Leadership and ECL

Kershek · Jul 14, 2004

If a 6th level Aasimar Paladin (ECL 7) gets the Leadership feat, can he at best get a 4th level cohort or a 5th level cohort?

The Souljourner · Jul 14, 2004

I think by the rules it's 4th, but common sense says 5th.

-The Souljourner

Chris Nagle · Jul 14, 2004

Kershek said:
If a 6th level Aasimar Paladin (ECL 7) gets the Leadership feat, can he at best get a 4th level cohort or a 5th level cohort?

Leadership feat as per the SRD

SRD said:
Leadership Score: A character’s base Leadership score equals his level plus any Charisma modifier. In order to take into account negative Charisma modifiers, this table allows for very low Leadership scores, but the character must still be 6th level or higher in order to gain the Leadership feat. Outside factors can affect a character’s Leadership score, as detailed above.

Cohort Level: The character can attract a cohort of up to this level. Regardless of a character’s Leadership score, he can only recruit a cohort who is two or more levels lower than himself. The cohort should be equipped with gear appropriate for its level. A character can try to attract a cohort of a particular race, class, and alignment. The cohort’s alignment may not be opposed to the leader’s alignment on either the law-vs-chaos or good-vs-evil axis, and the leader takes a Leadership penalty if he recruits a cohort of an alignment different from his own.

So It can only be level 4 anyway due to their character level.

The Souljourner · Jul 14, 2004

Once again, WoTC uses the cryptic "level" which has no true meaning for characters in D&D (characters have class levels and a character level and an equivalent character level.... but no standalone "level"). I don't think any DM would really argue the point if you tried to use your ECL... I mean, if you were a drow, does that mean you'd have to have a cohort 4 levels lower than yourself? How ridiculously crappy is that? No, you should definitely use your ECL, otherwise it just doesn't make sense.

-The Souljourner