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Hanuman
2011-10-15, 01:11 PM
So I stumbled upon a little feat called Animal Friends, you get up to 2HD of animal friends per feat (stacks) and only requires gnome. This, combined with flaws allows 6HD of animals, which means 32 rats or 6 dogs or 3 wolves or a lion, lions being listed as CR3.

Thoughts?

Dr.Epic
2011-10-15, 03:02 PM
Spend a feat on just two HD of animal(s). Seems like a waste of a feat. If you really want an animal that'll follow you around and even get more powerful as you do, just become a druid...or a ranger...or a paladin...or sorcerer or wizard.

Coidzor
2011-10-15, 04:12 PM
Considering you can't really do anything more with them than you could with a animal you got via training...

edit: Potentially worth it at 1st level if you can retrain those feats, but Wild Cohort (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/re/20031118a) is probably better there anyway.

But if the DM won't allow Wild Cohort, then he's probably not going to allow a 3.0 feat based off of a 3.0 spell that got replaced by the Animal Companion class feature.

Dr.Epic
2011-10-15, 04:22 PM
Considering you can't really do anything more with them than you could with a animal you got via training...

Yeah, just max out the old Handle Animal.:smallwink:


edit: Potentially worth it at 1st level if you can retrain those feats, but Wild Cohort (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/re/20031118a) is probably better there anyway.

Even at level 1, I don't see it as that useful. Maybe if you're going for a combat rogue and since your BAB is +0 and you can't get any of the good feats for the build or something like that, maybe. But at high levels, have a 2 HD animal doesn't seem all that useful as most creatures can just kill it with one blow.

Coidzor
2011-10-15, 06:41 PM
Even at level 1, I don't see it as that useful. Maybe if you're going for a combat rogue and since your BAB is +0 and you can't get any of the good feats for the build or something like that, maybe. But at high levels, have a 2 HD animal doesn't seem all that useful as most creatures can just kill it with one blow.

Well, if you've got 6 dogs at level one, you can just swarm your enemies. And if retraining is on the table, then you can get rid of them once a swarm of dogs is superfluous.

Then again, you can probably also afford 3 mules and have them trained for combat and that'd be more effective and have more utility once you no longer wanted to use 'em in a fight (carrying swag, perhaps).

I can't remember the details of the animal friendship spell, so it may give enough of a bonus on the handle animal check that investment isn't needed or allow for something like free action direction.

Dr.Epic
2011-10-15, 07:45 PM
Well, if you've got 6 dogs at level one, you can just swarm your enemies. And if retraining is on the table, then you can get rid of them once a swarm of dogs is superfluous.

You're really gonna waste three feats and take two weaknesses for this?:smallconfused: Also, there comes the fact that wouldn't you have to put down money in game to buy them? Seems like far more of a waste than anything else. Also, I'm pretty sure the animal companion is a better way to go, even compared to 3 regular animals.

Hanuman
2011-10-15, 07:50 PM
I think it boils down to having a LOT of animal companions, you may have 16x your level at level 1 and it trims down to about 4/level at high level, so at level 10 you have more than 40 animal companions. Whether theres a way to abuse this is another question.

Dr.Epic
2011-10-15, 08:04 PM
I think it boils down to having a LOT of animal companions, you may have 16x your level at level 1 and it trims down to about 4/level at high level, so at level 10 you have more than 40 animal companions. Whether theres a way to abuse this is another question.

I'm sorry, how are you getting 8 feats at level one? Because I don't think there's a creature with a fraction of a HD. Also, does it really matter that you have a lot of them. 40 at level 10? Yeah, that's like 1 HD per animal and they're not going to pose a threat to anyone. Just fodder.

Jeraa
2011-10-15, 10:45 PM
Because I don't think there's a creature with a fraction of a HD.

Rats (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/rat.htm) are just one of the animals with fractional hit dice. There are more. Unless you are playing pathfinder, where everything has a minimum of 1 full hit die. They have a +4 on their attack ,and do 1 damage (because of the minimum 1 damage rule). Alone, a rat isn't much of a threat. A whole lot of them is another story, unless you have area damage spells.

Better yet, cats. You can only have half as many cats as rats, but each cat has 3 attacks. 2 of which also have a +4 to hit like the rats single attack. If a single cat is a threat to a low-level spellcaster or a commoner, a pack of cats is really dangerous.

Coidzor
2011-10-16, 01:25 AM
I think it boils down to having a LOT of animal companions, you may have 16x your level at level 1 and it trims down to about 4/level at high level, so at level 10 you have more than 40 animal companions. Whether theres a way to abuse this is another question.

Still, probably better off with Initiate of Nature or revamping its 3.0 kissing cousin in order to have some steadier minions that you can allocate the HD of more fluidly.

Then again, you pretty much have to be T1 in order to take that feat... Still, Wild Empathy's probably more potent(doesn't have a cap, in either sense), and there's totemists and rangers that get it in addition to druids.

Hanuman
2011-10-16, 09:10 AM
Rats (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/rat.htm) are just one of the animals with fractional hit dice. There are more. Unless you are playing pathfinder, where everything has a minimum of 1 full hit die. They have a +4 on their attack ,and do 1 damage (because of the minimum 1 damage rule). Alone, a rat isn't much of a threat. A whole lot of them is another story, unless you have area damage spells.

Better yet, cats. You can only have half as many cats as rats, but each cat has 3 attacks. 2 of which also have a +4 to hit like the rats single attack. If a single cat is a threat to a low-level spellcaster or a commoner, a pack of cats is really dangerous.
The cat lady just became the most dangerous person in town.

There's gotta be some way to avoid them dying, a month is far too long to regenerate meatshields. Perhaps some sort of animal revival? Making them into cyborgs or something? Hm.

Coidzor
2011-10-16, 12:00 PM
The cat lady just became the most dangerous person in town.

There's gotta be some way to avoid them dying, a month is far too long to regenerate meatshields. Perhaps some sort of animal revival? Making them into cyborgs or something? Hm.

At the levels they're relevant they're as likely to die as a level 1 or 2 monk with not particularly good stats.

After they're no longer relevant, well, hope you could retrain those feats or convert it into some kinda spy network or something.