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Originally Posted by 0rion79
Effectively, no dog may be strong enough like a north american wolf that attacks bisons!
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On the contrary, english mastiffs, which are the war dogs that the D&D attack dog is most likely based upon, are much more formidable than a typical wolf. the record for the heaviest mastiff is 343 lbs, while they generally range from 160 to 230 lbs. A north american wolf will max out at about 175 lbs. In terms of speed there is a law (or there was) in England that required non-noble owners of mastiffs to cut off the second toe of the dog so that they would be incapable of running down deer (and deer are both fleet of foot and enduring runners.) It also seems that mastiffs (before the breed was standarized in England) were pitted against such foes as bears, lions, tigers, bulls, boars, other dogs, and humans in the Roman Coliseum. Armies throughout the ages have used these dogs. As far as attacking canadian bison there is no way to know if they are the equivalent of the wolf. But remember that wolves hunt in packs and you will simply not find an actual account of a wolf taking down a healthy, adult, non-pregnant bison on its own. The Canadian (and American, if you must) lone wolf seems to be mythological. Wolves are pack animals period. A wolf that lives outside of the pack structure is: a) a male trying to attract females to start a new pack; b) an outcast (keep in mind that an outcast was made so because some other, tougher wolf drove it away,) c) sick and soon to die; d) old and soon to die; e) an individual all of whom's pack has died (in which case they are probably soon to die because pack extinction is usually through disease
or a true rarity, an unsocial wolf. In all of these cases the individual subsists on a diet of rodents, insects, carrion and weak/immature prey (maybe a deer of 3 years or less, but not an elk, moose nor especially a bison of that age, heck, they would have trouble with a yearling bull in good shape.) Given all of these sources of food, except in some truly rare act of desperation, no sane "lone" wolf would ever dare attack a healthy, adult bison on its own anyway. And if it did, except by some almost unique stroke of luck, would it survive the encounter. I can't say whether an english mastiff would survive the same encounter but I am willing to bet that it would have a much better chance. Oh and, even in packs, wolves will generally not attack a healthy adult bison. They are just too big and deadly. A healthy adult bison, male or female (not pregnant) can generally do enough damage (death or serious injury) to a wolf pack that they won't even try. If you have been watching documentaries about this please bear in mind that: a) the documentary maker has no mandate to present the truth, he/ she is only trying to attract an audience to either sell commercial time or justify a cable network carrying his/her channel; b) they have managed to capture on film severely atypical behaviour (unlikely....see c); they are passing off an attack upon a weak member as something else ( see a). Finally, I have had encounters with both creatures. A friend of one of my cousins had a full blood wolf as a pet (totally illegal of course.) A more surly incorrigable thing you could not conceive of. I remember petting it and that it would always put its paw up to my face as though trying to overcome me. Eventually I just grabbed its paw and placed it firmly on the ground and stared it in the eye until it stopped. It was my friend after that. The mastiff, however, was friendly from the start (it was the pet of my ex-wifes brothers friend) but petting the thing was an intimidation. The dog weighed more than I do and,when it wanted attention, it would push its full weight against you, tongue hanging out, looking up at you with those eyes. Friendly as all heck but there was something else there.... Yeah I would gladly tackle the wolf before the mastiff any day. Maybe it is just because the mastiff was bred to kill and the wolf just does it because it has to. Maybe it is because the wolf will kill you if it must in order to eat but the mastiff will, if trained, simply kill you. Hmm....
Darmagon