Which animals (if any) exist in the Boneyard? It appears to have something like an ecosystem of flora, but beyond the mention of some psychopomps I can't find any mention of them.
Do fauna (bears, wolves, animals in general) exist there?
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So, you're asking if dogs go to heaven? :)
(And yes, a place called 'the Boneyard' probably would be heaven, to a dog!)
Considering they're called Hound Archon, I think the dogs that do go to Heaven, go to actual Heaven.
No, creatures that have less than int 3 don't have souls because they're not intelligent enough.
That doesn't mean animals don't exist on the planes necessarily, but they're not the souls of animals from the material plane.
And Hound Archons would be made from the petitioner's (souls of the dead) which are worthy enough to be made into outsiders, and graduate through the various ranks of that type of outsider (like Archons in general).
What I mean is that we're playing an official AP and it already features plants and fey local to the Boneyard. With both plants and fey, surely there are animals?
Which animals?
What I mean is that we're playing an official AP and it already features plants and fey local to the Boneyard. With both plants and fey, surely there are animals?
Which animals?
honey badgers?
(Some) Plants and fey are likely to have intelligence scores above 3.
Animals do not, so they would not end up as souls in the boneyard. That doesn't mean that a fey couldn't grab one from the material plane and place them there.
In fact, that seems exactly like the sort of thing fey would do.
No, creatures that have less than int 3 don't have souls because they're not intelligent enough.
Well that doesn't sound right. I mean, Raise Dead/Companion can be used on animals and that requires a soul.
Bonewright Willows, Duskwalkers, Familiar Automatons*, Kaichareks**, Lion Alebrijes***, Moon Hags, and Psycoplasmic Creatures**** are what I could find on Nethys.
* The Boneyard also contains a surprising number of familiar automatons. Here, the constructs walk among the souls awaiting judgment, serving as temporary companions for petitioners. The nature of a petitioner’s memory means that the petitioner usually does not recognize a familiar automaton but still retains a strong association with a beloved pet from its former life. This association provides comfort for especially distressed petitioners. Thanks to their ability to ease wary souls, a few catrina psychopomps establish friendships with familiar automatons, the two working in tandem to make the wait for judgment as painless as possible.
** The parasites of Achaekek can be found anywhere in the Blood Vale, Achaekek's realm in the tunnels beneath Pharasma's Boneyard, and their preferred hunting grounds always have plenty of soft soil and hiding places in which to stalk and ambush prey. Kaichareks sometimes wander into the Boneyard, though these expeditions rarely last long, as patrols of vanth and esobok psychopomps slay kaichareks on sight.
*** Alebrijes with a particularly strong connection to an individual may even search for the mortal’s soul once that person has passed into the Boneyard, protecting the soul from astral predators and easing its transition into the afterlife, much like a psychopomp.
**** A select few psychoplasmic creatures serve the interests of the Boneyard—though it can be difficult to tell whether that is intentional or incidental. Psychopomps keep these astral denizens at arm’s length, but nonetheless welcome their aid in their eternal vigil over the River of Souls.
So according to James Jaobs the answer of whether or not animals have souls is somewhere in information about Mummy's Mask.
I don't know where that article is, but there lies our answer.
Unless the cycle of souls is circumvented (such as through ritualistic sacrifice), does Pharasma send all dogs to Heaven?Whether or not dogs (and all animals) "go to heaven" depends on if they have souls, and that's a complex question. One that we actually had a really cool meeting about a few weeks ago.
I don't want to spoil the answer yet... but you'll want to see the article Wes wrote for the last Mummy's Mask!
I read Wesley Schneider's article, but couldn't find anything specific about animals. It's possible to interpret the following as support for "animals have souls":
When and how a soul enters a burgeoning mortal body remains a topic of debate, but by the time a creature can exist independent from a parent, it typically has a soul.
Fey, outsiders and undead get text about their special role, other creature types don't - which supports the position further.
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The daemon soul trade specifies animals have "animal spirits" but not souls.
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Whether they have souls or not, I'd imagine that whip-poor-wills, Pharasma's favorite feathered friend, are present, and some yummy moths for them to eat. Even if they weren't native to the place, by her will, they'd likely have been imported. (And therefore not outsiders or extraplanar magical beasts, just animals, far from home. Although there might be the occasional magical beast whip-poor-will also, just to confuse visitors, the immortal remains of a former familiar to some Pharasmin wizard...)
But there'd probably be no carrion-eaters. No vultures or jackals. No flies or worms or flesh-stripping beetles. Nothing that feeds on corpses, because that sort of thing doesn't really fit the tone Pharasma is going for.
If there were other sorts of unwelcome critters, they're likely also be cats prowling about. Pharasma's got a bit of Osirion-presence, and it feels thematically right that she might view cats as yet another kind of psychopomp / funerary protector type animal. But if there's no rats in the Boneyard (and I don't really see there being any, because rats implies an untidyness to the Boneyard that I can't picture Pharasma tolerating), it wouldn't make sense to have a bunch of cats...
I mean, celestial and fiendish animals exist. I'm not sure why there wouldn't be something similar in the Boneyard.
My conjurer often summoned from the Boneyard