I need some assisstance with an Animal Companion progression

[RangerRegis]

Hello there guys :) Thanks for looking into this post.

Now my issue is Im playing a ranger, and I would like for my animal companion to be with me through the whole session. To make it simple I want it to grow stronger with me, so I dont have to replace it, because replacing an animal companion is not something my ranger would do, but I also want for my animal companion to remain viable.

So here is my idea. I want to get Dire Panther as a animal companion BUT when I get him at level 4 I want him to be a kitten. ( I will find him or rescue him, DM will determine how I get him) and while he is a kitten he will essentially work like a Cat familiar with these stats here dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Cat after I get 2 more levels ( namely I get level 6 ) my kitten will grow up a bit and become a teen Dire Panther which will have all the stats of normal Panther like seen here dandwiki.com/wiki/Panther_(3.5e_Creature) and then when I get 4 more levels ( I get level 10 ) my animal companion will become adult Dire Panther with these stats here dandwiki.com/wiki/Dire_Panther_(3.5e_Creature)

PS: Sorry I cant provide direct links, I do not have enough posts :(

So essentially to compensate and make it a bit more balanced Im giving my animal companion 2 levels of almost basic uselessness since he is a kitten, and also every time my animal companion grows it resets to level 1. And does not keep any health it earned from it previous levels.

Example of its leveling would be as seen here:

Me lvl 4 Kitten lvl 1
Me lvl 5 Kitten lvl 2
Me lvl 6 Panther lvl 1
Me lvl 7 Panther lvl 2
Me lvl 8 Panther lvl 3
Me lvl 9 Panther lvl 4
Me lvl 10 Dire Panther lvl 1
.
.
. and so on.

I hope I explained this well, any more ideas and balancing thought would be well appreciated. I want to make this as simple as possible so I dont make it difficult for DM while also making it balanced.

[Flickerdart]

You get a CR5 companion at level 10. That's pathetically weak, I'm not sure how you expect it not to die constantly.

[RangerRegis]

You get a CR5 companion at level 10. That's pathetically weak, I'm not sure how you expect it not to die constantly.

I probably should have mentioned that this is my very first d&d session. I played games like Icewind Dale, Baldurs Gate and NWN and some others, but I never actually played like this. That is why Im asking for advice and help. If you could provide me with your knowledge that would be extremely helpful :)

[Flickerdart]

Alright, from the top.

D&D Wiki is homebrew material, not official rules. If your DM has approved it, that's not a problem, but you should know this. You can find official free content in the SRD (http://www.d20srd.org/). The CR2 leopard (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/leopard.htm) entry reads "the statistics presented here can describe any feline of similar size, such as jaguars, panthers, and mountain lions."

Ranger animal companions are pretty weak - a ranger level is worth half a druid level. So your companion will never be viable for combat unless you use some other means of raising its HD. A dip into Beastmaster helps - a ranger 10 has an effective druid level of 5, but a ranger 9/beastmaster 1 has an effective druid level of 8.5 (really 8, but more ranger levels still count for half). Decide if the trade-off is worth it - you lose a feat on Skill Focus (Handle Animal) to enter, and will delay your ranger features.

You can also use the feat Natural Bond to increase your effective druid level by 3, up to your hit dice. So you could actually pump your effective druid level to 11 by 10th, at some cost to yourself. There are other ways of boosting companions (search Ubermount) but if you want to be a ranger with a pet and not a dragon with a human "owner" off-screen you don't need to get in that deep.

[RangerRegis]

Alright, from the top.

D&D Wiki is homebrew material, not official rules. If your DM has approved it, that's not a problem, but you should know this. You can find official free content in d20srd.org/"]the SRD. The CR2 d20srd.org/srd/monsters/leopard.htm" leopard entry reads "the statistics presented here can describe any feline of similar size, such as jaguars, panthers, and mountain lions."

Ranger animal companions are pretty weak - a ranger level is worth half a druid level. So your companion will never be viable for combat unless you use some other means of raising its HD. A dip into Beastmaster helps - a ranger 10 has an effective druid level of 5, but a ranger 9/beastmaster 1 has an effective druid level of 8.5 (really 8, but more ranger levels still count for half). Decide if the trade-off is worth it - you lose a feat on Skill Focus (Handle Animal) to enter, and will delay your ranger features.

You can also use the feat Natural Bond to increase your effective druid level by 3, up to your hit dice. So you could actually pump your effective druid level to 11 by 10th, at some cost to yourself. There are other ways of boosting companions (search Ubermount) but if you want to be a ranger with a pet and not a dragon with a human "owner" off-screen you don't need to get in that deep.


Thank you very much I will look into that :) By the way if it also helps we are using the Player Handbook v1 and v2 for our Campaign and Complete Arcana 3.5