Lean wolflike beasts with bodies of gnarled wood and bones with a bristling coat of pine needles as fur, resin-hounds are undead creations of the pine-kindred. They serve their masters as hunting beasts, war hounds and guard dogs.

Meat Eating. If a resin-hound eats meat or is infused with the Gift of Nidhogg it temporarily gains the pine kindred trait of Regrowth. This allows the hound to slowly regenerate lost body parts and heal itself (a hungry resin-hound does not recover lost hit points naturally). One pound of meat gives a resin-hound one day of healing; one dose of Necrotic Sap Infusion is worth three months of healing. A resin-hound can store up to a year's worth of healing before it can eat or absorb no more. They can devour a month's worth of meat in a day, about 30 pounds. The meat's condition does not matter; putrescent carrion provides the same healing time as fresh flesh. Pine kindred often use resin-hounds to dispose of unwanted corpses.

Resin-Hound Creation. A resin-hound can be made from the dead body of any Medium size carnivorous quadrupedal animal. Most were once wolves or mastiffs, but the corpses of other predators like hyenas, panthers, or giant weasels serve just as well. Such creatures differ in appearance but have the same statistics as a canine resin-hound. Note that bears and boars are too omnivorous to become resin-hounds.
 The majority of resin-hounds are made with a Dark Druidic Mystery spell called animate resin-hound. Most jarls and even some thanes know this spell, which works like animate dead but produces resin-hounds instead of skeletons and zombies.
 A rare few jarls possess a secret ceremony, Pine Wolf Transformation. Similar to Pine Kindred Initiation, it can create many resin-hounds and/or one tree-vargr.

(Inspired by the Pine Kindred by Julian Lawrence; appeared in White Dwarf Magazine #21 (Oct/Nov 1980) as part of the Fiend Factory mini-module "One-Eye Canyon", edited by Albie Fiore.)