Beast of the Sea: Totally Unusable

[Foxhound438]

Speed: 5 feet.

Need I say more? Most, and I'm talking about like 99% most, DnD games will be almost entirely played above water. I see what they were thinking: "gee, people in the survey said they want a beast of the sea, what do you think they had in mind?" "Well, the only sea creature I can think of is the Octopus, it must be that. Better template the move speed off of that." Except there's a ton of sea creatures like crustacians (ie, Giant Crab being what I actully wanted) that actually have a real land speed.

Regardless of what they were thinking, giving something a 5' land speed gimps it so hard that it's going to be an actual burden to the party at every turn. You would never pick this, unless the campaign was HEAVILY focused on underwater content, like how Ghosts of Saltmarsh has all those parts where you go underwater, or at least get to do something meaningful in a boat or something. Maybe you want to argue that they had to make it bad somehow to make up for its good on hit effect, except that the beast of the land gets bonus damage and a knockdown, and the beast of the sky has Flyby and can move at its full speed (60 feet, by the way) in 99% of scenarios. Even if you did want to make beast of the sea slower to balance it, going all the way to 5' is just ridiculous.

"Oh, just cast longstrider on it all the time, it'll be great"

no, I don't want to play a spell-slot-less ranger.

The only ranger that I've ever wanted to play is a crab wrangling beast master, and I've been putting it off until a good version of the ranger comes out. I would be willing to use the new action rules (bonus action to command it) on a beastmaster with a good old giant crab, but the new rules for commanding the beast are locked into having one of these pets. It's just such a dumb design choice.

/rant.

[werescythe]

Last I checked, a fish outside of water doesn't move hardly at all. So with a speed of 5ft (outside of water) and a swim speed of 60ft (twice as much as most playable characters) actually seems pretty reasonable to me.

[Unoriginal]

Speed: 5 feet.

Need I say more? Most, and I'm talking about like 99% most, DnD games will be almost entirely played above water. I see what they were thinking: "gee, people in the survey said they want a beast of the sea, what do you think they had in mind?" "Well, the only sea creature I can think of is the Octopus, it must be that. Better template the move speed off of that." Except there's a ton of sea creatures like crustacians (ie, Giant Crab being what I actully wanted) that actually have a real land speed.

Regardless of what they were thinking, giving something a 5' land speed gimps it so hard that it's going to be an actual burden to the party at every turn. You would never pick this, unless the campaign was HEAVILY focused on underwater content, like how Ghosts of Saltmarsh has all those parts where you go underwater, or at least get to do something meaningful in a boat or something. Maybe you want to argue that they had to make it bad somehow to make up for its good on hit effect, except that the beast of the land gets bonus damage and a knockdown, and the beast of the sky has Flyby and can move at its full speed (60 feet, by the way) in 99% of scenarios. Even if you did want to make beast of the sea slower to balance it, going all the way to 5' is just ridiculous.

"Oh, just cast longstrider on it all the time, it'll be great"

no, I don't want to play a spell-slot-less ranger.

The only ranger that I've ever wanted to play is a crab wrangling beast master, and I've been putting it off until a good version of the ranger comes out. I would be willing to use the new action rules (bonus action to command it) on a beastmaster with a good old giant crab, but the new rules for commanding the beast are locked into having one of these pets. It's just such a dumb design choice.

/rant.

If you want a crab when you're out of the water, you could just take the land beast option and say it's a crab, no?

[Monster Manuel]

I think the intent is that you only use the Beast of the Sea when it's useful.

"When you finish a Long Rest, you can summon a different primal beast"

So, you keep the Beast of the Land running until you get to a point when a pet octopus would be helpful, sleep for the night, and swap them. Kind of like how you can swap out a familiar for a new form by re-casting the spell, the Primal Companion is flexible.

[Unoriginal]

I think the intent is that you only use the Beast of the Sea when it's useful.

"When you finish a Long Rest, you can summon a different primal beast"

So, you keep the Beast of the Land running until you get to a point when a pet octopus would be helpful, sleep for the night, and swap them. Kind of like how you can swap out a familiar for a new form by re-casting the spell, the Primal Companion is flexible.

Or you can swap between the two statblocks and say it's the same crab.

[Greywander]

Last I checked, a fish outside of water doesn't move hardly at all. So with a speed of 5ft (outside of water) and a swim speed of 60ft (twice as much as most playable characters) actually seems pretty reasonable to me.
I think the point is that a creature that isn't a fish would have been more viable. Something that's more amphibious than something that can only live in water. OP mentioned giant crabs, for example.

I haven't looked at the new ranger stuff (honestly I haven't looked much at ranger period), but what would make sense to me would be to give all three (I'm assuming there's three, land, sea, and air?) the same walk speed, but then depending on which one you choose they also get a swim, climb, or flying speed. Alternatively, the land creature might get a burrow speed instead of a climb speed (since flying makes climbing mostly redundant). There might be some other minor differences (like the sea beast being able to breathe in water), but otherwise they'd be mostly the same.

Point is, as the OP says, there's not really much reason to have an aquatic-only beast. Most adventures take place on land, and while I don't know the exact mechanics for ranger companions, I'm assuming they can't be swapped out as freely as a familiar (and even if they can, it's still kind of a pain). It would be better to have something that excels in the water but remains viable on land. The hard part should be making a land beast appealing when you could take a flying beast instead.

[DarknessEternal]

There are two other perfectly viable options for more traditional settings.

Is it really worth anyone's time to complain that your sea monster can't do very well on land?

[Foxhound438]

I think the intent is that you only use the Beast of the Sea when it's useful.

"When you finish a Long Rest, you can summon a different primal beast"

So, you keep the Beast of the Land running until you get to a point when a pet octopus would be helpful, sleep for the night, and swap them. Kind of like how you can swap out a familiar for a new form by re-casting the spell, the Primal Companion is flexible.

Yes, you can switch it. But if you have to wait for until the next day every time you jump in the water, and then also wait the rest of that day to continue doing things on land, it's not really going to be used very much. You'd have to expect to spend the entire day underwater for it to be a good choice. And to make it worse, I feel like more often than not even when you're doing "watery" things, you wouldn't want a companion who can't move close enough to do anything if you go into an underwater cave, or even if you get into a fight on a boat.

[Unoriginal]

For what it's worth, most crabs aren't known for their swim speed.

[greenstone]

Even worse, why would you take a beast of the sea when a beast of the land with water breathing cast on it is more effective?

[Unoriginal]

Even worse, why would you take a beast of the sea when a beast of the land with water breathing cast on it is more effective?

Define "more effective". Water breathing doesn't affect movement underwater or the disadvantage to attacking underwater, right?

[Rusvul]

Sea creatures being profoundly unhelpful on land strikes me as a feature, not a bug.

Certainly, I think it could've been neat if amphibious creatures had some kind of support, but it seems like it's primarily intended to model, like... fish/octopi, wolves et al., and birds. I can imagine that being frustrating if you have your heart set on a crab rangoon ranger (or a Florida Man type with an alligator), but... that's relatively niche

[Foxhound438]

Sea creatures being profoundly unhelpful on land strikes me as a feature, not a bug.

Certainly, I think it could've been neat if amphibious creatures had some kind of support, but it seems like it's primarily intended to model, like... fish/octopi, wolves et al., and birds. I can imagine that being frustrating if you have your heart set on a crab rangoon ranger (or a Florida Man type with an alligator), but... that's relatively niche

It has the ability, Amphibious. And I feel like crocodile companion wouldn't be a rare desire either.

Even if you do just want it to be a fish for some reason, why would you want it to not be a fish that's actually useful outside of one encounter in a year of playing the game? Why not have an especially badass fish that can hop around on land all day at 20 feet a round?

[HappyDaze]

It has the ability, Amphibious. And I feel like crocodile companion wouldn't be a rare desire either.

Even if you do just want it to be a fish for some reason, why would you want it to not be a fish that's actually useful outside of one encounter in a year of playing the game? Why not have an especially badass fish that can hop around on land all day at 20 feet a round?

Why not get a fish that can fly like a hummingbird?

[Foxhound438]

Why not get a fish that can fly like a hummingbird?

Sure, but it would be pretty awkward if it couldn't swim or breath underwater. Same goes for all the crabs that have charging attacks instead of pincirs that grab.

[Luccan]

I don't quite understand the resistance to this being at least moderately useful outside of the water. I don't play many rangers, beastmasters especially, so I don't know if I can get quite as worked up. But in my own experience many aquatic games still have plenty of land-based adventuring, so needing to swap your beast out every time you want to go dig up some buried treasure or investigate an island seems needlessly restrictive. Which, to be fair, is on brand for the beastmaster, but that doesn't make it good.

[JackPhoenix]

So, what exactly stops you from using Ranger's Companion instead of the variant and getting actual giant crab if you want to have a crab?

[Yakk]

Yes, I agree, that was a screwup.

Beastmaster characters often want a persistant companion. A naval themed companion - turtle, crab, even octopus - that is usable on land, but better in water, should be what they aimed for.

Instead we get an unusable on land companion.

I guess that is what happens when they get an intern to add features to a UA article before publishing.

And just don't use it people; the point of this variant was that the baseline animal companions didn't work well. Saying "use the ones that didn't work well" isn't productive, and having that argument here is redundant.

[Unoriginal]

So can anyone tell me why having a 5ft speed on land makes the Beast of the Sea unusable?

[Democratus]

Words mean things.

For the creature to be "unusable" it would need to have errors or contradictions in the stat block that keep it from working within the rules.

Beast of the Sea does not have that problem.

"I don't like it" is very different from "unusable".

[JackPhoenix]

And just don't use it people; the point of this variant was that the baseline animal companions didn't work well. Saying "use the ones that didn't work well" isn't productive, and having that argument here is redundant.

Well, by your words, the other option is "unusable". If one option is 'unusable', the one that 'doesn't work well' is still better.

[Dork_Forge]

Yes, I agree, that was a screwup.

Beastmaster characters often want a persistant companion. A naval themed companion - turtle, crab, even octopus - that is usable on land, but better in water, should be what they aimed for.

Instead we get an unusable on land companion.

I guess that is what happens when they get an intern to add features to a UA article before publishing.

And just don't use it people; the point of this variant was that the baseline animal companions didn't work well. Saying "use the ones that didn't work well" isn't productive, and having that argument here is redundant.

They allow you to change beast type freely on long rest, this seems more like a "hey an aquatic section, I have something for this!" rather than an option you're meant to take all of the time. It gives the Beast Master versatility to approach problems that isn't packaged inside a spell for a change, that's a feature not a bug.

Edit: It's not even like you're without options, if you find the 5ft on land crippling at some point and can't change it right then and there then just cast Longstrider on the beast and have it dash up to 30 to keep up.

[Quietus]

Am I the only one who loves the idea of a backpack octopus?

[MadBear]

I honestly don't see the issue at all. It's a great option when you know you'll be spending time in water. Sure there'll be times when you think you'll need a water companion, but then you want a land beast, but the unexpected happens all the time in D&D. Heck, there are many times my Cleric doesn't have the right spell prepared for the day, because they weren't aware they'd need it.

If you're really worried, on days where you get the beast of the sea, also prepare Longstrider. Now you have a 15ft moving sea creature. If it uses it's action to dash, it's moving just fine.

[Democratus]

Am I the only one who loves the idea of a backpack octopus?

Not at all! I was thinking of having a big wagon with a tank of water that the party hauls along on adventures. An "aquatic RV", if you will.

[Unoriginal]

Am I the only one who loves the idea of a backpack octopus?

Hermit-background character with an hermit Crab backpack.

[Daracaex]

Hermit-background character with an hermit Crab backpack.

Hermit-background Warforged who has been chosen as a hermit crab's shell?

[Greywander]

I don't really have a horse in this race, since I've never really been interested in playing a ranger (although this might be in part due its reputation as a weaker class), but after thinking about it a bit more, here's how I would have probably done it:

You have one default creature with a 30 foot walking speed. You then have a series of customization options, sort of like feats or invocations, that you can slap on. Some of these customizations just make the creature stronger, faster, or tougher, but others add animal-themed abilities. One might give a swim speed and underwater breathing, another might give spiderclimbing and the web-related abilities, another might allow them to spit poison, or give them tentacles that grapple on a hit, etc. Once you have the options that mimic the type of creature you have in mind, then you can focus on the options that just make them stronger.

Maybe I should write this up as an actual homebrew. I'd have to do some research into rangers first, though.

[Corsair14]

If you are the DM, then give it whatever speed you want. Book rules are strictly suggestions on how to run the game

[TigerT20]

Sorry, I'm still wondering why an amphibious/semi-amphibious animal like a crab, crocodile, octopus, giant axolotl etc is considered a more niche companion than... a literal fish

[Foxhound438]

They allow you to change beast type freely on long rest, this seems more like a "hey an aquatic section, I have something for this!" rather than an option you're meant to take all of the time. It gives the Beast Master versatility to approach problems that isn't packaged inside a spell for a change, that's a feature not a bug.

Edit: It's not even like you're without options, if you find the 5ft on land crippling at some point and can't change it right then and there then just cast Longstrider on the beast and have it dash up to 30 to keep up.

Sure, but it's not like a cleric not bringing protection from energy is going to have their level 3 spell slots sprinting 10' a round at something that can crawl away prone at 15'. Not having the right niche spell doesn't prevent you from leveraging your spells at all, but an encounter that starts with 30 or 40' between you and enemies makes your ranger's entire flagship build defining feature that holds all of the build value for several of your levels do nothing for 3 or 4 rounds if you happened to think the boat adventure would have fights in the water when the enemy instead just jumps on to your boat.

For longstrider: See OP. Spending spell slots to do that all the time is not going to be good, and waiting until combat starts means you have to be an entire turn behind when fighting starts just to have your extremely slow octopus still need to spend actions to catch up with something merely walking away.


Am I the only one who loves the idea of a backpack octopus?

This would in fact be great, but in terms of mechanics, if you're stuck to RAW ala something like adventurer's league, or just how most DM's do things in my experience, making it "ride you" like you would a horse requires you to be large, since the beast of the sea is medium, and regardless of what you do to get around it, a DM can veto it by saying you don't have the proper anatomy to be ridden. The other option is to grapple and drag it, but then your speed is halved, and you might be bringing your archer into melee range just to do this janky thing.

I also see a lot of "just use the other ones", which is ironic considering the same argument could be leveled at criticisms of the PHB ranger, which has a lot of fixes in this book, by saying something like "if you want to play a nature warrior, just be a fighter with a leaf on your head".

[Quietus]

This would in fact be great, but in terms of mechanics, if you're stuck to RAW ala something like adventurer's league, or just how most DM's do things in my experience, making it "ride you" like you would a horse requires you to be large, since the beast of the sea is medium, and regardless of what you do to get around it, a DM can veto it by saying you don't have the proper anatomy to be ridden. The other option is to grapple and drag it, but then your speed is halved, and you might be bringing your archer into melee range just to do this janky thing.

I also see a lot of "just use the other ones", which is ironic considering the same argument could be leveled at criticisms of the PHB ranger, which has a lot of fixes in this book, by saying something like "if you want to play a nature warrior, just be a fighter with a leaf on your head".

Grappling is the way I'd go, to start. If the speed bothers you, buy a horse with a cart so you can carry an aquarium with you. Or just let the octopus ride the horse. That's a normal fantasy itch for someone to want to scratch, right?

[Kane0]

I choose to believe it’s a typo and should have been 15’ or 25’

[Dork_Forge]

Sure, but it's not like a cleric not bringing protection from energy is going to have their level 3 spell slots sprinting 10' a round at something that can crawl away prone at 15'. Not having the right niche spell doesn't prevent you from leveraging your spells at all, but an encounter that starts with 30 or 40' between you and enemies makes your ranger's entire flagship build defining feature that holds all of the build value for several of your levels do nothing for 3 or 4 rounds if you happened to think the boat adventure would have fights in the water when the enemy instead just jumps on to your boat.

For longstrider: See OP. Spending spell slots to do that all the time is not going to be good, and waiting until combat starts means you have to be an entire turn behind when fighting starts just to have your extremely slow octopus still need to spend actions to catch up with something merely walking away.


Why would you be doing this all of the time? The only reaon you would ever take Beast of the Sea is if you're doing underwater shenanigans, in case those shenanigans happen to depart on land unexpectantly your beast can still breathe and move on land so you're not completely screwed. You're at a disadvantage, but then again you're at a significant advantage in the water too. If you were locked into your choice I'd totally agree, but you're not so I don't see the big deal. The Beast Master gets to rock under water if it comes up, that's good, if you're trying to use a water centric creature on land regularly that isn't the stat block's problem, it's a significant tactical error on the most fundamental level.

The point of me brining up Longstrider was to highlight that you aren't completely up a certain creek during dry season. It lasts an hour and is a first level slot with no need to concentrate, if you are in the niche scneario (which is what this should be) you can patch the speed. At no point should this be losing you and turns personally or should it be costing your beast dashing for 4 rounds, combat that opens up at 35-40' leaves most melee centric builds at a disadvantage on turn 1 anyway.

Summary: It exists for the same reason Water Breathing and the amphibious option of Alter Self does, it gives you options. If you choose to lock yourself into those options, or utilise them at the wrong time then that falls on you, not the option.

[Sindeloke]

Sorry, I'm still wondering why an amphibious/semi-amphibious animal like a crab, crocodile, octopus, giant axolotl etc is considered a more niche companion than... a literal fish

"Giant axolotl" is not a thing that had ever occurred to me before, which is genuinely tragic because it means I've wasted years of my life not having them in my fantasy worlds.

[SharkForce]

so, this is silly.

but a phantom steed is a resource that can be replenished in the middle of nowhere (including when you've just climbed out of the ocean), and if you take the ritual caster feat for wizard you'll get access to a bunch of other handy rituals, including one which conveniently will allow you to join your companion under the water without drowning.

[Samayu]

"When you finish a long rest, you can summon a different primal beast. The new beast appears in an unoccupied space within 5 feet of you, and you choose its stat block and appearance. If you already have a beast from this feature, it vanishes when the new beast appears."

So you can only summon it first thing in the morning? If you could do it anytime (once per day) then you could simply resummon when you reach the water. And hope you're not coming back out of the water the same day.

[Chaosmancer]

Yeah, I'm with Foxhound on this one, this is really bad design.

The Land beast has a 40 ft speed and 40 ft climb, and a charge, so they can move 20 ft, hit and deal and extra 1d6 damage with a chance of prone. That means is can deal 1d8+1d6+2+PB every turn is can move.

The Sea beast has a 60 ft swim, 5 ft move, can breath underwater and has a 1d6+2+PB attack with grapple, action to escape.


So, if an enemy is 20 ft away on land... the land beast moves up and hits them and does let's say average of 13 damage, and knocks them prone. The sea beast... dashes for two turns, and attacks on the 3rd turn. It will never catch the enemy on land if that enemy moves even a little bit.

Sea beast is utterly useless on land. But what about the reverse?

The enemy is 20 ft away in water. The land beast swims up to 20 ft, hits for an average of 13 damage, and knocks them prone (if that applies in water) They would not have disadvantage on the attack most likely, because I do not believe that those rules apply to natural attacks, only to weapon attacks. The Sea beast swims up, hits for 8.5 damage and grapples. Granted, is the swimming enemy is more than 20 ft away, then the land beast will need to take extra turns, but we set both distances the same, and increasing the sea enemy distance means making the sea beast even more useless on land.

So, let us look at a few other scenarios.

We are on a boat, enemies attack. If the enemies climb up the boat, the Sea beast is on land. If we put the beast in the water... it is by itself against the entire enemy force.

Let us say we start fighting in the water, but need to climb back up the boat? The Sea beast literally has to dash to climb 5ft up the side of the boat. Meaning in a decent sized vessel that is say 10 ft from sea to deck, requires two turns of dashing for the Sea beast to climb back onto the deck.

Go underwater in a lake, and find a cave? Sea beast becomes useless the moment you hit the ground inside the cave, which is probably where most of the action is happening.


The only time it is useful is if the party is underwater, fighting at a medium distance, for the entire day or adventure. And even then, the Land Beast is doing decent underwater. With a casting of longstrider it can move 25 ft underwater per turn. More than most of your party members, and it hits harder.


So.. yeah, the Sea beast is worthless as written. My solution? Give it a land speed of 20 ft. Just like some of the gators, frogs, and lizards in the book. Then it is superior in the water, but not entirely useless outside of it.

[Dork_Forge]

Yeah, I'm with Foxhound on this one, this is really bad design.

The Land beast has a 40 ft speed and 40 ft climb, and a charge, so they can move 20 ft, hit and deal and extra 1d6 damage with a chance of prone. That means is can deal 1d8+1d6+2+PB every turn is can move.

The Sea beast has a 60 ft swim, 5 ft move, can breath underwater and has a 1d6+2+PB attack with grapple, action to escape.


So, if an enemy is 20 ft away on land... the land beast moves up and hits them and does let's say average of 13 damage, and knocks them prone. The sea beast... dashes for two turns, and attacks on the 3rd turn. It will never catch the enemy on land if that enemy moves even a little bit.

Sea beast is utterly useless on land. But what about the reverse?

The enemy is 20 ft away in water. The land beast swims up to 20 ft, hits for an average of 13 damage, and knocks them prone (if that applies in water) They would not have disadvantage on the attack most likely, because I do not believe that those rules apply to natural attacks, only to weapon attacks. The Sea beast swims up, hits for 8.5 damage and grapples. Granted, is the swimming enemy is more than 20 ft away, then the land beast will need to take extra turns, but we set both distances the same, and increasing the sea enemy distance means making the sea beast even more useless on land.

So, let us look at a few other scenarios.

We are on a boat, enemies attack. If the enemies climb up the boat, the Sea beast is on land. If we put the beast in the water... it is by itself against the entire enemy force.

Let us say we start fighting in the water, but need to climb back up the boat? The Sea beast literally has to dash to climb 5ft up the side of the boat. Meaning in a decent sized vessel that is say 10 ft from sea to deck, requires two turns of dashing for the Sea beast to climb back onto the deck.

Go underwater in a lake, and find a cave? Sea beast becomes useless the moment you hit the ground inside the cave, which is probably where most of the action is happening.


The only time it is useful is if the party is underwater, fighting at a medium distance, for the entire day or adventure. And even then, the Land Beast is doing decent underwater. With a casting of longstrider it can move 25 ft underwater per turn. More than most of your party members, and it hits harder.


So.. yeah, the Sea beast is worthless as written. My solution? Give it a land speed of 20 ft. Just like some of the gators, frogs, and lizards in the book. Then it is superior in the water, but not entirely useless outside of it.

Anything that doesn't have a swim speed gets disadvantage on melee weapon attacks, so that would apply to the Beast of the Land as well.

Then there's the whole it not being able to breathe under water thing...

The Beast of the Sea is not useless when used in it's appropriate environment, underwater sections (and even whole adventures) are a thing, this is just an option for those occasions and not really intended to be used otherwise by the looks of it.

Though if pepole actually have a problem with this then just ask to drop the swim speed down a little and bump up the land speed accordingly...

[Pex]

Someone got stuck with playing Aquaman.

[goodpeople25]

Someone got stuck with playing Aquaman.
Which (iteration of) Aquaman?

[Pex]

Which (iteration of) Aquaman?

There is only one Aquaman.

https://i.postimg.cc/WzWvHYf8/aquaman.jpg

[JackalTornMoons]

Is it really worth anyone's time to complain

Do you know which forums you’re posting on?

😀😀😀

JK love you guys and your ability to derail interesting discussion with pages of bickering over pedantics

[Foxhound438]

Anything that doesn't have a swim speed gets disadvantage on melee weapon attacks, so that would apply to the Beast of the Land as well.

Then there's the whole it not being able to breathe under water thing...

The Beast of the Sea is not useless when used in it's appropriate environment, underwater sections (and even whole adventures) are a thing, this is just an option for those occasions and not really intended to be used otherwise by the looks of it.

Though if pepole actually have a problem with this then just ask to drop the swim speed down a little and bump up the land speed accordingly...

A big difference though is that the spells that support land creatures in water are a lot better than the spells that support the beast of the sea on land - Longstrider is pretty cheap to use once in a while, but most of your campaign is probably boots on some kind of ground, so you'd have to spend a lot of your daily resources on this just to keep up with travel pace. "get a horse" doesn't always work, because once again, a DM can just veto this on the basis of not having the right anatomy. On the other hand, water breathing is a spell on the ranger's own list that lasts 24 hours, benefits the entire party, and is a ritual if the wizard or cleric takes it. Not having a swim speed can be hampering to the beast of land, but having an attack at disadvantage is probably better on average than not having an attack at all because you're too far away.

I would like to have it be like 20/40 or something, and I would certainly allow it if I were DMing, but I wish it was just in the book that way so I don't have to argue with "no homebrew ever" DM's for me to play this. "just rule it differently" doesn't work when I want to actually play a class myself.

[Dork_Forge]

A big difference though is that the spells that support land creatures in water are a lot better than the spells that support the beast of the sea on land - Longstrider is pretty cheap to use once in a while, but most of your campaign is probably boots on some kind of ground, so you'd have to spend a lot of your daily resources on this just to keep up with travel pace. "get a horse" doesn't always work, because once again, a DM can just veto this on the basis of not having the right anatomy. On the other hand, water breathing is a spell on the ranger's own list that lasts 24 hours, benefits the entire party, and is a ritual if the wizard or cleric takes it. Not having a swim speed can be hampering to the beast of land, but having an attack at disadvantage is probably better on average than not having an attack at all because you're too far away.

I would like to have it be like 20/40 or something, and I would certainly allow it if I were DMing, but I wish it was just in the book that way so I don't have to argue with "no homebrew ever" DM's for me to play this. "just rule it differently" doesn't work when I want to actually play a class myself.

I never suggested (and wouldn't) getting a horse to solve an animal speed issue.

Water Breathing allows you to be underwater for a significant period of time, it does nothing else to help you with the various hindrances of being submerged. There's an aside that there's a two level gap between getting to chose a beast and a fullcaster being able to choose that spell and 6 level gap for the Ranger.

This is also such a niche negative, you're only going to choose this beast if you're going to be dealing with underwater (or at the very least in water) section that's more than just a single obstacle. So sure, you could get caught on land and at a disadvantage, but you had a huge advantage for the bulk of that section (and do have tools to mitigate the speed issue). If this was a case of the flying creature, not the sea, then I'd understand this more as it's a more universal choice, but the combination of when you'll choose the beast with the even lower amount of time it could be a downside just don't seem significant enough to me.

On the topic of disadvantage on attacks for the land underwater, it's a pretty significant nerf and the movement speed is still so low that the beast could easily lose at least one turn before attacking, whilst being on that creature's home turf.

[Segev]

Could cast Fly on it?

[Luccan]

Could this problem have been addressed adequately by letting you choose when you summon a Beast of the Land if it gets either a Climb speed or Amphibiousness + Swim Speed? Would that have made it too good compared to Beast of the Air? Or would Swimming Land Beast be considered superior to Climbing Land Beast?

[Mork]

"Giant axolotl" is not a thing that had ever occurred to me before, which is genuinely tragic because it means I've wasted years of my life not having them in my fantasy worlds.
giant axolotl mini :D (https://forum.reapermini.com/uploads/monthly_2018_09/03913_Cailleach_DKS_1front-600h.jpg.99d1a69c035b68dbc6fd8df6aec287b5.jpg) (from reaper miniatures)


When I first read the top post, I was like.. why would a water compagnion work anywhere else except for underwater. It is a specific tool with for a specific situation (underwater campaigns).
But people have made good points that a lot of campaigns are amphibious.. on a boat, in a marsh etc, you want to move in both places..
I think I would rule that the land beast either has a 20ft climb OR swim speed. And if it has a swim speed the penalties of attacking underwater don't apply. The CON modifier # minutes to hold your breath are generous already, so I would just keep that.

[Chaosmancer]

Anything that doesn't have a swim speed gets disadvantage on melee weapon attacks, so that would apply to the Beast of the Land as well.

Then there's the whole it not being able to breathe under water thing...

The Beast of the Sea is not useless when used in it's appropriate environment, underwater sections (and even whole adventures) are a thing, this is just an option for those occasions and not really intended to be used otherwise by the looks of it.

Though if pepole actually have a problem with this then just ask to drop the swim speed down a little and bump up the land speed accordingly...


I thought the disadvantage applied only to weapons, but even if it is all attacks, that is the same thing the rest of the party is dealing with.

As for not breathing underwater, while true, the Beast can hold its breath for 3 minutes and 2 rounds of combat (going off memory) and since most combats barely last ten rounds, it is unlikely to be an issue for short periods of time.


And yes, you might have a whole adventure underwater... but I've certainly never seen it. The longest underwater I've ever seen was a single combat. And half the time the party either stayed out of the water or used Control Water to create dry land anyways. In 99% of all cases, the Beast of the Sea is never going to be used.

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Could cast Fly on it?

I was wondering if a fly speed would count for how fast you could swim. Not sure how that gets ruled RAW

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[Dork_Forge]

I thought the disadvantage applied only to weapons, but even if it is all attacks, that is the same thing the rest of the party is dealing with.

As for not breathing underwater, while true, the Beast can hold its breath for 3 minutes and 2 rounds of combat (going off memory) and since most combats barely last ten rounds, it is unlikely to be an issue for short periods of time.


And yes, you might have a whole adventure underwater... but I've certainly never seen it. The longest underwater I've ever seen was a single combat. And half the time the party either stayed out of the water or used Control Water to create dry land anyways. In 99% of all cases, the Beast of the Sea is never going to be used.

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I was wondering if a fly speed would count for how fast you could swim. Not sure how that gets ruled RAW

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The disadvantage applies to melee weapon attacks, which should include all melee attacks that aren't spell attacks. The other PCs will be subjected to it, unless they switch to a weapon that doesn't suffer from the disadvantage (basically piercing weapons). Though more party members being at disadvantage isn't better... It just means the beast isn't the only one at disadvantage.

Movement speed wise, I believe when something refers to movement it defaults to ground movement, as swim, climb and fly speeds are always explicitly labeled as such.

As for holding you breath yes, if you're ever under water for a single combat then holding your breath isn't going to be an issue for anyone that has a Con of +1 and above. Those are not the situations that you switch to a sea beast for.

I think it's okay and assumed that a sea beast will be used the least, it's a niche that adds versatility to the Beast master, not the de facto choice, that's the land beast and always will be.

[JackPhoenix]

See, that's what you get for playing with formless blob of stats instead of an actual (well, imaginary, but you know what I mean) animal.

[Garfunion]

I’m not sure what problem there is with a “land” speed of 5ft? What kind of “aquatic” creature do you want to hangout with on land?

[TigerT20]

Have people considered that both players and characters can do the things that are not the most tactically optimal?

Like has noone here ever had a player that made a choice based entirely off thematics instead of strength? If I wanna play Steve Irwin the Beastmaster, picking Beast of the Land and just saying 'well the crocodile is just a bad swimmer' feels... wrong.

I'm not saying that the Beast of the Sea should be just as good on land as the BotL, but it should still have viability on land, but just not it's full potential. Like... the BotL has in water.

[Dork_Forge]

Have people considered that both players and characters can do the things that are not the most tactically optimal?

Like has noone here ever had a player that made a choice based entirely off thematics instead of strength? If I wanna play Steve Irwin the Beastmaster, picking Beast of the Land and just saying 'well the crocodile is just a bad swimmer' feels... wrong.

I'm not saying that the Beast of the Sea should be just as good on land as the BotL, but it should still have viability on land, but just not it's full potential. Like... the BotL has in water.

People keep wanting this, but I can't think of a single animal that would actually fit as a justification for this.

Crocodiles aren't amphibious in the D&D sense, they hold their breath and so aren't applicable.

The beast of the sea appears to be based on an Octopus/Giant Octopus middle ground (swim speed of a Giant, land speed of regular, medium instead of small or large). Both of those creatures have abyssmal land speeds, they're Ocotpi, why would they have a competent land speed?

The best argument I can see for this is the frog/Giant frog, they're amphibious and have a more useable swim speed. Problem is their swim speed and land speed are equal, so you'd likely end up with a beast that's mediocre at both at that rate.

There doesn't seem to be any precedent for an amphibious creature that has a high swim speed but competent land speed and it doesn't even make sense for there to be one...

[Hellpyre]

I'm honestly confused why so many people seem set on comparing sea and lan beast on the assumption that you'll still be having most of your adventuring day on land. If that's the assumption you're running under, why take the sea beast at all. If you're in an underwater campaign, sea beast compares quite well to land beast on land. It's intended for certain situations. I don't see that it needs to be competitive outside its niche. Giving it a fly speed would be odd, wouldn't it. But the arguments don't seem to compare how bad a land beast is a hitting a creature flying several feet up compared to a beast of the air.

[Willie the Duck]

When I first read the top post, I was like.. why would a water compagnion work anywhere else except for underwater. It is a specific tool with for a specific situation (underwater campaigns).
But people have made good points that a lot of campaigns are amphibious.. on a boat, in a marsh etc, you want to move in both places..
I think I would rule that the land beast either has a 20ft climb OR swim speed. And if it has a swim speed the penalties of attacking underwater don't apply. The CON modifier # minutes to hold your breath are generous already, so I would just keep that.

This is pretty much where I land. They included a fish option -- for fishy situations. Not sure how this is a problem. In previous versions of the game, there might be entire prestige classes dedicated to living underwater and riding sharks, or AD&D or BECMI race choices where breathing air took a spell. This thing takes one night's sleep to change out, which is honestly pretty minimal a price (again, in previous versions one would need at least that much time to change out spell load-outs to prepare for an underwater foray, if not hunting down an Apparatus of Kwalish or similar).

That said, What I do think is missing is a better option for the amphibious/semi-aquatic adventure. This is an issue with the slow rollout of supplements/lack of product for this edition -- perfectly reasonable options are seen as a problem because they aren't something else (that is needed or wanted). In days past, alongside this book with the three basic types, there would be a Dragon magazine article with a bunch of specialty options like amphibious and glider and digger and maybe even splitting the fliers into slower-but-rugged, ultrafast, and maneuverable or similar.

[Foxhound438]

I’m not sure what problem there is with a “land” speed of 5ft? What kind of “aquatic” creature do you want to hangout with on land?


People keep wanting this, but I can't think of a single animal that would actually fit as a justification for this.


as per my original post, giant crab.


I'm honestly confused why so many people seem set on comparing sea and lan beast on the assumption that you'll still be having most of your adventuring day on land. If that's the assumption you're running under, why take the sea beast at all.


This is pretty much where I land. They included a fish option -- for fishy situations. Not sure how this is a problem.

Once again, ironic to make this argument when we had to complain for how many years that rangers getting bonuses to tracking and roughing through the wilderness are dead features in campaigns that don't feature tracking and roughing through the wilderness before they fixed that, in this very book. Once again, saying "just use the beast of the land" is the same as saying "just play a fighter", but the question remains, why does the ranger have to be comparatively useless outside of those situations? And they changed a whole pile of ranger features for this, and rangers weren't even so bad at being fighters compared to how useless beast of the sea is when an enemy is merely 15 feet away from the water.

[Segev]

Once again, saying "just use the beast of the land" is the same as saying "just play a fighter",

It's not the same thing, though; it's a daily choice, not a permanent or even long-term one. Playing a fighter vs. a ranger is a permanent choice.

[Telok]

as per my original post, giant crab.

Last time I did water stuff I took a giant (medium size) otter.

Frankly though, if you're doing "underwater" for long enough for breathing to matter then you're talking about everyone having water breathing because otherwise only one player gets to do anything.

[Dork_Forge]

as per my original post, giant crab.





Once again, ironic to make this argument when we had to complain for how many years that rangers getting bonuses to tracking and roughing through the wilderness are dead features in campaigns that don't feature tracking and roughing through the wilderness before they fixed that, in this very book. Once again, saying "just use the beast of the land" is the same as saying "just play a fighter", but the question remains, why does the ranger have to be comparatively useless outside of those situations? And they changed a whole pile of ranger features for this, and rangers weren't even so bad at being fighters compared to how useless beast of the sea is when an enemy is merely 15 feet away from the water.

A giant crab has speed parity, 30/30 at which point it makes a pretty lousy water specialist creature as a lot/most of the time specialist creatures will have their specialst speed be higher than the PC average of 30ft. If you want someting that can act in land and water at the drop of a hat, then just pick and deal with a Giant Crab, the stock BM rules allow for that. It's going to be worse in almost every conceivable way, but it won't have that crippling land speed you appear to be looking for in a water option right?

I'm also curious, is this the only example? If that's the case your expectations are based on an exception whereas the beast blocks seem to be trying to generically represent the average abilities of each environment's creatures.


If there is any chance whatsovever that you will be fighting on land any time soon just don't pick the Beast of the Sea, you don't like that ("just play a Fighter!") but at the same time you're taking a specialist creature out of its specialist environment and complaining about its performance (which coincidentally does not map with the Fighter/Ranger comparison you make).

[Garfunion]

as per my original post, giant crab.
There are many different species of crab that spend a lot of their life on land, additionally crabs don’t “swim” they walk on the sea floor and not very fast mind you. While the stat block of a crab might say something different, it was only designed that way to simplify it.

If it has legs with bones or exoskeleton it is a land companion.

[Chaosmancer]

Have people considered that both players and characters can do the things that are not the most tactically optimal?

Like has noone here ever had a player that made a choice based entirely off thematics instead of strength? If I wanna play Steve Irwin the Beastmaster, picking Beast of the Land and just saying 'well the crocodile is just a bad swimmer' feels... wrong.

I'm not saying that the Beast of the Sea should be just as good on land as the BotL, but it should still have viability on land, but just not it's full potential. Like... the BotL has in water.

This.

There is no option that is good for an amphibious situation, which is one that makes sense.

Sure "but crocodile's only hold their breath" but there are plenty of creatures that live in the sea that do that same thing, and if they really wanted to write "can hold its breath for three hours" then fine. The only time it wouldn't be useful then is a purely underwater campaign... and those are startlingly rare.

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A giant crab has speed parity, 30/30 at which point it makes a pretty lousy water specialist creature as a lot/most of the time specialist creatures will have their specialst speed be higher than the PC average of 30ft. If you want someting that can act in land and water at the drop of a hat, then just pick and deal with a Giant Crab, the stock BM rules allow for that. It's going to be worse in almost every conceivable way, but it won't have that crippling land speed you appear to be looking for in a water option right?

I'm also curious, is this the only example? If that's the case your expectations are based on an exception whereas the beast blocks seem to be trying to generically represent the average abilities of each environment's creatures.


If there is any chance whatsovever that you will be fighting on land any time soon just don't pick the Beast of the Sea, you don't like that ("just play a Fighter!") but at the same time you're taking a specialist creature out of its specialist environment and complaining about its performance (which coincidentally does not map with the Fighter/Ranger comparison you make).



I think part of the problem isn't that it is a "specialist option" but that it is the only specialist option out of the three.

A beast of the Land is good on land, and decent underwater.
A beast of the Sky is good on land or in the sky
A beast of the Sea is only viable in an underwater campaign, or when you are spending more than one or two moments underwater.

Sure, in an underwater only campaign, it is the only choice worth taking, or if you are doing a full adventuring day underwater it might be worth taking. But beyond that? It is useless in a way the other two aren't outside of their specialties.

[Dork_Forge]

This.

There is no option that is good for an amphibious situation, which is one that makes sense.

Sure "but crocodile's only hold their breath" but there are plenty of creatures that live in the sea that do that same thing, and if they really wanted to write "can hold its breath for three hours" then fine. The only time it wouldn't be useful then is a purely underwater campaign... and those are startlingly rare.

Choosing a creature that is meant to be exclusively good in water and it not being able to breathe underwater is underwhelming.




I think part of the problem isn't that it is a "specialist option" but that it is the only specialist option out of the three.

A beast of the Land is good on land, and decent underwater.
A beast of the Sky is good on land or in the sky
A beast of the Sea is only viable in an underwater campaign, or when you are spending more than one or two moments underwater.

Sure, in an underwater only campaign, it is the only choice worth taking, or if you are doing a full adventuring day underwater it might be worth taking. But beyond that? It is useless in a way the other two aren't outside of their specialties.


-A 20ft speed, normal breath holding rules and disadvantage on attacks is decent?
-A beast of the sky has a 10ft land speed, is a small creature and has the worst attack (no rider effect, smallest die for crits) and the worst HP max by a significant margin. The Beast of the Sky is basically a big Owl, it'll hit and run but that's it and it will go down very quickly when hit
-You're saying this like it's a problem, it's a niche option for aquatic campaigns, that's not a bad thing. The moment a Beast of the Land needs to go underwater for longer than 3 minutes it will start to drown. 3 minutes is a very low bar to surpass in a niche.

Why does the aquatic option have to be decent or anything else outside of water? It's litreally just intended for water use, it's not a bad thing that it isn't good on land when there's two other options that you'll actually use.

The support for aquatic campaigns has been ramping up throughout 5e's life cycle:

-We got waterbreathing and alter self initially

-Then we got Tritons

-Then we got a Warlock invocation that allowed for easier access to Water Breathing

-Then we got Sea Elves

-Now we have the Beast of the Sea

I'm pretty sure I've missed multiple options there but I think it's enough to illustrate my point, there's no downside here to the Beast existing as it is now. You're only ever going to summon it if you're going to need extensive water work.

[Willie the Duck]

Once again, ironic to make this argument when we had to complain for how many years that rangers getting bonuses to tracking and roughing through the wilderness are dead features in campaigns that don't feature tracking and roughing through the wilderness before they fixed that, in this very book. Once again, saying "just use the beast of the land" is the same as saying "just play a fighter", but the question remains, why does the ranger have to be comparatively useless outside of those situations? And they changed a whole pile of ranger features for this, and rangers weren't even so bad at being fighters compared to how useless beast of the sea is when an enemy is merely 15 feet away from the water.

I think you might want to clarify the point you think you are making. This seems like a hodge podge of grievances without an actual argument towards or against something underlying it.


Sure, in an underwater only campaign, it is the only choice worth taking, or if you are doing a full adventuring day underwater it might be worth taking. But beyond that? It is useless in a way the other two aren't outside of their specialties.
I'm going to fall back on, 'yes, and?...' This is the ranger equivalent to rules for boats -- they work when you run into water. Rarely have I needed boat rules, but I also don't find it especially odd to find them in a gaming book. 5e already has both rules for boats and rules for aquatic-only creatures (including in the pre-existing Beastmaster Ranger animal companion options). This option retains that for this new set of ranger rules (and you get to switch it out without your pet dying or similar).

[Chaosmancer]

Choosing a creature that is meant to be exclusively good in water and it not being able to breathe underwater is underwhelming.

And as an option you'll never take unless you need to be traveling underwater for an extended time? Most gamer will never see it.





-A 20ft speed, normal breath holding rules and disadvantage on attacks is decent?

Um, comparatively? Yes.

You average PC has 15 ft of movement, normal breathing and disadvantage under those circumstances, so you are already 5 ft up on most player characters.

And compared to the Sea beast on land, you are doing phenomenal.


-A beast of the sky has a 10ft land speed, is a small creature and has the worst attack (no rider effect, smallest die for crits) and the worst HP max by a significant margin. The Beast of the Sky is basically a big Owl, it'll hit and run but that's it and it will go down very quickly when hit

Land speed doesn't matter, unless you've got 1 ft tall ceilings.

Being a small creature can be an advantage, certainly doesn't harm anything.

It does have the worst attack value, but the rider is moving away without opportunity attacks, which off course plays into exactly what you said, hit and run. Which keeps it safe from a lot of potential enemies.



-You're saying this like it's a problem, it's a niche option for aquatic campaigns, that's not a bad thing. The moment a Beast of the Land needs to go underwater for longer than 3 minutes it will start to drown. 3 minutes is a very low bar to surpass in a niche.

Why does the aquatic option have to be decent or anything else outside of water? It's litreally just intended for water use, it's not a bad thing that it isn't good on land when there's two other options that you'll actually use.

The support for aquatic campaigns has been ramping up throughout 5e's life cycle:

-We got waterbreathing and alter self initially

-Then we got Tritons

-Then we got a Warlock invocation that allowed for easier access to Water Breathing

-Then we got Sea Elves

-Now we have the Beast of the Sea

I'm pretty sure I've missed multiple options there but I think it's enough to illustrate my point, there's no downside here to the Beast existing as it is now. You're only ever going to summon it if you're going to need extensive water work.


Yes, I am saying it like a bad thing. Because we got two general options and one that was hyper niche.

Meaning that in 99% of cases, we got two options. And, it really isn't hard to make this option less bad. Give it a 20 ft movement speed on land. Done. It is slow, and not a great option, but it is at least not entirely useless.

Because remember, most of the time people aren't playing Sea Elves or tritons, and they are already casting Waterbreathing, which can give the land beast the ability to breathe underwater at the same time the rest of the team gets that ability. So, the only time you would use this beast more than on a rare blue moon, is when you are part of an exclusively underwater campaign.



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I'm going to fall back on, 'yes, and?...' This is the ranger equivalent to rules for boats -- they work when you run into water. Rarely have I needed boat rules, but I also don't find it especially odd to find them in a gaming book. 5e already has both rules for boats and rules for aquatic-only creatures (including in the pre-existing Beastmaster Ranger animal companion options). This option retains that for this new set of ranger rules (and you get to switch it out without your pet dying or similar).


See, but that is part of the problem here, the Beast of the Sea doesn't work "when you run into water"

There is an event coming up in a game I am in. We are going to head to a "fathomless lake" to confront a monster and get a magic staff. I am planning on my character creating and stocking up on water breathing potions, because it will be a long swim down.

I also fully expect to find a dry cave where the actual adventure will take place.

And this is one of the only times in my entire time with 5e we will be using the underwater rules. Other times?

A single fight against water spirits in a cave.

A flooded cave that the Cleric emptied with Control Water.

Another fight in a flooded cave against Chuul.


And that's it. And if I took a Beast of the Sea into any of those at the start of the day... well first off all, other than the lake, known of us knew it was coming for the day, so I couldn't even make that decision, but if I did... it would have been for a few minute combat where there was also dry land to utilize.

The only time you would use a Beast of a Sea is an exlcusively underwater campaign, featuring only Sea elves and Tritons.

Pirate Campaign? Nope. Can't get back on the boat, so it will be alone in the water to be attacked by whatever enemies come from the deep

Coastal Campaign? Nope. Too much time on land, won't get a chance to use it.

It just doesn't have a use except for a single, very rare, campaign. That is just far too niche.

[Unoriginal]

Have people considered that both players and characters can do the things that are not the most tactically optimal?

Like has noone here ever had a player that made a choice based entirely off thematics instead of strength?

You mean, not tactically optimal like picking a Beast of the Sea with a 5ft land speed?

[TigerT20]

You mean, not tactically optimal like picking a Beast of the Sea with a 5ft land speed?

The thing is that it's too unoptimal. Players should be allowed to play land-based characters with amphibious/aquatic partners because noone will ever play an Octonauts campaign. Ever. So if they want an aquatic theme, they're going for Florida Man and Professor Octo.

Yes, crocodiles can't breathe underwater forever and octopi have slow land speeds.

But this is a magic crocodile using the power of freindship. Noone's questioning why your eagle buddy is just a big owl or why Gizzard the Lizard, a komodo dragon, has the same statblock as Bjorn With A Horn, a rhino. It's a primal beast with mysterious origins, it's not gonna be your bog-standard hippo/frog/crab/axolotl/baby whale on a skateboard

Noone will ever play an Octonauts campaign.

[Lolzyking]

As a long time Giant crab guy I feel the giant crab is simple superior to the beast of the sea in every facet other than health (DAMN YOU NEW SCALING!)

I also feel the Pteranodon is superior to the beast of sky.

As for the Land beast....eh.... Frog/Spider/Wolf/Badger are competitive choices.

[stoutstien]

I'm surprised there hasn't been a bigger complaint that the new beasts' attack modifiers are based on the rangers spell attack modifier. This works fine for the artificer that is basically SaD but rangers don't have that luxury. They do have the ability to grab druid cantrips as a fighting style but then you have action conflicts.

[Foxhound438]

Choosing a creature that is meant to be exclusively good in water and it not being able to breathe underwater is underwhelming.


You mean, not tactically optimal like picking a Beast of the Sea with a 5ft land speed?

I feel like you're missing the point.

Hypothetically (this is decidedly not a real situation for me right now because of pandemic-y things, but bear with me), I want to play a ranger with something of a sea theme because my DM just picked up a copy of Ghosts of Saltmarsh, which is specifically advertised as a sea campaign book, and the whole group wants to be aquatic themed characters to fit the game. In an ideal world, I would pick beast of the sea and have my crab companion (or walrus, or crocodile, or penguin, or whatever else) and be able to have fun adventures fighting alongside my companion on land (where most of the game is) or at sea. However, because someone at WotC decided that beast of the sea has to be exclusively good in water, to the point of being not usable at all in an effective sense elsewhere, I have to take beast of the land all the time or just be a vanilla ranger with no subclass for most of the game. The question is, why? Why can't there be a beast of the sea that is viable for combats that occur a whole 10 feet away from water? why does picking one specific theme have to cripple a subclass's flagship feature so hard that you have to sacrifice thematic fit for re-skinned numbers that are good?


As a long time Giant crab guy I feel the giant crab is simple superior to the beast of the sea in every facet other than health (DAMN YOU NEW SCALING!

I completely agree with old crab being better, but on top of having worse health for using the old rules, you're also stuck with the garbage action economy mechanics. You don't get to command the beast to attack as a bonus action for the old style beast companions, and not taking the attack action yourself means you can't even take advantage of two weapon fighting or crossbow expert to get something out of that part of your turn. It's just ridiculous that that's still more attractive than the "upgraded" beast of the sea.

[JackPhoenix]

I completely agree with old crab being better, but on top of having worse health for using the old rules, you're also stuck with the garbage action economy mechanics. You don't get to command the beast to attack as a bonus action for the old style beast companions, and not taking the attack action yourself means you can't even take advantage of two weapon fighting or crossbow expert to get something out of that part of your turn. It's just ridiculous that that's still more attractive than the "upgraded" beast of the sea.

No, it's not riddiculous. Both choices being valid in different situations instead of one being straight-up superior is a good design.

[Unoriginal]

[/B] The question is, why? Why can't there be a beast of the sea that is viable for combats that occur a whole 10 feet away from water?

I have a different question: why do you think that Beast of the Sea is not viable for land combat?

I know it's because of the 5ft speed, but WHY does that speed make it not viable, in your mind?

[Lolzyking]

I have a different question: why do you think that Beast of the Sea is not viable for land combat?

I know it's because of the 5ft speed, but WHY does that speed make it not viable, in your mind?

Because most of the time dm's rule that after any movement in water a creature with a 5 foot land move speed does not have the required movement left to disembark the water.

Most people wanting an aquatic theme beast master pet want one that is semi aquatic and don't enjoy changing stat blocks willy nilly.


Personally I'm just sad that this doesn't fix the beast master. the new beasts are weaker in most areas compared to the bog standard cr 1/8 and 1/4th creatures we have access to. One horrendous point is the change to spell attack modifier as their hit chance.....what? Before rangers just added proficiency their pets hit chance.


The only thing beast masters needed was
A) bonus action to make pet attack if you didn't use the attack action this turn.
B) pet gets an ASI when you get a Ranger ASI.
C) all old pets get the new pets health scaling.

[Yakk]

The only thing beast masters needed was
A) bonus action to make pet attack if you didn't use the attack action this turn.
B) pet gets an ASI when you get a Ranger ASI.
C) all old pets get the new pets health scaling.
I don't think a pet ASI is a good option; it adds too much complexity (and plausible mistakes) to the beastmaster for little return.

[Unoriginal]

Because most of the time dm's rule that after any movement in water a creature with a 5 foot land move speed does not have the required movement left to disembark the water.

What if the Beast starts next to the land? Or is already on land? Or can Dash?

[Luccan]

What if the Beast starts next to the land? Or is already on land? Or can Dash?

With a speed that low, it's not unreasonable for a foe to have moved or fallen before your beast actually gets there. And it's also fairly likely it'll take at least another round of Dashing before finally being next to a foe you can hit. 2-3 rounds of nothing but movement and combat might be nearly over by then. That's assuming you start close enough for you beast getting there being remotely reasonable. If you start more than 30ft away from you enemies you'll probably have beaten them by the time your beast has crawled over. It's not even an extra sack of hit points at that point, because it's so irrelevant only mindless enemies will have a reason to attack it.

[Chaosmancer]

With a speed that low, it's not unreasonable for a foe to have moved or fallen before your beast actually gets there. And it's also fairly likely it'll take at least another round of Dashing before finally being next to a foe you can hit. 2-3 rounds of nothing but movement and combat might be nearly over by then. That's assuming you start close enough for you beast getting there being remotely reasonable. If you start more than 30ft away from you enemies you'll probably have beaten them by the time your beast has crawled over. It's not even an extra sack of hit points at that point, because it's so irrelevant only mindless enemies will have a reason to attack it.

This exactly.

I have seen multiple combats where the melee fighters are 40 ft away from the action, requiring them to dash.

The Beast of the Sea needs to dash for 4 turns, assuming the enemy does not move. If the enemy takes a 5 ft step back every turn? 6 turns.


But, there is another aspect people aren't talking about that is even worse. Overland travel.

Let us say you are playing a sea campaign, and come to an island. And everyone says "cool, lets explore this island". Your normal walking speed is 300 ft per minute or 3 miles per hour. This is based (roughly) on the 30 ft per round speed of walking.

A Beast of the Sea has 5. Meaning that if you want to walk the island to find something it not takes you 50 ft a minute, or half a mile per hour.

And if you decide to carry your medium sized beast? Your movement is cut in half, which still slows the party down to half their normal travel speed.

All to keep a beast who can't even fight effectively with the party.

[Dork_Forge]

This exactly.

I have seen multiple combats where the melee fighters are 40 ft away from the action, requiring them to dash.

The Beast of the Sea needs to dash for 4 turns, assuming the enemy does not move. If the enemy takes a 5 ft step back every turn? 6 turns.


But, there is another aspect people aren't talking about that is even worse. Overland travel.

Let us say you are playing a sea campaign, and come to an island. And everyone says "cool, lets explore this island". Your normal walking speed is 300 ft per minute or 3 miles per hour. This is based (roughly) on the 30 ft per round speed of walking.

A Beast of the Sea has 5. Meaning that if you want to walk the island to find something it not takes you 50 ft a minute, or half a mile per hour.

And if you decide to carry your medium sized beast? Your movement is cut in half, which still slows the party down to half their normal travel speed.

All to keep a beast who can't even fight effectively with the party.

Except that movement speed doesn't matter outside of combat, the movement section (PHB pg 181) doesn't discriminate how fast you move based on your in combat speed, if it did then you'd have Wood Elves moving faster or everyone slowing down for the Halflings, Gnomes and Dwarves.

[Chaosmancer]

Except that movement speed doesn't matter outside of combat, the movement section (PHB pg 181) doesn't discriminate how fast you move based on your in combat speed, if it did then you'd have Wood Elves moving faster or everyone slowing down for the Halflings, Gnomes and Dwarves.

By this logic then getting horses doesn't make overland travel faster, because there is nothing that gives you a per mile change for riding horses. Except we know horses are faster and we adjust based on the numbers which are rather explicit (300 ft per minute is literally the average of combat speed)

[JackPhoenix]

By this logic then getting horses doesn't make overland travel faster, because there is nothing that gives you a per mile change for riding horses. Except we know horses are faster and we adjust based on the numbers which are rather explicit (300 ft per minute is literally the average of combat speed)

Indeed. Horses are explicitly mentioned as being faster over short distances, but they don't increase speed for overland travel otherwise.

[Unoriginal]

Indeed. Horses are explicitly mentioned as being faster over short distances, but they don't increase speed for overland travel otherwise.

IIRC they do affect something about the exhaustion one can get from the overland travel, which indirectly can makes the trip shorter than if you have to worry about not pushing the PCs past their limits.

Or I could be misremembering.

[Valmark]

I mean... Of course it's going to be hard to use on land when it's a beast of the sea instead of the land. It's like saying that the beast of the land is terrible 'cause it can't breath underwater when it needs to.

That said, it's not unusable. Try using a shark on land, you can tell me how it went later. It has, besides hp, worst stats then other amphibious options (not by much) if I saw correctly but better mobility underwater (sacrificing land speed), substantially more hp, better action economy and better saves/skills.

I haven't compared it to strictly-acquatic options but I'd expect the Beast of the Sea to have the same rough comparison with the caveat that it can actually work on land in exchange for not being more manueverable in water.

Everybody will have their opinion, but imo I'd take the Beast of the Sea for acquatic campaigns- if you want to use it extensively on land sure, but you can't then blame the feature if you are using it for something it's not made for when you have a whole other version to use for it. Two if we consider Air.

This ignoring the fact that you can just switch it on a long rest.

If you never were in a situation where a mainly water-based companion would have been useful... That's just you. Picking the water option and saying that it sucks on land is kinda pointless.


IIRC they do affect something about the exhaustion one can get from the overland travel, which indirectly can makes the trip shorter than if you have to worry about not pushing the PCs past their limits.

Or I could be misremembering.

Water vehicles ignore penalties from Fast Pace and bonuses from Slow Pace, while horses just let you cover double the distance for an hour. More if you can get fresh horses every... 8 to 10 miles I think it says?

Neither of those deal with exhaustion BUT it does say that depending on current and wind the ships can keep traveling 24/24.

I don't know enough about traveling by boat or on horse to know if all this makes sense, but regarding overland travel having horses doesn't do that much unless you keep changing them. And as JackPhoenix said the rules don't really care about the exact speed the characters in the group have.

[Dork_Forge]

By this logic then getting horses doesn't make overland travel faster, because there is nothing that gives you a per mile change for riding horses. Except we know horses are faster and we adjust based on the numbers which are rather explicit (300 ft per minute is literally the average of combat speed)

It's not logic, it's game rules they don't have to align with one another. Combat speed is an abstraction of short bursts when one's life is under threat (paraphrasing), so using speeds for overland travel isn't appropriate either way you slice it.

Movement speed has no bearing on out of combat travel like you described, if oyu don't like it then you can change it, but at the same time if you don't like the beast of the sea's speed then you can change it too.

[AdAstra]

By this logic then getting horses doesn't make overland travel faster, because there is nothing that gives you a per mile change for riding horses. Except we know horses are faster and we adjust based on the numbers which are rather explicit (300 ft per minute is literally the average of combat speed)

Honestly, that kinda tracks. When a horse is loaded down with people and stuff on it, its practical speed over a long time tends to plummet. Traveling much faster than people can while mounted will exhaust a horse quite quickly. They'll still be faster, but DnD's assumptions for how far people can travel in a day are pretty optimistic to begin with (30 miles in a day is basically a forced march), and the difference in speed is not massive.

The Mongols could do much better, but that was due to a variety of specific factors (the Mongols tend to subvert a lot of typical stuff). They achieved something like 80 miles a day because their horses were bred for endurance and hardiness over speed and size. They also had multiple horses per rider, as many as half a dozen, which allowed the rider to transfer between horses to avoid exhausting them too badly. Mongolian horses also tolerated going without feed so long as they could graze, which reduced how much they needed to carry. And even then, terrain can slow that down significantly.

[Quietus]

That's my understanding, as well. Having a (one) horse, with absolutely minimal kit, will increase your pace over a long distance. However, as soon as you start getting them to carry all kinds of equipment (see : 50 lbs of armor, etc) on top of carrying you, and relying on one single horse to do all the work? They're really not going to increase your pace, they just make it possible to carry all of that stuff.

[Chaosmancer]

Well, this is literally the first time I've ever heard that the party buying horses to ride make zero difference in their travel speed. I would fully expect that spending that much money there would be some difference in your ability to travel, but I suppose it is purely aesthetic and a waste of money.

[Valmark]

Well, this is literally the first time I've ever heard that the party buying horses to ride make zero difference in their travel speed. I would fully expect that spending that much money there would be some difference in your ability to travel, but I suppose it is purely aesthetic and a waste of money.

And being able to carry more loot.

[TigerT20]

Well, this is literally the first time I've ever heard that the party buying horses to ride make zero difference in their travel speed. I would fully expect that spending that much money there would be some difference in your ability to travel, but I suppose it is purely aesthetic and a waste of money.

Well, you can use them in combat, among other things. So not useless, just not as useful as may have been originally thought.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Well, this is literally the first time I've ever heard that the party buying horses to ride make zero difference in their travel speed. I would fully expect that spending that much money there would be some difference in your ability to travel, but I suppose it is purely aesthetic and a waste of money.

It's a well known fact that humans are better long-distance runners than almost any other animal. In part because we can eat on the move (which they cannot).

Instead, horses allow
* more comfortable travel--the horse is doing the work.
* higher capacity, especially when the horse is pulling something.
* faster in bursts. This can translate to faster overall coverage if you can change out horses every few miles (CF ancient post stations, up to the Pony Express).
* the ability to do mounted combat (which ties into the higher capacity and faster in bursts pieces).

For adventurers, horses mainly are useful for the higher capacity. And it's probably best to get a few mules to carry stuff.

[Ettina]

Why are so many DMs putting random air-filled caves underwater? That seems like an odd feature for an underwater cave.

[Luccan]

Why are so many DMs putting random air-filled caves underwater? That seems like an odd feature for an underwater cave.

Underwater adventuring generally isn't particularly well thought out and few parties can do it well regardless. You need to cast a spell every day for it to work for the vast majority of PCs for longer adventures and it interacts with fighting in a way a lot of players won't find fun (both explicitly by RAW and by the DM answering questions like "what happens if you use Lightning Bolt at the bottom of the ocean?"). And if you're too far below the surface you absolutely need Darkvision to see anything and the human Fighter probably doesn't have the Light cantrip. Breathable caves might not make much sense, but you can at least try to eat your cake and have it too by doing the one big watery fight outside or in the main chamber at the end, while the rest of it takes place in a fairly normal environment. The sort of place your human Fighter can use a flint and steel and torches.

Depending on the bad guys, they might also be able to breath air and a fairly dry cavern, if they could manage it, would also be ideal for keeping certain treasures whole for a longer period of time.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I'm in the middle of an underwater arc. Don't tell my players, but not all of it will be wet. Why? Because magic. And kneecaps. Swimming things don't have kneecaps very often, and one player gets really grumpy if they can't break kneecaps every few sessions.

[Yakk]

Why are so many DMs putting random air-filled caves underwater? That seems like an odd feature for an underwater cave.

Have you never played terraria?