Beast men using no weapons

Umm, antlers and horns are a common guy thing among lots of herbivores.

This news item seemed relevant even though it's not weapons:
Oldest stone tools pre-date earliest humans

Evolution would seem to inevitably lead to tool use and that would include weapons. I think there might be another way to approach this story. It could be that the beast men created weapons that enhanced their natural weapons. So claws and teeth might be enhanced by weapons but projectiles and swords don't exist.

 

Oh.... never mind.

 

Herbivores would probably have weapons to enhance their defensives from the predators. And I guess having developing complex minds will help them improve their battle tactics.

 

The defence strategy that herbivores generally employ is the fact that carnivores can't afford to kill them all (or the carnivores will rapidly die of starvation). So, if the hunters only take, say, 1% of the herd, the odds are it'll be the old or the infant, so probably not you...today. Once you've produced your 2.4 children (who grow to adulthood - just remember that if ALL those cute little ducklings survive the vicious attacks by that nasty old pike, each adult duck would produce about 6 babies per year. Do the maths on how quickly the world would be overrun with the buggers!), you've done your fair share by posterity.

 

The use of weapons could be a breach of their society's code of honour.

Only teeth, claws, horns, hoofs, etc would be allowed. Use of artificial versions of these, either held in the hand or mounted onto the body (as in a prosthetic horn) would be seen as cheating.

Tools that aren't used for fighting could still be a reality in this setting.

 

If you remove the thumbs, inventing and building becomes hard in general, not just holding weapons. This could work to your advantage if you were to explain why they do not have weapons, but it would also be a disadvantage if you still want them to use tools and have cities.
I think that your idea of including supernatural abilities would help. If I could shoot exploding fireballs, freeze things, or shoot electricity out of my fingertips, anyone with a arrows or bullets would not scare me. They'd have to get on my level or retreat. So if they had inborn magic abilities, there would be no need for weaponry.

 

Seems to me a good SF writer could create a thumbless alien species that has adapted to the lack of thumbs in the their tools and technology.

 

I could see some kind of gripping alternative, like an owls opposable digits, or tentacles. But if I book tried to convince me that a civilization was built just using dog paws, that book is getting flung into the garbage.

 

The most interesting "dog" species are in Vernor Vince's works. They have a herd mind, where they have animal-level intelligence alone, but grow in intelligence when they pair or form small packs (a pack or five may have human level intelligence). They have a feudal society, but I think Vinge gave them anatomy that explains tool usage.

 

Why would a hive mind have a feudal society? They need to cooperate in order to stay smart, so raising an individual over the others would be entirly counter to the paradigm.

 

They didn't raise individuals, but packs.

 

Maybe not magical abilities, but possibly natural defense?

Here's what I thought as a example: An ape-like figure with long sharp claws, dipping them is toxic materials, but not being affected because of a immunity, either natural or "man-made" , if that term can be applied in this case.

Edit: Didn't notice that I was on the first page, sorry, but I personally feel that the advice still applies. Again, sorry if I did something wrong. :/

 

Then they will still invent tools to build better weapons or use them to enhance their natural defenses.