Animal words for Alias — a set by level

Domestic, wild and thoroughly exotic. The set that works equally well with children and adults.

The most universal set of them all: everybody knows animals, and you can explain them with a voice, a walk or a habit. From the cat under your feet to creatures most of the room has only seen on a screen.

Why animals almost always work

An animal comes with a sound, a movement and a habitat — three footholds no abstraction offers. Even when the group cannot recall the name they recognise the description: "grey, huge, long nose" reaches elephant faster than any definition. That is why this set rescues an evening where the players differ wildly in age and experience.

Who this set is for

Groups whose ages span a few decades. An animal comes with a sound, a gait and a habitat — three footholds no abstraction offers — so a seven-year-old plays level with an adult. The easy tier rests on household animals and the hard tier moves into biological terms, which stretches the set from the children's table to a group that enjoys the difficult.

Hedgehog

Works: “small, covered in spines, rolls into a ball when it is frightened.” Does not work: “a prickly animal” — too short, and the room says porcupine first. It is the second half, about the ball, that separates one from the other.

Elephant

Works: “grey, enormous, with a long nose.” Size plus one detail is the fastest route in this set. Does not work: “the largest land animal” — that turns it into a quiz, and the room will argue between elephant, hippo and rhino instead of answering.

Mole

Works through habitat: “lives underground and ruins vegetable patches.” Does not work: “a blind animal” — inaccurate, and the room says bat. For the rarer animals habitat is the shortest path, because it discards most of the options immediately.

Where groups go wrong

Animals invite description by appearance, yet appearance is the weakest of the three clues: “brown, four legs” fits half the set. Come at it through habitat or sound. The second trap is failing to settle the question of animal noises at the start: half the easy tier is guessed in a second if you may moo, and drags on for half a round if you may not. The third is explaining hard-tier terms by definition: herbivore lands faster through “eats only plants” than through “a member of the group that feeds on vegetation”.

Start with the habitat: "lives in water", "lives underground" cuts most of the options away at once.
A sound is the shortest route, provided you agreed that noises are allowed.
For rare animals go by resemblance: "like a horse, only striped" beats listing features.

Easy

Familiar words that land on the first clue. For warming up, for kids and for mixed groups.

cat, dog, cow, horse, goat, sheep, pig, hen, rooster, duck, goose, turkey, rabbit, mouse, rat, frog, fish, bird, bear, wolf, fox, hare, squirrel, hedgehog, deer, elk, boar, badger, beaver, otter, tiger, lion, elephant, giraffe, zebra, monkey, crocodile, turtle, snake, lizard, parrot, owl, eagle, stork, crane, swallow, sparrow, pigeon, crow, magpie, tit, woodpecker, heron, pelican, flamingo, penguin, dolphin, whale, shark, crab, lobster, octopus, jellyfish, butterfly, bee, wasp, ant, mosquito, fly, spider, beetle, snail, worm, caterpillar, dragonfly, grasshopper, firefly, bat, mole, gopher, ferret, marten, lynx, panther, leopard, cheetah, rhino, hippo, camel, llama, koala, kangaroo, panda, raccoon, skunk, ostrich, catfish, pike, perch, swan

Medium

Takes a few sentences and some imagination. The default setting for an ordinary evening.

aardvark, adder, albatross, alpaca, anteater, antelope, armadillo, baboon, barnacle, bison, bullfinch, bumblebee, bunting, buzzard, capercaillie, carp, chameleon, chaffinch, chipmunk, cobra, cormorant, cougar, coyote, crayfish, cuckoo, curlew, dingo, dormouse, dugong, eel, egret, elkhound, ermine, falcon, fawn, finch, gannet, gazelle, gecko, gibbon, goldfinch, grouse, gudgeon, guillemot, hamster, hawk, herring, hornet, ibex, iguana, jackal, jackdaw, jay, kestrel, kingfisher, kite, lamprey, lapwing, lemming, lemur, linnet, lynxcub, macaque, mackerel, mandrill, marmot, meerkat, mongoose, moorhen, moose, mussel, newt, nightingale, nutria, opossum, orangutan, oriole, osprey, oyster, partridge, peacock, pheasant, piranha, plover, polecat, porcupine, quail, raven, roach, sable, salamander, sardine, scorpion, seal, shrew, skylark, sturgeon, tapir, walrus, stoat

Hard

Rare or abstract words. More failed rounds, and more laughing at them.

amphibian, anaconda, arachnid, arboreal, axolotl, bandicoot, bioluminescence, biotope, brachiopod, camouflage, carnivore, cephalopod, cetacean, chrysalis, cnidarian, coelacanth, commensalism, coprophagy, crustacean, detritivore, diurnal, echidna, echinoderm, ecosystem, ectotherm, endemic, entomology, estivation, exoskeleton, extinction, fossorial, gastropod, gestation, habitat, herbivore, hibernation, hominid, ichthyology, insectivore, invertebrate, keystone, lagomorph, larva, marsupial, metamorphosis, migration, mimicry, mollusc, monotreme, morphology, moulting, mutualism, nocturnal, nomenclature, omnivore, ornithology, oviparous, pangolin, parasitism, pinniped, placental, plumage, pollinator, population, predation, primate, proboscis, pupa, quadruped, ruminant, scavenger, sedentary, speciation, subspecies, symbiosis, taxonomy, terrestrial, territoriality, thermoregulation, ungulate, vertebrate, viviparous, zoology, zooplankton, aposematism, brumation, cannibalism, colonisation, dimorphism, endoskeleton, fledgling, gregarious, hybridisation, imprinting, juvenile, keratin, lekking, mandible, nictitating, altricial