Re: Nehcnush

From: Argrath_at_aol.com
Date: Wed, 3 Jan 1996 20:29:10 -0500

In V2 #305, Andrew Behan writes:

>IMO all sentient animals are "hsunchen" with Transform Head (Speech),
>Transform Body (Walk Upright) and Transform Limbs (Use Tools) spells
>allowing them to temporarily take on human form. Many tula priestesses are
>sentient animals, so naturally the species that worships your tula is taboo
>to hunt,
>though the exact reason why is a "womens' secret". IMO this is the
>Brolian/Hsunchen connection.

This is way cool, but I'd require animals to get spells the same way everyone else does, rather than (as implied) automatically getting them. Perhaps I'm inferring something you didn't intend. Anyway, there'd be raccoon shamans (frex) who'd teach the spells you name. Another quibble: all intelligent animals can talk, but they don't speak the local human language unless they've learned it. Their mother tongue is a hsunchen language. Thus, an intelligent wolf speaks Telmori. (Awakened Praxian herd animals are different, for various reasons, and speak Praxian.)

I don't think ALL awakened animals have hsunchen-type spells. In Brolia, most might.

• ----------
  > However, the "hunter" may normally not accompany his cat on
  >its expeditions. For one thing, watching a hunting cat ply its
  >trade is incredibly tedious, since most of the time is spent
  >watching the cat sit absolutely still in ambush mode. For another,
  >the hunter's presence would just tend to spook prey animals. Some
  >hunters with especially well-trained cats may take advantage of
  .this, and try to frighten prey towards the alynx. But even in such
  >cases, the hunter normally wouldn't observe the kill. *sigh*
  > Alynxes are small enough that most of their game doubtless
  >consists of rabbits, grouse, and the ilk. I'm sure they're capable
  >of taking down a deer at times (just as are cougars).
  

It depends. People hunt with cheetahs, and have done so for centuries, if not millenia. While not the best model for alynxes (which I agree tend to use stealth), their existence shows that there's more than one hunting method. That's why I suggested the hawking model.

---