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Normally, you don't need to know the CR of an animal companion. However, with the new hunter class from the Advanced Class Guide, one of the hunter archetypes is the Divine Hunter, which gives the animal companion the Celestial Creature template. So far, so good ...
The Celestial Creature template says:
A celestial creature's CR increases by +1 only if the base creature has 5 or more HD.
A celestial creature gains SR equal to its new CR +5.
At 5th level, the hunter's animal companion's HD increases to 5
So, a 5th level Divine Hunter's animal companion gets at least SR6 (CR1 +5). The question is, how do you calculate the animal companion's CR and does that CR increase as the character and/or animal companion increases in level?
The strictest ruling would probably say something like use the CR of the base animal (a normal wolf is CR1, for example). However, an animal companion is clearly more powerful than a normal animal, especially at higher levels, so that doesn't really work.
Perhaps an animal companion's CR should equal the the CR of the PC? That seems more reasonable, but to my knowledge, there is no hard and fact rule for calculating a PCs CR. It's typically said to be something like PC level -1 = CR or sometimes PC level = CR.
So, maybe a 5th level hunter/divine hunter's animal companion CR might be 4 or 5?
Is there any official word on this? If not, how do most GMs handle this?
Oh, and if there is no official word yet, I'd ask that folks click the FAQ link on this post so we can get it on the FAQ/errata radar!
Just use the PCs level. It's easy and it produces reasonable results. An Animal Companion literally has no CR, it's counted as part of the character's CR.
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Just use the PCs level. It's easy and it produces reasonable results. An Animal Companion literally has no CR, it's counted as part of the character's CR.
I think that's certainly a reasonable approach. It's of course essentially a house rule until we get an official ruling (for instance, I wonder how they handle divine hunters in PFs?)
Still, it seems like a good house rule for the time being.
Any other thoughts, comments or ideas?
Baring a faq i would calculate an animal companion's CR the same as one of the npc classes with its hd in place of levels. An animal companion is capable, not not as much as a full class, so the character's CR seems off to me.
So effectively HD of the animal companion -2
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So, depending on the interpretation chosen, we'd be looking at either:
SR11 (HD5=CR5 +1 + 5) or SR9 (HD5-2=CR3 + 1 + 5) for the celestial animal companion of a 5th level divine hunter.
Either certainly sounds reasonable at that level. It will be interesting to see what the Design Team rules ...
Be sure to click that FAQ if you haven't already!
James Jacobs posted an answer on this for how he plays it. He has stated that he is not the rules guy, so a FAQ would help clear this up if it ever happened.
Animal companions, mounts, familiars, and the like do not have CR scores. Use your character's CR (this equals your character's total character level minus 1) instead as the SR baseline.
And a couple posts underneath that link he clarifies that the CR should be equal to character level instead.
Once again, not an official answer, but it's something.