Mabari

Mabari war hounds are a breed of dogs bred by the Alamarri.

Basic Information

Biological Traits

Mabari are huge mastiffs with a touch of wolf blood that stand as tall as a dwarf and just as wide.

Additional Information

Domestication

Each mabari chooses their master for life in a process called imprinting. Although fierce combatants, a mabari companion is shown to be a highly sociable animal, and though not capable of speech, they can clearly respond to speech with growls, whines, barks and several other actions that demonstrate intelligent comprehension.
Of all the dog breeds that the Fereldens have produced, none are so highly regarded or so widely famed as the Mabari. Justly renowned, the Mabari are intelligent war hounds fully capable of understanding speech and interpreting complex commands.
Their masters, or “partners” as many of those paired with mabari prefer, will often choose a distinct style of war paint to mark them with so that they can better pick them out from other mabari at a distance in the midst of combat. Correspondingly, many Fereldens that frequently fight alongside Mabari will scent themselves with distinctively pungent body paint called “kaddis” which allows the dogs to easily mark them as allies.
The bulk of Mabari will bond with a single warrior, whom they will fight beside and follow until death takes them, for there are many stories of Mabari avenging a fallen master before lying down beside his corpse to join him. Due to their great value, “feral” Mabari are unheard of.

A mabari covered in its owner's war paint.