Doggy Talents is a Minecraft mod, currently available over at CurseForge. It completely reworks the Wolves in Minecraft, turning them into lovable pet dogs which can be customized and upgraded with talents.
When it comes to the customization part, it’s incredibly impressive. Using the ‘Texture index’ feature, you can change your Dog between many different breeds. Whilst some of the best talents and skills include poisonous fangs and the ability to ride your dog.
Below, we’re going to take a dive into Doggy Talents and guide you on how to get started. For more Minecraft Guides & Best-of content, make sure to check out our dedicated area here!
Taming a Wolf
Like in Vanilla Minecraft, you’ll need to find a Wolf. They are neutral mobs which spawn in a variety of biomes including Forests and Taigas (and all variations of these biomes). If you’re using a biome generation mod as well, it’s likely Wolves can be found in many other locations.
Once you’ve found a Wolf, to tame it you will need to repeatedly feed it Bones until it ‘accepts’ you as an owner. Therefor, it’s best carrying around a stack of bones or so whilst looking for a Wolf. When using bones, each one will provide a 33% chance of successfully taming a wolf.
Converting into a Dog
Now, what you have is a Vanilla Minecraft Wolf, and not a Dog from the Doggy Talents mod. To convert it, we need to feed the Wolf a ‘Training Treat’. These are new items added by the mod, and are pretty cheap to craft.
To craft a Training Treat, add 3 Wheat, 3 Sugar, 1 Gunpowder, 1 Bone and 1 String into a crafting table, in a layout similar to the screenshot above. Take the Training Treat, and feed it to your Wolf by right clicking on it. The treat will be removed from your inventory and the Wolf converted into a Dog.
Training & Talents
With the Wolf now a Dog, we can start using talents and training! The Dogs in Doggy Talents use a levelling system, with each level providing an extra point which you can place in a skill. After converting a Wolf, you will start off with 15 points to use freely. You can access the interface by holding a Stick and right clicking on a Dog.
In the middle of the screen, you can see the amount of points they currently have, as well as the level. On the left hand side are all of the available skills which you can upgrade as you wish. You can hover over each of them to see what benefit they provide.
To upgrade and level up your Dog, you need to simply feed it more Training Treats. Each treat will provide an additional level (and an additional point) which you can spend. However, you can only do this up to Level 20.
After reaching Level 20, you will need to start feeding your Dog Super Treats, which can be used to get an additional levels (up to Level 40). You can craft Super Treats by combining 5 Training Treats and a Golden Apple inside of a Crafting table. After Level 40, you will need to use a Master Treat, which is crafted with 5 Super Treats and a Diamond to take you to Level 60. Finally, you can use Dire Treats to go from Level 60 to 80, with the recipe being 5 Super Treats and an End Stone.
Changing Dog Appearance
With Doggy Talents, you can even customize the appearance of your dogs. To do that, open up the interface previously shown, by right clicking your Dog with a Stick. On the right hand side, you can see a ‘Texture Index’ option with a + and – button, here you can switch between.
There’s a few different breeds to choose from, such as Pugs, German Shepherds, Huskies and more. Hopefully now you have a bit more familiarity with the Doggy Talents mod for Minecraft!
