I want to play a bear.

[Brains]

The title says is all, I want to play a bear PC. While chatting up possible badass character ideas with a friend, the old 4chan bear PC post was mentioned and I began to wonder if this could be done right.

So I need some ideas for a legitimate bear build. Not a were-bear or a anthropomorphic bear, but a down-to-earth actually legitimate bear. Obviously I am not able to take a bear right out of the MM and smack some class levels on it, so it needs to work some other way. Perhaps a druid animal companion that steals the spot-light, but even that would need some more to it because of the crappy intelligence and awaken would not work.

Gimme something to work with, and please don't start a pun thread. Please.

[NotScaryBats]

Got you covered right here, bro (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=140757)

[Figgin of Chaos]

Perhaps this old thread will be of interest: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=140757
EDIT: Drat! Pesky swordsages.

[Brains]

Got you covered right here, bro (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=140757)

Oh god this post.... 3% content 97% puns!

[Agent 451]

The title says is all, I want to play a bear PC.
Gimme something to work with, and please don't start a pun thread. Please.

Pleading for people not to do something while on an internet forum? You'll reap what you sow, mate. :smallwink:

[NotScaryBats]

But really, what's the problem with an Awakened (whatever type) bear?

[Brains]

But really, what's the problem with an Awakened (whatever type) bear?

The druids "awaken" spell which would open up some neat possibilities with a intelligent animal companion does not work on animal companions.

[NotScaryBats]

Well, you said you already discussed this? (http://worldofdarkmyst.forumotion.com/t21-mr-bearington-true-roleplaying)

Why don't you just make an awakened bear pc and not be an animal companion? otherwise, Sentinel of Bharrai is a fullcaster PrC from BoED that has a lot to do with bears.

They get an Su at 9th level called Cavalry of Dire Bears.

So

[Urpriest]

Exalted Companion can make an animal companions Celestial. That would give a Bear companion enough Int to know a language at least.

[Brains]

Well, you said you already discussed this? (http://worldofdarkmyst.forumotion.com/t21-mr-bearington-true-roleplaying)

Why don't you just make an awakened bear pc and not be an animal companion? otherwise, Sentinel of Bharrai is a fullcaster PrC from BoED that has a lot to do with bears.

They get an Su at 9th level called Cavalry of Dire Bears.

So

I would assume that because of the lack of LA on a bear it would not be open to use as a character's base race, even if it was awakened.

[NotScaryBats]

Ursinal and Warden Archons from BoED both are quite bearlike and have LAs.

They are ridiculously high, though :(

[Brains]

Ursinal and Warden Archons from BoED both are quite bearlike and have LAs.

They are ridiculously high, though :(

I'll look into it, but I really was hoping that I could find a way to actually pull off playing as an actual bear. Does anyone know of a way to increase an animal companions Int score?

[Flickerdart]

I would assume that because of the lack of LA on a bear it would not be open to use as a character's base race, even if it was awakened.
Pretty easy to ad-hoc the LA.

An Awakened Black Bear would have 5 Magical Beast HD, +8 Strength, +2 Dexterity, +4 Constitution, +2 Wisdom, and -2 Charisma. It would also have +2 natural armour, two claws, a bite, 40ft move speed, and the scent and low-light vision special qualities.

As the bear is obviously a melee bruiser, we can compare it to another, similar one - an Orc Barbarian. The default Orc gives +4 Strength, -2 Wisdom, Intelligence, and Charisma. When raging, those go up to +8 Strength, +4 Constitution, -2 Intelligence, -2 Wisdom, -2 Charisma. The bear is slightly better - it has +2 in two scores and the orc has -2 in two scores, plus its bonuses are permanent. But the Orc has more HP (due to its Barbarian HD) and better skills, plus weapon and armour proficiencies.

Overall, the bear is still slightly better than the orc barbarian. I would give it a level adjustment of +1, so an awakened black bear with no class levels is an ECL6 character. This seems like a lot, but most of it is RHD, so with clever skill and feat selection, the bear character can take one or two levels of a base class and then jump into a PrC.

Alternatively, you could use a black werebear that simply never assumes human form, and thus for all intents and purposes is a regular bear. Take your first class level, get infected with lycanthropy, that's a total ECL of 6 for a 1st level werebear character, one lower than the awakened bear above - but you have two fewer HD, so you're a little squishier.

[Urpriest]

I'll look into it, but I really was hoping that I could find a way to actually pull off playing as an actual bear. Does anyone know of a way to increase an animal companions Int score?

If you're cool with Int 3, my post above should be relevant. From there, Int items if you really feel like you need it.

If you want more Int, Arcane Hierophant upgrades your animal companion's Int to Familiar levels.

[NotScaryBats]

Page 9 of Savage Species:
"The following general rules apply to building any monster
character.
• The base creature must have an Intelligence score
of 3 or higher. A creature with an Intelligence score
lower than 3 cannot have levels in any class. (The
awaken spell can be used to give an animal or plant
an Intelligence score of 3 or higher. Also, an
animal with the celestial or fiendish template
gains an Intelligence score of 3.)"

If you wanted some RAW to convince your DM to let you play just and awakened bear.

[Brains]

Pretty easy to ad-hoc the LA.

This looks very reasonable, but I'm worried a DM would be more skeptical. Being able to provide written rules for something as ridiculous as playing a bear always seems to be the only way I would be able to get this past my DM.

[Brains]

Page 9 of Savage Species:
"The following general rules apply to building any monster
character.
• The base creature must have an Intelligence score
of 3 or higher. A creature with an Intelligence score
lower than 3 cannot have levels in any class. (The
awaken spell can be used to give an animal or plant
an Intelligence score of 3 or higher. Also, an
animal with the celestial or fiendish template
gains an Intelligence score of 3.)"

If you wanted some RAW to convince your DM to let you play just and awakened bear.

This looks promising! I don't suppose Savage Species actually provides a way to apply LA to these awakened creatures?

[Urpriest]

This looks promising! I don't suppose Savage Species actually provides a way to apply LA to these awakened creatures?

Nope! It could have, but they chose to make an LA for a bunch of Anthropomorphic Animals instead.

Incidentally, Savage Species does make the point that even with enough Int players shouldn't be allowed to play things without prehensile limbs.

[Gnome Alone]

Aw, thought this thread would be another holocaust of bear puns, but I see that everyone's comporting themselves with decorum. I'll take my leave.


...I mean, we don't want puns so unbearably grizzly that the OP has to go into hibernation for the winter.

[Ravens_cry]

Well, a druid of high enough level becomes less a humanoid who transforms into a an animal as an animal who sometimes transforms into a humanoid.

[Flickerdart]

This looks very reasonable, but I'm worried a DM would be more skeptical. Being able to provide written rules for something as ridiculous as playing a bear always seems to be the only way I would be able to get this past my DM.
Then just use the werebear option.

Though Savage Species does provide guidelines for giving things LA on page 11. The bear would have +1 LA for unbalancing ability scores, +1 LA for Scent, and another +1 for the natural AC bonus. However, Savage Species itself provides an "acid test" like the one I described previously, and demonstrates how an ogre and kuo-toa are given LA that is much too high by these guidelines. While this does require DM adjudication, it's a good starting point.

[Jack_Simth]

The title says is all, I want to play a bear PC. While chatting up possible badass character ideas with a friend, the old 4chan bear PC post was mentioned and I began to wonder if this could be done right.

So I need some ideas for a legitimate bear build. Not a were-bear or a anthropomorphic bear, but a down-to-earth actually legitimate bear. Obviously I am not able to take a bear right out of the MM and smack some class levels on it, so it needs to work some other way. Perhaps a druid animal companion that steals the spot-light, but even that would need some more to it because of the crappy intelligence and awaken would not work.

Gimme something to work with, and please don't start a pun thread. Please.
OK. Let's see... what resources do you have to work with? A Psion(Telepath) could do a True Mind Switch (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/mindSwitchTrue.htm) with a bear, to Instantly get a bear body ... and a psion without hands isn't overly encumbered by the difficulty, so it's not too bad. Of course, that requires either a very expensive powerstone (and a bit of luck) or 17th level and a hefty chunk of XP to burn.

The Wearbear route has already been mentioned.

Savage Species has Anthropormorphic animals; one of which is a bear. 3.0, though, and commonly regarded as containing much broken material.

A Druid is the easy answer - at 5th, you can be a bear for 5 hours a day. 12 at 6th, 21 at 7th, and full-time at 8th.

You could do a mount build - again, Druid, but this time instead of focusing on wild shape, you focus on your animal companion, and technically play the druid while functionally playing the bear. Get the Black Bear at 4th, pick up Natural Bond along the way to mitigate the level adjustment, and dump your feats into stuff that'll buff the bear animal companion - Companion Spellbond (PHB II), Extend Spell (for making buffs last longer), Quicken Spell (for dumping buffs faster), Craft Wondrous Item (for stuff for the bear to wear), maybe Exalted Companion (Book of Exalted Deeds) for the celestial template so the bear can act tactically, and so on. Maybe take levels in beastmaster or some such.

[Flickerdart]

OK. Let's see... what resources do you have to work with? A Psion(Telepath) could do a True Mind Switch (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/mindSwitchTrue.htm) with a bear, to Instantly get a bear body ... and a psion without hands isn't overly encumbered by the difficulty, so it's not too bad. Of course, that requires either a very expensive powerstone (and a bit of luck) or 17th level and a hefty chunk of XP to burn.
There's an earlier trick you can do (the sandwich trick).

Step 1: Get your desired body.
Step 2: Use regular Mind Switch to swap minds with it.
Step 3: Manifest Astral Seed.
Step 4: Kill yourself.

Because Astral Seed explicitly reads the body you were in when you manifested it as "yours", you will be reborn on the astral plane as a bear, while still wielding the prodigious mental abilities of a psion.

[Coidzor]

This looks very reasonable, but I'm worried a DM would be more skeptical. Being able to provide written rules for something as ridiculous as playing a bear always seems to be the only way I would be able to get this past my DM.

On the contrary, having a DM willing to help you out is the only way you'll be able to get this off the ground.

[Jack_Simth]

There's an earlier trick you can do (the sandwich trick).

Step 1: Get your desired body.
Step 2: Use regular Mind Switch to swap minds with it.
Step 3: Manifest Astral Seed.
Step 4: Kill yourself.

Because Astral Seed explicitly reads the body you were in when you manifested it as "yours", you will be reborn on the astral plane as a bear, while still wielding the prodigious mental abilities of a psion.
For now I was avoiding the routes that work based on things most likely not intended by the designers. But yes, this works. You can also use Metamorphosis instead of Mind Switch, or pick up a Skin of Proteous. Hiring a Polymorph Any Object is not recommended, for obvious reasons.

[Flickerdart]

For now I was avoiding the routes that work based on things most likely not intended by the designers.
That's fair, though I can't see any DM complaining too much when the trick is used to turn into a perfectly ordinary bear instead of some heavily templated monstrosity.

[t'zran]

You could arrange it with your DM so that your characters backstory includes you as a regular bear finding some kind of intelligence boosting magic item, so your character simply became to smart to live in the wild like a beast

Of course that would leave the issue of how your character joins the party

[Waker]

You could arrange it with your DM so that your characters backstory includes you as a regular bear finding some kind of intelligence boosting magic item, so your character simply became to smart to live in the wild like a beast

Of course that would leave the issue of how your character joins the party
I think it would be more enjoyable if there was no explanation for how/why a bear joined an adventuring party. Being the jaded adventurers they are from having seen everything, they accept him without comment.
Kudos if you play it straightfaced.

[t'zran]

I think it would be more enjoyable if there was no explanation for how/why a bear joined an adventuring party.

That would be best. (having played a lot of 3.5 I've noticed that most DM's who are worth their salt don't mention much about how the party gets together)

[Seharvepernfan]

Best option, I believe, is playing an awakened brown bear barbearian.
Equip some Wild armor.
Aim to get greater magical fang permanently on your claws and btie.
Remember; use the bear totem variant.

[Tetsubo 57]

Have you read the book, Noble Wild? It deals with playing 'normal' animals. It is available in both 3.5 and Pathfinder versions. It is quite good. You can play a mouse with a half-orc familiar...

[lunar2]

play an ubermount build, and take wild cohort to pick up a bear as your special mount. your bear will have Int 6 when you get it, and Int 9 by level 20. so you could effectively play the bear, and the halfling paladin 5/beastmaster 1/halfling outrider 10/legacy champion or faith scion 4 just stays back and uses his (legacy or legendary) sling.

[Kuulvheysoon]

play an ubermount build, and take wild cohort to pick up a bear as your special mount. your bear will have Int 6 when you get it, and Int 9 by level 20. so you could effectively play the bear, and the halfling paladin 5/beastmaster 1/halfling outrider 10/legacy champion or faith scion 4 just stays back and uses his (legacy or legendary) sling.

This... wouldn't work. Wild cohort gives you an animal cohort, not an animal companion. Not quite the same thing, so you can't apply outrider/beastmaster levels to it.

However, a Beastmaster 1 with the Natural Bond feat can get you a black bear companion.

[lunar2]

This... wouldn't work. Wild cohort gives you an animal cohort, not an animal companion. Not quite the same thing, so you can't apply outrider/beastmaster levels to it.

However, a Beastmaster 1 with the Natural Bond feat can get you a black bear companion.

ubermount builds rely on the devoted tracker feat, which allows your special mount to count as an animal companion, and get the benefits of that. wild cohort gets you a bear, which you then take as your special mount, and once it's your special mount you can apply animal companion benefits to it through devoted tracker. and it's still a special mount, and gets special mount benefits. halfling outrider advances special mount and animal companion, and is one of the few classes that doesn't specify that you have to pick which one you advance. legacy champion can advance halfling outrider, and therefore get both animal companion and special mount, while faith scion advances both directly, again without any need to choose which to advance.

the reason you do it this way is because there is no rules for using your animal companion as your special mount, but there are rules for using your special mount as your animal companion.

[Dr.Epic]

Wild shape or Bear Warrior PrC.

[Kuulvheysoon]

ubermount builds rely on the devoted tracker feat, which allows your special mount to count as an animal companion, and get the benefits of that. wild cohort gets you a bear, which you then take as your special mount, and once it's your special mount you can apply animal companion benefits to it through devoted tracker. and it's still a special mount, and gets special mount benefits. halfling outrider advances special mount and animal companion, and is one of the few classes that doesn't specify that you have to pick which one you advance. legacy champion can advance halfling outrider, and therefore get both animal companion and special mount, while faith scion advances both directly, again without any need to choose which to advance.

the reason you do it this way is because there is no rules for using your animal companion as your special mount, but there are rules for using your special mount as your animal companion.

You see, it's this part I keep getting hung up on. Where on earth did you find anything that allows you to do this? I've read through the article a half dozen times, and I can find nothing that allows you to treat your cohort as your paladin special mount.

[lunar2]

You see, it's this part I keep getting hung up on. Where on earth did you find anything that allows you to do this? I've read through the article a half dozen times, and I can find nothing that allows you to treat your cohort as your paladin special mount.




PALADIN COHORT MOUNTS
At the DM’s option, she may allow a paladin or other character
with a special mount class feature to combine the special mount
with the cohort feat. The special qualities such as the empathic
link and shared spells make this quite potent and worth a mini-
mum of a +2 level adjustment to the cohort mount ECL.

it's a variant rule in the dmg. then again, leadership et. al. are also variant rules, so if you can have one, why not both. it doesn't get cheesy until you start claiming that the bonus hd from special mount and animal companion don't count towards your cohort's ecl (since they are a bonus granted by your class features, not part of the cohort itself).

[Flickerdart]

it's a variant rule in the dmg. then again, leadership et. al. are also variant rules, so if you can have one, why not both. it doesn't get cheesy until you start claiming that the bonus hd from special mount and animal companion don't count towards your cohort's ecl (since they are a bonus granted by your class features, not part of the cohort itself).
That passage is obviously not referring to Wild Cohort.

[lunar2]

That passage is obviously not referring to Wild Cohort.

obviously. wild cohort didn't exist at the time. however, it refers to the cohort mechanic, which is the same for leadership, undead leadership, draconic cohort, and wild cohort.

anyway, there is no way to get an intelligent bear into play as anything resembling a PC without a helpful DM, so we can assume a helpful DM in this instance. which means leadership variants count as wild cohort variants.

[Flickerdart]

obviously. wild cohort didn't exist at the time. however, it refers to the cohort mechanic, which is the same for leadership, undead leadership, draconic cohort, and wild cohort.
It's, uh, not even close to being the same. The cohort granted by Leadership is a character and built like a character. The animal cohort granted by Wild Cohort is built according to its own rules.

[Brains]

A mount build is actually what I've started working on, and supermount does seem to be the way to go. Halfling Paladin 5/Beastmaster 1/Halfling Outrider 10 with Devoted tracker and Natural bond would get me an intelligent bear that would be pretty powerful. I would not be able to start RPing as the bear until level 7 though which is frustrating.

[Marnath]

Best option, I believe, is playing an awakened brown bear barbearian.
Equip some Wild armor.
Aim to get greater magical fang permanently on your claws and btie.
Remember; use the bear totem variant.

You don't need Wild armor for that. You can just make barding that fits bears.

[lunar2]

It's, uh, not even close to being the same. The cohort granted by Leadership is a character and built like a character. The animal cohort granted by Wild Cohort is built according to its own rules.

hmm. you are right. nvm, then. find a way to get a bear with leadership, or play a straight druid and get a celestial bear animal companion.

[Seharvepernfan]

You don't need Wild armor for that. You can just make barding that fits bears.

Yeah, but it'll cost like 4 times as much. I don't supposed you can just put on Wild armor made for humans though...you'd have to be a human than turns into a bear for it to work, right? Regardless, bearding will work fine if he can afford it. Did anyone get my great bear pun in my last post? Anyone?

[Ravens_cry]

Yeah, but it'll cost like 4 times as much. I don't supposed you can just put on Wild armor made for humans though...you'd have to be a human than turns into a bear for it to work, right? Regardless, bearding will work fine if he can afford it. Did anyone get my great bear pun in my last post? Anyone?
The 4x is only for the base cost, not enchanting, I believe, so past the first few levels, you should be able to afford it.
Edit: Looked more like a typo. Sneaky though.

[Seharvepernfan]

The 4x is only for the base cost, not enchanting, I believe, so past the first few levels, you should be able to afford it.
Edit: Looked more like a typo. Sneaky though.

Not that one, though I guess the one I was referring to isn't exactly a pun...

[Devils_Advocate]

The story of Sir Bearington always reminds me of Animanics. "He's a chicken, I tell ya! A GIANT CHICKEN!"

So, Brains, it took me a while to figure this out, but from your posts, I gather you assume that rules-granted companions (animal companions, familiars, cohorts, etc.) are player-controlled? Because I don't think that that's actually spelled out anywhere, so this approach is still DM-dependent. But if that's already established as the way that your group handles that, then never mind.

As to Level Adjustments for awakened animals, consider the following:

Lycanthropes all have the same Level Adjustment, in addition to a variable number of animal hit dice. It's apparently assumed that the improved stats and number of animal hit dice you have to take roughly balance each other out to about the same degree in each case.

An awakened animal differs from a lycanthrope created by applying the lycanthrope template to a LA +0 humanoid most notably as follows:

- Animal form only.
- No bonus natural armor or damage reduction.
- No racial traits from a humanoid race.
- Type is magical beast (augmented animal) rather than humanoid (shapechanger).
- Two additional animal hit dice.
- Lower Cha and maybe higher Wis. (Depends on the animal.)

All things considered, I'd say that these changes warrant dropping the LA from +2 or +3 to +0. So a Tiny to Large awakened animal should be playable at LA +0. Smaller or bigger animals might warrant more LA, since big size modifiers in either direction can be quite beneficial, and that's beyond the bounds of what you can get by lycathopizing a LA +0 race (unless there are any Tiny or Large LA +0 humanoids or giants out there).

To get the stat adjustments for an awakened animal race, do the following:

1. Start with the normal animal's stat block.
2. Add two animal hit dice, making appropriate changes to BAB and base saving throws. Do not alter the creature's size. If the animal has a fraction of a hit die, simply increase its HD to 2 instead. (I'm pretty sure that an creature with a fraction of a hit die is treated as having 1 HD for most purposes (skills, saves, etc.) already.)
3. Increase Intelligence score to 10. Increase Charisma score by 2.
4. Change type to magical beast (augmented animal).
5. Take this adjusted stat block and convert it into a list of racial traits as normal.

[Kazyan]

Mulhorandi Divine Minion (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/mb/20050209a) has at-will Wildshape into particular forms. One of the options is Brown Bear. Costs you +2 LA, but this is a simple way to be all bear all the time.

[Agent 451]

Did anyone get my great bear pun in my last post? Anyone?

I caught it. ...like a salmon during spawning.

[Seharvepernfan]

Best option, I believe, is playing an awakened brown bear barbearian.
Equip some Wild armor.
Aim to get greater magical fang permanently on your claws and btie.
Remember; use the bear totem variant.

I just couldn't let it go.

[LordVonDerp]

there's alsways Sir Bearington, the bear rogue that uses Disguise to pretend to not be a bear. Or you could be a bear monk who kills people with his bear hands.

[Gnome Alone]

I just couldn't let it go.

...Wow.

My comically cone-shaped red hat is off to you.

[dysprosium]

+1 for the Noble Wild book. It was the first thing I thought of when I saw the title of the thread. It is one of the better third party materials out there.

If third party material is out then I would go for the awakened bear idea.