The Alter Creature spell is the only (easy) way of creating awakened animals that are the size of herd men (and the other beasts of the wastes) that does not require them to be bound to a shrine for their continued intelligence. This spell makes them require human quality food so they do not maintain the advantage of being cheap to feed. Given this I am having trouble understanding what difference there is between Awakened herd-men and humans, they seem nearly identical to a normal human (which is their godtime origin so this makes some sense) but they are consistently referred to as a different thing than humans (them being referred to as awakened herd men rather than humans who are former herd men) so I think there is probably some substantial (magical) difference I am missing. Maybe it is just the Praxens being pedantic and there is no significant difference.
On the topic of Herd-men and Awakened herd Beasts I have a few other questions that I am putting here to avoid making more threads:
1) it is my understanding that creatures Awakened through Alter Creature do not follow the normal rules about needing to be bound to someone to remain intelligent is that correct?
2) What cults can Awakened Herd Men and awakened Praxian beasts more generally be initiates of? I seem to recall Waha Khans having awakened mounts that are themselves initiates of Waha but I could be misremembering.
3) What is the status of awakened herd men in the Morokanth tribe? Are they treated/thought of as: especially valuable herd beasts, Slaves, or full members of the tribe? Does this differ from how the other tribes treat awakened herd beasts (do the non-Morokanth tribes differ in their views on Awakened Herd beasts?)
4) If awakened herd animals are slaves or Herd beasts to Praxians what are the rules around selling them? Can they be sold to outsiders (non-Praxens, the other tribes would not be interested)? Clan clan Khans charge outrages prices to awaken outsiders Praxian beasts?
5) If they are full members of the tribe what happens if they run off to become a Pol-Joni? Would the Pol-Joni accept them (much more a problem for non herd-men awakened herd beasts)? Are there special rules/attitudes on part of the Praxian tribes that prevent this? (Obviously this could differ tribe to tribe)
6) Why haven’t Herd-Men spread well beyond the tribes? They are significantly cheaper to feed than humans and can be trained to engage in basic tasks. As such they would be useful in almost all sophisticated societies.
7) off topic but how do Morokanth treat their slaves? I would think that they wouldn’t treat them awfully in order to avoid revolts and keep them useful as combatants.
Sorry about the plethora of questions.