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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 5556075" data-attributes="member: 82106">Yeah, I don't think there's a real problem with Animal Master either. Here's an example: I have a player that wanted to have a pet cat. The reason for wanting to do this was so that the character (who is not at all stealthy) could send the cat along with the rogue and the warlock when they go sneaking around, which they frequently do in this campaign. Now, this character also happens to be a wizard, so the solution was of course to get a familar and pick cat. That works fine and the cost of one feat isn't a big deal, especially since familiars have some other minor ancillary benefits. OTOH Animal Master would be perfect for a character like this. She'd probably get more out of that than having a familiar. Certainly if the PC wasn't Arcane and required 2 feats (and one being an MC feat) to do this it probably wouldn't be worth going the familiar route, at best it would be a significant opportunity cost with little ancillary benefit and require taking an MC that might not fit the character well (and maybe forgoing one that would).OTOH Animal Master would be perfect for such a character. It would work great. The player doesn't care about having some super awesome combat advantages out of the deal. She just wants a cat. If she were say a fighter, then Animal Master would be perfect. Heck, it DOES have some potential use in combat. Yeah, the animal COULD get curb stomped and I do think some scaling would be a good idea, but she can also just have Fluffy keep well out of the way. Fluffy can hide in her backpack when the PCs are wandering around in some dangerous environment. Fluffy can tag along with the stealthy characters and it all works out. Yeah, maybe Fluffy WOULD get in trouble now and then, but we could work that out.So, Animal Master may not be PERFECT, but then again WotC has stated these themes are still subject to finalization. Lets wait and see if they are going to tweak this one issue. Even if they don't it is still a useful theme. In some campaigns the fragility of the animal really won't matter anyway. In others nobody is going to bother with Animal Master because they are all about min/maxing their combat power. If a player in such a game wants a cat to use in a fight, they'll just have to create a build that can get a tough animal that will do that. There are several options open to them.</blockquote>

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