Poof! Instant mounts, just add water

[Sugarbear007]

Howdy all :P

So I was talking to a friend who is making a backup character atm. He spotted a spiffy mini on reaper and ponied up the 20 bucks for it. So he was asking about how he could get a spiffy bear mount.

http://www.reapermini.com/Miniatures/bear/latest/14433#detail/IG_2236_1

The campaign is set in forgotten realms and so aside from Pickle the dwarf that kind of takes druid off the table, besides he doesn't want to be a druid anyway. He mentioned wanting to go cleric. He's modeling the character after the mini. I told him he should make a cleric of Haelea since it looks like she's wielding a great sword to my eyes.

My first thought to get said mount in question was the wild cohort feat. I am assuming that you can get your cohort to bare you into combat. Then I remembered some of the forgotten realms books I read when I was a teenager and everyone’s favorite (or not, I see lots of Drizz’t hate too :P) ranger Drizz’t Do’Urden and his companion Guenhwyvar.

Drizz’t can summon Guenhwyvar using an onyx figurine. There was another character, an undead Paladin whose name I can’t remember who was in….. I think Pools of Twilight maybe? It’s been a long time since I’ve read anything like that. Anyway, he had a similar figurine to summon his horse. That particular horse also could breathe on other horses to make little temporary figurines of them. Mostly that was a plot devise too let them keep their horses when they would have had to abandon them but I digress.

I’ve read about the amber vermin amulets that let you summon giant insects once a day for a minute. Are there any other ways to do something that’s more akin to the book references I’ve mentioned? Something that would let my friend have the bear mount and when it’s time to head down into a dungeon or something poof it’s gone from a bear to 3 pounds of rock in your backpack? Basically the Marvin the martian thing with instant martians, just add water.

Any way to get a bear companion but particularly a mount would be greatly appreciated.

[Segev]

Depending on his level, he could use Planar Ally to call a Celestial Bear, perhaps?

[Zweisteine]

I doubt that it would be that hard to make a homebrew figurine of power for a bear.

Just go request a homebrew (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=219438)! Just be sure to include the summoning limits. (I'd go for a basic bear, not a dire bear, because, besides being cheaper, it's easier to apply wild cohort to. Black bear is best (maybe?), because it starts out weakest.)

And create a different thread in this section of the forums to ask how that creature might work with wild cohort, because I'm assuming you'll want the figurine to be able to advance over levels. Wild cohort can get you a black bear starting at level 7, but the time limitations might make it lower-level, and the difficulty of truly killing a figurine might raise the animal's effective cohort level.

Then present it to the player as "random" loot. Don't tell them how much effort you put into it until much later.

And don't forget to post back afterwards to tell us how it went!

[Fitz10019]

Just go request a homebrew (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=219438)! ...Black bear ...

Zweisteine offers some good advice regarding the homebrew thread, but black bears are Medium, and only suitable as a mount to Small PCs.

[Sugarbear007]

Figurines of power. I should have known something like these were translated into the game. I'm still learning all of the stuff put into the game so thanks for pointing me in the right direction. I'll ask around. :P

[Darrin]

Easy Rider: Magic Items as Mounts (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=120298).

[lunar2]

when i first started playing D&D, i was actually surprised to see there was no panther figurine of power in the DMG.

[Fable Wright]

Smokey Confinement (C. Mage), the Pokeball spell, may work for your needs. A Schema, which allows for 1/day use of it, would cost 13,200gp. A bit expensive, perhaps, but it's a bear scaling with Wild Cohort, cheaper than Figurines of Wondrous Power, and not vulnerable to dispels.