Language of animals

[Tanuki Tales]

If you're part of the "Great Quest to Playtest" game and are not Gr8artist, please turn around and close this thread without reading any further.

Spoiler: If you are not, then open this spoiler

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Though this is a Pathfinder play by post, the center point of this thread is based in more generalized fluff and psychology than it is on mechanics unique to that d20 derivative (which I will only mention in passing to frame the context for this conversation).

I'll be retiring my old character very soon in the "Great Quest to Playtest" and my new character is a former familiar named Enn. He is a Toyger house cat that formerly belonged to a gnome wizard, who died quite tragically. Unfortunately for Enn, not only did he have to deal with the loss of what was essentially his whole world, but he was stuck within a mile of her and felt every excruciating second leading to her death because of the empathic link shared by a familiar and its owner. All of these factors, combined with him still coming to terms with going from being just a cat to having a slightly below average human intellect (which would later become even further enhanced) made him snap and become a Teramach.

Regardless of the fact that he is completely mute (though understands gnomish and common), I'm finding myself having trouble wrapping my head around what kind of language he would use internally, in his thoughts, to describe the world around him. I know what adjectives, nouns, verbs and even sentence structure that I, as a human, would understand and attribute to the world around me, but would this apply to even an intelligent familiar? I could see them recognizing and understanding, at least on some level, what words humanoids would use to describe the world, but they wouldn't probably internally adopt using these terms themselves.

So far, I've come up with only two examples of how I envision Enn to think (in response to use of force against foes and to rationalize a party member who is of a homebrewed race that isn't, but looks like, some kind of half dragon):

Bat with paw.
Is dead?
If no, bat harder with paw.
Is dead?
If no, bat with many paw.
Is dead?
If no, be angry and make dead.


The above concerns a routine of starting with a regular attack routine, then using Power Attack, then using the Broken Blade maneuver "Steel Flurry Strike" and finally activating his Rage and doing any of the above again.


Big flying cold predators are very strong.
Big flying cold predators mate with all things.
Offspring little flying cold predator and other parent's kind.
Big flying cold predator can be good or bad.
Not kill until must kill.

Any suggestions or help here would be greatly appreciated, as this is an entirely new and alien thing for me.

[Palanan]

Spoiler: Familiarity

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I think your ex-familiar is much smarter than you're giving him credit for.

If he's a familiar, he probably had an Int of 6 or 7, yes? Keep in mind that chimpanzees have an Int of 2 and they're capable of signing fairly well, so your familiar-cat should be well ahead of them. And you say he's been enhanced? He should have a mental vocabulary of several hundred words, if not more, and won't need to rely on simplified caveman-talk.

For me, part of the interest in writing the character would be in his gradual struggle to express what he sees in the world with a vocabulary which would be adequate for a day-laborer, but not to express the nuances of behavior and emotion he's beginning to perceive. I assume he's been very focused on his wizard for most of his life, so all the terms, phrases, habits of thought he learned from her are what he's armed with as he attempts to understand a far wider and more intricate world.

[Tanuki Tales]

Spoiler: Familiarity

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I think your ex-familiar is much smarter than you're giving him credit for.

If he's a familiar, he probably had an Int of 6 or 7, yes? Keep in mind that chimpanzees have an Int of 2 and they're capable of signing fairly well, so your familiar-cat should be well ahead of them. And you say he's been enhanced? He should have a mental vocabulary of several hundred words, if not more, and won't need to rely on simplified caveman-talk.

For me, part of the interest in writing the character would be in his gradual struggle to express what he sees in the world with a vocabulary which would be adequate for a day-laborer, but not to express the nuances of behavior and emotion he's beginning to perceive. I assume he's been very focused on his wizard for most of his life, so all the terms, phrases, habits of thought he learned from her are what he's armed with as he attempts to understand a far wider and more intricate world.

Spoiler

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He had an Int of 9, since I just assumed he came from a level 8 wizard, and that has been increased to an Int of 12 because of a template.

And I'm not arguing he wouldn't know those words, because humanoids know them and use them as their language, but would that mean he would internally use them when he was never able to converse in Gnomish or Common? Would the language of his master and those species that make up his master's greater society subsume and replace his own understanding and appreciation of the world?

I'm still contemplating exactly how long he was with his owner though, since levels can be abstracts.

[gr8artist]

Tangentially related.

Honestly, the way you're writing his though processes seems fine to me. While he may be able to rationalize or sound more intelligent, he puts no focus or interest in such things and evaluates what he sees in a blunt, crude, efficient manor. I think it makes thematic sense in several ways.

[Psyren]

Though familiars are probably smarter, I always imagine animals as thinking in images.

There was a highly-acclaimed issue of Hawkeye where the entire story is told from the POV of his "pizza dog," Lucky. (So-named because he's a dog that loves pizza.) If you have the time/inclination to pick up the issue, it could provide a lot of insight or roleplay ideas.

[Tanuki Tales]

Tangentially related.

Honestly, the way you're writing his though processes seems fine to me. While he may be able to rationalize or sound more intelligent, he puts no focus or interest in such things and evaluates what he sees in a blunt, crude, efficient manor. I think it makes thematic sense in several ways.

Borderlands is one of those things I need to play. I played the first one up to the first boss and then things just got away from me. Isn't Krieg a boss in Borderlands 2 though?

And it's not so much the style, it's the actual words. Since he has no reason to use our nouns, verbs and adjectives, what would he use? How would he describe colors? Would blue be cold and wet? Would red be hot and hurt? Yellow sweet? Would he attribute things to other things and through that context emote to himself the true meaning of his thoughts?

Though familiars are probably smarter, I always imagine animals as thinking in images.

There was a highly-acclaimed issue of Hawkeye where the entire story is told from the POV of his "pizza dog," Lucky. (So-named because he's a dog that loves pizza.) If you have the time/inclination to pick up the issue, it could provide a lot of insight or roleplay ideas.

I am actually going out today and can see if I could pick that issue up.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Tanuki Tales
Since he has no reason to use our nouns, verbs and adjectives....

Well, does he have a reason not to? I'm assuming his wizard talked to him normally, despite their empathic bond; I talk to my cats all the time. That would be his primary exposure to human(oid) language, so I'd expect him to use many of the terms and phrases his wizard commonly used.

Originally Posted by Psyren
Though familiars are probably smarter, I always imagine animals as thinking in images.

I was just thinking that my cats probably have about a dozen proto-words they'd love to express, but which their voices keep rendering the same. There are some squeaks and trills I'm clearly meant to understand.

[Tanuki Tales]

Well, does he have a reason not to? I'm assuming his wizard talked to him normally, despite their empathic bond; I talk to my cats all the time. That would be his primary exposure to human(oid) language, so I'd expect him to use many of the terms and phrases his wizard commonly used.

Why?

Why would he think in those terms and phrases other than because human-centrically that would "make sense"? Does a person who spent their whole life speaking English and who becomes fluent in German stop thinking in English? If they lived predominantly in a germanic society, I could see this slowly bleeding into their thought process, but even then, that's how a human's mind would work.

[Palanan]

Considering this is an ex-familiar, defined as "practically one being" with his master, I'd say he's pretty "human-centric" already.

[Tanuki Tales]

Considering this is an ex-familiar, defined as "practically one being" with his master, I'd say he's pretty "human-centric" already.

I don't know where you're getting the idea that a Familiar and its owner are a single, gestalt entity, because that certainly isn't the case here. A familiar has some form of metaphysical link to its master, but it only views them as a very dear friend and does its best to follow orders given and to keep the caster from harm (but it won't blindly follow orders, especially if they're suicidal). At least, that's how its detailed out in the rules for Pathfinder.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Tanuki Tales
I don't know where you're getting the idea that a Familiar and its owner are a single, gestalt entity, because that certainly isn't the case here.

This seems to be yet another difference between Pathfinder and the 3.5 rules that I wasn't aware of. I have a better sense of where you're coming from now.

That said, I still don't see any particular reason why a familiar wouldn't absorb the language habits of its master, especially a familiar that's more intelligent than many manual laborers and attends its master constantly. But clearly you do, and you already seem to have strong ideas on the approach you want to use.

[Ettina]

Regardless of the fact that he is completely mute (though understands gnomish and common), I'm finding myself having trouble wrapping my head around what kind of language he would use internally, in his thoughts, to describe the world around him. I know what adjectives, nouns, verbs and even sentence structure that I, as a human, would understand and attribute to the world around me, but would this apply to even an intelligent familiar? I could see them recognizing and understanding, at least on some level, what words humanoids would use to describe the world, but they wouldn't probably internally adopt using these terms themselves.

Who says he needs to use language internally? Not even all humans do that. There are people who think mainly by visualization, or imagining complex webs of spatial relationships, or so forth.

My guess is most animals probably think by fairly concrete mental representation of sensory stimuli. So a rat running a maze wouldn't think 'I need to go right' in some sort of rat-language, but would instead visualize what the maze looks like (or smells like) if he turns right vs left, and decide what looks like the direction he knows leads to food.

A more intelligent animal might have more abstract representations, to represent more abstract concepts, but would still be mostly imagining sensory experiences rather than thinking in words.

[Tanuki Tales]

This seems to be yet another difference between Pathfinder and the 3.5 rules that I wasn't aware of. I have a better sense of where you're coming from now.

Spoiler: Tangential rule stuff

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Really? I thought that it was just ambiguous for 3.5 whether they were separate or not.

That said, I still don't see any particular reason why a familiar wouldn't absorb the language habits of its master, especially a familiar that's more intelligent than many manual laborers and attends its master constantly. But clearly you do, and you already seem to have strong ideas on the approach you want to use.

The difference is that this is an animal raised to below average intellect (above for Enn), not a human being or dwarf or gnome (as is this case). I have said multiple times that I see no reason why a familiar wouldn't understand its master's languages (which, at least a Pathfinder familiar, does not really get without an Awaken spell normally, in fact, they compare an intelligent familiar to a toddler), but why would it supplant its natural thought process? Especially when the familiar hasn't spent decades with its master in a socialized setting.

Edit:

@Ettina: Now how would I represent that in writing?