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I have a player that wants to make a chicken sled (don't ask). I am not convinced that it would ever work.
My opinion is that most livestock (chickens included) would have the Int of 1, with the occasional animal (such as pigs) at Int 2.
The point being that Handle Animal says that you can only train animals with an intelligence of 2 or 3.
Any thoughts? I will admit that I am biased because I believe that the player is just being silly, but I would like some other thoughts, that could possibly change my mind.
Thanks and I apologize in advance for any silliness. :)
Yeah, i might allow a gnome with a rooster as an animal companion or familiar to have maybe the equivalent of a 4 chicken dogsled pull him around, but that's about it.
The point being that Handle Animal says that you can only train animals with an intelligence of 2 or 3.
No it doesn't. You can train an animal with only 1 intelligence.
Teach an Animal a Trick: You can teach an animal a specific trick with 1 week of work and a successful Handle Animal check against the indicated DC. An animal with an Intelligence score of 1 can learn a maximum of three tricks, while an animal with an Intelligence score of 2 can learn a maximum of six tricks. Possible tricks (and their associated DCs) include, but are not necessarily limited to, the following.
Thanks! I was looking at the general purpose passage, and missed the individual trick paragraph! So maybe he could... but then he would have to see how many it would take to pull him along...
Your typical chicken would be Diminuative (between 6 inches and 1 foot tall), and if we assume a strength of 1:
Heavy Load: 2.5 pounds
Push/Drag: 12.5 pounds
A character can generally push or drag along the ground as much as five times his maximum load. Favorable conditions can double these numbers, and bad circumstances can reduce them by half or more.
A sled could be considered a "favorable condition" as opposed to just dragging him. So double that to 25 pounds. Each chicken attached to the sled can move 25 pounds.
Which is just ridiculous, but thats what the rules would say.
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He is listing 100 chickens on his character sheet. I am feeling much the same as you about non-magically having any success at this.
I think it's AWESOME!
Everyone should be not only allowed to do this but should be encouraged."Man! THAT is a nice sled.. what kinda power does she got?"
"100 Chicken power"
whew.. must go fast!
Quit with the rules-festing and just allow this amazing bit of fluff to go. Who cares about the mechanics. Imagine the scene!
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He purchased a lot of feed as well. Looking at the rules, based on a 1 Str, a single chicken would be able to drag up to 10 lbs. (I personally think it would be significantly less, but 1 Str is the lowest Str available.)
So by that account, he would need significantly less than 100 chickens. I would say that 25 chickens would allow him to have a decent pull with minimum supplies.
But it is something I really need to talk to him about. With how the campaign may work, it may just be wasted money.
Most livestock would probably have an INT of 2. Pigs are smarter than dogs, and while not quite in the same ballpark, cows seem to be a bit smarter, or at least more sociable than chickens. Turkeys, it turns out, are actually pretty smart on the "dumb bird" scale, smarter than chickens, anyway.
I think a chicken sled is an awesome idea, but it would need magic, definitely. Chickens spook easily and they don't quite flock the way flying birds do. They can be herded, so to speak, into their coop, but it's a scattershot experience doing so.
A sled moving over normal ground isn't that favorable. It's not like the runners are as useful as wheels. If it were a chicken chariot, that's a different story. A sled on snow would be great, but the chickens would be moving through difficult terrain and he wouldn't get any real speed.
He'd be better off saving up for a custom magic item that lets him do what he wants magically without dealing with the insanity of real chickens.
100 chickens? How does he keep them all contained? Seriously? What roadside inn is going to have accommodations for that many chickens?
He purchased a lot of feed as well. Looking at the rules, based on a 1 Str, a single chicken would be able to drag up to 10 lbs. (I personally think it would be significantly less, but 1 Str is the lowest Str available.)
That why such small creatures should not have stats. Even if given the minimum (such as 1 strength, 1 damage, or 1 hit point), they are far too strong compared to their real-world counterparts.
Chickens don't have stats. Any amount of hit point damage will kill them, they can do 0 damage in combat. Thats all of the stats a chicken needs. (Removing the stupid "minimum 1 damage rule" also fixes the cat vs commoner problem.)
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Thanks! I was looking at the general purpose passage, and missed the individual trick paragraph! So maybe he could... but then he would have to see how many it would take to pull him along...Your typical chicken would be Diminuative (between 6 inches and 1 foot tall), and if we assume a strength of 1:
Heavy Load: 2.5 pounds
Push/Drag: 12.5 poundsA character can generally push or drag along the ground as much as five times his maximum load. Favorable conditions can double these numbers, and bad circumstances can reduce them by half or more.A sled could be considered a "favorable condition" as opposed to just dragging him. So double that to 25 pounds. Each chicken attached to the sled can move 25 pounds.
Which is just ridiculous, but thats what the rules would say.
Oh yeah, forgot about dimunitive aspect.
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Shell out the extra bucks for advanced giant chickens.
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He's a witch, so I think it's part of his "flavor" but I am more concerned that he's trying to get away with some "tom-foolery"... We will see. I was just trying to get some other opinions so that I have a little more of a balanced response than the knee-jerk reaction that I was having at the beginning of this...
Yar!
Also, random note about push/drag numbers... the rules don't say how fast you can move when pushing/dragging, but the next lower step "Lifting off the ground" states that between it's max load (2.5) and double that "5), it can only stagger about, moving only a mighty 5' as a full round action.
So depending on conditions, each chicken can bear 12.5 - 25 lbs. However, how fast do you really think they'll be able to move that? For the first few rounds, probably no more than 5' as a full-round action. Once this train gets going, great! But then, fatigue may start to set in (what is a chicken's Con score anyways?)
Regardless, this here be a fantasy game, and what village idiot wouldn't have his day made by seeing a gnomish bard riding into town on a sled pulled by chickens wearing capes and shakos?
:D
~P
Having had a lot of personal first hand experience with real chickens, I'd say they probably have an INT of 3. They're surprisingly intelligent, for a "livestock" animal. They can run to grab the farmer if one of them is in jeopardy, for instance, and I'm not sure cows even do that.
They can also predict earthquakes, by the way. Don't ask me how, but I've seen it.
The real reason he can't have a Chicken Sled is that Chickens have a strength of basically zero. They can barely move their own weight, to say nothing of a sled. 12.5 to 25 lb drag weight is a crock, chickens can barely lift a quarter of a pound. He'd need thousands of them, and even then, he'd need some way to not only harness them, but to direct their motion.
The solution is mentioned above. Advanced giant template chickens, from the Mythical Valley of Chickendoom. Make him adventure for it. He'd rather do that anyway, because then it's not just loot, it's an achievement.
This all depends on what kind of chicken you get. A standard domestic chicken is pretty dumb, and pretty weak. But wild and feral versions of the species are comparatively stronger, without the selective breeding for edible proportions.
Perhaps you might find better luck with a larger, specimen that is more adapted to moving as opposed to roasting.
So... advanced giant chicken sled it is.
Or tell him to learn how to craft homonculi, and make them chicken shaped.
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I live on Kauai, and we have feral chickens everywhere! They are dumb as posts.
Now, Beej67, I think your post leads me to believe that the chickens can indeed learn tricks, and like everything else, there may be variation in Intelligence. In my experience, they tend to be very dumb. :)
Anyway, he told me that a chicken is 2 cp each, so he just decided to drop 2 gp on a 100. >.<
100 chickens will absolutely not pull a sled.
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Yeah the 12.5 to 25 pounds would be for a medium creature. I believe a diminutive creature would pull what 1/4th of that weight? So like 3 pounds to 8 pounds where they basically could stagger.
Yeah the 12.5 to 25 pounds would be for a medium creature. I believe a diminutive creature would pull what 1/4th of that weight? So like 3 pounds to 8 pounds where they basically could stagger.
The 12.5 to 25 pounds is for a diminutive creature. Heavy load for a strength of 1 is 10 pounds, x 1/4 for a Diminutive creature is 2.5 pounds. Push/drag is 5x you heavy load, so 12.5 pounds.
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You should just rip off the Thor myth and have some crazed avian deity grant the gnome a small chariot pulled by two magical dire chickens. Each night he can kill, cook, and eat them. Then as long as he leaves the bones in a pile the next morning they are resurrected from the dead to pull the chariot once more.
Need bigger chickens.
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Even more humiliating than the 'housecat vs. commoner' situation, in real life, chickens can kill people. (Some trainer got his throat slashed open by one of his fighting roosters during a police raid.)
Geese would make for much more effective sled-pullers. They are bigger and stronger and more prone to flocking in an organized fashion. (They also can kill people. Some dude had his back broken by a swan hitting him with it's wing.)
We totally need a 'panicked chicken swarm' encounter in some low level module. Perhaps a 'We Be Goblins' style raid on a farmstead... A party of 1st level goblin PCs vs. a chicken swarm? Smart money is on the chicken swarm!
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We totally need a 'panicked chicken swarm' encounter in some low level module. Perhaps a 'We Be Goblins' style raid on a farmstead... A party of 1st level goblin PCs vs. a chicken swarm? Smart money is on the chicken swarm!
Funny you should mention that. A couple years back, in our last 3.5 game, we got a little gonzo, and for fun I let my son play a two-headed baby roc named Chick-Chick (basically, we have a collector's model of the roc chick from 7th Voyage of Sinbad that is in scale with the other minis, and we wanted to use it in a game).
Chick-Chick was of not much more than animal intelligence, and was basically a Large fighting creature with two bite attacks and a penchant for becoming distracted by insects and running off to feed during battle. But, just for fun, we gave him a spell-like ability. That was that when he became panicked, he could unwittingly summon a swarm of chickens. The chickens didn't do any damage to his enemies, but they provided a good distraction, as swarms are wont to do.
I made up AoE markers with small groups of chickens from Mega Miniatures on them, to represent the swarms. It was great!
I have a player that wants to make a chicken sled (don't ask). I am not convinced that it would ever work.
My opinion is that most livestock (chickens included) would have the Int of 1, with the occasional animal (such as pigs) at Int 2.
The point being that Handle Animal says that you can only train animals with an intelligence of 2 or 3.
Any thoughts? I will admit that I am biased because I believe that the player is just being silly, but I would like some other thoughts, that could possibly change my mind.
Thanks and I apologize in advance for any silliness. :)
100 chickens including other animals are pulling a sled?
Does he have a sheep-dog to herd them?I think it could work. The hand-brake had want to be good though.
I live on Kauai, and we have feral chickens everywhere! They are dumb as posts.
Now, Beej67, I think your post leads me to believe that the chickens can indeed learn tricks, and like everything else, there may be variation in Intelligence. In my experience, they tend to be very dumb. :)
Anyway, he told me that a chicken is 2 cp each, so he just decided to drop 2 gp on a 100. >.<
I am starting next game with 100 chickens. Maybe a sled.
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We totally need a 'panicked chicken swarm' encounter in some low level module. Perhaps a 'We Be Goblins' style raid on a farmstead... A party of 1st level goblin PCs vs. a chicken swarm? Smart money is on the chicken swarm!
My name is Link, and I approve of this message!
I can kill an epic level wereboar magus, but a swarm of angry chickens WILL kill my ass DEAD!
We totally need a 'panicked chicken swarm' encounter in some low level module. Perhaps a 'We Be Goblins' style raid on a farmstead... A party of 1st level goblin PCs vs. a chicken swarm? Smart money is on the chicken swarm!My name is Link, and I approve of this message!
I can kill an epic level wereboar magus, but a swarm of angry chickens WILL kill my ass DEAD!
Uh, excuse me... those are Cuckoos. And they make great hang gliders!