Well, obviously they count to the Ratcatcher.  :)  But specifically I am referring to whether they count as an ally.  

Take the melee action Backstab - It has a difficulty of 3 Misfortune.  But for each of your allies engaged with the enemy, it reduces this by 1 Misfortune.  Does the SBVD count?

Also, does the pet move on its own?  Should it roll initiative?  Or do we just assume that it moves with the player?

 What, no one has any input here?

Yes, they count.  No, they are not "intelligent", so they must be directed by the rat catcher to do specific actions (so same initiative as the Rat Catcher).  Otherwise, they just bark when you're trying to be sneaky, lick your face after licking their own bum, roll on dead stuff, and lurk around begging for scraps like most dogs :)

They're not like the intelligent and independent automaton's of D&D's druids who can talk, do tricks, and negotiate terms with the king.  They're just dogs ;)  Really small, but vicious dogs.

The SBVD in our group last session managed to shake a fimir off of a tower to it's doom..but suffered obedience loss all the way down to zero…

 www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp

Here's an article on WFRP3 animal trainers:  www.liberfanatica.net/LF7download.html

jh

Craftzero said:

I currently play the rat-catcher in Emirikol's game.

I consider it an ally.

The SBVD moves on my initiative, not on its own, and I direct it.

Interesting question about Backstab. My ratcatcher has that card! But I did not consider that the pet would reduce the dice by one. Good question. I will yield to Emirikol's interpretation. 

I used Bite and Shake to good effect and as Emirikol mentioned, Man's Best Friend allowed the ratcatcher to avoid a crit. And yes, that took the SBVD effectively out of the combat since obedience points were gone and my ratcatcher was busy fighting Fimir daemons and falling off a tower into a sacrificial pit of watery filth and blood. Arg! :(

I agree with Emirikol.

 As a GM I'd count it as an ally, just like I would a friendly NPC.

However, since the SBVD is also essentially an extension of the Ratcatcher PC, only operating by use of Tricks that the Ratcatcher has, I would not roll a separate initiative for it and would have it act on the same initiative as the Ratcatcher.