suggestions for a mount/animal companion? [3.5]

[some guy]

Yesterday my druid's (advanced to large) wolf died in valiant battle. In the upcoming sessions I will be looking for a new animal companion.

I'd like to hear your suggestions or experiences with animal companions.

I want to use it as a mount, but not necessarily during combat. The party I'm in is not optimised, so I'm looking for a cool or nifty animal companion, not a ridiculous strong one. I'm not sure how my DM feels about animal companion outside core, but feel free to suggest one.
We're playing in an enviroment close to mountains, deserts and dying forests, if you need any fluff.

Party build:

1 lvl 8 barbarian
1 lvl 8 fighter
1 lvl 8 sorcerer
1 lvl 8 druid (me)
1 lvl 7 ranger (who also lost his animal companion during that battle, together with his own life)

As for the battle in which 2 large wolves and a ranger lost their lives, that was against 2 rage drakes and 1 bearded devil. An EL of 11 against a party of 5 level 8's. It was so awesome, you guys. We all almost died.

[Vladislav]

I'm impartial to riding a Dire Bat. But that's just me.

[big teej]

i take beefy creatures whenever possible
bears
boars
rhino
bullette
those are my suggestions

but I play meleers, big beefy, chunky 6 feet tall 260lb+ people...

so I NEED bigger stuff...

but I've always been partial to bears and boars regardless.

[some guy]

I'm impartial to riding a Dire Bat. But that's just me.
Dire bats are awesome, but sadly they can't carry enough for me and my gear.



i take beefy creatures whenever possible
bears
boars
rhino
bullette
those are my suggestions

but I play meleers, big beefy, chunky 6 feet tall 260lb+ people...

so I NEED bigger stuff...

but I've always been partial to bears and boars regardless.

I considered the rhino, but it's too slow for my liking. Bears and boars are nice but still a tad too slow.
Still, buying adjusted horseshoes should fix the speed problem and getting saddlebags of holding should fix the problem of the dire bat's carrying capacity. Too bad I spend a lot of money last session.

Thanks for the suggestions so far!

[Baveboi]

Shouldn't the animal companion be best suited for the player? I mean, big teej made a fairly good example. He likes beefy animals because that's his mindset.

Sooo.. why not go with your own mindset? I saw druids with vipers, cobras and scorpions doing more damage than guys with big mountrous things, like dire animals. It should be about a player choice and what he really needs, not a pack mule.
We had enough of that with Sam and Bill...

[some guy]

Shouldn't the animal companion be best suited for the player? I mean, big teej made a fairly good example. He likes beefy animals because that's his mindset.

Sooo.. why not go with your own mindset? I saw druids with vipers, cobras and scorpions doing more damage than guys with big mountrous things, like dire animals. It should be about a player choice and what he really needs, not a pack mule.
We had enough of that with Sam and Bill...

I agree with you, that's why I also asked about players' experiences with companions. For inspiration, and all. For example, without your post I would have never thought about using scorpions and vermin.

[Morbis Meh]

I've always wanted a triceratops mount, I thought it would be fun...

[Urpriest]

I agree with you, that's why I also asked about players' experiences with companions. For inspiration, and all. For example, without your post I would have never thought about using scorpions and vermin.

That would be because you can't, without Child of Winter.

Similarly, big teej, how do you get a bullette? Beast Companion?

[Feliks878]

Just looking at the table in the PHB I see some neat things that are available to you at level 8.

You could have a Deinonychus, a type of Dinosaur in the MMI that is similar to the classical pop-culture image of a Velociraptor. It's large size, so you could ride it, has a 60ft movement speed, and a pretty awesome pounce attack. Because you'd be using the Druid Level-7 table to calculate its buffs, it wouldn't have a lot of hp, though, or AC, so it'll be a bit of a glass cannon that'll be an excellent out of combat mount. They environment is "Warm Forests" and some games don't mesh with the mighty Dino, so that might be an issue.

Dire Boars are fun, they basically have Diehard and lots of HP and while they only have one attack it hits pretty hard. However, they're a bit slow for a mount.

[AstralFire]

Glidewing from ECS. Give it rainbow feathers. 800G, super awesome, can carry one Medium or two Small. You're riding an archaeopteryx!

[dsmiles]

The only Druid I ever played (Druid/Ranger/Lion of Talisid with the Combined Empathy feat), ended up with a Celestial Dire Eagle companion.

Glidewing from ECS. Give it rainbow feathers. 800G, super awesome, can carry one Medium or two Small. You're riding an archaeopteryx!

Hello, druids, look at your animal companion, now back to me, now back at your animal companion, now back to me. Sadly, it isn’t me, but if it stopped being an animal and switched to Homo sapiens, he could look like it’s me. Look down, back up, where are you? You’re in a forest with the man your animal companion could look like. What’s in your hand, back at me. I have it, it’s an bag of holding with ammunition to that sling you love. Look again, the ammunition is now diamonds. Anything is possible when your man smells like Old Spice and not a lady. I’m on a archaeopteryx.

[Worlok]

Similarly, big teej, how do you get a bullette? Beast Companion?
Bulettes, along with dragonnes, basilisks, worgs, owlbears, giant eagles and hippogriffs, are occasionally re-fluffed into animals via homebrew. I theorise that it's something about them being so very close to actual animals - partially or whole - in appearance. This might have been the case here.

Speaking of owlbears, I fondly remember one being used as a mount and ad-hoc animal companion in a campaign. The party's barbarian had made his entrance in the campaign by chancing across the other players, who were cornered by that owlbear. He heroically charged, bull-rushed and wrestled the beast into submission, then figured that 'an owlbear scared of you (would) equal an owlbear submissive to you' - as they are occasionally found in packs, they obviously had to have some natural sense of hierarchy - and began using it as the biggest and meanest steed in town. If you want to follow teej's way of the beefiness, some guy, you might want to consider (something like) that as an option, provided the owlbear has, in fact, been refluffed.

[Fitz10019]

My group enjoys having a dire badger, because he digs them a burrow almost every night as a secure campsite.

[Eldariel]

Level 8 = Brown Bear. No question. It's a friggin' BEAR! Dire Bat isn't bad and yes, it can carry you and your gear since by that time you can afford a +2 or +4 Str item for it, or just Bull's Strength (lvl 2, 10 min/level; easy enough), but it's not nearly as badass as a good ol' Grizzly.

Not to mention, you have Wildshape so chances of you being in a shape that wants to ride instead of ripping opponents' throats off or flying itself during combat seem very, very slim (you can even ride yourself if you feel like it). Of course, you can ride a Bear too. Get Horseshoes of the Zephyr for +30' movement if it's such a big deal.
http://www.themostawesomepageintheuniverse.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/bear-cavalry.jpg


EDIT: Look. You don't understand. You can be a bear with a bear companion summoning bears. Nothing can bear that much awesome. It's just unbearable.

[Vladislav]

getting saddlebags of holding should fix the problem of the dire bat's carrying capacityI don't know how much gear you have, but you may want to look into increasing its STR instead. Belt of Strength+2 costs doesn't cost much more than a Bag of Holding (4k vs. 2.5k), and is very likely to push the Dire Bat's strength into the "can do" range. In addition to the obvious combat bonuses, of course.

[some guy]

You could have a Deinonychus, a type of Dinosaur in the MMI that is similar to the classical pop-culture image of a Velociraptor. It's large size, so you could ride it, has a 60ft movement speed, and a pretty awesome pounce attack. Because you'd be using the Druid Level-7 table to calculate its buffs, it wouldn't have a lot of hp, though, or AC, so it'll be a bit of a glass cannon that'll be an excellent out of combat mount. They environment is "Warm Forests" and some games don't mesh with the mighty Dino, so that might be an issue.
Actually you're mixing the megaraptor and the deinonychus a bit now. A deinonychus is medium-sized.


I've always wanted a triceratops mount, I thought it would be fun...

Sandstorm has a protoceratops, but that one is also medium. So not suitable as mount for medium-sized creatures.


Glidewing from ECS. Give it rainbow feathers. 800G, super awesome, can carry one Medium or two Small. You're riding an archaeopteryx!
I like this archaeopteryx, but sadly I don't have ECS. Maybe, I can fix up some homebrew.



Speaking of owlbears, I fondly remember one being used as a mount and ad-hoc animal companion in a campaign. The party's barbarian had made his entrance in the campaign by chancing across the other players, who were cornered by that owlbear. He heroically charged, bull-rushed and wrestled the beast into submission, then figured that 'an owlbear scared of you (would) equal an owlbear submissive to you' - as they are occasionally found in packs, they obviously had to have some natural sense of hierarchy - and began using it as the biggest and meanest steed in town. If you want to follow teej's way of the beefiness, some guy, you might want to consider (something like) that as an option, provided the owlbear has, in fact, been refluffed.
Heheh, that's awesome. I should have just kept one of the ragedrakes alive and ride that around.

[Feliks878]

Actually you're mixing the megaraptor and the deinonychus a bit now. A deinonychus is medium-sized.


Unless my copy of the MMI is full of lies, I may have to disagree strenuously. Denonychus are Large, Megaraptors are huge. I am staring at it, and I know my vision isn't that bad.

Edit: Also, HS icon bros, fist bunp.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Celestial ape. It's intelligent enough to take feats that most animals can't, and it's humanoid in shape, meaning it can use regular equipment. It does require you sink a feat to pick it though.

[Foryn Gilnith]

Unless my copy of the MMI is full of lies.

Errata was issued.

[some guy]

My group enjoys having a dire badger, because he digs them a burrow almost every night as a secure campsite.
I do the same, but with wildshape. It's nifty.



EDIT: Look. You don't understand. You can be a bear with a bear companion summoning bears. Nothing can bear that much awesome. It's just unbearable.
Bear with me now, though ursine companions would open the adventure to much punnery, I think a dire bat with a dire bat companion summoning dire bats would be bat*ss.
And though I'm usually a down-to-earth guy, I could wait several levels, take elemental companion and be an earth elemental riding an earth elemental summoning earth elementals. That would rock. I could say that I'd ground my enemies to dirt and sand mocking letters to their remaining relatives. Or is this idea grounded on loose sand?
Is there a batwarrior or earthwarrior prestige class? And can earth elementals be lycanthropic? :smallwink:

[Worlok]

EDIT: Look. You don't understand. You can be a bear with a bear companion summoning bears. Nothing can bear that much awesome. It's just unbearable.Bear with me now, though ursine companions would open the adventure to much punnery, I think a dire bat with a dire bat companion summoning dire bats would be bat*ss.
And though I'm usually a down-to-earth guy, I could wait several levels, take elemental companion and be an earth elemental riding an earth elemental summoning earth elementals. That would rock. I could say that I'd ground my enemies to dirt and sand mocking letters to their remaining relatives. Or is this idea grounded on loose sand?
Right off the bat, I can only direct you at pages 2 and 3 of this (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=176970) and tell you that your idea is, in fact, rock-solid. If perhaps a little too übear. :smalltongue:

[some guy]

Celestial ape. It's intelligent enough to take feats that most animals can't, and it's humanoid in shape, meaning it can use regular equipment. It does require you sink a feat to pick it though.
I was thinking about monkeys and apes, actually. But I don't know how a celestial ape would be received in the group. We're a bit shifty, alignment-wise.


Unless my copy of the MMI is full of lies, I may have to disagree strenuously. Denonychus are Large, Megaraptors are huge. I am staring at it, and I know my vision isn't that bad.

Edit: Also, HS icon bros, fist bunp.

It seems your MMI is only filled with a tiny bit of lies. With errata it's not that big of a deal.

And also:
that is SO SWEET man how about a bro hug bump

[Feliks878]

Booo, I apologize then.

[Darrin]

I've always wanted a triceratops mount, I thought it would be fun...

"Cave" versions of the Ankylosaurus, Triceratops and T-Rex can be found in the Miniatures Handbook. All of these are large-sized.

The Triceratops only has a speed of 30', but it has the ideal HD for the Warbeast template: 8HD + 1HD gives it a bonus feat and increases the speed by +10'. Warbeast price per MMII: 775 GP.

Even better, the Cave versions have been bred by the Yuan-Ti and may have mutations, which could include poison, spell resistance, or wings with a 50' fly speed.

The Dungeonbred template (Dungeonscape) can also be added to some creatures to knock their size down by one category. I'm not sure if there's a GP cost involved with that, though.

[Vladislav]

Celestial ape. It's intelligent enough to take feats that most animals can't, and it's humanoid in shape, meaning it can use regular equipment. It does require you sink a feat to pick it though.
From all I was able to find, Celestial animals only get their Int bumped up to 3, that's all. Normal ape has Int 2, Celestial Ape Int 3, that's all the difference. Is there anything I'm missing?

[Kelb_Panthera]

I was thinking about monkeys and apes, actually. But I don't know how a celestial ape would be received in the group. We're a bit shifty, alignment-wise.

Fiendish ape then. Though that's an ACF which may require a slight re-spec.


From all I was able to find, Celestial animals only get their Int bumped up to 3, that's all. Normal ape has Int 2, Celestial Ape Int 3, that's all the difference. Is there anything I'm missing?

Int 2 is animal. Int 3 is sapient. Int 2 is pure instinct and learned tricks. Int 3 is language, society, complex tool use. A celestial/fiendish ape can be trained in the use of arms and armor, can learn to activate command-thought magic items, can understand basic tactics. Int 3 beats the living crap out of Int 2. If you're willing to sink serious resources into your animal companion, you can burn a few wishes and give it a headband of intellect to make it as smart as people.

[big teej]

I have returned, and I have many many quotes to address. :smallbiggrin:




Shouldn't the animal companion be best suited for the player? I mean, big teej made a fairly good example. He likes beefy animals because that's his mindset.

Sooo.. why not go with your own mindset? I saw druids with vipers, cobras and scorpions doing more damage than guys with big mountrous things, like dire animals. It should be about a player choice and what he really needs, not a pack mule.
We had enough of that with Sam and Bill...

A) +1 to the mindset comment, thats always been my take on it, I consider 3 things when picking things such as a mount for my character
1 and 2: do I like it? does it fit my character? (entirely depends on the situation, so those 2 constantly swap places) question 3 'is it a good mount?'

questions 1 and 2 if both answered yes, totally and completely trump question 3's answer

B) who are sam and bill? :smallconfused:




I agree with you, that's why I also asked about players' experiences with companions. For inspiration, and all. For example, without your post I would have never thought about using scorpions and vermin.

oh... for the record, I've only played 1 ranger, (bear companion) but mounts on the other hand... I have ideas in the works for rhinos, bears, boars, and bullettes.....

... I'm noticing a slight pattern here :smallsigh:





I've always wanted a triceratops mount, I thought it would be fun...

I did too when I first saw it in a book (A&EG if I recall correctly) and my reaction was something along the lines of

(a very juvenile) SCORE!!! :smallbiggrin: helloooooo new favorite mount.

this was completely trumped by the fact it takes 4-6 dwarves (I wanna say 5, but I don't recall exactly) to guide



That would be because you can't, without Child of Winter.

Similarly, big teej, how do you get a bullette? Beast Companion?

Races of stone page.... -goes to find book-
161
"monster manual monsters as mounts"
bulette (I've been spelling it wrong this whole time!!! :smalleek:) is the 2nd animal listed.

the book also contains a special saddle for use with burrowing creatures... page..... heh 160, thats convienent,



Dire Boars are fun, they basically have Diehard and lots of HP and while they only have one attack it hits pretty hard. However, they're a bit slow for a mount.

now, I'm sure this is just a reflection of my psyche and personality as a whole, but my stance on this type of thing (not just in DND, it applies to anytime I'm given an option*)

durability trumps speed (in my particular taste)

so to me, the fact that my boar is durable, and can keep going even when its well on its way to the grave, totally makes up for the fact it doesn't have 'go faster stripes'

*cross ref: Mechwarrior, Armored Core, dnd characters, RPG games,

The only Druid I ever played (Druid/Ranger/Lion of Talisid with the Combined Empathy feat), ended up with a Celestial Dire Eagle companion.


I've never played a druid, I can't get around the fluff of it, even though I kinda wanna play one (from a mechanical standpoint) I just can't get around the whole 'no metal' and the fluff of it


help?



Bulettes, along with dragonnes, basilisks, worgs, owlbears, giant eagles and hippogriffs, are occasionally re-fluffed into animals via homebrew. I theorise that it's something about them being so very close to actual animals - partially or whole - in appearance. This might have been the case here.

Speaking of owlbears,

snipped for brevity

Bulettes, as mentioned before, can be found in races of stone for mounts
owlbears are located within the A&EG

my group doesn't 'refluff' monsters to make them mounts (at least we haven't yet, and whenever I'm dming we never will)

so no, in this particular instance I REALLY mean bulette

as for owlbears, if a Player really wanted to go through that much trouble (if you get knocked unconcious and fall off it will kill you) I'd probably let them have it
(for full price of course)




I think thats everything I saw that I really felt I had to comment on/respond too

[ShriekingDrake]

Sam Gamgee and Bill, a pony, are from the Lord of the Rings or more specifically, Sam is present in all three books and Bill . . . his big role is in the Fellowship of the Ring.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Bulettes, as mentioned before, can be found in races of stone for mounts
owlbears are located within the A&EG

Unfortunately, both of those were 3.0 books. In 3.0 bulettes and owlbears were of the beast type. There is no beast type in 3.5. All beasts were re-classified as either animals, or magical beasts. Bulettes and owlbears are now magical beasts, and as such are no longer available as animal companions. They could still be used as Paladins' special mounts though.

[ShriekingDrake]

Moreover, I should mention that in 3.5 your AC doesn't get larger. It does improve, but it doesn't grow in size as it gains hit dice.

[Baveboi]

@Big Teej:

Sam is our well know hobbit, Samwise the Great and Bill is an almost secient packmule they get in the middle of nowhere.
He's the infamous last member of the One Ring Society.

And you call yourself a geek? xD lol kidding man.

[Urpriest]

Unfortunately, both of those were 3.0 books. In 3.0 bulettes and owlbears were of the beast type. There is no beast type in 3.5. All beasts were re-classified as either animals, or magical beasts. Bulettes and owlbears are now magical beasts, and as such are no longer available as animal companions. They could still be used as Paladins' special mounts though.

Races of Stone is 3.5. And animals are no longer unrestrictedly allowed as animal companions, so the type doesn't really matter here anyway.

Bought mounts generally seem pretty fishy to me...in general, the game is not particularly well balanced around hirelings. War Trolls are something like 30g a day for example. Even a first level adventurer can save up enough to have their problems dealt with by a friendly local War Troll if one happened to be on offer. And if you're not in a Monty Haul-verse like that, bulette eggs might not be on sale either. Though I'm guessing big teej just bludgeoned one into submission in typical manly fashion.

[some guy]

Thanks for the help everyone.
I think I'll ask the DM how he's feeling about a large 7HD dire weasel at a druid level -6. It's below the brown bear and the rhinoceros in raw power, but has blood drain.
Without his consent I'll probably go for the brown bear or rhinoceros. In later levels perhaps the dire bat.

[Incanur]

Bought mounts generally seem pretty fishy to me...in general, the game is not particularly well balanced around hirelings. War Trolls are something like 30g a day for example.

Really? War trolls are CR 12 so I would expect 144 gp per day according the DMG II rules. It's character level squared. Also, NPCs higher level than the buyer demand 10x the price. So 1,440 gp per day. You should just spend 1,200 gp (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/equipment/goodsAndServices.htm) for a wizard to permanently PAO you into firbolg giant instead. That's how the game balances fighters and monks. All y'all n00bz have been doing it wrong. :smallwink:

[Urpriest]

Really? War trolls are CR 12 so I would expect 144 gp per day according the DMG II rules. It's character level squared. Also, NPCs higher level than the buyer demand 10x the price. So 1,440 gp per day. You should just spend 1,200 gp (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/equipment/goodsAndServices.htm) for a wizard to permanently PAO you into firbolg giant instead. That's how the game balances fighters and monks. All y'all n00bz have been doing it wrong. :smallwink:

Monster Manual III gives specific costs for War Troll mercenaries. I just checked, and they are indeed 30gp per day.

[Incanur]

Wow. That's a bargain. However, you could argue that the rules in the DMG II supersede those in the MM3. And the old DMG itself suggests a price of 6 gp per day for a 20th-level warrior. That's five dudes with +20 base attack for the price of one war troll. The DMG II rules provide more balance.

[AstralFire]

Specific trumps general.