A Furry Friend

(No, not that kind of furry)

The dog food keeps making me think - it wouldn't be that implausible for a few stray dogs to be wandering around, would it? It'd be neat to have one appear as a mob that you could befriend - maybe you could train it to carry a few extra pounds of gear, or pull a sledge, or help you with hunting.

I know it sounds a bit cutesy for the game's tone, but just imagine how heartbroken we'd be when Balto inevitably bit the dust defending us from wolves. Or when we tried to gut him for warmth, Jack London-style.

I don't know. Robert Neville was a badass in I am Legend, and he adopted a stray dog (I'm talking about the original book by Richard Matheson, not that travesty featuring Will Smith (not faulting Will Smith, but the movie adaption of the novel was awful))

Oh, I'm not at all denying that you can have a dog and still be a badass. I actually think the whole "A man and his dog against the world" thing would work really well in this setting, especially in survival mode - it's a nice sort of middle ground between "totally alone and isolated" and "actually having human company".

Richard Matheson is great!

Having a stray dog pet that you have to feed a little bit would be great. He could help ward off wolves and track wounded game and give you some companionship in the desolate wilderness.

I really don't like the idea of a pet. The game is meant to focus on desolation, and a pet kind of takes away from that. I don't disagree that it would be interesting, and I know I'm being the post that 9001% of OP's hate, but it just doesn't seem to fit into the game.

I get what you mean. I don't think a dog necessarily has to take away from the desolation aspect (see: the Jack London story I was referencing), but it would have to be carefully done to keep from being too "cutesy". Ideally, a dog would provide an opportunity for some of the tough survival choices that the developers want to implement: e.g, do you keep feeding it when supplies run low? What if there's not enough food for you, let alone it? Do you let it go, and let a potential meal walk away? Stuff like that.

I think all the dogs have been eaten by the wolves.

Not sure if I would want dogs in the game, but if they are put in, they should be more of a burden to the player (if you want to keep them as a pet) than a help. They'd need to be fed after all.

Realistically, vast majority of dog breeds is depending on a human master in everything. The remaining few breeds are either not well suited to survive in arctic conditions (would freeze or couldn't catch anything that IS adapted for life in snow) or is not used to hunt in packs... unlike wolves. I am not a cynologist so there maybe is a dog that could work well, some wolfdog breeds maybe, but I am sure any lone dog would be killed be exposure, starvation or wolf pack quite quickly.

I did think about this in the context of wolves.

This is all completely wishful thinking beyond balance and implementation, but, as in, if you purposefully feed a wolf say 10x times it becomes friendly and follows you around. (This only works if the reason the wolves are aggro is they're also starving, tho.)

Of course, getting eaten by other equally strong wolves would always be a chance and there's a % chance that the wolf, when starving, will go on and try to eat the player. Constant paranoia rather than bonding fun time unless the wolf has proven that it can be really hungry and has a "personality" score that doesn't involve chowing down on you.

The main advantage would be the wolf would hunt deer and rabbits for you, buuut at the sacrifice of a big chunk of the meat. (Or 50%, wolves aren't dumb.)

In terms of dogs I'm guessing the only living dogs would be ones that were already feral. Almost might as well work on befriending a wolf at that point. (They'd have a better read on your body language than a wolf.)

Realistically, vast majority of dog breeds is depending on a human master in everything. The remaining few breeds are either not well suited to survive in arctic conditions (would freeze or couldn't catch anything that IS adapted for life in snow) or is not used to hunt in packs... unlike wolves. I am not a cynologist so there maybe is a dog that could work well, some wolfdog breeds maybe, but I am sure any lone dog would be killed be exposure, starvation or wolf pack quite quickly.

For what it's worth, a lot of the common sled dog breeds/mixes would probably fit the bill in terms of hunting ability/tolerance for cold. The wolves would most likely be the big issue in terms of survival.

Realistically, vast majority of dog breeds is depending on a human master in everything. The remaining few breeds are either not well suited to survive in arctic conditions (would freeze or couldn't catch anything that IS adapted for life in snow) or is not used to hunt in packs... unlike wolves. I am not a cynologist so there maybe is a dog that could work well, some wolfdog breeds maybe, but I am sure any lone dog would be killed be exposure, starvation or wolf pack quite quickly.

For what it's worth, a lot of the common sled dog breeds/mixes would probably fit the bill in terms of hunting ability/tolerance for cold. The wolves would most likely be the big issue in terms of survival.

Depends. Again, I am no dog expert, but my understanding of sled dogs is that while they are amazing runners and can withstand freezing temperatures, they are bred to obey they Alpha, which is a human master.

Even if we found a perfect breed, I cannot imagine how it would work. Hunting/guard dogs are no pets and it is not uncommon that the dog listens only to one human master (especially the wolfdog breeds). The attitude towards other humans would probably deteriorate even further after "going wild" for a few days.

However, in the story mode, this could be totally different. You could get a dog from an NPC, you could gain the loayality of a dog by healing its wounds... There would be many implications and interesting design decisions of having a dog (how to control it, how to maintain it, how the wildlife would react to it).

Do you know of a game where dogs are implemented in a similar way? I know Bohemia Interactive are planning to have dog companions in DayZ, also there will be one in the upcoming realistic medieval game Kingdom Come from Warhorse, so I'm waiting how it turns out.