ShadowViper's page

It seems I will have to play around with house rules for this.

To everyone who contributed to the thread and continued the discussion, THANK YOU!, it is greatly appreciated! :-D

I apologise for trolling the trolls.

Quote:

By that logic/definition, couldn't it then be argued that a leopard(for example) would get pounce&rake as RAW instead of sprint, according to the general rules(it's bestiary entry in this case)?

No. Because the Small Cat companion is not a leopard. You are not selecting a leopard (or cheetah) animal companion. You are selecting a small cat animal companion. It is a small cat, a generic animal that represents all small cats. It is not a leopard. (Though the stats given are actually closer to a cheetah, they are not the same. The small cat, though close in stats to a cheetah, is still not a cheetah.)

Aye, you're right. Didn't really look at it that way before.

Yar.

Appareny I suffered from a copy-paste error when making the link above to the post/thread where you asked about wolves and low light vision months ago and it was answered via link to James Jacobs (creative director) posting the answer.

THIS is the proper working link to the Thursday, September 2nd, 2010 post, which is followed by your post (posted the following Monday) thanking that poster for providing the answer.

*eyeballs the link, making sure it actually works this time*

It may not be printed in your hard copy of the book, but wolf animal companions, "officially", DO have low light vision.

Now, as to the houserule suggestion for bringing pounce back (and rake) for Leopards, I say: sweet.

What I would do is change the base companion to better match the leopard. That is, reduce its speed from 50 to 30. Add climb 20. Exchange trip for grab. And instead of advancing at 4th level, it would instead advance at 7th level, where it would then gain it's normal size increase, pounce and rake. Pounce and rake ARE powerful abilities, and should not be accessible at a level as low as 4th.

Balance. (and consistency. From a quick glance, I do not see any other AC gaining pounce earlier than 7th level).

~P

Wow, thank you!

Heh the funny thing is before starting this little endeaver, I had looked through my own old posts because I could've sworn I had brought up/asked about the Wolf's lack of Low-Light Vision before, must've missed one or two.

The only way the animal companion rules would supersede the rules for the animal type is if it specifically says that the companion loses low-light vision. In order for that to be true, the animal companion entry would need to say "Unlike most creatures with the animal type, XXX does not receive low-light vision". Since that sentence, or one similar, is not found, all animal companions receive low-light vision.

Just because low-light vision is left out of a companions entry does not mean that the companion does not have it. The entry has to specifically say they do not get low-light vision.

By that logic/definition, couldn't it then be argued that a leopard(for example) would get pounce&rake as RAW instead of sprint, according to the general rules(it's bestiary entry in this case)?

Wouldn't it's animal companion entry then need to include a line such as this "Unlike most leopards, one selected as an animal companion loses pounce&raket and gains sprint instead"? Please note this is just an example.

Another example of the specfic superceding the general would be Change Shape. Normally a creature can only use Change Shape to take on a form that's within one size category of it's original form. Large can choose either a huge or medium form as an example. This general rule is superseeded by the draconic(Bronze, Gold and Silver) Change Shape in which is states they can use it to assume the form of any animal or humanoid.

I'm mainly just trying to understand and break down the mechanics for animal companion conversion. A formula if you will defining how to convert a standard animal from a Bestiary/Monster Manual into an animal companion. This mainly comes from the interest of attempting to stay as close to RAW as possible. I perfer house rules to add in something new(subrace, weapons, new character options) rather than adjust or change an existing rule, but that's just me.

Wolf animal companions DO get low light vision. ShadowViper, I think I've seen you bring this up before.

Wolfs are of the animal type: Creature Types

Therefore, they GET low light vision.

Animal

An animal is a living, nonhuman creature, usually a vertebrate with no magical abilities and no innate capacity for language or culture. Animals usually have additional information on how they can serve as companions. An animal has the following features (unless otherwise noted).

• d8 Hit Die.

• Base attack bonus equal to 3/4 total Hit Dice (medium progression).

• Good Fortitude and Reflex saves.

• Skill points equal to 2 + Int modifier (minimum 1) per Hit Die. The following are class skills for animals: Acrobatics, Climb, Fly, Perception, Stealth, and Swim.

Traits: An animal possesses the following traits (unless otherwise noted in a creature's entry).

• Intelligence score of 1 or 2 (no creature with an Intelligence score of 3 or higher can be an animal).

• Low-light vision.

• Alignment: Always neutral.

• Treasure: None.

• Proficient with its natural weapons only. A noncombative herbivore treats its natural weapons as secondary attacks. Such attacks are made with a –5 penalty on the creature's attack rolls, and the animal receives only 1/2 its Strength modifier as a damage adjustment.

• Proficient with no armor unless trained for war.

• Animals breathe, eat, and sleep.

Also, the developers have explained that some abilities were excluded for balance reasons (not simply at random). If you feel a certain animal companion should get a given ability back, go ahead and just do it in your game. See how it goes. If it works in your game, great. If not, admit it was a bad idea, take the ability away again and move on.

ShadowViper, it really does seem like you are more or less alone on this one I'm afraid. The animal companion rules are fine and they work well with the game. If you...

I wish it was as simple as this, however the animal subtype is a general rule, while the animal companion section is a specfic rule which would supercide(sp) the general rule unfortunately in this case.

I would also like to thank you(and those that have done the same!) for making a non-troll post that continues the discussion and contributes to the thread, it is greatly appreciated! :-D

I apologise for the necro post, but where are the class and feat/s found?

ShadowViper wrote:

Since it seems that special qualities/abilities are randomly excluded or included, I would like to suggest something much simplier.

You know darned well what's going on. It's called balance. The animal companion offerings deviate from Bestiary stats deliberately because what is reasonable to give a PC versus what is reasonable to eat a PC isn't always in sync.

I get it. You want more power. You see stuff in Bestiary that animal companions don't get and you want it. So you're coming here and you're arguing with anyone and everyone who doesn't agree with you in an attempt to skew the signal-to-noise ratio in favor of your viewpoint.

Your fundamental observation in the multiple threads you've got going is flawed; this isn't random, it's not senseless, and it's not complicated. It's balanced, it's deliberate, and the "solution" is as easy as use the stats you're given and keep your player nose out of DM books. If you want to house-rule something different, you're entirely welcome to do so.

I would normally agree with you however, please explain what is "balanced" about a wolf being the only animal not able to see in the dark and why it's low-light vision was appearantly removed. I have so far seen nothing that proves it was just an error or a typo, just assumptions and claims of faulty eratta.

That is one of the reasons why I believe the process to be a bit random. And wish for some clairification.

And no, animal companions should never be taken as is from the Bestiary/Monster Manuals, otherwise we get 4th level druids running around with flesh-rakers as in standard 3.5.

ShadowViper wrote:

Okay here is a little FYI and common sense lesson for some people.

If you believe a thread has been posted in the wrong forum section(mistakes do happen after all), simply inform a forum moderator and move on.

Creating a troll post that is some variation of "Hey ****! This is in the wrong section!" contributes nothing to the thread, is considered flamebaiting, as well an attempt to derail it; is a great way to annoy and irritate people while making yourself look like a troll. So when such posts are made, it should be no surprise that the thread creator may adopt a "snarky attitude" in responce to the trolling spam.

You'll find in these forums were around to help each other for the most part the reason we're posting in your thread to tell you you'll have more luck posting in house rules is because we're trying to help you.

If you post these idea in house rules forum your going to get responses that will improve your ideas and suggestions. This is not the section for it.

you might consider it trolling but on these forums we're just trying to help, there no malice involved we genuinely think if you post your ideas in house rules section you'll get a much better response.

If you want to talk about animal companions in general then by all means post in the general discussion but if you suggesting alternative rules then its houserules.

The devs do look at the house rules section you've got more of a chance of having your ideas looked at there than you will in general discussion.

But if you've got it into your head these are evil flammy trolls forums there's really nothing else I can say so hopefully you'll take the advice that has been provided and realise most of us are just trying to help.

If someone is genuinely trying to help, the accusations of trolling are not directed towards them and I apologise if they were offended.

You may be trying to help(which I appreciate and thank you for :-D). And while I do realise I should have probably posted this thread in the house rules section(despite that it's purpose is to also seek clairification on the animal companion conversion rules/mechanic/process), but it still seems that some people(and this is true of most forums) just want to troll and spam. Bigkilla being the first example in this thread.

ShadowViper wrote:

Aye, you'd think it was. The wolf is the only animal companion(AFAIK) that does not have low-light vision.

Main question, would a Lepord animal companion gain pounce and rake(instead of sprint, sprint's Cheetah after all) when advancing at 4th level?

By RAW, no. Animal Companions are not normal animals, and they follow the stats and rules laid out for them. Something I lament for this particular case because jaguars are my favorite cats and cheetahs are distinctly not.

As far as the rules are concerned for Animal Companions, it might look like a Jaguar, Leopard, Cougar, Lynx, etc etc etc... but they all fight like a Cheetah. Which makes zero sense to me since Cheetahs are an extraordinarily unique breed. Most other "Small Cats" are pretty similar in technique, behavior and prey.

If I were to make a guess as to Paizo's motives for this, I'd say that they figured they already had a feline companion with Pounce and Rake and all that (the Large Cats). So the Small Cats should do something different, which works just fine for the Druid but leaves the Ranger high and dry.

Aye I completely agreed.

And yes the changes I believe were made in the spirit of "balance," but that is also why I'm attempting to find some clairification and open up discussion on whether for not for at least one example(cheetah/leopard) if just giving the leopard pounce&rake instead of sprint would be too "unbalanced"

Because after all, a leopard sprinting after prey like a cheetah seems rather silly to me too.

one thing you need to realize is companions do t loose any abilities. the beasiary stats are irrelevant to companion stats.

They may be a little different yes. But I do not think that is entirely the case. After all it's still an animal that the Druid or Ranger attracted to him to befriend.

Otherwise we have Wolves that can't see in the dark and Leopards who believe they're Cheetahs and try to sprint rather than waiting in a tree and pouncing upon unsuspecting prey.

Yes there are some aspects that support your post. For example: Why do Tyrannosaurs never grow up? Biggest they get is large size, or a Bear that only reaches medium size.

This is the cause of the confusion, the conversion from animal to animal companion seems rather random, some things are included while others are not.

But this thread is specifcally discussing the random inclusion/exclusion that seems to take place with some animals' special qualities/abilities.

The problem with putting leopards in the Big Cat animal companion is that the big cat companions start as medium-sized and advance to large sized. Leopards are medium sized.

IF you put it in the big cat animal companion, not only will the size not be right, but the ability scores will be bigger than a leopards, the damage of the bite and claws will be greater, and it won't have its climb speed.

If you truely want a leopard animal companion and not just a generic small cat companion, it really does need its own category. Both big and small cat categories leave out parts of the leopards abilities, or just increase them beyond what the leopard can do.

Once again, you're getting way too hung up on the animal's actual size. A leopard is perfectly fine as a "Cat, Small" the differences in stats between a cheetah and a leopard is very minor, they are pretty much identical. The only thing that's really needed(in my opinion) is simply exchanging sprint for pounce&rake when someone chooses the Leopard.

What I'm really wondering about is if there is an actual game mechanic behind the conversion of animal to animal companion, and say an actual procress. Because so far the inclusion/exclusion of an animal companion's special abilities/attacks/qualities seems rather random. If someone disagrees with this, I highly encourage them to check out the wolf.

Nevermind...

It's obvious most people are either

A. Missing the point entirely

or

B. Just interested in trolling.

Really disappointing and seems it's true what I've heard about the paizo boards' general population. :-(

P.P.S. Calling somebody a troll because they disagree with you is not very nice.

If someone doesn't wish to be accused of trolling, then they shouldn't knowingly create posts that contribute nothing to the thread and/or attempt to derail the topic. Honestly, this isn't rocket surgery.

Posts of....

"Hey ****! This thread is in the wrong forum section!"

"You mis-spelled somthing!"

"Some random remark(ha ha I think I'm funny teehee)"

Contribute nothing to the thread and is considered trolling.

Come on guys, this is pretty basic stuff....

Possibly(and if so, my bad), but let's get back on topic.

Also please note that I'm not really making a house rule, I want to keep things as close to RAW as possible, house rules usually(in my experience) mostly just complicate things. I'm more seeking clarifacation and proposing a change while I'm at it. But again, whether or not I'm suggesting a house rule or which forum section this thread is supposed to be in is off-topic. Continually making off-topic posts is a great way to get reported for trolling, so I'd refrain from doing it.

And honestly, getting all hung up on what section of forum a thread is "supposed" to be in is rather silly. If you have something to contribute to the thread topic, then please do so, if you're just going to make meaningless posts that contribute nothing and just troll, don't waste your time and mine. If someone creates a thread asking for a rules clairifaction(and maybe proposing an idea to make things easier while he/she at it), posting variations of "Wtf? This thread is in the wrong section!!!??" is a great way to irritate an annoy people.

This a prime example of why the paizo boards have a bad reputation. Too many posters not using common sense and attempting to troll those looking for answers. :-(

1) Eliminate leopards (or anything else that pounces).

2) Done.

Removing options is not the way to fix/address these issues.

heh I hate to say it but your a bit late to the party animal companions and their rules have been around since PF core they're not going to be changed in any significant way.

if you want to make your own house rules go for it, if you want to post about them do it in the house rules forums.

I understand that they've been around for awhile, what I don't understand is why no "offical" clairification has been given, why some animals are lumped together, why a wolf is the only one(AKAIK) not to have Low Light Vision?

In the example of the Cheetah and the Lepord, I'm sorry, but I really don't want to have a Cheetah in Lepord skin as an animal companion, that's just silly. If I pick a lepord, I want an actualy lepord, not a cheetah dressed as a lepord.

I'm the type of play that likes to stick as close to RAW as possible, so excuse me for trying to get answers/clairification to a bit of rules confusion. And for suggesting ways that could make them even easier, Pathfinder animal companions are greatly improved than standard 3.5 in ease of creation and use. Trying to make something better is not a bad thing. ;-)

But once again, if you're not going to contribute to the thread, it's a good idea to just refrain from posting, wouldn't want to be considered a troll after all.

Back on topic..

You seem to really be the only person raging on this issue in the three threads you have started on the same topic in the last two days.

If you're not going to contribute to the thread, it's a good idea to just refrain from posting in it.

Hope this advice helps. :-)

ShadowViper wrote:

Is there information on how to convert 3.5 poisons into 3.P poisons? For example, the Yuan-ti Tainted Ones' poison bite. 1d4 Con/1d4 Con.

Would it stay 1d4 and just switch to 1rd/for 6 rds? Like most injury poison.

It's in the conversion guide.

Link

Thank you! :-D

::Reburies the thread:: Nothing to see here, move along.

Is there information on how to convert 3.5 poisons into 3.P poisons? For example, the Yuan-ti Tainted Ones' poison bite. 1d4 Con/1d4 Con.

Would it stay 1d4 and just switch to 1rd/for 6 rds? Like most injury poison.

Thank you for the examples Raving! :-)

Since it seems that special qualities/abilities are randomly excluded or included, I would like to suggest something much simplier.

Each animal companion has the special qualities/abilities that it's entry in the Bestiary/s gives it. So Wolf once again has Low Light Vision without issue(because, honestly, who wants a wolf that can't see in the dark, just plain silly).

If it's an advanced ability it would be gained as normal when the animal companion advances. For example, Tigers and pounce.

So no more lumping different animals together and forcing them to share special qualities/abilities that they wouldn't have! :-)

Complete Example.

Lepord, starting out it has scent and low-light vision as normal, but when it advances, it does not gain sprint, instead it gains pounce & rake as per it's entry in the Bestiary.

Much easier way of doing animal companions.

Edit: And with the ammount of people freaking out and attemtping to troll and derail the thread.... It seems this was posted in the wrong section, my mistake seeking some clairification and offering an idea that could make animal companions a bit easier/better.

Bump.

Quote:

If the wolf's lack of low light vision wasn't intentional, then why isn't it fixed in the eratta? And yes the GENERAL rule is indeed that all animals have Low-Light Vision, however the animal companion rules are categorized as SPECFIC rules which override the GENERAL rules.

Because errata is never perfect. Just like things get overlooked in the first printing of the book, things get overlooked when compiling errata.

If you want your cat companion to be closer to a leopard, then you have to house rule a new animal companion category. Leopards aren't big enough to be classified as a "Big Cat" companion, nor are their abilities the same as the "Small Cat" companion.

Okay I think you're getting too caught up on the big/small cat name categoriziation. It's irrelevant.

For the "Cat, Small" option it is a choice between the Cheetah and the Lepord. At 4th Druid/7th Ranger level they advance and gain sprint. However sprint is the Cheetah's ability(Bestiary pg40). Now, we can see that a Lepord has pounce and rake in place of sprint, so logically it should get them when it advances, in place of sprint.

Do I really have to explain the differences between Cheetahs(Plains) and Lepords(Forests)?

All the "Cat,Small" means is that it is "smaller" than a Lion or Tiger. That's it, nothing else. A couger(mountain lion) would be a "Cat,Small" as well. A new "medium" cat entry doesn't need to be created. The animal's actual size is irrelevant to this discussion. I am asking about an animal's special abilities/qualities and why some seem to be missing randomly(meaning no specfic mechanic behind the inclusion or exclusion of said abilities, or at least one that is not appearant). I honestly don't understand where this confusion is coming from but I hope I cleared it up.

So inconculsion the two questions for thread discussion are as follows.

1. Would it "unbalance" the Lepord to give it pounce and rake in place of sprint. Keep in mind that both of these animals are CR 2 creatures. One having sprint, the other having pounce&rake.

2. What is the mechanic/proces(if any) behind converting an animal into an animal companion. Because so far it seems as though the inclusion/exclusion of special abilities/qualities are completely random.

ShadowViper wrote:

Up is up with this? It seems to be rather random as well. It would be helpful if animal companion conversion mechanics were released.

Some exmaples.

-Wolf being the only animal companion(AFAIK) that doesn't have low light vision.
-Lepord not having pounce and rake.

Can we please get some clairification? Should animal companions have everything that the animals naturally have(once the advance of course)?

All animals have low-light vision from animal traits, unless specifically noted. Since the wolf companion doesn't say it removes the low-light vision, it has it . It was just mistakenly left off the wolf companion.

The leopard loosing those is because of it being classified as a small cat. (If you look at the small cat companion, it is a cheetah. The speed is too fast, and it gets the sprint ability, which leopards don't get. You will also notice, the stats for a big cat companion don't match the lion or tigers either.) Leopards need their own category, as they don't fit either the small cat or large cat companions.

It only STARTS out as a SMALL creature. At 4th level it ADVANCES to a MEDIUM creature. Cheetah would then gain sprint. But how about a Lepord? Lepords don't really sprint(AFAIK), and a MEDIUM Lepord does indeed have both pounce and rake.

So again I ask, why do some animals seem to randomly lose some abilities?

If the wolf's lack of low light vision wasn't intentional, then why isn't it fixed in the eratta? And yes the GENERAL rule is indeed that all animals have Low-Light Vision, however the animal companion rules are categorized as SPECFIC rules which override the GENERAL rules.

Up is up with this? It seems to be rather random as well. It would be helpful if animal companion conversion mechanics were released.

Some exmaples.

-Wolf being the only animal companion(AFAIK) that doesn't have low light vision.
-Lepord not having pounce and rake.

Can we please get some clairification? Should animal companions have everything that the animals naturally have(once the advance of course)?

Aye, you'd think it was. The wolf is the only animal companion(AFAIK) that does not have low-light vision.

Main question, would a Lepord animal companion gain pounce and rake(instead of sprint, sprint's Cheetah after all) when advancing at 4th level?

Aye it does, which brings me to another question. If someone were to want an Elven Hound as an animal companion via the Elf Ranger sub levels in(RotW), which of their abilities would they lose and which would they keep? Also would they stick with the Magical Beast HD(as per the advantage of level the 4th Elf Ranger sub level).

While Pathfinder makes animal companions alot more simple and easier to do, it also adds a bit of confusion(why some animals lose abilities they should have, prime example being the Wolf's Low Light Vision).

It does, just not as an animal companion. It's like how a wolf animal companion appearantly loses Low Light Vision during the ritual.

Anyone?

I use 3.5 material with PF, that's kinda the point after all heh. It's not that hard to convert things any way.

This is mainly just a thread asking for opinions.

Now suppose someone wanted to play a Ranger and decided to choose a Lepord over a Cheetah. Now the sprint doesn't really work with a lepord, so my question is, would it be "balanced" to allow the person to exchange sprint for pounce?

My first thought is "no," seeing as how pounce(at least in my opinion) is a more powerful ability than sprint and more useful.

Thank you. I found it after another look through the combat section.

I had originally considered that as well, but I had dismissed it since the spell had said it's centered on the caster, which I considered the middle of the caster's space. But then again, for a medium caster, it would be really any corner he/she likes.

Aye, I've yet to run across anything that states you have to enter a dragon's space to attack it. Once again, afaik, by RAW. All you have do to attack something in melee is have the enemy within your reach(I.E being adjacent to it if you have 5ft of reach).

You don't have to enter a dragon's space to attack it, as far as I know any way. Lets continue with a colossal dragon. It's space is 25 ft(speaking of which, where are the actualy space/reach general tables located? I can't seem to find them in either the Core Book or the Beastiary). We'll mark the Dragon's space as X with the enemy space as Y

Y
XXXXX
XXXXX
XXXXX
XXXXX
XXXXX

Y is a standard medium creature. Lets say a foolish human with a sword. He's attacking the dragon head on(bad idea). Once he's adjacent(sp) to the dragon, his reach(5ft) allows him to attack the dragon, he needn't enter the dragon's space to attack him.

My understand is that unless a creature has a reach of 0ft, it does not need to enter the enemy creature's space to attack it.

So as my adove post. (Which assumed that the spell was centered on the dragon on didn't grow due to dragon's size) as said before. It's really not big enough to be all that effective to use against enemies or to protect the dragon.

So again, why would an intelligent larger dragon even bother learning anti-magic field as one of it's very few spells known since it appears that the spell is rather useless to it. Unless I'm mistaken.

My question/confirmation request is this. A Colossal Dragon casts Anti-Magic Field. Now it's centered on the caster. The caster, being a colossal dragon, takes up 25 feet of space. Now the Anti-Magic Fields radius is 10-feet. So that means(provided I'm understanding this correctly, and the spell's radius doesn't extend based on caster's size) that the dragon's space is larger than the spell's radius?

So then one wonders, why would a larger dragon even bother casting anti-magic field? Since it seems to do the dragon no good. Not big enough radius to extend to enemy targets, and not a big enough radius to fully cover the dragon.

Maybe it only has 23 ranks in it?

I don't think so. It has a total of 11 skills chosen with 11 skill points total each HD.

Now looking at the stat block for the Ancient Red Dragon. His/her skill modifier on fly is only +11 when it should be +13. So I'm assuming I've missed a penalty, what -2 have I missed? Or has someone given the dragon a colossal penalty to fly instead of a gargantuan penalty?

+ 25 ranks for 25 HD, +3 Trained Class Skill= 28

-1 for 8 Dex, -6 for Gargantuan size, -8 for clumsy manuverability= -15

28 - 15= 13

With the information in this thread, the existence of draconic bloodline sorcerers now has some even more.. troubling implications. Especially if they belong to a bloodline of dragons that don't get polymorph or change shape.

All dragons have the option of casting polymorph if they're old enough.

The more I think of this problem, the more I'm coming to think that the change shape universal monster rule needs some FAQ treatment.

Because as it stands, a doppelganger's change shape ability will expire a few minutes after it falls asleep. And that's certainly not how that monster's supposed to work. In fact, the more I look at the change shape ability, the more I think that things like duration, target, and the like are NOT intended to use the spell's defaults. If they were, then every monster would have an effective caster level listed for their change shape ability.

My suggestion and preference for how change shape should work is to say that when a creature uses change shape, it can remain in its new form as long as it wants. This lets things like succubi or doppelgangers remain in their disguise for an entire night without having to stay up all night. And it allows dragons to move in to humanoid societies without worrying about durations—they can only assume humanoid form 3 times a day, but once they get a form they like, they can stay in that form for however long they want.

I'm relatively sure, having looked at how all of these shapechanging monsters function, that this is the correct interpretation of the change shape rules, and its CERTAINLY the way that the ability should work from a story viewpoint.

So fans of dragons who stay in human form for a long time? It still works! And there was much rejoicing!

I'm gonna hit the FAQ flag on this post; other folks who want to see this show up in the FAQ officially should hit the flag as well. I've already sent emails to Sean, Jason, and Erik, in any event, so hopefully this'll end up in the FAQ someday soon. In any event... there ya go.

Thank you!! :-D

Garreth Baldwin wrote:

James actually posted somewhere that all animal companions have the animal type and thus low light vision. I'll cite later when I'm not at work and have time to dig though the threads...unless James beats me to it.

Found it.

Thank you. I was going to go ahead and house rule it if this was not the "offical" case.

Thank you.

Thank you :-)

It's more of a fluff thing really that I was referring to. A druid going out into the wild to attract the desired animal and transform it into their companion.

Hypothetically, if you were to convert the yuan-ti alternate form to change shape, would it work as standard polymorph(beast form II, vipers only) or "upgraded" to just working as beast form III(for poison)?

Ahh alrighty thank you!

Is it possible to get an offical answer on this?

I mean seriously, how does this work? Mr. Wolf comes to the druid with low-light vision but then loses it during the transformation into an animal companion?

The point of an animal companion is to get the actual animal, not an animal with missing parts.

Specfically: A creature cannot change shape to a form more than one size category smaller or larger than its original form.

It seems that, gone are the days of great wyrm bronze, silver or gold dragons taking humaniod forms. In fact with this change, once a dragon reaches huge in size, the change shape ability pretty much becomes useless for what it was originally intended for: disguising a dragon.

How about the yuan-ti wanting to change herself into a tiny viper, nope sorry, out of luck. Once again another creature where change-shape becomes useless.

I'm hoping there is an errata that fixes this over-sight.

Is listed as only having Scent(Rather than Low-Light Vision and Scent) in it's Special Qualities entry. I'm assuming this is an error(printing error, etc).

I've yet to find an animal in the Beastiary that doesn't have low light vision.

If it's not an error, what is the reason for Wolf animal companions only having scent?