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emo samurai
My hellhound puppy'll have one tilted ear and chase larger dogs down decrepit alleyways! It'll always be my friend and be ready to rip off the head of a mugger and toast his body with his magical fire breath.

But seriously, isn't it theoretically possible to tame a hellhound? Practically anything can become your pet if it's fed and well treated enough, especially intelligent pack animals like hellhounds. Hell, its average intelligence is 4, higher than that of most metahumans. Especially if you have a bound fire spirit to keep it in line; that'll probably help. And since it has magic, you could have a sustaining focus bound to it for the sake of maintaining a physical mask.
Mr.Platinum
have you never bumped into security that uses hell hounds?

it's possible bud.
PBTHHHHT
Just remember to keep your place furnished with only flame retardent materials and you don't mind the furniture getting chewed up like you wouldn't believe. It's possible as Mr. Platinum said, several corp and other facilities use them as guard animals.
emo samurai
Are they bigger and stronger than most dogs? And what's the softest thing they can chew without destroying it? Like, solid steel bars or something?
BishopMcQ
QUOTE (emo samurai)
And since it has magic, you could have a sustaining focus bound to it for the sake of maintaining a physical mask.

This will be a hard trick to accomplish, as you would have to explain to the Hellhound how and why it needs to maintain the physical mask at all times. Much harder than teaching it to play dead...

In my own campaign, I would look and see if the runner has the appropriate skills and kenneling facilities. I would not allow any runner to start with the hellhound out the gate, but it could be something earned or purchased within the overall campaign.

My biggest concern would be why do you want this? i've had runners who brought a German shepherd with them on every run, it was different, and they had to work through several obstacles but it was what they really wanted and had it explained in their background. A hellhound will be that much harder to convince me of, and I would make sure the player knows that it is opening a whole new can of worms.
emo samurai
Because hellhounds are awesome! I see your point; a fire spirit could potentially be MUCH stronger.
MK Ultra
Allso, you canŽt just domesticate every animal! tigers, lions, fenrier wolves, even normal wolves for that matter, the likes, they will never be as tame as your lill housedog! Thes are wild animals, you can work with them, but never let your attention drop (or else sigfrid & roy would never have had a problem).

Allso most corps wont keep them guard-paranimals like pets, more like wild animals in a zoo.

True Hellhounds are better to controll then others, but they are not tame, someday, they mitght as well eat your face. Or more likely, that of an innocent bystander.
nezumi
If NPC guards can do it, PCs can too. As has been said though, you need the skills and equipment, and there's always that chance he'll forget his training for just a moment... (Imagine all the problems pit bull owners have to deal with times ten. Mauling a six year old girl is the least of your worries. Imagine the headlines, 'pet hellhoud mauls bus of nuns - details at 11').
Talain
I imagine players might want one for the same reason corp facilities do: Security! They're guard dogs on magical steroids, so if you want a really really safe haven...
MK Ultra
My gang character has 3, althoug they are all still puppies (the hounds as well as the gangers I guess).

They are not allowed to be in his squatt allso
Calvin Hobbes
Remember that most corporations with hell hounds and other such creatures have either a) entire reams of information on training said creatures, or b) lots of disposable personnel. Because if you don't have A, you'll need B.

As a runner, it's possible for you to have A, but unlike corporations, you're only going to have one disposable person on hand (read: you) and I don't think you can afford that loss.
MK Ultra
biggrin.gif @CH

Well, guess IŽll have to shoot them, when they get too big. Or the shamane nees crittercontroll and 3 spell locks
stevebugge
And another thought, feeding a Hell Hound is going to seriously jack up your lifestyle payments.
Ancient History
"How do you tell them apart from wolves?"
"They have collars."

Aah...anyone interested in hellhounds as a pet should pick up Awakenings. Boggle the mind with the concept of paranormal daschunds.
Azralon
Pfft! Of course hellhounds can be trained. Mind control comes in both cybernetic and magical flavors.

wink.gif
PBTHHHHT
invae can also be trained... in a sense...

ask Ares
Capt. Dave
QUOTE (MK Ultra @ Jan 5 2006, 04:18 PM)
My gang character has 3, althoug they are all still puppies (the hounds as well as the gangers I guess).

They are not allowed to be in his squatt allso

I would guess not. I mean, who's going to house-train them? Are you going to rub a hellhound's nose in his "accident" or beat him with a rolled up newspaper?

Hellhounds, in my opinion, can make good security animals. As pets, OTOH, they leave much to be desired. The effort required to train, feed, and otherwise coexist with such a creature isn't worth it, to me at least. However, if one were so inclined, it could indeed be done.

My view is: I want my dog to be able to curl up on the bed without me laying there, with a gun under my pillow, one eye open, wondering if he's waiting for me to fall asleep and then devour my precious limbs.
PBTHHHHT
One fun thing outside of having the hellpuppy for security/intimidation and companionship... you can train them for the illegal pit fights.

Thanks Capt, I now have an image of a distraught runner looking at the remnant of his burnt rolled up newspaper and thinking... now what? As the hellhound pup (almost as large as the runner) sits there looking at him, growling and also making another mess on the floor... biggrin.gif
MK Ultra
Pitfights! Ah, I knew there would be money in these hounds someday smile.gif
boskop-albatros
don't get upset at my two sents but wouldn't a Hellhound shaman have an easier time controling a Hellhound?
emo samurai
Hmmm.... What if I had a bound force-6 fire spirit whose sole purpose was to move out of wherever he was and wrestle the hellhound to the ground whenever he got out of hand? Each intervention could be a task. I imagine that would both keep me safe and sufficiently impress the hound.
Clyde
Dogs have been bred for millennia with a single, overriding trait in mind - the ability to interpret human behavior. Dogs do very well at reading human beings - other animals don't. If a Hellhound is pretty much a "dog" then I'd say yeah. Certainly the fiction seems to suggest it can be done - check out "Awakenings" for example. The 'hound could probably be housebroken - but that would be an interesting process.
fistandantilus4.0
PHHBBTTT: been reading threats 2 lately?

AH: you mean the detective story where tha ledy walks into his office with a poodle that is really a hell hound wit ha mask spell? I loved that one. biggrin.gif

In New Seattle, one of the gangs, the Leather Devils I believe, have two. The gang leader raised them from pups.

My gargoyle shaman has a afew. Used a variant of comtrol pack to keep them in line if they misbehaved. Helped a lot. Named 'em Hel, Sparky, and Cinders. *grin* good 'ol Cinders.
mintcar
I would say any character with a bit of instruction (paranimals) skill (is it still called that?) could keep hellhounds as guard animals, or maybe even as pets. Concidering the damage they could cause if their training sliped I would choose a troll character though smile.gif . Makes it a bit safer.
PBTHHHHT
QUOTE (fistandantilus3.0 @ Jan 6 2006, 12:52 AM)
PHHBBTTT: been reading threats 2 lately?

In New Seattle, one of the gangs, the Leather  Devils I believe, have two. The gang leader raised them from pups.

Ayup. It's a fun book. smile.gif

Oh yeah, I remember reading about that gang in New Seattle. Is that the one where the leader is a vampire wannabe? (well, he might or might not be, lol)

Just be sure when you're housetraining them and you're using rolled up newspaper to discipline them... to have a large supply of it, because you'll probably burn through a lot of them...
stormvane
Training a hellhound is like training any other animal in that you have to establish yourself as the alpha in the relationship. It would also be fair to assume that hellhounds aren't born with all of their powers. Otherwise, hellhound puppies would frequently crisp their dame with friendly fire. If you established your relationship with the animal before it was able to set you on fire, it would probably never occur to it to set you on fire. You also have to guess that your average security hellhound isn't the same as one that is running free. It only takes a few generations of selective breeding to begins picking up the basics of domesticated behavior. The russians did it with siberian foxes. They have a whole slew of them that act much like dogs, all based on breeding for responsiveness to humans and friendliness.
PBTHHHHT
All this talk about breeding for a domestic hellhound made me think of this particular webcomic.

edit: some little info of siberian foxes. I was curious what stormvane was talking about and did a search on them. smile.gif
http://www.nature.com/news/2005/050207/pf/...50207-3_pf.html
http://hs.riverdale.k12.or.us/~dthompso/ex...u_t_i_o_n6.html
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