Fleshraker dinosaur animal companion -- opinions?

[moritheil]

The basic concept behind "ravages" is: it's like poison, but you can use it and stay Exalted.

It is indeed a silly book.

Cheers, -- N

Insert 10-page flamefest about ontological evil, ethics, and morality.

There. Just preempting so no one else undertakes it.

 

[Maldor]

How do you manage to have characters with exalted feats adventuring with evil characters?

It's pretty much spelled out that characters with exalted feats have to be the epitome of -goodness- To me that precludes adventuring with people whom you know to be morally unsound. If the cleric has even cast detect evil and knows there are evil PCs, then that is all the evidence you need....So in the interest of avoiding PCs kiling PCs either the evil PC needs to go, or the exalted character needs to go.


I think what the other guy meant about using poisons was that the rules explicitly say that using poison is considered an evil act, even though it doesen't automatically make your alignment evil if you use it. Either way exalted characters are prohibited from doing 'evil things' otherwise they aren't really exalted afterall. As such, you should be prohibited from taking animal companions that use poison, or inflicting poison on your enemies (except for ravages). You also can't cast the Poison Spell, or Creeping Doom since they inflict poisons. Tell the druid to be happy with his Dienonychus.

so since pioson is evil that mean in your game all vipers and piosons spiders are evil
i'm also not wear of good creatures not being able to use pioson i know the pallys can't but thats becuase it's dishonorable

P.S. don't forget BOED is 3.0 and many of the things it says are evil arn't in 3.5 like Death magic

 

[Nifft]

so since pioson is evil that mean in your game all vipers and piosons spiders are evil

Of course not. Animals and vermin don't have enough intelligence to be moral beings. They're always Neutral -- not by choice, but rather by default. They're not Lawful or Chaotic, either.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Failed Saving Throw]

Why isn't one of these two dead?

-- N

The warblade was attacked by a spear-wielding lhosk, and I rolled two 20s in a row on him. The crit killed him.

The Fleshraker animal companion was dropped by an angry chimera.

 

[Plane Sailing]

What's the assessment of the balance of the fleshraker dinosaur (MMIII), particularly as an animal companion?

I consider it to be completely over the top compared to other comparable creatures.

I seem to recall reading some kind of playtest report (not 4e) on the wizards.com site which mentioned how a fleshraker animal companion completely dominated a game.

Regards

 

[Jack99]

What's the assessment of the balance of the fleshraker dinosaur (MMIII), particularly as an animal companion?

It's broken for it's CR.

 

[eamon]

It's broken for it's CR.

The fleshraker's pretty powerful for an animal companion of a 4th level druid.

On the other hand, if the entire party is heavily min-maxxed (and it looks like they are) a puny animal like the fleshraker isn't going to be dominating the game.

In any case, druid animal companions are pretty good around those levels: A 3rd level druid can have a riding dog animal companion advanced by 2HD (in total thus 4HD and more than the druid himself), with more hit points than the fleshraker you only get next level and if you invest its feat in improved natural armor, the same AC. Of course, you don't get the insane # of attacks and poison, but I'm just saying that low-level druid's have pretty good animal companions in any case. A fleshraker's more powerful than other CR2 animals, but in a high-power party, it's not a big issue.

 

[Jack99]

The fleshraker's pretty powerful for an animal companion of a 4th level druid.

On the other hand, if the entire party is heavily min-maxxed (and it looks like they are) a puny animal like the fleshraker isn't going to be dominating the game.

In any case, druid animal companions are pretty good around those levels: A 3rd level druid can have a riding dog animal companion advanced by 2HD (in total thus 4HD and more than the druid himself), with more hit points than the fleshraker you only get next level and if you invest its feat in improved natural armor, the same AC. Of course, you don't get the insane # of attacks and poison, but I'm just saying that low-level druid's have pretty good animal companions in any case. A fleshraker's more powerful than other CR2 animals, but in a high-power party, it's not a big issue.

Comparing the riding dog to the fleshraker:

riding dog (for a 4th level druid) 4d8+8 hp, bite +6 1d6+4 damage, ac 19
fleshraker (and lets forget about natural bond, since it is a very debated feat) 4d8+8 hp, claws(2) +6 1d6+3+poison, bite +1 1d6+1, tail 1d6+1+poison, ac 20

So, same HPs, more or less same AC (fleshraker wins by a very small margin). However, max damage (no crits) for the mutt is 10, while it is 32 + 18 dex damage for the fleshraker. Even though 2 of the attacks has little chance to hit, the claw attacks are just as good as the dog's, there are two of them, with dex poison damage on top.

That is, in my mind, quite a bit of a difference. Not to mention that the fleshraker can benefit much more from the feats that it will gain as it increases in HD (multi-attack and focus ability (poison) both come to mind). The DEX damage is lethal against many targets.

Anyway, YMMV ofc.

Cheers

 

[eamon]

Comparing the riding dog to the fleshraker:

riding dog (for a 4th level druid) 4d8+8 hp, bite +6 1d6+4 damage, ac 19
fleshraker (and lets forget about natural bond, since it is a very debated feat) 4d8+8 hp, claws(2) +6 1d6+3+poison, bite +1 1d6+1, tail 1d6+1+poison, ac 20

So, same HPs, more or less same AC (fleshraker wins by a very small margin). However, max damage (no crits) for the mutt is 10, while it is 32 + 18 dex damage for the fleshraker. Even though 2 of the attacks has little chance to hit, the claw attacks are just as good as the dog's, there are two of them, with dex poison damage on top.

That is, in my mind, quite a bit of a difference. Not to mention that the fleshraker can benefit much more from the feats that it will gain as it increases in HD (multi-attack and focus ability (poison) both come to mind). The DEX damage is lethal against many targets.

Of course, that's not a correct comparison.

Firstly, a riding dog has those stats on a 3rd level druid, which is a nice bonus!

Then, since you've added a 4th HD, you may add +1 to an ability score, which ,since constitution is odd (and str/dex aren't any longer) you'd most reasonably add to Con. Also, you can add a feat, and for fair comparison, adding improved natural armor is reasonable so both have exactly the same AC, even though potentially more useful feats do exist.

So, a riding dog would have slightly more hp (4 more), the same AC, the same attack bonus, but far fewer attacks, no pounce and no poison.

is a fleshraker more powerful? Yes. But it's also one level higher. You could also get a dire bat, for the same AC, again slightly more hp (30), but large and flying (i.e. a handy mount) and with the potentially useful blindsense.

Is the fleshraker too good an upgrade for a mere one level bump? Perhaps. But it's not going to be a problem in a party which is strongly min-maxed, and certainly not in a party like the actual poster's, which included a bunch of dubious Exalted stuff and whatnot.

Edited to add: Oh yeah, and don't forget that riding dogs (can) come trained for war, which means they can wear armor without extra penalties, which is a BIG boost!

In other words... it might be a problem in some situations, but it shouldn't be a big one in this particular case. I think the DM's ruling that the poison applies max once per round is a good compromise.

Like many other splat book abilities, it's not broken per se, merely powerful, and it's most problematic when only part of the party is using that kind of stuff. As long as everyone is benefiting from splat-book power-creep, then it's a question of taste; do you like splat books or not?

 

[Evilhalfling]

somebody want to run a comparison fleshraker vs 6th lvl animal companions?
It might provide enlightenment.
I would balk at a posion-spewing dinosaur for an exalted PC - think of common attitutdes towards spiders and snakes, yes there natural but they have a terrible reputaion.