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Beastmaster's animal companion: can it survive for 2 rounds?
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<blockquote data-quote="Mouseferatu" data-source="post: 6372304" data-attributes="member: 1288"><p>See, if I was rebuilding the companion feature from the ground up, I'd do something very much like that. Have it deal damage based on the needs/level of the ranger (like in 4e), rather than based on what the same critter in the MM did. I like it, in theory. <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite1" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":)" /></p><p></p><p>But I'm trying to find a way that avoids wholesale rewriting. <img src="http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/nervous.png" class="smilie" loading="lazy" alt=":heh:" title="Nervous Laugh :heh:" data-shortname=":heh:" /> I'm trying to just balance it, more or less as-is, with the hunter ranger, or thereabouts; and since I <em>do</em> want to keep it more or less as-is, I'm reluctant to change the ACo's damage from RAW.</p><p></p><p>Having an ACo make an attack has more versatility than Hunter's Prey options, so it should do less--or at least no more--damage. The HP options are all (on average) based around d8s. One of them specifies d8, the others are weapon-based, so d8--the best one-handed martial weapon--is a good baseline. It's hard to balance that against the ACo's attack, since they vary so widely (and since some have riders, like the wolf's trip attack). But it's easy to balance against the ranger's own weapon attack.</p><p></p><p>Where it runs into problems is where balance smacks up against verisimilitude. Mechanically, it makes sense the ACo can't attack if the ranger casts a spell, dashes, or does anything other than attack. After all, the hunter only gets most of his bonuses if he attacks, and neither he nor the TWFer can make an off-hand attack if they aren't taking the attack action.</p><p></p><p>But in terms of verisimilitude, why can't Fido bite while you cast a spell, if he can bite while you attack someone other than who he's attacking?</p><p></p><p>I'm still working on reconciling that. <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite9" alt=":eek:" title="Eek! :eek:" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":eek:" /></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Mouseferatu, post: 6372304, member: 1288"] See, if I was rebuilding the companion feature from the ground up, I'd do something very much like that. Have it deal damage based on the needs/level of the ranger (like in 4e), rather than based on what the same critter in the MM did. I like it, in theory. :) But I'm trying to find a way that avoids wholesale rewriting. :heh: I'm trying to just balance it, more or less as-is, with the hunter ranger, or thereabouts; and since I [I]do[/I] want to keep it more or less as-is, I'm reluctant to change the ACo's damage from RAW. Having an ACo make an attack has more versatility than Hunter's Prey options, so it should do less--or at least no more--damage. The HP options are all (on average) based around d8s. One of them specifies d8, the others are weapon-based, so d8--the best one-handed martial weapon--is a good baseline. It's hard to balance that against the ACo's attack, since they vary so widely (and since some have riders, like the wolf's trip attack). But it's easy to balance against the ranger's own weapon attack. Where it runs into problems is where balance smacks up against verisimilitude. Mechanically, it makes sense the ACo can't attack if the ranger casts a spell, dashes, or does anything other than attack. After all, the hunter only gets most of his bonuses if he attacks, and neither he nor the TWFer can make an off-hand attack if they aren't taking the attack action. But in terms of verisimilitude, why can't Fido bite while you cast a spell, if he can bite while you attack someone other than who he's attacking? I'm still working on reconciling that. :o [/QUOTE]
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