Kzinti males are very strong, very fast,
and have incredible stamina. This means
that they make impressive opponents;
they can carry heavy armor and still
move faster than human infantry, and
they can do it for longer periods of time. 

Kzinti tend to go berserk when threatened; their instinctive reaction to hostile
creatures is to instantly attack them,
whether they can win or not. This tendency becomes less pronounced after
the kzinti lose a few wars, as the most
enthusiastic warriors rush to the front 
and die, while the cautious survive to
perpetuate the race. 

In spite of this kamikaze attitude, the
kzinti are capable of putting together
well organized and well trained armies.
Kzinti like warfare, and they’re very good
at it. Their eagerness works against them
in one respect; they always seem to attack before they’re ready. 

Kzinti females are at best semi-intelligent; females from the primitive culture
discovered on. Ringworld can speak a
few words; those in the modern world of
Kzin described in RINGWORLD and
THE RING WORLD ENGINEERS are so
unintelligent that they do not speak at
all.

Kzinti females apparently are rather
helpless physically, also. Thus, they
need constant protection and attention
from the males. 

There are about three females for every male in cultures where warriors die a
lot (as they would in a D&D setting). In
more placid situations the ratio will appear 
proach one-to-one. The females will
have from three to six young each. 

A little arithmetic will reveal that of the
kzinti population, only four to eight percent are adult males. The males will have
their work cut for them; they have a lot of
mouths to feed and bodies to protect. 

ARRIVAL IN D&D WORLDS
Several hundred years ago there lived
a magician of such extraordinary powers
that he had partial control of several
gods. As is typical of magicians of extraordinary powers, he wanted to rule
the world. He commanded the gods to
deliver to him intelligent monsters that
could help him conquer the world. The
gods wanted to deliver them in such a
way as to kill the magician. They were
tired of being ordered around.

The specs he listed fit kzinti pretty
well. The gods bargained with other
gods, who in turn dickered with other,
more outlandish gods, who then dealt
with truly bizarre, alien gods, who, in return for godly favors delivered a hundred
square miles of Kzin, complete with flora, fauna, two hundred feet of dirt and
rock, and five thousand puzzled kzinti. 

The wizard survived the sky falling on
him, but lost most of his troops and magic items. The kzinti were looking for and
found the wizard. Three thousand kzinti
died before the wizard, who after all had
extraordinary powers, was rent into bitesized morsels. Score one for kzinti recklessness.

The kzinti were confused by their
strange surroundings, but they could
take that. They were also puzzled by the
failure of their old gods to respond to
their prayers, and they were very concerned.

They found magic. They’d never had
magic before, and it fascinated and
frightened them. Regardless, the kzinti
resolved to extend their dominion all
over the world and subjugate all of the
intelligent races.

Centuries passed, and the kzinti now
control a large portion of the major continent, and have enslaved many tribes of
Orcs, Goblins, Hobgoblins, Kobolds, Lizard Men, Ogres, Gnolls, Trolls, and
Men. Elves and Dwarves they cannot
enslave, though entire clans have been
exterminated.

SOCIAL ORGANIZATION
As kzinti females are unintelligent, all
kzinti social structures and pantheons
are patriarchal in nature.

All adult male kzinti are warriors. They
are by nature hunters, and enjoy hunting
and fishing immensely — duels among
themselves are common, although the
formality of human dueling is unknown;
the combatants leap to engage with each
other without bothering to choose seconds. 

The modern kzinti society has an extremely rigid structure; 
kzinti of low status have no names, and are called by
their profession. As a kzin gains status,
he may be given a partial name — one
kzinti warship commander was called
Chuft-Captain —or, if he does very well,
he may be awarded a full name, which
contains no reference to profession.

Social status also corresponds with
superior fighting ability. A kzin with a
partial name will have 6+4 hit dice, and
one with a full name will have 8+4 dice.

Since names mean status, a kzin with a
name is a big cheese, perhaps corresponding to a Count or Earl in human
feudal society. A kzin with a partial name
would correspond to a Baron. Kzinti
without names would have status equal
to that of a Knight if they are from a
civilized region, yeoman if they are from
a more primitive area.

Kzinti culture does NOT correspond
closely to human feudalism, but the humans who encounter kzinti will try to define kzinti social status in human
terms, and vice versa, and will convert
each other’s relative ranks accordingly. 

About the only way for a kzin from a
non-aristocratic family to get a name is
to do something spectacular. “Winning a
name for yourself” has great significance to kzinti. Young kzinti warriors are
continually searching for a suitable
quest to attempt in order to win a name. 

Many kzinti quests center around
gaining magic items. Kzinti are impressed
by magic, but can’t seem to learn how to
cast spells, so their magic is limited to
using enchanted items. 

To get these enchanted items, kzinti
go singly or in small groups to (you 
guessed it) dungeons, abandoned castles, and other crumbling structures.
This is where adventurers most often
meet kzinti.

Magic-seeking kzinti are not always
hostile to adventurers. They respect
Fighters and Clerics of reasonably high
level, and fear and respect Magic-Users.
They despise Thieves and Assassins,.
and think Monks are crazy.

Kzinti tend to think of adventurers encountered in dungeons as good cannon
fodder. They especially like to send party members ahead to find traps the hard
way. They can sometimes be persuaded
to treat everyone more or less as equals
if there’s someone in. the party they
respect.

Kzinti treasure hunters can be in any
kind of armor, including none, and carry
any kind of weapon, from claws to ballistae. Their equipment will generally correspond to the military gear common
with the nearest kzinti settlement.

RELIGION
Kzinti religion underwent considerable revision after the kzinti were dumped
into the D&D multiverse, as the kzinti
gods had sold them out.
Searching for suitable gods, many
kzinti found the Lawful Evil group (Asmodeus, Baal, et al) the most suitable.

They do not particularly trust these alien
gods, however, since they suspect that
the gods don’t really care about them.
The kzinti tend to suspect they’re being
used, and they don’t like it.

Since these gods are primarily interested in humanoid creatures, the kzinti
clergy decided to misrepresent themselves as humans to their new gods, by
wearing masks of human skin during
church ceremonies. This is similar to the
Kdapist heresy described in RINGWORLD. These masks are used by the
kzinti priests as holy symbols in spelt
casting; masks made from the facial skin
of a Good Cleric are considered the most
potent.

MAGIC USE
Kzinti are unable to cast spells of any
kind; their magic use is limited to using
enchanted items, and occasional special
dispensation from the gods. This dispensation will be very limited in scope;
for example, one kzinti priest was given
the ability to cast lightning bolts once
per day, but he had no other spells.

PSIONICS
Kzinti are known to have psionic ability similar to that of humans. One kzin in
five hundred has some psionic talent.
Strength, attack and defense modes, etc.
are determined as in humans. A kzin with
psionics rarely has to go adventuring to
gain status, so they’re rarely encountered on dungeon expeditions.

FOOD
Kzinti eat a lot. An adult male kzin
weighs in at around five hundred pounds,
and leads a very active life. Moving a
kzin’s body around all day takes a lot of
energy. Feeding three females and nine
to eighteen young also takes a lot of
energy. Rough calculations indicate that
an adult male kzin needs fourteen
pounds of fresh meat a day; and his family needs another 125 pounds per day.
That’s about ten times the consumption
of a comparable human family — and
humans can eat lots of things besides
raw meat.

Another problem is that the kzinti
prefer their meat VERY fresh. It is difficult for kzin to eat cold meat, and probably impossible for him to eat cooked or
dried meat. Kzinti need to be close to a
supply of live animals. 

Kzinti population density is thus kept
low by the necessity of being near food
animals; Kzinti who live by raising cattle
on prime pastureland could achieve a
population density of two families per
square mile — but only if there were no
bad years and no cattle died of disease.
A realistic density would be one kzinti
family per square mile for PRIME pastureland; worse land would have fewer
kzinti per square mile.

As one final complication, kzinti aren’t
temperamentally suited to caring for
animals. A kzin would kill any domestic
animal that bothered him, and soon
there would be no animals left. A kzin
has to have slaves to tend his animals,
which screws up their population density even more.

In contrast, humans could realistically
expect prime pastureland to support ten 
o twelve families per square mile, assuming everyone was on an all-meat
diet. Subsistence farming could support
50 or more families per square mile. The
kzinti will always be outnumbered.

Even so, there is much that the kzinti
can do to boost their population density.
A major strategem will be to take slaves
to raise grain for animal feed, which will
allow more cattle in a fixed area. Tribute
in cattle and grain will be exacted from
neighboring countries whenever possible.

The kzinti also have the charming habit of eating members of the slave races
(although Kobolds and Lizard Men will
escape the honor, being cold-blooded
and thus inedible as far as kzinti are concerned). Slaves can thus form a good
backup food supply in the event that disease or drought reduces the animal
population.

“WILD” KZINTI
Most kzinti will live in a semi-feudal
society that concerns itself mostly with
ranching and conquest. Some kzinti,
however, are living the “natural life” in
primitive hunting societies.

These kzinti will usually live in small
groups in forests. They will be seminomadic of necessity, as kzinti will soon
hunt out any area in a relatively short
time.

Because a kzin who lives a claw-tomouth existence in the forest is in a
much more vulnerable position than a
kzinti rancher under the protection of
the Patriarch, the wild kzinti are much
less arrogant and xenophobic than their
more civilized relatives. 

A wild kzin must hunt every day, and
while he is hunting, his family is left unprotected. Considering the creatures
that inhabit a typical D&D forest, this is a
highly undesirable state of affairs. Carting the whole family along on the hunt is
small improvement. Wild kzinti therefore
lead a precarious existence unless they
find strongholds, allies, or both. 

One solution favored by many wild
kzinti is to ally themselves with the Wood
Elves. This odd alliance has advantages
for both sides. The kzinti can leave their
families tinder the protection of the
elves, which leaves them free to hunt.
The elves gain valuable allies; they can
lounge around and drink wine all day
while the kzinti take care of all the nasty
forest critters. The kzinti don’t understand the elves attitude, but respect
them for their fighting ability and for
their magic. 

Wild kzinti tend to a more neutral
alignment, partly because of the elves’
influence, and partly because the wild
kzinti are in a rotten position to do much
evil. They have enough problems.

Even so, adventurers often find that
wild kzinti like to accost travelers. They 
rob and eat small parties, take tolls from
medium-sized groups, and leave large
ones alone. Merchants going through
areas inhabited by wild kzinti usually pay
an annual tribute, in return for which the
kzinti guard their caravans. Kzinti like
protection rackets. Payment is in coin or
trade goods; wild kzinti are too proud to
accept livestock as payment; they think
it reflects unfavorably on their hunting
ability. 

Wild kzinti normally wear no armor,
and use no weapons other than their
claws. Because of the extremely low
population density of wild kzinti, they
are rarely organized into formal military
units. Civilized kzinti, on the other hand,
have a highly developed military organization.

KZINTI MILITARY
The kzinti military organization resembles that of the humanoid races. Differences in outlook and size make the kzinti
auxilaries rather unusual, but the regular
troops are organized in a fairly conventional manner. 

Infantry: Kzinti infantry is very powerful. Kzinti are almost as tall as Ogres, but
are faster and smarter. Most kzinti armies are composed of light, medium,
and heavy infantry.

The light infantry is composed of kzinti who wear either leather armor (armor
class 7) or no armor at all. Weaponry
varies considerably; swords, axes, and
c!aws are among the preferred weapons.
Most kzinti light infantrymen carry javelins or longbows. Kzinti light infantry
moves 18” per turn, which means that
they are as fast as heavy cavalry.

Kzinti medium infantry is the backbone of most kzinti armies. Preferred
weapons are swords, axes, maces, and
halberds. Kzinti with one-hand weapons
will carry large shields, and all will wear
armor—banded, chain, or plate—which
is thicker than human armor. Armor
classes, without shields, are AC 3, 2, 1
respectively. The shield drops armor
class by one, as usual.

Medium infantry moves 12” per turn,
the same rate as human fight infantry. 

Kzinti heavy infantry is truly awesome.
Armored in unbelievably heavy field
plate, the heavy infantry lumbers along
at 6” per turn, with an armor class of -2.
They will use weapons suited to killing
armored opponents; halberds, lucerne
hammers, maces, and two-handed
swords.


These are typical kzinti regular troops.
The deficiency in archers in all but the
light infantry can be attributed to kzinti
eagerness to get into the fray; archers
are considered to be useful mainly in
ambush and siege, and are thus classed
as auxiliary troops.

Cavalry: Kzinti can’t ride horses;
they’re too heavy. They understand the
value of cavalry, however, and looked for
a good substitute for horses. They chose
mastodons.



Mastodons are mean, nasty, vicious,
and hard to tame, but so are kzinti. The
kzinti eventually tamed large numbers of
mastodons for use in war. A large mastodon can carry two kzinti into battle.
Some mastodons are armored in studded leather barding; these can carry a
single kzin. Unarmored mastodons are
armor class 6, and move at 15” per turn,
armored mastodons are armor class 3,
and move 12“ per turn.

Kzinti lancers on mastodons probably
make the world’s best shock cavalry, but
don’t make up a large portion of the
army, because of the huge cost in upkeep (pachyderms have the world’s most
inefficent digestive system, and eat
enormous amounts of food). Figure
about one mastodon for every ten to one
hundred warriors.

SUPPLY
Kzinti armies are plagued with supply
problems. Although they can often
stretch supplies by eating dead and
wounded humans on the battlefield, they
still must either drive great herds of cattle wherever they go, or spend most of
their time foraging. In many battles with
kzinti, the main objective of the opposing army was to separate the kzinti from
their cattle.

In addition to herd animals, kzinti
supply trains will have many horsedrawn wagons for supplies and plunder.
Kzinti like horses for their versatility; if
there’s no work for the horse, it can always be eaten. 

Supply problems also make the kzinti
lousy at conducting sieges that are any
distance from home. They also have little
patience, so they tend to storm fortifications instead. Suckering kzinti into at b
tacking a fort that they can’t take is a
favorite trick in the border countries. 

DRAGONS
Kzinti LIKE dragons, especially talking dragons. Dragons are everything a
kzin wants to be: big, fierce, arrogant,
and magical. Kzinti and dragons get
along fine. Kzinti like to have dragons as
air cover in battles. Dragons like to have
the kzinti deliver succulent human maidens to them every day and twice on Sundays. It works out.

This kzinti-dragon alliance results in
dragons showing up for kzinti battles,
typically one dragon for every two hundred fifty to one thousand kzinti. It can
also work the other way; many dragon
lairs have kzinti guards, either regular
troops or wild kzinti who use the lair as a
safe (for them) base. Dragons will also
take a couple of kzinti with them when
they decide to destroy a hamlet, since
the kzinti are more effective at looting

SLAVE TROOPS
Slave races can usually provide the
kzinti with cannon fodder for their campaigns. Humans and Orc auxiliaries are
the most common, but the kzinti will use
whatever they can get, including Trolls
and Ogres.

These troops are organized into regular military units with kzinti officers. Morale is ten to twenty percent higher than
normal for slave troops because they
fear their officers more than the enemy.
Their weapons and armor will be those
normally used by soldiers of the slaves’
races.

In extreme situations the kzinti have
been known to eat slave soldiers. The
Trolls are victimized first, since a Troll’s
regeneration ability allows you to butcher him several times a day.

HUMANOID AUXILIARIES
If a country is strong enough to successfully resist kzinti invasion, the kzinti
will sometimes put forward an offer of
alliance. These countries will gain the
advantage of having a secure border
with the kzinti and the promise of kzinti
aid if their lands are threatened. In return, they must send their troops if the
kzinti are threatened.

Thus, in many battles with kzinti, human and humanoid auxiliaries make up a
large part of the kzinti forces. These
troops are under the command of their
own leaders, and can sometimes be per-
 suaded to desert the kzinti before or during the battle.

Auxiliary units are less controllable
than kzinti or slave units, since they are
not directly under kzinti command. They
sometimes ignore orders and battle
plans in order to gain some advantage
for themselves. They often stop to plunder a baggage train when they’re needed
elsewhere, for example.

CONCLUSIONS
Kzinti have been used for several
months in the author’s campaigns, and
all of the encounters with them have
been interesting (the party has always
won, but maybe next time...). In my campaign, kzinti have filled a gap in the
AD&D monster lineup by being nasty but
very intelligent, vicious but organized.

I’d also like to express my thanks to
Larry Niven for his patience in answering
my questions, and for bringing us kzinti
in the first place.

Finally, remember that kzinti have hairtrigger tempers. Calling a kzin nasty
names is dangerous; insulting his ancestors is fatal. Under no circumstances
should you call out to a kzin, “Here, kitty,
kitty, kitty...”