Animal Companions

[CNFish]

Yo, Hey guys. I'm having a little trouble with animal companions from dnd 3.5e (This seemed like the best place to post this thread.) Ive read the book, but it still escapes me on how to... lets say... build an animal companion for (druid.) See the thing is I'm essentially building a spreadsheet using Excel that allows me to build character sheets faster and keep them safer (because of cloud storage.) and to be quite real the spreadsheet is looking extremely decent the only major problem ive run into at this point in time is animal companions because theres a lot going on with them and its difficult one way or the other to know if my sheet is correct. for instance the whole ideal of the spreadsheet is to streamline the character creation process (creating characters faster = more time to play the game.) but if my sheet is calculating it wrong, then its not helping anyone.

so first question. monster advancement

lets say I pick a wolf at druid level 3 the wolf should get two bonus HD (2HD8+Con modif.) but how do you calculate things like base saves and BAB? and the like? skills? (it has a negative INT modif.) does it get more skills? are they set? Monster advancement is the thing that is killing me here a dummys guide to monster advancement would be extremely helpful.

(also, see? if its stumping me, itll stump any kind of new player who wants to play a druid that equals headache for DM, and more headaches for the player who doesn't understand. I want this to help take the guess-work out of it.)

[Pyromancer999]

The rest should be calculatable based on animal HD.

Also, for the future/moving this thread, the 3.5 subforum for Roleplaying Games would be best.

[eggynack]

They're animals, so they get animal type stuff. That means good fortitude and reflex saves, average BAB, and, because it's a general rule (which is listed right in the type), a minimum of one skill point per HD. A convenient thing is that animals are kinda like druids. Same HD, same BAB, and the same number of good saves. So, you can kinda imagine a 4 HD animal as identical to a fourth level druid, pulling from that line in the chart, and then moving the good will save over to reflex. The skill list is a bit trickier, but it's determined by the skills listed in the monster's entry. Monsters are indeed tricky, in any case. For more information on monsters, you should check out the monstrous monster handbook (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?207928-Urpriest-s-Monstrous-Monster-Handbook), and if you specifically want druid stuff, my sigged handbook can help with that.

[Goaty14]

I was under the impression that once an animal companion's HD went up, only hp changed, the only save I see changing is the reflex change (because a druid's companion gets a higher dex)

[eggynack]

I was under the impression that once an animal companion's HD went up, only hp changed, the only save I see changing is the reflex change (because a druid's companion gets a higher dex)
No, HD increases broadly bring about the whole suite of level related changes. Saves and such are inextricably linked to HD, after all. More to the point, the bonus HD section of the animal companion entry explicitly states that, "Remember that extra Hit Dice improve the animal companion’s base attack and base save bonuses," among other things related to this advancement issue.