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Animals and Monsters As Guards

Okay...imagine the body of a bear. Now imagine it has spider legs and a hornet stinger. Now imagine poisonous goose teeth and bat wings. Now imagine a komodo dragon tongue covered in spikes. Now finally, it has two swan heads growing out of its butt. A Bearmowan.
 
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Have two sets: deadly subtles and big chained intimidators. The big chained intimidators (bears and lions are easy) will be viewed by thieves as the real target while the subtles (brown recluses, black widows, weasels as suggested earlier) will do the killing. Remember, it's not just desirable to keep people from going inside, but also not to have bodies pile up. The subtles are to get those who aren't demoralized by the intimidators.
 

Helen

Inkling
What sort of animal based guards would you find to be the scariest and most intimidating? Assuming human or higher intelligence on all of them. Currently thinking of going with large magic weilding dog/wolf monsters as guards but I wanted to get alternative ideas.

A malevolent, faceless AI.
 

TWErvin2

Auror
Some sort of undead creature(s). In theory they wouldn't be easily distracted or have earthly needs or concerns. They'd be more difficult to incapacitate kill in many ways. Incorporeal, like ghosts or wraiths that could slay intruders--so not like a simple poltergeist type creature that could only knock over jars or something ;)
 

ShadeZ

Maester
Have two sets: deadly subtles and big chained intimidators. The big chained intimidators (bears and lions are easy) will be viewed by thieves as the real target while the subtles (brown recluses, black widows, weasels as suggested earlier) will do the killing. Remember, it's not just desirable to keep people from going inside, but also not to have bodies pile up. The subtles are to get those who aren't demoralized by the intimidators.
Ended up with something simalar. Giant wolves, tigers and bears often winged as well are guards but even they mention the really dangerous "guards" are these small kestrel size birds that have control of the winds. They can smack someone into a tree with he force of a hurricane and can mute sound magically. Being wind element monsters they are all aggression.
 
Have two sets: deadly subtles and big chained intimidators. The big chained intimidators (bears and lions are easy) will be viewed by thieves as the real target while the subtles (brown recluses, black widows, weasels as suggested earlier) will do the killing. Remember, it's not just desirable to keep people from going inside, but also not to have bodies pile up. The subtles are to get those who aren't demoralized by the intimidators.
This just gave me an idea... boars. Giant boars. Pigs can and will eat pretty much anything, including humans if hungry enough. The only thing that they have a hard time with is the bones, due to not being able to break them down into smaller bits. A giant boar though? I'd imagine a couple of those could make short work of those pesky bones. It could be a great way to get rid of the bodies that would be piling up.
 

Insolent Lad

Maester
This just gave me an idea... boars. Giant boars. Pigs can and will eat pretty much anything, including humans if hungry enough. The only thing that they have a hard time with is the bones, due to not being able to break them down into smaller bits. A giant boar though? I'd imagine a couple of those could make short work of those pesky bones. It could be a great way to get rid of the bodies that would be piling up.

The infamous Hell Pig (Entelodont) maybe? I've never thought of using them as guards but have played with the idea of employing them as a mount for battle (or unmounted, for that matter). One of my gods transforms to a giant boar in his alternate form; he likes to boast he's smarter than his fellow gods when he changes, as they mostly become rather mindless creatures such as spiders and reptiles.
 
The infamous Hell Pig (Entelodont) maybe? I've never thought of using them as guards but have played with the idea of employing them as a mount for battle (or unmounted, for that matter). One of my gods transforms to a giant boar in his alternate form; he likes to boast he's smarter than his fellow gods when he changes, as they mostly become rather mindless creatures such as spiders and reptiles.
I definitely like the idea of using them as mounts. I just think the idea of them being able and willing to eat basically an entire human is pretty frightening. Give them a larger size and throw some large tusks on them and they'd be pretty menacing. A friend of mine is working on a novel where a large boar demon is featured in a battle. He's only in that one chapter, but ended up being one of the most intimidating antagonists. It got me thinking about how boars should be used more in general.
 

Demesnedenoir

Myth Weaver
Flesh eating kangaroo... just try to run from that bad boy, heh heh. Of course, I’m old and my run is now more of a fit of cussing while hobbling along, but seriously, it’d be a short-lived race on Bolt’s finest day.
 
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