If you were going to allow a character in a Pathfinder home campaign to have a Winter Wolf for an Animal companion, what stats would you give a Winter Wolf at Starting/Level 4/Level 7 advancement, and would you require the player to take an "Improved Animal Companion" type feat?
I'd really appreciate some advice, so I don't unbalance/overpower it! Thanks!
I'd use stats for a wolf. The creature would just have white fur.
You don't get an actual winter wolf for an animal companion because they're not animals in any sense of the word: They're not of the animal type, they have abilities no animal can have (breath weapons, speaking languages), and they are way smarter than any animal (they're almost as smart as your average human, and many druids might actually be dumber than winter wolves).
If anything, I'd say that he should play a winter wolf character, get leadership, and select a human druid as companion ;-)
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If you were going to allow a character in a Pathfinder home campaign to have a Winter Wolf for an Animal companion, what stats would you give a Winter Wolf at Starting/Level 4/Level 7 advancement, and would you require the player to take an "Improved Animal Companion" type feat?
I'd really appreciate some advice, so I don't unbalance/overpower it! Thanks!
Here is a feat from the D&D Wiki that addresses magical beasts as animal companions. I think it is a user-created feat, so probably doesn't appear in any of the 3.5 books, but it provides a reasonable system for determining what level druid you would have to be to attract a magical beast of any given CR.
For a Winter Wolf, you'd have to be a 10th level druid to attract an adult, or a 7th level druid to attract a pup, and you'd follow the advancement table as if you were a 1st level druid in either case.
I'd use the regular Winter Wolf stats as a base, but if you're starting with a pup, it will start with the Young Creature template with the accompanying reduced size (pgs. 295 and 296, respectively, in the Bestiary), so it will have -8 Str, +2 Dex, -4 Con, -2 natural armor (minimum +0) and decreased damage die one size just from the size decrease, and an additional -4 Str, +4 Dex, -4 Con, -2 natural armor (minimum +0) and decreased damage die one size from the Young Creature template, for a cumulative -12 Str, +6 Dex, -8 Con, -4 natural armor and decreased damage dice two sizes (its breath weapon would be 6d3 as a Young Creature, 6d4 once it loses the Young Creature template, and then 6d6 when it advances to normal size).
Once you reach the 7th level advancement stage, it would lose all the adjustments from both templates. Now, if it were me as GM, I like to represent a sense of realism, and if we were going to be fully realistic (magical aspects of the beast aside), those stat changes would take place gradually over time, not all happen at once in the space of a single moment (i.e. when the druid gains that 1 xp needed to advance to the requisite level to advance the creature). Obviously, that would be extremely cumbersome to represent fully in game play, but what I would do is give it two points of advancement instead of one - at 4th, the creatures loses the Young Creature template adjustments; at 7th, the creatures becomes Large and loses the adjustments from reduced size. Of course, if you're starting with the adult version, then you'd only get the 7th level adjustment, at which time it becomes Huge, and you'd apply the Large-to-Huge adjustments from pg. 296 of the Bestiary.
I'd use the regular Winter Wolf stats as a base, but if you're starting with a pup, it will start with the Young Creature template with the accompanying reduced size (pgs. 295 and 296, respectively, in the Bestiary), so it will have -8 Str, +2 Dex, -4 Con, -2 natural armor (minimum +0) and decreased damage die one size just from the size decrease, and an additional -4 Str, +4 Dex, -4 Con, -2 natural armor (minimum +0) and decreased damage die one size from the Young Creature template, for a cumulative -12 Str, +6 Dex, -8 Con, -4 natural armor and decreased damage dice two sizes (its breath weapon would be 6d3 as a Young Creature, 6d4 once it loses the Young Creature template, and then 6d6 when it advances to normal size).Once you reach the 7th level advancement stage, it would lose all the adjustments from both templates. Now, if it were me as GM, I like to represent a sense of realism, and if we were going to be fully realistic (magical aspects of the beast aside), those stat changes would take place gradually over time, not all happen at once in the space of a single moment ...
Thanks, Nightwish! This is very helpful. I wanted to start the companion young anyways, for story reasons, and I agree that the changes as it grows should happen gradually.
I really appreciate your breakdown of the template adjustments for the stats... This is an area in which I am extremely novice, so thanks for taking the time to explain it in detail.|
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Thanks, Nightwish! This is very helpful. I wanted to start the companion young anyways, for story reasons, and I agree that the changes as it grows should happen gradually.
I really appreciate your breakdown of the template adjustments for the stats... This is an area in which I am extremely novice, so thanks for taking the time to explain it in detail.
No problem, happy to help! Also bear in mind, depending on the alignment of your druid, that the winter wolf does not have to be evil. As Pathfinder designer James Jacobs recently stated in the "Liches - any advice?" thread in the Advice forum, unlike outsiders, magical beasts are not limited to their stated alignments in the Bestiary in-story, even in common circumstances. A winter wolf (usually neutral evil) taken on as a pup, could just as easily develop a good, neutral or evil alignment, depending on how they are raised.
Here was his exact quote:
"Free will, which includes the ability for a creature to choose to be an alignment other than the one that's listed for it in the Bestiary, is a powerful thing. It's something that's denied things like outsiders, and also to most undead. It's NOT something that's denied to aberrations, animals (assuming they somehow magically gain enough Intelligence—at least a score of 3—to make choices), constructs (see animal regarding Intelligence scores), fey, humanoids, magical beasts, monstrous humanoids, oozes (see animals regarding Int), plants, and vermin (again, see animals regarding Int).