Helm of Comprehend Languages and Read Magic... on my animal companion

[Laniius]

So the animal companion will still have an intelligence of 2. But it now can understand exactly what I'm telling it in my weird human-speak. Does this let me or my party tell it what to do without relying on tricks, or give a bonus to Handle Animal DC's, or what?

[hivedragon]

(just from my experience) DMs treat familiars and companions as if the were extensions of that player's character, treating handel animal more like diplomacy on creatures without a language.

What kind of animal is the companion? Bercause unless it's a primate, it might be dificult for the helmut to fit it.

[D@rK-SePHiRoTH-]

Does this let me or my party tell it what to do without relying on tricks, or give a bonus to Handle Animal DC's, or what?
there are no rules about it. ask your dm

[Grelna the Blue]

I don't pretend that this is an official ruling, but I think that the answer would usually be no. I think the Helm would work for any animal that already speaks or understands a language or parts of a language. So it might well allow commands already understood given in one language to be understood from someone speaking another language, but wouldn't translate unfamiliar concepts or commands.

The spell Speak with Animals notwithstanding, most animals do not actually communicate more than the most basic ideas (possession, agression, food, sexual interest, submission, etc.) via language. Of course, a few animals could be considerably more advanced (wolves, elephants, whales, maybe parrots and a few others), but I wouldn't think the common run of animals would benefit much. But I bet it would work fine if you could get it to fit on an animal familiar's head.

[ericgrau]

You could make a technical argument for it, but it wouldn't make sense at all. I don't think the helm was intended for use on something that didn't already have at least 1 language. Now if you got the animal an intelligence boosting item, taught it a language and then got it the helmet...

A lot of DMs let PCs control the actions of their animal companions directly, but actually the rules are quite clear that you need handle animal checks.