question about advancing animals

[theIrkin]

how have you guys dealt with advancing the HD of player pets in your games? it hasn't come up yet for me, but i expect it to soon. do you just let players buy the higher HD, or does the implied rarity mean they have to tame it/jump through some other hoop?

joe

[Glimbur]

When you say 'pets', do you mean class features like Animal Companion, or things they have bought like a horse or a guard dog?

I'll assume the latter. I have never dealt with this issue, but I would consider the power of the pet versus the party.

If they want to train up their light horse to have more than 3 HD when they are level 10, throw a little gold at the problem. Make an Animal Handling check or hire someone to; the animal has potential just from being around greatness. It's flavor more than anything, and unlikely to affect combat or whatever. Maybe they'll have the horse take Run or something, but I don't see that as a big issue.

If they have a dinosaur that contributes to combat, and they want to make it huge so it can have a large effect on the game, that's a different issue. I would call for a quest, some special magic, and effort.

I would also make it easier to find/buy a bigger and stronger critter than to upgrade a currently existing one, but that might not be very acceptable if they like their current pet.

[Splendor]

I've never played a game where a non-animal companion got extra HD (or leveled up).

If they want their pet to advance in HD make them take the wild cohort feat.
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/re/20031118a

If you are just looking for some rules on buying tougher animals....
Well the cost of intelligent slaves is: Cost = (CR, minimum 1)^2 × 100 gp (Lords of Madness pg 101).
Magebred animals costs the horribly under priced "x2" (Ebberon Campaign).

[theIrkin]

Glimbur, i did mean in pets in the mundane sense, and this would be an animal contributing to combat. you definitely echoed my initial thoughts on the process, so it assures me that i was more or less on the right track to begin with. thanks.

Splendor, i'm trying that right now as they're just now putting their characters together. one of them expressed interest in having a pet but is tight on feats, so he asked about this. i'd rather have him take wild cohort, but it not unreasonable to want to just buy a pet instead. it might be unreasonable to expect to be able to buy an oversized, max HD creature though. thanks for the input.

joe

[theIrkin]

new question: this comes specifically from warbeast, but is also a general question...

1. when advancing the creature's HD, do you treat that as a normal advance (i.e. new feats, increased attributes, etc.)

2. does an increase in movement (in this instance a wolverine) affect just the base speed, or does it also affect the burrowing and climb speeds? the warbeast speed boost simply states


from MMII
speed: same as base creature +10 ft.

it would seem to imply that it works on the base speed. would this need to be factored into other modes of speed? should i treat this like enchantment/enhancement effects to speed which apply to all forms of speed?

joe

[Splendor]

1. Most of the groups I have played with did.
2. Most speed enhancements only affect their base speeds (highest of possible movement modes), like expeditious retreat. But some, like haste, would affect others.

Your example of a wolverine would increase his base speed from 30 to 40, an increase of 33%. But it doesn't seem right to increase his burrow from 10 to 20, a 100% increase. I guess you could use a sliding scale, like a burrow speed of 13.

[Curmudgeon]

All aspects of NPCs are up to the DM, so the players never get to decide these things.

[Urpriest]

In general, an Advanced creature is not simply a normal creature with more XP, it started out that powerful. You can't just train a creature to be more advanced, and you wouldn't want to anyway, since mundane creatures either rapidly fall off in power compared to what you are fighting or scale like an Animal Companion or a Paladin's Mount and thus make such class features obsolete. So either way this isn't something you want your players to do.

Note that Warbeast can't be applied to an existing creature either, the template is the result of a breeding program.

[JonU]

Actually you could apply a warbeast to an existing domestic creature. From MM2: "If the base creature is a domestic animal, the creature need not be specially reared, but it must be trained for two months.

For a wild animal though, it must be reared for one year then trained for 2 months. So I would agree that I wild animal would be required to be reared from birth. But if the animal is a product of a breeding program; at what point would people consider the animal to be no longer wild but domesticated.

[Kioras]

Per the rules can't advance animals in monster hd.

Players could always go about for example capturing some dire horses, and then starting a breeding program to improve hd and trainability, eventually adding the warbeast template to them.

Would take quite a bit of time however, over several generations, unless there is already someone doing something similiar with dire animals.

[ksbsnowowl]

Per the rules can't advance animals in monster hd.


Umm...


Ape
...
Advancement: 5-8 HD (Large)

Bear, Black
...
Advancement: 4-5 HD (Medium)

Lion
...
Advancement: 6-8 HD (Large)
Et cetera, et cetera...

Now, there are some certain animals (horses, dogs) that don't have an advancement line. But a blanket statement that animals cannot improve by racial HD is just flat out wrong.

[Lord Vukodlak]

Umm... Now, there are some certain animals (horses, dogs) that don't have an advancement line. But a blanket statement that animals cannot improve by racial HD is just flat out wrong.

You completely missed the point, a fighter can go from level 1 to level 20.
But a 2HD wolf will never have more then two hit dice unless it becomes animal companion. Generally speaking an individual animals don't advance in their own HD. They're either born exceptionally powerful or not.

advancement in racial hd is the result of age if it even occurs at all.

[Urpriest]

Actually you could apply a warbeast to an existing domestic creature. From MM2: "If the base creature is a domestic animal, the creature need not be specially reared, but it must be trained for two months.

For a wild animal though, it must be reared for one year then trained for 2 months. So I would agree that I wild animal would be required to be reared from birth. But if the animal is a product of a breeding program; at what point would people consider the animal to be no longer wild but domesticated.

Look up what the word "rear" means in this context. I'll wait.