Today’s DnDtober prompt was ‘movement’

My players are really cheap when using potions, although they have a lot and have money to get more.

Given this, I know an encounter is hard when at least one has to chug a potion.

System Lancer RPG

System: Stars Without Number TTRPG

I'm in no way frustrated by this, but has anyone else noticed that there's very few ways to hype up a party faster than a slightly magical animal companion, or is that just me?

Examples that have gotten my parties riled up in the last decade:
A horse that stomps morse code but doesn't understand spoken word, so is just a stream of consciousness to anyone that cares to listen.

A wolf immune to magic missile, specifically magic missile.

A kobold who wants ALL the smoke and will fight alongside the party against whatever odds. Wasn't even magical, just managed to land a crit on an archfiend and earned the parties eternal love.

And now, finally, a mastiff sized chicken that's pretty good at card games but has no concept of money so doesn't try particularly hard to win.

My party has been going through a bit of a rough spot in terms of dark and depressing themes and a world that's not exactly cheerful, so I introduced the chicken last night. Already they've named it, and openly declared they would both kill and die for her. Next week we'll be back to the depressing low point of act two, but a night with Beaky gave them back the joy they needed.

System: Wolves of God

Shoutout to Kevin Crawford and Sin Nomine Publishing for making this absolute gem of a game!