The Gaming Den

So, we know the Druid's Animal Companion doesn't work. To be more accurate, it works too well. Is there a way to get it to work properly?

Frank proposed, at some point, a two character combat/non-combat split, where one character is a Texas Execution Rat, and one is the kid who somehow turns enemies into friends by the end of the episode, and together they're like a whole character. That certainly scans for something like, say, Slaine and Ukko, but it's not the flavor a lot of people are looking for, which is more like The Phantom and Devil.

I get the idea that the Animal Companion was intended to work like the WoW Pets do, which is provide about 1/3 of a character's combat participation. In D&D, you'd probably also want them to provide about 1/3 of a character's non-combat participation, where the Druid can combine his skill points with the wolf's Scent and function like a full tracker. That seems like a reasonable sort of place to start.

I know a lot of people's first thought will be the Leadership feat, and that might actually perform the same function, but I'm looking for a Class Feature version, available from 1st level onward. What might that look like?

Allegedly 2 critters of CR X are supposed to be equivalent to one critter of CR X+1.

So if druids were as weak as a character 1 level lower than themselves, and the companion was equally suited, that would work (except shit gets muddied with multiclassing of course). I think the animals are really already there, so all that remains is to kick the teeth out of the druid. Take away wildshape (did we really need it anyway?) and you've pretty much got your slightly-weaker-than-a-cleric nature caster right there.

Rock and roll.

[edit: typoe]

clikml at [unixtime wrote:1190307441[/unixtime]]Allegedly 2 critters of CR X are supposed to be equivalent to one critter of CR X+1.

You refer to the EL calculations in the DMG?

If so, then they say that double the number of same-CR enemies adds 2 to the EL (usually).

Doh, I misremembered it as +1. Thanks.

In that vein, druids could be nudged a little bit more by changing their spell progression into a sorcerer-like tier where they get new spell levels 1 level later, effectively making them another 1 level weaker.

...Honestly, I've always found the animal companion to be underpowered...

-Crissa

That's still treating them as equals, though. I'm really looking for a situation where one is 'the star' and the other is 'the sidekick.'

In a cohort-style relationship, if the intended character level is X, then the star is effective level X-1, and the cohort is effective level X-3 (providing that they're both full and complementary characters). So at 1st level, the Druid fights with a stick with the leaf still attached, has a wolf cub for a pet, and takes full-round actions to cast his 1st-level spells?

Well, he is 1st level. That might just work out. Provided that the CR could be made to work as advertised, which need not be impossible.

In fact, that setup works OK with an idea I've been toying with: '1st level' is 4th level, so HD can equal CR without a starting character being equal to a rat.

A promising topic <_<

IMO a Druid should have to chose between becoming animals, having animal cohort/familiar/whatever, and becoming Buffmaster Flex.
The roles could be interchangeable day-to-day but they shouldn't have it all at once.

There is a pretty decent druid variant put out by privateer press in their No Quarter magazine (#10). wild shape and animal companions go away (along with some other changes), in exchange for Path abilities every 5 levels. The base path abilities give a +1 to spell DC and saves for specific type(s) of spells, and the others are on a web enhancement here
http://www.privateerpress.com/docs/noqu ... br][br]You can pick animal companions and wild shape back up, but you can't get an animal companion until 5th level, or wild shape until 10th. Hit dice drops to a d6, but they get 6 skill points a level. The whole thing seems to focus more on the druid as a full caster, rather than a caster/tank with a pocket fighter. It could stand to be picked apart, especially because of PP's traditional poor editing skills.

Blaahhh I'd never exchange more HP for SP in a caster/warrior like a Druid.
In a Sorcerer, maybe.. but only if the Sorcerer doesn't lose anything, and even then it's a toss up between HP and Skills. More of both, preferably, but I digress, and Sorc fixes are as common as rats these days..

Well, thats just it. This druid version isn't a caster/warrior. Its a straight caster, much more in line with a wizard (without some of the more troubling higher-level spells. The various options in the web enhancement use a lot of spontaneous casting options for the Path specialties.

Even the wildshape option in the enhance has serious limits. med, large and (at 15th) huge animals only, no elemental wild-shape, and the Iron Kingdoms setting lacks a lot of the stupider animals, like dinosaurs.

Oops. I misunderstood something about the extra paths in the web enhancement, those are extras, not part of the Path class features. Interesting. You still can't get wild-shape until 10th, though.