“Bring it here!”
“Bring what here, master?”
“I’m not going to argue with you, cockroach, nor engage in tittle-tattle with a creature unable to beat a slug at snap or a hedgehog at cribbage. I’m referring to the thing you just put in the cupboard.”
“Oh that, ’tis nothing master, just some stray kitten I found.”
“I see, then let me have it.”
“Yes, master, here it is.”
“Kitten, you say. How odd. I thought they normally had four legs. Tell me, how would you describe this kitten of yours?”
“Fleshy.”
“And?”
“Unpleasing to the eye.”
“I see, and how many legs would you say it had?”
“Thirteen master.”
“Thirteen. Yes, I must confess, slimeslave, that I have yet to hear of any kitten with thirteen legs, pale flesh, and two heads. Not to mention the wings. You’ve been at my transmutation spellbook again haven’t you?”
“If I said yes would you punish me less for being honest master?”
“No.”
Anyone can have a cuddly kitten, a funny gerbil, or pet snake. These creatures are commonplace, but what kind of animals might appear in a pet shop where a manticore is a common sight, or in a world that breeds chokers and gibbering mouthers? Such places would surely have more exotic creatures than a slobbering collie dog or a purring fat cat.
Here is a list of exotic pets, together with a brief description if necessary. These creatures can become the basis for odd familiars, or even odder animal companions, the stuff of menageries or the servings at table. Some are less exotic and more tragic, some may defy logic, and others may in fact be fake. Some are very real, yet to look at them you’d think someone would have to make them up. Have fun with all of them, and be prepared to be surprised about just which are real and which are fantasy.
- Aardvark
- Anchovy
- Animated object, metal cat
- Animated object, rag owl
- Animated object, string mouse
- Animated object, tin dog
- Animated object, wood rat[1]
- Anteater
- Armadillo
- Babbington’s catsnake – a furry snake with a cat’s head and habits
- Babbington’s stirge-wren (1/8 HD)
- Black puddinglet (1/2 HD)
- Blind hairless rat
- Burrowing toad
- Bush pig
- Bushbaby
- Capybara
- Carpington’s Hog – a rare barking pig
- Cauler’s Manticore Lemur – a winged lemur with a barbed tail
- Chimera pig – basically a three headed pig, each face uglier than the last
- Cockatrice egg
- Crimson-hued fighting hedgehog
- Crying ball of fluff called a Crongkit Baby
- Curl-crested aracani
- Double-ended dog
- Dragon peacock – peacock that looks a bit like a dragon
- Drake Duck – a duck with leathery flesh that resembles a miniature drake
- Dusky Titi
- Edible Dormouse
- Extremely orange snake
- Fanalouc
- Fine water elemental
- Fury frog
- Gelatinous cubelet (1/2 HD)
- Ghoul mouse
- Giant mole
- Goblin dog puppy
- Greater Angry Tortoise – basically a spitting tortoise
- Greater stirge-skunk in a cage – a very smelly stirge
- Green Day Gecko
- Hepher’s Molecat – a blind, very fat cat with big forepaws that digs numerous holes
- Herring
- House spider
- Hummingbird
- Judd’s Tiny Darkmantle (1/4 HD)
- Kreg – a sort of leathery sheep
- Leather gopher
- Leech
- Lime green toucan
- Lodd’s Crocodilemouse – a very small mouse with a very big mouth
- Long-fanged fighting toad
- Lumpry – a rather fat six-legged cat with a large head
- Matamata
- Meerkat
- Mite
- Mockingbird
- Munkrey – a leathery mammalian stick insect with large eyes that grows very attached to people
- Naked Mole-rat
- Nemicolopterus
- Newt
- Olm
- Otter
- Otter-civet
- Owlbadger (cross)
- Owlferret (crosser)
- Paddup’s Hydra-shrew – a five-headed shrew without legs
- Pink Fairy Armadillo
- Polecat
- Prigling – a dormouse-sized pig
- Pygmi’gator – a very, very small alligator that could sit in the palm of your hand
- Rat Snake
- Redgin’s Double-ended Mouse – seemingly two mice connected via a single tail
- Shoebill
- Skeleton, tortoise
- Slender loris
- Slether – a sort of caterpillar snake the size of an arm, covered in fur
- Slobbingon’s Frightfully Roperesque Hornbill – hornbill with an oddly ropery look about it
- Sloth
- Slowworm
- Small spotted miniature fire beetle
- Something that looks like a small rock – a small rock
- Squeaking ball of yellow fur known as a Yaktar
- Stickle-backed mouse
- Stirge in a cage
- Stonkington’s Screaming Squirrel
- Tackler’s Wrongcat – a very fleshy 13-legged cat, with wings and two heads
- Tackler’s Wrongmouse – a very large fat mouse with 6 legs and tentacles
- Tarsier
- Three-legged Cat
- Tiny Earth Elemental
- Tollman’s Jumping Rat
- Two-headed Squirrel
- Very Fat Peccary
- Very Sleepy Skink
- Vulture
- Wallaby
- Young Ankheg – very young, about the size of a finger
- Zombie Frog
- Zombie Stoat
- Zombie Toucan
[1] Come to think of it, this could have mileage all of its own making, watch this space for future animated chums
The double-ended dog has possibilities… especially depending on which end is doubled.
Very nice, Mr. Pett. Pets from Pett. Mwhahahaha. . . .
Useful for flavorful familiars and vexing vermin.
I have stopped in the middle of my game to rapidly look up tables from TWH and describe items that raise the weirdness and awesome of my game to 11.
Thanks.
Very amusing Rich. One of your best lists!
My favorite: “Extremely orange snake”. Sounds like a beverage at a fiendish juice bar.
I also like the banter with the homunculus. :)
Always excellent. Thanks for all your hard work Mr Pett. If you take requests could you turn your talents to a list of intriguing documents that might be on a person as my pickpocketing players are heading to the market soonish.
Huzzah!
I’ll give that some though Jackdaw, I have a couple of YWHs in the cellar fermenting just now but a content of pockets list is a good one. Somewhere in the YWH drafts folder I have a gear gear – basically a way of randomly creating gear for NPCs, that needs to be birthed soon as it would be useful.
Rich
Really dig the Black Puddinglet and the Gelatinous Cubelet. Brilliant.
The Mite and the Young Ankheg are great too, the Ankheg almost reminds me of Bug from the Micronauts, lol!
And wouldn’t every caster want a Tiny Earth Elemental as a homunculus?
Great Stuff, Mr. Pett!