounds?

[acreRake]

Pretty sure they are hollow and/or completely made of armor. IIRC, they are more like a golem than a zombie: i.e. created from scrap not a living/dead creature. I don't think it ever comes right out and says in the books does it? I don't own Nightlands, though, and my memory does kind of suck...

[Tinker Dragoon]

Are they armored dopplegangers?

Magic robots?

Demons?

The reason I ask is that there are certain attacks which may or may not work depending on thier nature. For example, how would martial art powers affect them? If you shatter a piece of armor with Tamashiwara, what's underneath?

You never know what exactly ANYTHING is in Nightbane, because so much of the information is deliberately subjective and open to GM interpretation.

The hounds are definitely living creatures (the band of warriors known as Cortez' Cannibals is mentioned as drinking their blood in Between the Shadows), but exactly what sort of living creatures they are is open to speculation. One hypothesis presented in the books is that they, along with the Doppelgangers, Hunters, and several other minions, are actually corrupted and permanently transmuted Formless Ones and/or Nightbanes.

[LunarYoma]

I think of that as Golems. The nightlords created a magic ritual(which requires the sacrifice of a living being) to turn armor(what they appear as now) into golem like creatures(the sacrificed sentient creature giving the hounds greater intelligence & thinking ability above that of a regular golem).

[Sanctu]

I thought I read in something canon a while ago that Hounds were baked.

Take 10 Doppleganers.
Throw into a large, strange, black metal vat.
Start your priest types chanting, or just watch and pour power in.
Press their bodies like grapes.
Watch the energy from their screaming, wailing forms solidify into a Hound.

Hunters are made using a different mold.
Masters require more Dopplegangers.

I'm unsure if any of them needed to be awakened at any part of this, or if you need an extra separate sacrifice for it, or what. If so, make sure to "pre-spice" the Dopplegangers in question.

That's what I recall reading, anyway.

This, plus the random slaying of Dopplegangers by board Hounds and Hunters, or their use for practice, does explain why there are so few Dopplegangers in the Nightlands compaired to humans.

[Reagren Wright]

Well first off they have the basic immunities that golems do. They
don't bleed or eat. They don't even have a personality or emotions.
So I say there more golems created by the powers of the Nightlords.