Druid Animal Companion

Valavien · Sep 9, 2003

I am just about to start converting my Druid to 3.5 and I came upon an interpretation problem with the Animal Companion advancement info and table.

I am not sure how the table works, do the figures represent how much extra HD (etc) an animal ganes with each level increase or do the numbers represent the total increase from the base animal?

So does the animal gain +2 HD when my druid reaches '3rd-5th' level and then an additional +4 HD when my druid reaches '6th-8th' to make it a total of +6HD?

The description leads me to believe that this is the case because for STR/DEX increase it says that this value is added to the companions str/dex score. So at 3rd level a wolf's str would now actually be 14 not 13 and at 6th the str score would be 16.

umm, any thoughts on this?

Legildur · Sep 9, 2003

No. The table reflects the cumulative bonuses (or is that bonii?)

Anyway, a 6th level druid's animal companion would have +4 bonus HD, +4 natural armor, +2 to base Str and Dex, 3 bonus tricks, and the Link, Share Spells, Evasion, and Devotion special abilities.

jgsugden · Sep 9, 2003

Legildur said:
No. The table reflects the cumulative bonuses (or is that bonii?)

Anyway, a 6th level druid's animal companion would have +4 bonus HD, +4 natural armor, +2 to base Str and Dex, 3 bonus tricks, and the Link, Share Spells, Evasion, and Devotion special abilities.

This is correct. Also remember to give your animal extra skill points (usually 1/HD), ability score adjustments (+1 / 4 levels) and feats (+1 / 3 levels). For instance, when a druid goes to 3rd level, his wolf gains +2 HD, +2 natural armor, +1 strength/dex, 1 bonus trick, 2 skill points, 1 ability score adjustment (for gaining a total of 4 HD ... best used on constitution, I'd say) and 1 feat (for gaining 3 HD).

According to Andy Collins (Revised 3.5 PHB lead revisionist), animal companions do not increase in size when gaining HD. They are also animals, not magical beasts according to Andy.

Valavien · Sep 10, 2003

Thanks that is very helpful.

Where did you get that information from?

jgsugden · Sep 10, 2003

Valavien said:
Thanks that is very helpful.

Where did you get that information from?

I don't remember if it was from the big 3.5 answers thread on the wizards board or if it was from things on Andy's board at his web site at http://www.andycollins.net/.

Brekki · Sep 10, 2003

What an animal gets when increasing HD is in the MM.

The no-size-change is from Andy's board: http://pub36.ezboard.com/bgameschat19968

Legildur · Sep 10, 2003

I know Andy is revered by many, particularly in his role as the head reviser (or whatever his fancy title was for the revision work resulting in 3.5E), but until I see any errata my DM and I reckon my Druid's wolf companion is now large size (for better and for worse) due to the bonus HD.