Vampire bats form strong bonds with other members of their colony. Vampire bats can't be guaranteed to find food every night, so the ones who do find food share it by gorging themselves profusely and regurgitating the excess blood into the mouths of hungry bats in their colony.
As bats are social animals, should it not be possible to domesticate them?
People in a fantasy setting may breed vampire bats to produce narcotic saliva, and train the bats to regurgitate on command into the mouths of decadent nobles.
Really? That's the idea you had when you learned that little fact?
Instead of imagining a hated race of bat people that go on berserking rampages through the forest and occasionally even attacking villages, but who are tender and sweet to their own villagers and can't help the necessities of their diet? The most vile and hated ones who do the most damage to other villages are actually the ones who are the kindest and most dedicated to feeding their young and elderly?
With the PCs forced to face the classic dilemma of deciding whether the genocide of the race is the only way to keep the villages of other races safe?
>>46066786
You're asking people to care about things that are killing others en masse for literally any reason when they are getting paid.
They would kill them all, and be bummed out afterwards, but they'd still kill them all.
Now if the bat-people were not openly hostile to other villages and such and only a select few individuals were, or were defending themselves and decided "Fuck it, they're dead, might as well eat em." then you'd get a better reaction from the moral quandary. It's easy enough to play off the "whole villages slaughtered by the bat-people" because of superstition and general "racism" towards them.
>>46066844
What if they ordinarily just attack things like deer and moose, and rarely actually kill them, but do drink a ghastly amount of blood? And, when they realize that they're overfeeding on the forest fauna, to ensure they don't actually kill too many of the animals they start attacking farms for their large animals?
And, on occasion they wind up in a blood frenzy, either killing the forest/farm animals or attacking villagers?
I do think they need to be actually attacking villagers, but what if they very rarely, if ever, actually killed them, instead drinking a non-lethal amount of blood?
>>46066604
Hola rata!
>>46066786
Sounds a little furry, man. I mean, if that's your magical realm, that's your magical realm. I can't really judge.
I like going into a lot of detail about what people in my settings actually eat. Much like GRRM, except I like to describe really gross shit.
One of my friends features 'monkey wine' heavily in his D&D campaigns (borrowed from Green Antarctica, on the alternate history forums.) The hive monkeys eat huge amounts of nuts and berries, dig deep holes about 10' deep, regurgitate the berries into the hole, cover it with leaves, and allow the concoction to ferment for a season. Then, monkey happy hour!
PC's will even drink that shit if ration and hunger rules are in effect.
I'm also fond of Green Antarctica's 'gut stew'; penguins can even be domesticated and trained to eject their fatty, protein-rich vomit into buckets collected for human consumption.
Some penguin species migrate up to South Africa and I think New Zealand maybe? So it doesn't just have to be an Antarctica thing.
There has actually been some talk in the real world of raising pigeons to use their vomit as an ingredient in processed foods.
It's not that much more disgusting than what Americans already eat. Did you know that the artificial strawberry flavoring used in Poptarts and other strawberry flavored confections is extracted from the anal musk glands of beavers?
>>46066933
There would probably be a great deal of blood borne diseases that spread without medical attention, and those bitten being driven out or killed by the villagers on petty superstition.
So you'd hear stories of a lot of freaky bat-demon-things spreading sickness or cursing innocent folk.
If you want people to feel bad about killing what amounts to innocent but culturally different beings you have to spread misinformation, much like how ignorant people don't understand not every Arab is a Muslim or vice versa.
When people are attacked they react violently, regardless of the reason for the attacks, and there will be a shitload of hyperbole around it too, so people can be assured in their own ego about how bat-people beat him despite him being the burly farmer's son or whatever.
>>46066604
You obviously didn't read all of that passage in your genetics book, man.
There's another part to that strong bond thing.
Because altruism is so important to the survival of a group of bats, any bat that DOESN'T give a bit of blood when another bat asks, triggers the requesting bat's autism, who will then proceed to attempt to beat the shit out of the non-sharing bat, and will never again share its food with him.
>>46067057
>so people can be assured in their own ego about how bat-people beat him despite him being the burly farmer's son or whatever.
There's no shame in losing to a Desmodu.
>>46066967
Other delicacies:
Iron rations are actually just hardtack fortified with soil.
(I was hiking up by Suraksan mountain in Korea with my friend Minju and her family one time. Minju's grandmother kneels down, scoops up a handful of dirt with her hands, and puts it in her mouth. Then the entire family does the same. Scooping up dirt and eating it. Evidently this is a really traditional Korean thing still practiced by some rural people. Used to be really common in times of famine.
Apparently the clay and decomposing vegetable matter in soil has some nutritional value for humans, and the clay even has some antibiotic properties. Just make sure you don't get a parasite, I guess?)
Anyway, iron rations are made by mixing wind-seed flour, salt, water, and rich soil into a tough dough, then baking flattened wafers of this a dozen times over until all moisture is removed.
Ice toads are capable of entering a state of suspended animation by freezing themselves. They can later spring back to life when they thaw out.
Some wealthy nobles like to eat a sort of meaty papbingsu made using shaved slivers of frozen ice toad.
>>46067118
>There's no shame in losing to a Desmodu.
You lost.
WHAT KIND OF A MAN LOSES?!
Back in my day, if you didn't feast upon the hearts of those that slighted you, you were a pansy and got beaten by all the children and womenfolk in the village with soft sticks, because if they hit you with anything harder they might break your limbs you potassium-bruising buffoon!
>>46067057
>If you want people to feel bad about killing what amounts to innocent but culturally different beings you have to spread misinformation, much like how ignorant people don't understand not every Arab is a Muslim or vice versa.
Eh, I'm not really a fan of thinly veiled political commentary. I'm much more interested in it not being a black-and-white "they're just misunderstood so you should spare them!" type of obvious answer.
It should be the type of situation where the group should be evenly split into those agreeing that the bat-people are too big a threat to be left alive and those who believe that they should be tolerated and some other solution needs to be found.
>>46067244
>Eh, I'm not really a fan of thinly veiled political commentary
Anon, that was just an example of similar phenomenon, and not even a good one for this particular situation.
As for what the players feel it depends on what system you are using and the theme of the campaign. Good-aligned D&D parties are going to more than likely try to figure something out, while something like Numenera and the party are all assholes they'll probably just kill them all on principle if they can. Without the context of what you are running and the general disposition of your players you can't get a reasonable answer.
>>46067094
>>46066604
>As bats are social animals, should it not be possible to domesticate them?
just because something is social, doesn't mean you can domesticate it.
Look at lions and tigers. They're social. You can keep them in a cage on your property, but you can never "domesticate" them. Even after 2 or 3 generations I doubt you could domesticate them.
>>46068055
>you can never
>I doubt
"Never" and "doubtfully" are on opposite ends of the certainty spectrum.
>>46067244
So you want them to have multiple realistic and complex motivations that's players can find conflict with or support
Which is much more detailed work for the dm and world builder.
>>46066604
My first thought was goblins breeding Bats to replace hunting hawks/dogs but OK.
>>46068055
Aren't tigers typically solitary hunters though?
The fact that we have domestic birds but not domestic bats makes me sad.
>>46068686
never refers to domesticating within an animals life. doubt refers to the 2 or 3 generations of breeding.
I can be two different levels of certainty if I want to. No need to be obtuse.
>>46066604
He's cute!
My fetish is about vampire bats trying to fit in to the civilized society.
Imagine: a vampire bat takes in an orphan kid and tries to raise it as it's own child.
Misunderstanding and hijinks galore.
![sample_89636097ca17b3ee29a8056d66616d00[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/GGPGe0s.jpg "sample_89636097ca17b3ee29a8056d66616d00[1].jpg")
>>46066604
>>46066786
Fresh Anon coming into this thread's discussion.
What I'm taking away from this is: Vampires (The Bleh kind, not the bat) will regurgitate blood into the mouths of their family members and loved ones if they have a difficult night finding food.
Like, we're talking: hold your partners head, twist your own just a little, mouth to mouth, vomiting down there, letting them swallow it and then vomiting again.
It seems like the sort of horrifying, disgusting, but oddly tender act of kindness Vampires would be all about in their personal/home lives.
Like, the Vampire lord puts up a good front, but even he has someone special in his life; a close friend or perhaps a sibling who he'd willingly vomit sustaining blood into their mouths if they were coming up onto hard times.
>>46071233
Bats usually are
>>46071533
>implying that the vampire doing the gifting isn't doing it out of sheer terror that they'll get torn apart by an older, more powerful vampire
>implying that this act of submission doesn't, in some way carry some sort of magical weakening device
>implying that the vampire drinking its kin's blood won't develop such rarefied tastes, that it enters bloodlust and slaughters its own kind
