Greetings from Magrathea

Introduction

When planning for running a game, I see it mainly as a series of encounters. I tend to look at the main antagonist first and build the encounter around that. This is accepted practice. The Pathfinder Core Rulebook says, "The heart of any adventure is its encounters. An encounter is any event that puts a specific problem before the PCs that they must solve. Most encounters present combat with monsters or hostile NPCs, but there are many other types?but the most complex encounters to build are the most common ones?combat encounters." The cool D&D Next Preview I got at GenCon, a preview that's focused on the bare bones of gamemaster advise, has a highlighted section called "Encounters and Rewards" (the other highlighted section is the chapter is "Miscellaneous Rules"). Both then go into how you can build monsters to make them challenging to the player characters by totaling up XP and dividing by the level or something like that. I was never good at that. I just guess and hope that I don't kill too many PCs.

If we look at a typical encounter through a lens of biological interactions, this is classic antagonism, bordering on predation or competition. One species (the Homo adventus) gains as a second species (the monster) loses. Because I focus on the encounter, I tend to lose focus on the other types of biological interactions. So, here they are.

Parasitism

This is similar to predation (one organism benefits, while the other is harmed), except parasites usually don't kill their host. Parasites that do kill off their host usually aren't good parasites, because if the host dies, that causes issues for the parasite. When we think of parasites, the general idea is a microbe or worm, but there are social parasites as well. For example, the cuckoo deposits an egg in other bird's nest, causing the other species to raise their young. Stories of faeries leaving their children in human villages could be reality in D&D. Picture if one in every hundred children had actual fae blood; it would be medieval Battlestar Galactica, with the player characters being human, fae, or both, and not even the player characters know who is who. We all know that aliens are this century's faeries, but that's grist for another column.

If you want to have a more traditional parasite, let's look at mistletoe. Mistletoe latches onto an existing tree and burrows into its branches. It absorbs water and nutrients from the plant. Mistletoe is also a symbol of magic, partly because it grows with the assistance of other trees. Pliny the Elder says, "The Druids--for that is the name they give to their magicians -- held nothing more sacred than the mistletoe and the tree that bears it, supposing always that tree to be the robur. Of itself the robur is selected by them to form whole groves, and they perform none of their religious rites without employing branches of it; so much so, that it is very probable that the priests themselves may have received their name from the Greek name for that tree. In fact, it is the notion with them that everything that grows on it has been sent immediately from heaven, and that the mistletoe upon it is a proof that the tree has been selected by God himself as an object of his especial favour." What if mistletoe stole magic as well as water from the host tree? Or what if it changed and started growing on?something else? Like people?

Commensalism

Here, one animal gains and the second animal is not affected. The classic example is the remora and the shark, or scavengers following high-level predators. However, let's look at some non-classical examples. Modern-day humans are the single most impactful species on the environment; we level forests and build cities and change climates. Because of this, a subset of animals have successfully adapted to us. If you don't believe this, I encourage you to check out Field Guide to Urban Wildlife, by Julie Feinstein (especially if you are in North America, her target audience). She gives a good account of animals that a typical city/suburban dweller can see.

For example, in a 1977 study in Glendale, Illinois, naturalists found there was one raccoon for every 1.6 humans in the neighborhood. They congregated where the best food and dens were, which meant they lived side-by-side with humans. Unlike traditional animals, these raccoons became accustomed to humans and didn't necessarily run away from them immediately. Because raccoons are nocturnal, most of us don't interact with them on a daily basis ? we see them if they get trapped in a chimney or garbage can, or see what they wrought in the morning. While mainly an American animal, when raccoons have been relocated to other nations, they have thrived. In a brilliant yet unintentional case of mimetic warfare, Nippon Animation broadcast the series Rascal the Raccoon, which caused thousands of families in Japan to want a raccoon as a pet. Over 2000 raccoons were imported into Japan, an environment where the raccoon had no natural predators. The raccoons thrived, and Japan now has to deal with an invasive species.

Another animal that has done well is the American crow, a crazy smart bird. Crows memorize garbage truck routes, following them to increase access to food. They supposedly learn traffic patterns to help them crack nuts. And crows are social animals. One study had scientists wear a "dangerous face" mask when they trapped, banded, and released crows. The mask was communicated through the crow population, and scientists who wore the mask were harassed by crows they didn't have contact with. They continued to be harassed; the study shows their memory lasts at least five years.

Now, picture a typical fantasy city with magical, mythical monsters. What monsters could be living in that city? You could have goblins or kobolds replacing the raccoons, living in basements and sewers and underground caverns, coming out at night to forage. Heck, D&D even supports this with the otyugh. The wikipedia article says that it is for dungeons, but there is no reason why you couldn't have a Slurr living under a city instead.

Mutualism

The otyugh is an example of mutualism, in that both animals benefit. Again, the classic example of mutualism is the rhino and the oxpecker bird. The oxpecker bird eats ticks from the rhino ? the rhino is cleaned up, while the oxpecker bird gets food. The thing to remember with mutualism is that it lasts only as long as both animals benefit. There's no inherent loyalty with either the oxpecker bird or the rhino. There's no reason why the otyugh would stay with a dungeon, let alone risk its life because some crazy adventuring party tries to clean up the area. So, when GMing a mutualistic relationship, make sure everything is put into perspective.

Again, humans are not immune to this. People have gut flora (not, it is important to mention, gut fauna) to help digest. A tribe in Africa uses the honeyguide bird to find bee colonies. The bird leads the person there, the person gets the honey, and the bird gets the leftovers. Everyone benefits. Except the bees. If we want to look at faerie myths again, the shoemaker faeries repair items left out, and they take food and small items as souvenirs. Or if you wanted to look at magic, what if magic was created by some creature? Spellcasters fed that creature, and in turn they powered people's spells? And then what if someone (or something) made those creatures a better offer? Sounds like a campaign arc.

Domestication

This is a special type of mutualism, where one animal is bred specifically to help others. This domestication can be very specific. For example (and I love this story), there's the turnspit dog, a dog bred specifically to sit in a wheel and turn a spit. Turnspit dogs are now extinct, but the Welsh corgi is probably the closest breed. The wheel was kept away from the fire and heat, but even then, the dogs had it rough, and the SPCA was founded partially because of the treatment of turnspit dogs in the hotels in New York. On Sundays, the dogs were allowed to attend Church to warm the feet of the gentry. Turnspit dogs lasted until the end of the 19th century, when machinery allowed mechanisms to replace animals.

Of course, there are other types of domestication. People have been breeding horses, cats, and dogs since civilization started. One of the things that D&D does not do well is determine breeds. You have "horse" as something to purchase, but any horse trader knows that the breed is everything. Likewise, dogs are an example of generic manipulation, artificially creating "fitness" (Darwin used dog breeds as an example of adaptation and selection of the greyhound in On The Origin of Species). I encourage you to create breeds in your worlds (or have the players do it).

And horses, cats, and dogs are just the obvious animals. Guard geese have been used for centuries, starting in ancient Rome; geese from the Capitoline Hill are said to have saved Rome. Doves are bred in North Africa as pets. Leeches were bred and semi-domesticated for medicine in the middle ages. The domestic silkmoth is used for silk in China. And these are just the "real" animals. Picture a domestic unicorn used to test for poison, or a domestic dragon (bred for size, of course) used for fuel and heating.

Conclusion

So, that's it for now. I'm going to starting a new Firefly game with my regular role-playing group, so I figured I should do some research on space. So, next column, I'll be looking at zero-G gravity and how people adapt in space. And I want to end with a shameless plug of a different story, Dread Lord Bob. Until next month.