Cory Szabo's page

I am just going to throw my two cents in. This is my opinion as a wargamer and playing a great many different roleplay systems. But, I am by no means any form of expert. But have a great understanding of the term "rules as written."

Being as I have been playing around with a ranger and a fighter with a mount. I love the ideas of Animal companions. Or a knight on his horse. The only roleplay game that has handled it well really at all, is Iron Kingdoms. Even then, it isn't that great.

First, we will go over the rules, starting with what provides us with the animal companions.

You gain the service of a young animal companion that travels with you and obeys simple commands to the best of its abilities. See Animal Companions on page 284.

Now looking on the rules given by Animal Companion...

Animal companions are loyal comrades who follow your orders. They have the minion trait, so they gain 2 actions during your turn if you use the Command an Animal action to command them; this is in place of the usual effects of Command an Animal. (Etc.)....

Take this from someone who sucks at English himself, but spends a lot of time messing with rules and the grammar of rules. By the way these are stated, I read that you need to use a single Command an Animal action to give your Animal Companion 2 actions. So far, we have 1 action for 2.

However now we will have to take a peek at the Minion Trait and the Command and Animal rule, in order to delve deeper.

A creature with this trait can use only 2 actions per turn and can't use reactions. A minion acts on your turn in combat when you spend an action to issue it verbal commands (this action has the concentrate trait). If given no commands, minions use no actions except to defend themselves or to escape obvious harm. If left unattended for at least 1 minute, mindless minions don't act, whereas intelligent ones act as they please.

You issue an order to an animal that's obeying you, either because you previously used Handle Animal successfully (see below) or you have the Ride feat (see page 170). Most animals know the Leap, Seek, Stand, Stride, and Strike basic actions. If an animal knows an activity, such as a horse's Gallop, you command the animal to preform the activity, but you must spend as many Command an Animal actions as the activity's number of actions. The animal uses the action you command.

Most animals understand only the simplest instructions, you might be able to instruct your animal to move to a certain square but not dictate a specific path to get there, or command it to attack a certain creature but not to make its attack nonlethal. The GM decides the specifics of the action your animal uses.

First looking at the Minion trait, we see the mention of using 2 actions if given a verbal command. Which basically re-iterates what the book was stating in the Animal Companion area. No change there.

However, looking at Command an Animal. It states you must have the Ride Feat, or successfully completed a Handle An Animal action prior to this.

- 1st Issue: Up until now, if a action required something... there was a Requirements tab at the top and/or trigger effect. Already it is missing the ground rules set forth in the beginning of the game. This needs to be fixed.

- 2nd Issue: The standard Command an Animal requires you to spend a command an animal action, for every action you want your animal to do. I.E. if you want your Wolf to Stride and Strike... you must spend 2 actions of Command an Animal, to get it to move and attack. Want an eagle to use Flyby Attack? You have to spend two actions to Command an Animal twice, to get it to do so. However, as stated in Animal Companion (or Minion trait) it stats using 1 Command An Animal (verbal command) action gives your animal 2 actions. So, it only takes one Command An Animal to tell your Companion to do his thing, he will (because of training or your kinship) be able to use his actions to do as commanded, two of them. Rather than needing your constant commands.

- 3rd Issue: You need to use Handle Animal or have the Ride Feat before you can use this. This is Not Covered by animal companion. I am not a english person, as you can probably tell already. But as a wargamer. No. Animal Companion, rules as written, does not stop the need for Handle An Animal before doing Command An Animal. Animal Companion just reduces the amount of Command An Animal actions you need to make to get the companion to do anything.

- 4th Issue: There is no Handle Animal action that exists in the book. Can't find it. But I did find a Handle an Animal Action. I an't dumb, I know what this rule is intended for. But in a game designed to appease people who love things complicated and rules upon rules. Also as a wargamer, you need to define the rules better. Or you're going to constantly get arguements and debates and confussion. Simple mistakes, can lead to big problems. But, this isn't the biggest issue.

Looking into Handle Animal.

You prepare a helpful animal to accept your commands. If you are trained in Nature, you can use Handle an Animal on a friendly or indifferent animal as well.

Success Until the end of your turn, you can use the Command the Animal action to direct the animal. You can mount the animal (see pabe 309).

Oh look it states it there as well, you need to succeed on... something, to command your animal.

- 1st Issue: IT doesn't tell you... what you need to Succeed on. It is implied that you need to make a Nature check. It also doesn't give a DC or state that the GM needs to make the DC. Like so many other actions. Either this was missed, rushed, or just lazy writing. The wargamer in me says this needs love.

- 2nd Issue: The Command the Animal action doesn't exist anywhere in the book. I found the Command an Animal action. Like before, this is nit picking. Read before...

- 3rd Issue: If you have a devoted Animal Companion whos been trained and even has proficiencies and such. Why does it need to be "prepared," to take a command? Animals are smarter then that, for sure. A well trained canine can understand something is coming from a simple whistle or even a raising of a hand. A full ACTION to prepare an animal to do something. To me. Is over kill, and horribly not necessary.

My overall feelings about this?:
Rules as written (even poorly written), you must spend 1 ACTION to prepare your companion to recieve orders. Because, for some reason your Animal Companion is a daft unintellegent thing that needs to be Prepared, instead of training and animal instincts keeping it on edge in the adrenline rush that is combat.

Then spend 1 ACTION to Command it to do the Actions it needs to do. I really am okay with this, one Action out of three to to get the Animal to do something? Cool.

However if the ability have the CONCENTRATE TRAIT. Why do I have to do it every turn? I command my animal companion to "Attack him" as I point at the evil orc. My, we will say wolf, is going to rush forward and attack and until I order it to stop. That wolf is attacking, as with most trained police/military dogs. If the orc runs, the wolf is going to follow. So it needs me to constantly tell it what to do for actions like that? Now I understand something like a horse, you sorta have to constantly tell it to change directions, keep on the path, stop, go, gallop and more even with super well trained ones. As much as I hate complication this needs a look into or perhaps do the biggest roleplay game band-aid, "GM descretion."

This being said, action economy wise. Your Ranger (we will go with this class) will be spending TWO of its three actions. To get its animal Companion to do TWO actions. Totaling about 4 actions. However, this means your Ranger is having issues with either... moving or attacking. It locks the ranger into using a Bow. As a two-weapon fighting ranger... is never going to be able to do anything. A crossbow ranger, will spend one action shooting, and then the next turn reloading. And the poor ranger will have to decide if he needs to move or attack.

Making the only useful pet in most cases beint the Bear or Bird, which allows the ranger, whos already been made lame by this action economy, do more damage... however the animal has to use one of its actions to even DO THIS.

The worse part is if the ranger has to do something and doesn't command the pet. It sits there with a Dunce Cap on its head. Doing literally... nothing. And if left alone for a minute. Goes and does what ever the animal does. This doesn't at all sit with a trained animal companion.

Druids can't even cast spells and use their animals.

The only use the animal companion is, is to Paladins and Fighters. Who only need to spend 1 action, to ge the mount to do what it needs to do. Leaving them with 2 actions to do their will, if they have the Ride Feat...

All in all. Animal Companions are a failure. They need a re-work in Action Economy. The other rules are great, having an animal companion that levels and changes as the campaign progresses is amazing. Also having a Horse that can live and be a "Companion" of a Knight is great... rather then a Knight having to buy a new Warhorse everytime a wizard drops a fireball.

To answer the question: Rules as written. Yes, you must preform the HANDLE AN ANIMAL action and succeed on the roll. If successful, you then must perform the COMMAND AN ANIMAL action to allow your animal companion to take its 2 actions. The Ride feat lets you bypass the HANDLE AN ANIMAL action, only in the case of you riding a mount.