TheRPGSite

First, I wasn't pleased by WotC's Unearthed Arcana ranger fix. I felt it went too far.

Second, this blog post on the subject is both eye-opening and kinda funny, and provides context for what I'm going to post:
http://librarians-and-leviathans.blogspot.com/2015/07/a-beastly-problem-animal-companions-in.html

So with the above in mind, here's what I'd do:

Ranger's Companion. Replace the second paragraph with this: "In combat your companion has its own initiative roll and set of actions. Until you give it specific instructions it will only stand its ground and fight back against anything that attacks it, or flee if the situation warrants it. If you are incapacitated it will try to protect you or drag you to safety. On your turn, you can use an action to verbally and physically communicate a set of commands to it. Once you have done this, you can control the companion's actions as if it were an additional character until either the combat ends, you or your companion are incapacitated, or your companion can no longer see or hear you."

Add this to the third paragraph: "Your companion can make death saving throw like a player character and can spend hit dice during a short rest."

Replace Exceptional Training with this: "You can now select large beasts and beasts that have a challenge rating of 1/2 as your Ranger's Companion."

Replace Bestial Fury with this: "You can now select beasts that have a challenge rating of 1 as your Ranger's Companion."

Rationale for the change: Best of both balance styles - The beast feels less like the automaton described in the blog post and the ranger only has to give up one action to get the beast started (comparable to a druid spending an action to conjure animals).

So, what have I overlooked or written incorrectly?

Id rather see some sort of upgrade in the companions ability to do things as the Ranger levels up. Essentially showing that the bond, rapport, and skills are growing. Even animals learn.

Just swapping out the animal every few levels like buying a new sword feels wrong.

Quote from: Omega;858433Just swapping out the animal every few levels like buying a new sword feels wrong.

It makes them like a horse rather than a dog.

(A dog is for life, a horse is until you feel you need a new one).

Ironically in fiction heroes often have one famous sword all their career.

Firstly, I totally agree with your sentiments and Shimmin's about the way companions are handled in 5th edition.  I think they went too far in pulling back from earlier editions.

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;858430Ranger's Companion. Replace the second paragraph with this: "In combat your companion has its own initiative roll and set of actions. Until you give it specific instructions it will only stand its ground and fight back against anything that attacks it, or flee if the situation warrants it. If you are incapacitated it will try to protect you or drag you to safety. On your turn, you can use an action to verbally and physically communicate a set of commands to it. Once you have done this, you can control the companion's actions as if it were an additional character until either the combat ends, you or your companion are incapacitated, or your companion can no longer see or hear you."

Specific to this, I feel like this is one time that something similar to the MMO treatment of pets (GASP) would be more appropriate.  Specifically, if you feel the need to quantify the rule, I'd handle it like this:

"In combat, your pet has its own initiative roll and set of actions.  You may use your action to command your pet to attack a target of your choice, which must be within sight and clearly discernible. Your pet will act on its initiative to attack the target lethally to the best of its ability until the target is incapacitated or you expend another action to command it to cease, at which time it will return to your side.  If you are attacked in combat and your pet has not yet been commanded to attack a target, it will defend you, attacking any creatures taking hostile actions against you.  You may command your companion not to defend you if you desire.  If you are incapacitated it will try to defend you or drag you to safety regardless of if you have commanded it to defend you or not."

The logic I put forward for this method is that your companion is still an animal, not some kind of equally intelligent extension of the Ranger.  That was the issue they were trying to correct with pets in the previous editions; they became tactical extensions of the commanding character, and the method you present (IMO) retains that form for the measly cost of a single action per combat (anyone would be insane not to just do it as their first action, other circumstances permitting).  

When the pet has clearly been instructed to attack a target (and it's definitely an action to command a working dog to attack, you have to be very clear with it to avoid confusion) it'll do it, but it won't necessarily change targets to the next target without a specific command to do so (IRL you'd have to use an action to call the dog all the way back to you then another action to command it again).

What neither method takes into account is that animals don't see things the way we do.  You might point at a group of orcs and yell "Chopper, sic balls!" and the companion will take off, but he won't necessarily go for the third one from the right because he's carrying the crossbow, he'll go for the one that seems like the weakest; or maybe for the one with the big mustache and hat because FUCK POSTMEN!; or maybe the one that just moved to the side of that group because he's likely to run.  If someone was playing a BM Ranger in my game I'd probably run the companion as an NPC more than as an extension of the character.

Again, all IMO and YMMV.

Quote from: JoeNuttall;858454Ironically in fiction heroes often have one famous sword all their career.

A-lot of players apparently do to. They get "that one special item" and hang onto it over sometimes better ones later due to the personal history. Sometimes a +1 to hit is not better than the story of how this normal sword was wrested from the tomb of an ancient wraith king.

The more I explore, the worse it gets - consider the spell Awaken. What happens when a ranger inevitably gets it cast on their companion? Does the companion remain weirdly artificially restricted by the ranger's actions for no logical metagame reason?

Quote from: Omega;858433Id rather see some sort of upgrade in the companions ability to do things as the Ranger levels up. Essentially showing that the bond, rapport, and skills are growing. Even animals learn.

Just swapping out the animal every few levels like buying a new sword feels wrong.

Alright, how about these alternatives:

Level 7 - If your companion has a Challenge Rating of 1/4 or less its attacks are now considered magical for the purpose of overcoming resistance and immunity to nonmagical attacks and damage.

Level 11 -  If your companion has a Challenge Rating of 1/4 or less you can grant it proficiency in one saving throw of your choice (remember you also add your own proficiency bonus to saves it is proficient in).

Quote from: PanzerkrakenThe logic I put forward for this method is that your companion is still an animal, not some kind of equally intelligent extension of the Ranger. That was the issue they were trying to correct with pets in the previous editions; they became tactical extensions of the commanding character, and the method you present (IMO) retains that form for the measly cost of a single action per combat (anyone would be insane not to just do it as their first action, other circumstances permitting).

When most combats are over in less than three rounds, I don't believe an action is not such a measly cost. And yes, the idea is to make that action mechanically comparable to a druid spending an action to cast Conjure Animals, so it frequently would be the ranger's first move under my proposal.

I'm concerned that your proposal would make the beast good against big targets with lots of hit points but kinda bad against hordes of smaller monsters that die quickly. That would be odd, as I think players would be inclined to think that having an extra body to fight at their side would actually help against hordes.

Your proposal does highlight a potential lack of clarity in mine though: What if the ranger argues he can 'prep' the beast right before a fight to save his in-combat action? What if the circumstances of the fight change so radically (like everyone falling through a rotting floor) that a new 'instructions' action would logically be required? How would I write my proposal to plug these holes without getting too wordy?

Quote from: PanzerkrakenWhat neither method takes into account is that animals don't see things the way we do. You might point at a group of orcs and yell "Chopper, sic balls!" and the companion will take off, but he won't necessarily go for the third one from the right because he's carrying the crossbow, he'll go for the one that seems like the weakest; or maybe for the one with the big mustache and hat because FUCK POSTMEN!; or maybe the one that just moved to the side of that group because he's likely to run. If someone was playing a BM Ranger in my game I'd probably run the companion as an NPC more than as an extension of the character.

Perhaps some modification of the morale rules from the DMG could be applied to this situation? I don't know, I appreciate where you're coming from, but that's starting to feel like a lot of potential complexity for very little 'realism' gain that many game tables (including mine) would quickly forget about.

ADDITIONAL NEW PROPOSAL for consideration: Let the pet be totally independent, no ranger commands or anything, but in exchange the ranger must permanently 'commit' a first level spell slot to the beast for as long as it is around. If this feels unbalanced, consider everything a familiar can do for the cost of a single 1st level spell cast ONCE and how powerful the Hail of Thorns and Hunter's Mark spells are.

There's the rub about culture clash, between "doesn't say so, but makes sense, so why not?" vs. "doesn't say so, therefore it cannot be done."

Notice a few more actions that are left out of that Beast Master paragraph: animals cannot Hide, Search, Use an Object, or Ready an action. (I left out Cast a Spell on purpose, as it assumes spellcaster access, and beasts just logically don't so far.)

Now arguments can be made about Use an Object and Ready an action due to the context of the specific animal (and possible object to be used). But the lack of Hide and Search is illogical, since that's so often core to what animals do for survival. Granted there's the errata for animals to logically act on their own interests, yet bonding and training an animal to Hide or Search does not stretch credulity.

(Ready an action is an interesting one because I would make the argument that guard dogs are trained to do exactly that. "Heel," "stay," and "sic 'em" are well known commands. And just a little observation of K9 units or dog training competitions show you that you can train animals for delayed reactions.)

I think the big problem is the defined wording of actions allowed. This is instead of relying on GM and Player judgment upon situational context — which I know angers some, but due to the known complexity of the world is the only logical phrasing available. If it was reworded where it said the Ranger "uses their action to coach the animal through an action that animal can reasonably perform" a lot of this headache would have been avoided.

First off, all those basic actions (outside of Cast a Spell, unless you are specifically able to do so) are presumed available to all, PC and MM NPC alike. Second, it leaves free any inherent abilities latent to the animal accessible. Third it doesn't bother with delineation of specific possibilities versus nonsense, i.e. whether a bat can Use an Object on the massive portculis lever, because it assumes participant judgment can handle such obvious things.

Sure it will piss off Denner aesthetics and they'll decry Magical Tea Party. But writing a treatise of how to handle every potential situation you can with an animal, and note the differences with each potential animal, is madness. It opens up interaction with the environment — y'know roleplaying in a shared imagined world — than trying to finagle micro-measures to the Cult of the Balance.

Southlands Heroes had a good solution. But did not think it out far enough.

Here was my solution.

Treat the companion as an henchman and give it the NPC traits. Ideal, Bond and Flaw. They may baulk at some tasks or dislike someone and these things need to be worked out between the Ranger and the companion and possibly the other PCs.

The example given was

QuoteA rangers giant spider may adore the party halfling, but despise the drow. A ranger's hawk may have staring contests with the party fighter, while putting dead animals in the bed of the wizard as a sign of affection.

Take that firther and run them as NPCs. The party can have hirelings anyhow so what really is restricting the companion and ranger accomplishing?

So we went with this.

The above noted NPC style traits. Ideal, Bond and Flaw.

They can act on their own with basic commands. Actions are needed to be spent to have the companion perform more complex tasks, like retrieving a specific potion bottle from a pile of items or a specific attack routine.

At levels 5, 11 and 17 the companion gains another hit dice and one point to a stat of the rangers choosing. Which may improve its proficiency and damage bonuses.

Jannet plans to test run this should her current non-ranger character drop.

I've toyed with the idea of a very simple change. Simply this - if your companion is within 5 feet of you, you can command it to take an action without using an action of your own.

Found a great post on enworld:

Quote from: Sword of SpiritWe've mostly sort of glossed over an important distinction in this discussion, but I think it would be good to be clear about what angle we are coming from on it. The question being whether or not it is assumed that other players can/will have normal pets (not class features). It makes a huge difference in how you handle the Beast Master.

If anyone can have a pet, then you need to run the games from the baseline of how you decide that that works (ignoring the ranger for the moment). Only then can you look at it and ask, "what makes the Beast Master special?" Since his subclass is all based around having a pet, his pet should be significantly more effective than another character's pet. And while it isn't strictly required, suspension of disbelief is also better served if the Beast Master's pet doesn't lose anything (no standing around stupid unless commanded)--he only gains benefits. You basically have a situation where PC(1.5) + Pet(0.5) = 2, and Beast Master(1) + Pet(1) = 2. (The shift of the arbitrary 0.5 is meant to represent the subclass portion of the character being invested in his pet.) So you essentially have to buff the Beast Master somehow.

If, on the other hand, you decide that the baseline for pets is that they are class features in your games, then you have this situation instead: PC(1) = 1, and Beast Master(0.8) + Pet(0.2) = 1. (All numbers arbitrary.) In that situation, either you straight up forbid PCs from having pets without class features, or you have to decide how pets that aren't class features actually work and you have to make sure that they aren't competing with the Beast Master's pet. So you can't say something like: PC(1) + Pet(0.1) = 1.1, and Beast Master(0.8) + Pet(0.2) = 1. What's the point of being a Beast Master? So either forbid PCs from having pets that aren't class-features, or you essentially have to buff the Beast Master somehow.

I suppose this is a third solution, for those who want it. The baseline can be that pets are a liability. Only by having a class feature can you have a pet be on par with other PCs. So it's PC(1) = 1; PC(1) + Pet (-0.2) = 0.8; Beast Master(0.8) + Pet (0.2) = 1.

And then this response to it:

Quote from: I'm a BananaThat's a useful analysis, @Sword of Spirit, and helps inform my idea that the beastmaster is a bit of an odd duck out - pets shouldn't be reserved for one particular subclass (that you lock in at level 3 and have to spend the next 17 levels in). Let ANY ranger have a panther companion, ANY paladin have a pegasus mount, ANY fighter have her squire to follow her around, ANY bard to get a groupie/bodyguard...the question should be more about how to account for these creatures for any PC, rather than trying to shove them all into subclass positions (where, if the Beastmaster is anything to go by, quarters are a little cramped).

That was part of what I was mentioning above.

What is the point of limiting the Rangers companion when the other PCs or the whole group can pick up fully autonomous NPCs? Or have autonomous but still commandable pets?

While a familliar may not be able to attack. It can still be given orders without using an action. The Paladins summoned steed on the other hand is combat capable and fights in co-ordination with the paladin without need to blow actions.

I was actually going to raise that point: one of the players in my games loves to have dog or wolf pets, and he plays a Fighter. I typically let him do Ranger type stuff, ie., training the animal, coaching it, etc., since dog owners IRL do this stuff all the time and they're just regular people. But then that opens the question of how to make using the animal a special perk if the class is centered around it.

What I do if you're just a normal PC trying to coach an animal: you have to use an action, and make an Animal Handling check to get the animal to listen to you each time.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;858608What I do if you're just a normal PC trying to coach an animal: you have to use an action, and make an Animal Handling check to get the animal to listen to you each time.

That is a solid way of resolving it. That, unlike the Beastmaster Ranger, there is always a risk that your Animal Handling check will fail. It also opens all the basic actions back up for both Ranger and regular pet owners, so you can command Search ("fetch!"), Hide, or Ready ("stay!... sic 'em!"), etc. The Ranger just gets an additional benefit where Attack, Dash, Disengage, Dodge, and Help all do not require an ability check.

You could make it even stronger where the animal itself needs to make a raw ability (INT) check for more complex tasks (i.e. "fetch that specific thing over there"). Since it is often negative it makes the Ranger's PB added to the animal's checks that much stronger. As a solution it is very system cohesive while setting logical.

e.g. Fighter tells Mastiff to Use Object (fetch) that scroll case on the empty floor and bring it back to her. Relatively easy command, DC 8. Fighter uses her action to command and rolls Animal Handling (WIS) to see if it works. Mastiff is willing to help and easily knows which thing brought back will please.

Beastmaster Ranger would do the same thing, and for the most part it would be a wash.

e.g.2. Fighter tells Mastiff to Use Object (fetch) that third scrollcase to the left of the table and bring it back to her. Relatively easy — yet complex — command, Animal Handling check DC 8. Fighter uses her action to command and rolls Animal Handling (WIS) and passes. Mastiff is willing to help.

But then the animal itself has to INT check for comprehension. Normally an Easy idea, DC 10, but then the Mastiff's INT (-4) gets in the way. Animal is willing to help, but is not necessarily mentally capable of carrying it out.

Beastmaster Ranger would do the same thing, but the animal companion would get the Ranger's PB to its INT check to partially offset its penalty. So the mastiff penalty would be -2 or smaller depending on the Beastmaster Ranger's PB. Suddenly even those with Speak With Animals realize the Beastmaster has a remarkable communion of minds with said companion.

Also, you may want to have pet animals make INT checks during Attack or Help commands so that it doesn't mess with your allies, hover only around you, or target foes randomly. Then the GM can apply DCs accordingly to a) how long and well your companions have been together, b) how confident the animal is in straying from your side, c) how coherently it can follow attack orders in combat or launch a helpful distraction, etc. That the Beastmaster would not need their animal companion to roll INT at all for this would make them stand out from pet owners.

Ah that's another thing. I didn't have the PC use an Action to command the wolf. I didn't think of that really since it's easy to say "go fetch" and that's not really something that takes an action.

The wolf just gets its own initiative and turn during combat. And since it's a loyal animal you wouldn't need to tell it to help defend its owner or itself. A real dog would just leap to your defense on its own. (Unless it was a dragon or something, in which case there'd be some sort of check to see if it's scared.)

Maybe this is all making the average Fighter with his Wolf too strong. Luckily there's no Ranger in my game yet.

Oh but as a tradeoff the Wolf doesn't level up or anything. No matter how long he's with you or how late into the campaign it is he'll always be the CR 1 or whatever animal he is. Although I did consider having it grow alongside the Fighter, but then that really is Ranger territory.

Some interesting posts here.

If we're still trying to fix the system presented in the book instead of junking it altogether I'd be inclined to use it for any other animal that non-rangers try to deploy in combat because in that case the real benefit of the beast master is the significant buffs it applies to its companion.

So, taking some of people's ideas so far, here another proposal:

Keep the second paragraph as is, but add hide and search to the list of actions the companion can perform.

Add a new paragraph after the second paragraph: "If your turn is about to end and you have not issued any commands to your companion, it will instinctively take one of the following actions:
- Move closer to you or to any space around you.
- Move to get out of any harmful terrain or effect its animal intellect can understand. If you are incapacitated it can attempt to drag you out of harm's way as well.
- Move away from enemies.
- Make a single attack against an enemy it saw attack or obviously harm you during the turn. It cannot move before or after doing this.
- Make a single attack against an enemy that attacked or harmed it during the turn. It cannot move before doing this."

Allow the Exceptional Training feature to issue hide and search as commands.

If an animal companion is altered with the spell Awaken it becomes an independent NPC but may still benefit from the alterations to its stats if it agrees to.

What do you think? Did I miss anything?

The trouble I find is I want to avoid expressing rules here in programming code format. You will only feed into the gaps of code where it meets the setting's context/reality. There is way too much you can do with another mobile and aware being that encoding it removes the point, and trying to spell it all out will always be laughably incomplete.

It is like encoding what you can do with a skilled hireling. It is just a bad idea and doesn't need hard and fast rules. It is explicitly the wrong design path to tread, for it has been tread many times before unsuccessfully.

Giving the animal its own stat block and place in initiative is normal and should be expected. Even the new errata believes the animal has "situationally logical autonomy" (why that needed to be spelled out, may I point back to the above about programming code format?). In this way it would be like how you handle skilled hirelings — who many are expected to join combat with you. They can think enough for themselves for self-preservation (fight or flight) at the very least.

For past references on how animals were handled, I look back at 2e and note that animal friendship took quite awhile to build up to a trained pet. Further, even trained pets were open ended on what tricks they could learn. The limiter was something like 3 tricks per INT point and took well over a week to learn (and if the bond was broken the animal would revert and forget those tricks, IIRC).

But the modern D&D paradigm expects gratification considerably faster. So spending weeks to build up an animal's repertoire of tricks is probably unreasonable for half the player pool. In that respect, and to keep with the old school aesthetic of "why can't I at least try?", mAcular Chaotic's idea of including Animal Handling skill check — and my idea of adding the animal's comprehension raw score INT check — should kill two birds with one stone. Now there's a guideline for generic pets, and the Beastmaster Ranger stands well beyond others in not needing, or at least getting bonuses, in the animal checks.

Getting an INT 1 creature to obey your commands, sometimes with no check at all, is pretty magical then.

(My big challenge is checking the wording on Wizard and Warlock's Find Familiar  to see where their weaknesses are.)

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;858608But then that opens the question of how to make using the animal a special perk if the class is centered around it.

The 5e rules at least treat the companion, familliar and steed as something more than an average beast. The Paladins steed is supernatural of course. But the familliar and companion are a cut above the norm. Up to and including speech.

How much so tends to be left to the DM and PCs.

Quote from: Opaopajr;858691The trouble I find is I want to avoid expressing rules here in programming code format.

Well, would adding the following clause to my list fix this issue?

Add a new paragraph after the second paragraph: "If your turn is about to end and you have not issued any commands to your companion, it will instinctively take one of the following actions:
- Move closer to you or to any space around you.
- Move to get out of any harmful terrain or effect its animal intellect can understand. If you are incapacitated it can attempt to drag you out of harm's way as well.
- Move away from enemies.
- Make a single attack against an enemy it saw attack or obviously harm you during the turn. It cannot move before or after doing this.
- Make a single attack against an enemy that attacked or harmed it during the turn. It cannot move before doing this.
- Perform a different action similar to these, at the GM's discretion."

Quote from: OpaopajrIt is like encoding what you can do with a skilled hireling. It is just a bad idea and doesn't need hard and fast rules. It is explicitly the wrong design path to tread, for it has been tread many times before unsuccessfully.

I can absolutely see this point, but the reason I'm currently trying to work with the original write-up is that it maintains the idea that the beast is a class feature of the ranger, that the theoretically cool gimmick of the archetype is, "you get two characters for the price of one!"

Most hirelings are treated as separate NPCs added to the party, and if one is bothering to adjust encounter difficulty then all you need to do is adjust the difficulty accordingly. This is the most realistic way of handling permanent "bodies" added to a party, but if you try to do that with the animal companion concept then there is no more beast master ranger archetype, and the ranger is down to one archetype. I can't personally accept this.

Yes, you could say, "Well then the beast master's power is to enhance a single animal NPC that is added to the party," but that doesn't seem to be worth the loss of what the hunter archetype offers. After all, even with the beast master stat enhancements, the animal is still generally inferior to a hired sword of equivalent level, and your balancing proposal would actually make the animal unreliable to boot.

On that subject, I don't mind your general idea of trying to balance the animal by making it unreliable, but so far it looks like implementation will involve extra rolls, extra bookkeeping, and the occasional argument with the GM/player over what actions are reasonable for animal intelligence. None of that seems very appealing to me personally.

What about my other type of "two characters for the price of one" proposal, where we try to give the animal companion a full range of independent actions in exchange for taking things away from the ranger? I suggested taking a spell slot away from the ranger for as long as she had the companion, since ranger spell slots are generally a pretty valuable source of extra offense. Would that work?

Ok, looking at Find Familiar spell, I see where the largest problem lies:

Find Familiar spell gets a small paragraph (IIRC it is the 2nd) to explicitly normalize it as an NPC (in exchange for the vessel's normal attack form).

The Familiar is explicitly not an animal; it is either a celestial, fey, or fiend within the vessel of one of the small animals listed. So it is assumed to be natively intelligent on a level to comprehend language and complex instructions. Warlock's Pact of the Chain grants Find Familiar as a ritual and access to 4 other rather strong non-animal forms.

That spell's second(?) paragraph explicitly gives the Familiar NPC capacity and autonomy between master's commands. It gets a place on the initiative board, its own action economy spread (including its own reaction), and access to "all other basic actions" except Attack. That alone is a huge piece missing from Beastmaster, and which lead to the errata necessary to apply logical judgment on Animal Companion coherent autonomy (i.e. defend itself without command, keep moving without pixel bitching for more commands, etc.).

The easiest solution is to just adopt that paragraph for the Beastmaster and then add that GM purview controls the Animal Companion until commanded. Resolve the "goes on same initiative" line as "Ranger and Animal Companion have the same initiative value — as in two separate numbers with a tied value — break ties as usual." That way when Ranger sacrifices its action it is a sacrifice for coordination, taking the creature temporarily back from GM control.

As for the Beastmaster being weak due to other animal pets being potentially available... That will always be regardless because of the Find Familiar and Find Steed spell. That ship has already sailed; you might as well add the basic animal pets.

Find Familiar sacrifices just about nothing, except for the vessel's normal attack (boo hoo!). Throw in touch attack spells and Warlock tricks and even this limiter is gone. The big thing is the familiar is functionally tethered to within 100' (otherwise it's free! mwa ha ha!), and has only 1 hour of existence at a time.

Find Steed is similarly powerful, and due to celestial, fey, fiend nature similarly sentient for complex commands, but trades available basic actions for Attack and greater time frame.

Unless you want caster dominance, you must allow normal NPC animal pets with shakier control to contest this level of "action economy" field domination. There really is no other way. Either spells have this in essential isolation — with only a marginalized archetype to contest — or everyone gets access and the differential value gets wiped in the common availability. Animal Pets only real advantage over others would be its common availability, and removing that removes a leg from the stool as it were.

Then by wiping the rarity by democratizing availability you get to define the other niches.

Find Familiar and Steed both trump regular animals due to their inherent celestial, fey, fiend nature. Thus assumed comprehension of language (read: no need for Speak with Animals equivalent), and languages' assumed comprehension of greater complexity, means assumed greater delegation potential. This ship has also already sailed; you might as well niche protect the Beastmaster's level of delegation potential v. regular animal pets.

Now what you get between the gaps of those two spells, Familiar and Steed respectively, is: greater time frame and HP resilience vs. Familiar, greater fine motor/space action finesse v. Steed, and greater resistance v. Dispel for both spells.

Thus the Animal Companion plays a midway point between all four sources, Animal Pets, Familiar, Steed, and Animal Companion. It would be more commonly available, always on, resistant to Dispel, solid combat resilience, solid fine motor control, solid smaller space access, and solid complex delegation potential. Its niche would be all-around capable instead of focused.

The Beastmasters main advantage is that the companion can improve over time. The familliar and steed can not.

But yeah. Easiest solution is to remove the "needs to use action to command" bit and make them semi-autonomous NPCs.

So if I understand Opaopajr's arguments, the fix should look like this (a combination of Find Familiar and Pact of the Chain's benefit):

Replace the second paragraph of Ranger's Companion with this: "Your companion acts independently of you, but it always obeys your commands to the best of its ability. In combat, it rolls its own initiative and acts on its own turn. The companion cannot normally attack, but it can take other actions as normal. When you take the Attack action, you can forgo one of your own attacks to allow your companion to make one attack of its own."

Then replace the level 7 feature with the ability to grant proficiency to one of the animal's saves (mirroring the hunter's Defensive Tactics).

Does that sound good?

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;858992Does that sound good?

er. No?

That does not seem to solve much of anything other than the non-movement problem. The ranger still has to blow an action to get it to do anything significant.

Which leaves it still outstripped by the paladins steed and regular non-class pets or summoned beasts.

Quote from: Shipyard Locked;858992So if I understand Opaopajr's arguments, the fix should look like this (a combination of Find Familiar and Pact of the Chain's benefit):

Replace the second paragraph of Ranger's Companion with this: "Your companion acts independently of you, but it always obeys your commands to the best of its ability. In combat, it rolls its own initiative and acts on its own turn. The companion cannot normally attack, but it can take other actions as normal. When you take the Attack action, you can forgo one of your own attacks to allow your companion to make one attack of its own."

Then replace the level 7 feature with the ability to grant proficiency to one of the animal's saves (mirroring the hunter's Defensive Tactics).

Does that sound good?

The fix needed to make the Animal Companion an autonomous NPC with its own action spread and base actions available. So yes, it's in the right direction because it is removing limitations (or "explicitly allowing") the Animal Companion to be its own NPC. However the spells are written like typical WotC shit, so that's the next big hurdle -- you've only begun to "undo the suck."

The Ranger Beastmaster ability needs to sacrifice an action to get any coordinated action out of the AC. Neither spell needs this. Now, we can chalk this up to "magic" and let that be part of their spell advantages. But in turn you would have to make regular owners sacrifice their action to coordinate their regular pet's action.

But then we get into discussing command range and delegated coordination.

As for command range, regular pets and animal companions should be far and away better than the spells. If the animals can be commanded by sight or sound, as far distant as their senses allow, then animals should easily best 100', possibly going out into miles. Working animals do this now (falconry, sheep herding, etc.), there is no reason this should not be an animal advantage over those spells.

As for delegated coordination, commanding pets to separate and follow delayed commands is also not impossible for animals ("Lassie, go get help girl!"). Familiars are bound to obedience within 100', but it leaves it open what happens beyond 100'. The big differences between animals v. astral/ethereal beings should be one of comprehension and cooperation.

Animals in general would likely have challenges in comprehension and cooperation. That is what the checks that would be there represent. They may be willing or unwilling, hence Animal Handling check. They may be able or unable to understand, hence Skill (INT) check (yes, you can do this mix with any Skill, as per Ability Check chapter).

Spirits in general would likely not have challenges in comprehension. However, since they deliberately tied obedience to a rather close band around the caster, it does invite questions about cooperation. While they may understand their caster, they may have other powers or desires to answer to, and once out of command range won't hesitate to forward their own goals while out of command shot.

It would make them risky choices to delegate anything farther than command range.

As for Animal Companions, you now have an interesting design space reserved. They have bonded to a level of comprehension and cooperation that is greater than the average animal pet. However, they aren't too smart to cause really big trouble once "off their leash," as it were. They are close and far range utility.

I will admit one of the design paradigms I am working with is trying to step as lightly between the rules as possible so as to implement this as a solution in Adventure League style play.

In AL those spells are present, it is a done deal. However regular animal pets are undefined, outside of mounts, and are open ended like hirelings. AL deliberately does not let you hire skilled hirelings for combat due to action economy issues, hence it would likely come down the same upon regular pets. (Translation: usable for social and exploration actions, like unskilled hirelings. at which point Find Familiar is leagues better.) Which in turn leads to caster dominance in that game facet of Organized Play.

(It's like they don't always read what they write...)

Anyway, since many people try to play according to Organized Play formats to at least stay abreast of cross-table style play, it is an area worth addressing before getting too far afield. Too many players immediately write off house rules and stick to Org Play just to be part of the larger crowd. If you can slide between the rules I think you might get more people listening.

And another example I totally forgot. The very mis-inspiration for the ranger companion.

Figurines of Wonderous Power. Obeys the users spoken commands. Defends itself on its own. Otherwise does not move or act/attack unless told to.

No Actions needed to just command it.

Sure they are uncommon to rare to very rare items and have use and duration limits. But here again we have pet type monsters that dont use actions.

Then there is the Staff of the Python which also does not need actions to command acts on its own initiative and can be ordered for general defend/attack actions left to its own discretion. This is an uncommon item. So a Druid or Cleric could possibly have one at level 1 with some luck. (More likely around level 5 or thereafter.

And others.

The playtest interestingly had no entries for anything other than the Find Familliar spell and animate Dead. And at that time the familliar had set stats no matter the form it assumed. It acted independantly, but would follow orders given. No action requirement to command. Animated dead also did not use an action to command and could be set to general orders.

Quote from: Omega;859000The ranger still has to blow an action to get it to do anything significant. Which leaves it still outstripped by the paladins steed and regular non-class pets or summoned beasts.

So what would you remove from the ranger to make it fair? I've already suggested a spell slot.

Perhaps the ranger could get disadvantage on Initiative rolls (he's busy coordinating the companion but doesn't lose any actions?)

Quote from: OmegaAnimated dead also did not use an action to command and could be set to general orders.

Animated dead can still take general orders (page 212).

Quote from: OpaopajrI will admit one of the design paradigms I am working with is trying to step as lightly between the rules as possible so as to implement this as a solution in Adventure League style play.

Thank you for clarifying that. I understand your position and you have my sympathy. I'm motivated by the blog post I linked in my first post (specifically the parts about the companion not behaving like any sane creature would), a desire to make the companion less retarded and more palatable for players who sit at my table without provoking the dreaded whine of "overpowered!" from anyone. I am willing and able to make bigger changes, but I want to avoid extra bookkeeping and extra rolls.