Pathfinder Second Edition
Compendium
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Roc
Legendarily massive raptors capable of carrying off elephants as prey, rocs are typically about 30 feet long from beak to tail and have a wingspan of 80 feet or more. While their beaks are hooked to rip flesh from bone, their hunting strategy involves grabbing their prey in their powerful talons and then dropping it from great heights before feeding. This method creates a massive amount of carrion, which guarantees that rocs are followed by flocks of opportunistic scavengers, such as ravens and buzzards, who find it easy to steal bits of the larger birds’ meals. Rocs, for the most part, don’t mind these creatures, which sometimes get gobbled up along with the rest of the roc’s food.
Rocs usually nest among mountaintops and cliffs inaccessible to all but the bravest of terrestrial dwellers. They are long-range predators that hunt both land and sea in search for massive prey to sustain them and their young.
Rocs are antisocial and lone hunters who compete with each other in fierce aerial battles to protect territory. But about once a decade, a mating couple pairs up to raise their chicks. Once the chicks are old enough to hunt on their own, the parents separate to once again engage in lone hunting.
Particularly skilled druids or rangers might capture and train a roc to serve as a flying mount or hunting Companion, though examples of such an incredible feat of domestication are few and far between. The easiest way to rear a roc is to do so from the moment it hatches, since the chick imprints on the first creature it sees. Acquiring a roc egg is by no means an easy feat, though, and is often a death sentence for the would-be egg-snatcher.