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Message: <blockquote data-quote="gabrion" data-source="post: 2830488" data-attributes="member: 30779">Thanks Hyp, I was gonna post that but you beat me to it!No, no it's not.  What's clear is that a 9th level druid doesn't have a way of getting a 10 HD wolf companion.  This doesn't mean the designers intended to prevent that from ever happening, it just means the current rules don't allow for it to happen - but keep in mind that the rules don't allow for a lot of things to happen.Before Complete Psionic was printed, many people debated whether or not a feat like Practiced Manifester would be balanced.  Using logic like you're people often extrapolated the intent of the designers based on the (then) current limitations of the rules set, arguing that the designer's intend was never to allow a psionic character to make up for lost manifester levels, short of using damaging class abilities or feats.  Guess what?  They were wrong.  Your claim that the designers "intended to disallow a 10 HD Wolf for a straight 9th Druid," is actually just conjecture.No, that's not the main question at hand here.  Actually, that seems to just be an irregularity that occurs because to the nature of first level animal companions.Nor would the DM tell a player wizard who's never cast a spell with variables, "I'm sorry, but your character taking the empower spell feat would ruin the game.  You should take spell focus instead."  What they might say though is, "Um, you know taking empower spell is a really bad choice for your character, right?  Have you thought about using a more suitable feat, like spell focus?"In the same way, a straight druid with natural bond is simply wasting a feat if he sticks with his wolf companion from first level.  Like I said earlier, all this establishes for us is that WotC didn't print every feat with coaching instructions on how to use it.  Well, I'd rather infer from the rules, but you can divine as you will.As I pointed out above, the designers have made a lot of feats that only offer benefits under certain circumstances.  The "open question" you've come up with pretty much boils down to, "would the designers intend for a feat to be useful to a character who makes certain choices during his career, but not to others?"  The answer seems painfully obvious..of course they would.Actually I said:...which doesn't seem to be a claim about a "general design principle."  All I was saying was that when I come across an ability or effect that is more beneficial to a character of higher level because of options made available to them, but not to lower level characters, I'm not going to draw the conclusion that said ability runs counter to the intent of the game designers (which is exactly what you're doing).Like I said, it happens here and there...it isn't a general rule of some kind.  I'm fine when it happens though, and it makes sense to me why it happens.No, but we see a lot of feats that aren't available until character have certain abilities.  These feats tend to be more beneficial than ones that don't have such requirements.Not that it really matters to this discussion, but what kind of things are you talking about here?Ya...I think the quotes Hyp provided above do a good job of handling this.  They make my case stronger, not yours.It's an ability gained at 1st level.  The option of having a dire wolf is an ability gained at 7th level.  Comparing this to the Paladin's lay on hands ability doesn't work because that ability is static, other than the variable within it being dependent on level.  It operates in some ways like druid's wild shape ability, in so far as the Druid gets more uses of it as he gains levels and can use higher HD forms.  It's different from an ability like that though, because wild shape also introduces new stuff, like the availability of large forms.In the same way, no one is arguing that a druid's animal companion is a first level ability.  What I am arguing is that the option of choosing something like a dire wolf companion is explicitly a higher level druid ability.  If you don't think so, go ahead and justify the lines, "A druid of 4th level or higher may select from alternative lists of animals," and "A druid of sufficiently high level can select her animal companion from one of the following lists..."No, but sometimes such feats are disproportionately more beneficial to the higher level characters.Well, once again I'll point to the FAQ entries on Practiced Spellcaster.  Sure, it doesn't directly talk about this feat, but the two are pretty similar.  WotC has adopted an in writting position that feats like this should be used in the most beneficial way for the player.  So yes, I have a "general rule of thumb" in writing.  Do you have one to support your stance?Well for once we agree.  I do think the wording they put into this particular aspect of the game could have been better.  However, given the "most beneficial to the player" stance that they've adopted, I'm also quite sure that if they had put more time into the wording, the result would even more strongly support my position.Still, if we're going to talk about a case where the rules seem to have somewhat poor wording, that still doesn't mean RAW aren't RAW.  In this case, they may have mixed up ideas of effective druid level, druid level, and "druid’s level for purposes of determining the companion’s characteristics and special abilities," but a simple understand of the English language still leads one to the conclusion that the rules support my position.What?  That make no sense at all.  If we're unclear about how an ability gained at a higher level interacts with a feat, we should see how an ability at a lower level interacts with it and go from there?  Why on earth would that make more sense that judging how a feat interacts with each ability a character has on a case by case basis?Sure it does.  It allows the feat to maintain the claus about limiting the adjustment so that a druid with the feat can't be treated as higher level than his character level.  It's just a practical limitation put into the feat that happens to have the coincidental affect of not allowing the feat to equally benefit a first level animal companion and one gained later in the druid's career.So you're arguing against the rules, the game designers, and your own interest?  That makes me trust something, but it isn't that you're being objective. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" /></blockquote>

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