Has anyone located information on animal upkeep requirements ie how much food an animal consumes per day?
I note there are table for food available after slaughter, but not daily food requirements for horses, pigs, cows, etc.
In particular, I was looking for information on daily consumption/horse upkeep for a cavalry based campaign. I have put together the following for horse consideration:
One encumbrance unit is 3kg. I would presume horse fodder would be similar to the material used for stills, so a unit of horse fodder/organic material is 3kg.
On daily horse food consumption, some internet searching says:
As a rule of thumb, allow 1.5 to 2 kg of feed per 100 kg of the horse's body weight.
Average horse weight : Most riding horses weigh in the range of 800-1,100 pounds (362kg to 498 kg).
500KG (heaviest) riding horse needs 10Kg grain a day.
So a horse needs average 9kg of grain/fodder/organic material a day. So three encumbrance units of grain.
In terms of gathering organic material/fodder, one person can gather 30 encumbrance units per shift in a field. That is halved in winter to 15 encumbrance units (p.142 4e players rulebook).
So enough feed per day for 10 horses (summer) or 5 horses (winter).
Horse movement rate is 3/2 per shift, so 30/20 km per shift. That’s 60/40km for two shift movement (in open terrain).
Twilight 4e HORSES
In game terms, horses count as vehicles for the purposes of combat (page 86). A typical horse can carry a rider (including carried gear) plus 25 encumbrance points of additional load, or a second person. If you instead lead it by the halter, the horse can carry up to 50 encumbrance units.
During travel, you can only ride a horse for two shifts per day. To ride for a third shift, you need to make a MOBILITY roll, modified by the Rider talent. If you fail, the horse goes lame and becomes incapacitated. A horse needs at least one shift of rest per day.
So an extra horse carries 50 encumbrance units. So that’s 16.6 days of fodder for a single horse. For two horse package, that is 6 encumbrance units per day. Five days for two horses is 30 encumbrance units. That leaves 45 encumbrance units per two horse team with rider plus their carried equipment.
In ideal conditions, you could have a five character party with ten horses travel up to five days (300/200 km) with internal stores. After that, 60/40km a day, with a shift spent gathering 30 encumbrance of organic material to feed the horses that day. So two shift riding, one gathering material, one rest.