doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
Okay okay I’m gonna answer twice because I got D&D answers and answers for my own game.
D&D
Wood Elves - Bears.
Gnomes - Giant Foxes (Forest) and Giant Badgers (Rock), and big mountain wolves (Homebrew Mountain Gnomes).
In another world they ride living construct birds.
Deep Gnomes - Giant sea bats (they tend to live near sea caves, and only need mounts when they leave their underground homes)
Hill Dwarves - Aurochs
Mountain Dwarves - Sheep, usually rams
Halfling - Dogs. They tend to breed very large dogs whose size relative to their own is equivalent to beefy horses compared to the average human, and generally friendly, independent, and intelligent. For description, look to wolfhounds, or in some places mastiffs, and temperament tends to be similar to Irish wolfhounds or to the friendlier herding dogs. What everyone knows about halfling dogs is, they are “friendly when stroked, fierce when provoked”, meaning they are gentle and friendly and more curious than territorial, but when provoked are truly terrifying, even to the big folk.
In one world I am working on, there is a war within living memory where something was taken from the Small Folk by a human kingdom, and the halflings and gnomes disappeared from human lands, and returned to their ancestral homes, and this was bad enough. But then, as winter thawed into spring, the Small Folk returned to the human lands. Tens of thousands of them mounted and armed for war. At ea h border they asked to be left to pass through the land to reach the nation that had sinned against them, and were denied, and that nation burned as a result. Nothing was looted, no captives taken, no civilians harmed if it could be avoided, but they would not be stopped until they were done.
When they finally reached the offending kingdom, they stormed the capital, the palace, and hanged the Prince from his own palace walls. And then they left, and when those who lived in human lands returned they did so carefully, and simply refused to speak of the war in any context.
Halflings and Gnomes of The Windhavens - giant coastal hawks
Orcs - horses.
Drow - The nocturnal desert Drow ride large desert cats (my wife wants it to be “weird fantasy lizards”)
Shadar-Kai - large corvid-like feathered avian dinosaurs that can move quickly upon the ground but are truly majestic and awesome in the sky
Eladrin - Griffon-like creatures
Dragonborn - wyverns and sometimes drakes
Kobolds - drakes
Goblins - wolves of various kinds. Worgs are wolves bred by goblins to be intelligent and loyal to goblin riders.
Goliaths - often don’t ride anything, but in lands with the right equine breed stock they might ride very strong large horses, or in other places might ride especially large bison or even trade with dwarves for aurochs mounts.
Firbolg - Giant arthropods
Everyone else either rides horses, or one of the above because the commingle with that species a lot.
D&D
Wood Elves - Bears.
Gnomes - Giant Foxes (Forest) and Giant Badgers (Rock), and big mountain wolves (Homebrew Mountain Gnomes).
In another world they ride living construct birds.
Deep Gnomes - Giant sea bats (they tend to live near sea caves, and only need mounts when they leave their underground homes)
Hill Dwarves - Aurochs
Mountain Dwarves - Sheep, usually rams
Halfling - Dogs. They tend to breed very large dogs whose size relative to their own is equivalent to beefy horses compared to the average human, and generally friendly, independent, and intelligent. For description, look to wolfhounds, or in some places mastiffs, and temperament tends to be similar to Irish wolfhounds or to the friendlier herding dogs. What everyone knows about halfling dogs is, they are “friendly when stroked, fierce when provoked”, meaning they are gentle and friendly and more curious than territorial, but when provoked are truly terrifying, even to the big folk.
In one world I am working on, there is a war within living memory where something was taken from the Small Folk by a human kingdom, and the halflings and gnomes disappeared from human lands, and returned to their ancestral homes, and this was bad enough. But then, as winter thawed into spring, the Small Folk returned to the human lands. Tens of thousands of them mounted and armed for war. At ea h border they asked to be left to pass through the land to reach the nation that had sinned against them, and were denied, and that nation burned as a result. Nothing was looted, no captives taken, no civilians harmed if it could be avoided, but they would not be stopped until they were done.
When they finally reached the offending kingdom, they stormed the capital, the palace, and hanged the Prince from his own palace walls. And then they left, and when those who lived in human lands returned they did so carefully, and simply refused to speak of the war in any context.
Halflings and Gnomes of The Windhavens - giant coastal hawks
Orcs - horses.
Drow - The nocturnal desert Drow ride large desert cats (my wife wants it to be “weird fantasy lizards”)
Shadar-Kai - large corvid-like feathered avian dinosaurs that can move quickly upon the ground but are truly majestic and awesome in the sky
Eladrin - Griffon-like creatures
Dragonborn - wyverns and sometimes drakes
Kobolds - drakes
Goblins - wolves of various kinds. Worgs are wolves bred by goblins to be intelligent and loyal to goblin riders.
Goliaths - often don’t ride anything, but in lands with the right equine breed stock they might ride very strong large horses, or in other places might ride especially large bison or even trade with dwarves for aurochs mounts.
Firbolg - Giant arthropods
Everyone else either rides horses, or one of the above because the commingle with that species a lot.
I should have some appropriately-sized giants around here to do a conversion with...
