Animal Handling reflects your ability to influence and understand non-magical animals through voice, posture, patience, and practice. It covers both momentary control—like calming a spooked steed—and long-term training, such as teaching a wolfhound to track or a hawk to return on command.
Typical Uses:
- Calming panicked animals (e.g., after loud noises or injury)
- Coaxing frightened or injured creatures to accept handling
- Training animals to follow commands or perform tricks
- Reading animal behavior—fear, aggression, illness, or affection
- Managing pack behavior, herding livestock, or quieting a barking dog
Situational Modifiers:
Apply the standard difficulty ladder depending on the animal’s temperament, the urgency of the moment, and the environment. Add or subtract modifiers before the roll:
- Trivial (+50%): Telling a well-trained dog to sit in a calm room.
- Effortless (+40%): Nudging a familiar horse into a trot on open road.
- Easy (+30%): Calming a tired mule at the end of a long march.
- Routine (+20%): Getting a riding horse to obey in light traffic or noise.
- Favorable (+10%): Soothing an unfamiliar but calm beast with food.
- Everyday (0%): Training a pup or maintaining control of a familiar mount.
- Challenging (–10%): Handling an anxious warhorse near open flames.
- Hard (–20%): Calming a panicked beast in combat or thunderstorm.
- Very Hard (–30%): Mounting a spooked animal mid-fight.
- Extreme (–40%): Pacifying a half-wild predator without prior contact.
- Near-Impossible (–50%): Taming a savage beast with nothing but voice and presence.
Working Without Training:
Attempting Animal Handling without the skill invokes the usual penalties:
- Base chance is half Mind, rounded down
- Difficulty steps one rung tougher (e.g., Routine becomes Challenging)
Narrative Examples:
- A ranger calms a bear cub snarling in a trap, speaking low and slow.
- A stablehand calms a horse that smells blood on the wind.
- A bard uses food, soft tone, and rhythmic steps to tame a street mutt.
- A druid trains a panther over months, earning trust through shared hunts.
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File Created: 04/30/2025 Last Modified: 04/30/2025