Ardent's going to the dogs

The Backstory

Long ago mankind vied against animalistic predators in the quest for survival, competing for the same resources. A fortuitous alliance was formed when wolves left their wild ways to live among humans, slowly changing to something new and different under their civilized influence, becoming the creatures known as "dogs".

It is an old story, one told as a mythological origin story for pups. Maybe it was true, maybe it was not. All that is truly known is that mankind shaped dogs, and they entered into an alliance that lasted thousands of years. They hunted beside humans, protected them and their flocks, and remained loyal.... even after mankind went extinct.

Dogkind was left bereft of masters and friends, but the world did not wait upon their grief. Predators returned, their ancient enemies the wolves taking over the formerly human territories and spreading like a plague over the lands. Some dogs banded together and held territory against the predators. A mountain retreat of human-history scholars. Groups of nomadic herders. And curiously, an order of wolf-killers - assassins.

Long ago in its war against wolves mankind created several races of dog that were specifically designed to hunt, to chase, and to kill wolves. With man gone, these ancient warriors did not retreat from their purpose. They codified it.

Though the keep's assassins walk boldly among their enemies, the keep itself is a secret. Not all among their number are wolfhounds or guardians - many are hunters, herders, healers, so its existence is kept a secret. But from among the wolf-killer types, pups are trained from a young age to kill wolves. It is a tradition time honored among their kind.

The Details

The keep is a mishmash of many different family groups living together, many pure of breed, many not, so there's a wide variety of cultures and religions coexisting. Wolves are often, though not always, seen as evil creatures, with opinions ranging from indifferent to outright hate, though some may be open to being friendly. Wolfdog mixes are overwhelmingly considered an abomination, so sexual relations are outright banned among wolves of the keep.

As far as breeding within the keep, they don't generally mix breed types though there are exceptions - ie, a retriever may end up mated to a mastiff, though they most often wouldn't mix socially enough to have gotten that point. There's no particular emphasis placed on pure types so much as its a matter of them having different priorities, and any mixing tends to get extremely diluted as the mixed type pups drift away to the groups that most appeal to them. Within those types, though, its fairly common to have mixed breeds, such as herding dogs with many different herding breeds in their ancestry. There are pure lines as well to choose from as many families naturally gravitated towards others of their breed.

The majority of the assassins are various hound types, with the other dog types tending towards the support roles. So this would include the sighthounds, the scent hounds who often act as trackers, the alaunts who often act as fierce soldiers and the mastiffs who often acted guards.

Among the scenthounds there were two general types consisting of the running-hounds who would track their quarry to kill, such as the foxhounds, and the lymer who were known more for trailing and were more likely to be hunters and navigators than they were fighters, such as bloodhounds.

The sighthounds as well were somewhat divided, since the smaller sighthounds were not capable of felling a full grown wolf so were most often hunters, spies, or poisoners.

Alaunts were fierce, almost berserk fighters, the large game hunting dogs of the middle ages that later grew into breeds like the dogo argentino and the pit bull terrier. They don't tend to be super subtle and are more often soldiers than assassins but sometimes a problem needs a big hammer to fix it. There is some overlap with mastiffs in this category, as there are some fierce guardian dog breeds that were used in war as well.

The mastiff types are most often huge, low key dogs who rarely leave the keep as they generally act as guardians for the flocks and defenders of their borders.

A chosen few among the other types are chosen when they show aptitudes that are needed by the assassins, whether that is a particularly agile xolo or a toy breed with a talemt for going unnoticed, so there is a wide variety of possible breeds and mixes to choose from.

Dogs of the keep are often sent out as young dogs at the end if their training to make their way in the world and begin to carry out their mission of ridding the world of mankind's enemies, notably wolves. They may or may not ever actually kill anyone, but they do work to sow dissention and strife among wolves to weaken their hold on the land.

The Adoption

The dogs of the keep are going to be a very open adoption. There will be no particular post requirements - I don't have the time or energy to chase people down to make them post. Almost any design goes though if they're an assassin they wouldn't be very successful if they're fluorescent pink so please stay away from super unnatural colors as much as possible. Fairly open on things like personality, breeds, even history though I will be okaying adoptions before they can be played as dogs of the keep, just in case. You will need to buy your own canine pass, they're fairly cheap. So with no further ado, here's the form.



Any questions about anything, feel free to ask! These adoptions will be open basically indefinitely but I do ask that WIPs not sit for more than a couple weeks.