How high should we raise the Animal companion CR cap to make more useful?

[CyberThread]

This is an idea as a possible fix to the beast master besides just giving the animal more freedom of movement in what it can do during the rangers turn.

[Sigreid]

Having put absolutely no thought into balance, I'd use the same rules for CR and type as for a moon druid's transformations, by level of course. It would be cool to have, for example, a goliath ranger with a mammoth for a pet.

[SharkForce]

the effectiveness of the companion is not the problem. beastmaster companions are quite good when they act. the problem with them is that they need constant direction or else they do nothing.

[MaxWilson]

the effectiveness of the companion is not the problem. beastmaster companions are quite good when they act. the problem with them is that they need constant direction or else they do nothing.

The relative puniness of the companion is a problem to the extent that it fails to be Cool. I can have an AC 23, 80-HP cobra but I can't have a bear? What gives? The limitations get in the way of many fun concepts.

Using the regular druid shapechange guidelines would be fine. Eventually you can have a rhino, if you can catch one.

[Zalabim]

You can raise allowed CR of the animal companion, but then you'll also need to reduce the scaling bonuses to damage rolls, to hit, and AC based on the CR of the companion to keep balance between different companion choices. Just as a caution. That's more hassle than I care to go into, personally.

[Daishain]

I am disinclined to rely on increases to CR for fluff reasons. A ranger's companion tends to be their closest friend and in some cases the nearest thing to kin they have. Treating them as something to be swapped out at whim when a newer model comes around...

[Tanarii]

If you raise the CR, you need to reduce the to hit, damage, and additional features power to be in line with a CR 1/4 creature.

A Rangers companion is plenty useful if you use it right: 1) it's your primary 'weapon', not your own attacks; 2) it allows 'you' to be in two places at once on the battlefield

From what I've seen so far, the problem isn't the creatures stats. The first problem is players making an assumption that the companion is supposed to enhance their own attacks, instead of the companion being a primary attacker that they enhance the attacks of. Or at least a flexible alternate option to switch hit with. Second problem: the ranger has several features features around enhancing the players attacks, especially the Fighting Styles and the spell Hunter's Mark. This supposed fix doesn't address that issue at all.

If your complaint is fluff, it's far simpler to just re-fluff the badger companion as a bear.

[N810]

You could let your player find an item that lets either them or their companion (depending on the item) [like a ring or a collar or something]
have an additional independent action. (that way the companion and the character could each have an action)

[Belac93]

You could do something along the lines of pathfinder. Give the player a young version of the creature they want (like CR 1/8), but have it be able to attack with a bonus action. At higher levels, increase the creatures power (I would say 1/4 at 4th level, and then increase by 1 step every ability score increase). They did something like this for hook horrors in rage of demons.

[Notafish]

The tricky thing with balancing the companion is that the Monster Manual animals have all been (theoretically) assigned CRs based on a combination of their offensive capabilities (average damage per round) and their defense (AC and HP, mostly). Since most animals are low AC, most of them have their Defensive CR augmented when they become a Companion, but the Offensive AC won't change significantly until later levels. Having a bear as a companion probably won't make too much of an impact at higher levels, but could make a lot of combat trivial at levels 3 and 4 due to the increased damage output.

I might allow animals of up to CR 1/2 (and lose the size restriction), but wait to add the Proficiency Bonus to damage until the 7th level feature for the CR 1/2 creatures.

[Vogonjeltz]

This is an idea as a possible fix to the beast master besides just giving the animal more freedom of movement in what it can do during the rangers turn.

I mean, even the lowest CR animal companion is actually quite dangerous already as their health, saving throws, skills, AC, and attacks scale up from the Ranger's level and proficiency bonus.

So going from a Panther to a Tiger, which is an identical creature chassis but slightly higher stats, would not change their hit points but would increase their damage by 3 points on average. Yay?


the effectiveness of the companion is not the problem. beastmaster companions are quite good when they act. the problem with them is that they need constant direction or else they do nothing.

Well, they can use their reaction, and it costs the Ranger nothing to move their pet, and at 7th the Ranger can use their bonus action to have the pet use the help action.

So they could help someone else (say, the Ranger) shoot at the target from range with Advantage and if the target tries to get away the pet gets an opportunity attack.

[Sindeloke]

the effectiveness of the companion is not the problem. beastmaster companions are quite good when they act. the problem with them is that they need constant direction or else they do nothing.

That's the thematic problem. The mechanical problem is that against flying enemies, underwater challenges, or things with resistance to nonmagical weapon damage, they're suddenly impotent sacks of meat. That, and their incredible weakness to magic generally, thanks to poorly scaling saves and low HP that leave them all but helpless against AoEs and Hold Monster.

You can alleviate a lot of these problems with spells and magic items, but that leaves the ranger in a position of consuming twice the percentage of the party's resources as anyone else, which is also bad design.

Raising the CR cap doesn't really help this issue. Companions need better scaling instead; lose the front-loaded damage and AC bonus and just give them genuine hit dice increases and the corresponding increase in proficiency and stat bumps. Higher CR creatures don't become an issue this way because they already have higher hit dice and so they wouldn't gain as much as a 1/4 critter. Add in a ritual (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=19471729&postcount=2) for rangers that lets them give their beast certain needed single-encounter or high-level traits without draining party resources and you're pretty much good.

[Tanarii]

That's the thematic problem. The mechanical problem is that against flying enemies, underwater challenges, or things with resistance to nonmagical weapon damage, they're suddenly impotent sacks of meat. That, and their incredible weakness to magic generally, thanks to poorly scaling saves and low HP that leave them all but helpless against AoEs and Hold Monster.The ranger can get flying snakes & blood Hawks if he expects to be dealing with flying creatures. Crabs and other swimmers exist too. It takes 8 hrs to find an appropriate companion for the expected challenges. Which is the same amount of time it takes clerics/Druids/wizards to prepare new spells to meet the challenge too. Or the ranger can use his longbow against flying enemies ... He's got more options than a low dex fighter or Bavarian or paladin, or even a cleric if he doesn't have the right spells prepared.

That's the Rangers strength, and the beastmaster can play well to it: flexible adaptability to different styles of combat as needed.

Poorly scaling saves is a problem for all characters, but Ranger companions get their prof bonus to all saves ... that's superior to most PCs. AoE damage is a potential problem though.

[Notafish]

I do think that the thematic issues might be mitigated in part through a rewording of the feature. Rather than saying that the Ranger must command the pet to take an action, why not write that the Ranger and her animal companion move separately and take reactions separately but share actions on their turn? That makes it sound less like the animal is an automaton, I think, and easier to see that the combination of actions is done for mechanical reasons (not sure why familiars get completely separate turns, but that's a slightly different issue).

I'd also want to change the wording on the resummoning process to indicate that a Ranger might want to temporarily dismiss the companion rather than implying that a different companion can only be summoned to replace a deceased companion. Maybe the companion could visit the same pocket dimension that familiars do?

Still, I think that a slightly higher level cap would not be amiss. Why shouldn't the Beast Master be able to team up with bears and sharks?