Ranger Animal Companion and Magic Weapons

[Caliber]

In way of explaining my question, I'll use an example from the Compendium:


Ranger Attack 1 Synchronized Strike
You command your beast companion to tear into your opponent, opening a gap for you to exploit.
Encounter Beast, Martial, Weapon
Standard Action Melee weapon (beast 1)
Target: One creature
Primary Attack: Beast’s attack bonus vs. AC
Hit: 1 + beast’s Strength modifier damage.
Effect: You make a secondary attack against the target.
Secondary Attack: Strength vs. Reflex
Hit: 1[W] + Strength modifier damage.

Notice, in particular, that this power possesses the Weapon keyword. Now my question:

For the primary attack, the attack bonus is the Beast's attack bonus vs AC. I accept that a Ranger's magic weapon would not add to this bonus. But what about the damage roll? 1 + beast's Strength mod ... + magic item bonus? For the record, the CB DID include the bonus for my Ranger's weapon in the damage.

But that begs other questions ... would a crit from my Beast's attack also trigger the crit property of my weapon? In this particular case, I have a Rending Greataxe, so the crit property is that I get to make a basic attack. Who would make this attack? Me (the Ranger) or my Beast?

Thanks in advance for your help!

 

[Mort_Q]

It would never have occurred to me to add any of the magic weapon bonuses to anything other than the secondary [W] attack.

 

[Caliber]

It would never have occurred to me to add any of the magic weapon bonuses to anything other than the secondary [W] attack.

Same here, actually. It was the CB that first brought this to my attention. When thinking about it, however, I realized there is some measure of precedent. The Fighter and Warlord, for example, get attacks that have a Secondary Attack which represents a victorious shout or a punch to the face; in both cases magical weapon bonuses are factored in because the attack has the Weapon keyword.

Anyone have an opinion/ruling on how a magical weapon and a Ranger's companion interact when using Weapon AND Beast keyword attack powers?

 

[Sunglare]

Same here, actually. It was the CB that first brought this to my attention. When thinking about it, however, I realized there is some measure of precedent. The Fighter and Warlord, for example, get attacks that have a Secondary Attack which represents a victorious shout or a punch to the face; in both cases magical weapon bonuses are factored in because the attack has the Weapon keyword.

Anyone have an opinion/ruling on how a magical weapon and a Ranger's companion interact when using Weapon AND Beast keyword attack powers?

Well of course the power has the Weapon keyword, you're going to be making a attack with this power. I don't see anywhere ont he Beast hit line that you include the magic weapon damage. it's pretty spelled out what you do get. Did the power on the CB break out the two damages? I don't have access right now. Maybe you were just looking at the secondary hit damage.

 

[Oompa]

The first attack gets the beast keyword because its made by the beast..

The second attack gets the weapon keyword because its made by you..

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I think there are basically 2 answers. The first answer is the RAW answer. By RAW the attack has the weapon keyword and thus all bonuses, to-hit and damage, applicable to a weapon attack should be factored in. There is no way by the rules for a weapon to add to only to-hit or only damage (unless a specific rule for that item).

The RAI answer is that the primary attack should have the beast keyword, and the secondary attack should have the weapon keyword, IMHO. Thus you would get nothing for your weapon on the beast primary attack, and both to-hit and damage bonus for it on the secondary.

Thirdly, CB is not a rules compendium. Don't judge ANYTHING based on what CB does. Not that it isn't better at figuring things out than most of us are, but it is just code and when it goes wrong, it is just plain wrong. Customer Service is one step better than CB, but they get things wrong a lot too, and sometimes they make no sense at all. The PHB etc FAQ entries are 'more official' than CS, but even those seem wrong at times. Make sure you keep up to date on errata if you have tricky questions like this too, often it does answer them and is certainly official (and so far pretty high quality).

So, to summarize, CB is wrong. In fact it is just plain wrong on both attacks.

 

[Caliber]

As a related question, would a Fighter get the bonuses from his magic weapon when using the Pit Fighter 20 attack, Lion of Battle? After dropping a foe he makes a fearsome yell in a Close burst 5 that is Str vs Will. What about the Pit Fighter 11 All Bets Are Off, which involves an attack and a follow up punch?

Weapon bonus to-hit and damage?

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

As a related question, would a Fighter get the bonuses from his magic weapon when using the Pit Fighter 20 attack, Lion of Battle? After dropping a foe he makes a fearsome yell in a Close burst 5 that is Str vs Will. What about the Pit Fighter 11 All Bets Are Off, which involves an attack and a follow up punch?

Weapon bonus to-hit and damage?

By RAW if it has the weapon keyword then it is a weapon attack and it gets weapon enhancement bonus, proficiency bonus, etc. Keywords are binary, they either exist and you get all the benefits, or they don't and you don't. Of course individual powers with secondary attacks can attach different keywords to the secondary, so they can write a power that has different bonuses applying to each part of the power use. WotC seems to be pretty schizy about how they structure these kinds of powers though. If you read through various powers of the general "provides a secondary attack" ilk you will find they've utilized a wide variety of different approaches and thus created a whole slew of different corner cases.

 

[Caliber]

Thanks for your thoughts/opinions everyone. You've given me a bit to chew on. It does seem that the format of powers like this is somewhat haphazard. I'll have to come to some agreement with my DM.