Hi,
Im putting together some "bonus" encounter for the Savage Tide AP, and one of the big baddies is going to be a lvl 9 fighter with the leadership feat, but instead of giving him a human cohort, I was thinking about giving him a CR7 elite dog instead, as he can get a level 7 cohort (which make it a 21HD dog. Nasty). When improving animals, do they, like PC's and NPC's, gain a feat every three levels(Im assuming 1HD = 1level here, please tell me if my assumption is wrong), and an ability point every 4 levels? This does make a pretty nasty dog.
Animals gain ability increases and new feats for all Racial HD gained above their regular number of HD.
But I don't think that an 21HD dog would make a proper cohort... you need an ECL 7 creature, not a CR 7 one (methinks)
I think it'd be a better idea to replace the Cohort with an Animal Companion instead; to gain the right kind of creature.
But i thought that the ECL and CR where generally the same. For example
a ECL7 human(lvl 7 fighter) is CR7.
a ECL7 Drow (lvl 5 Fighter +2LA) is CR7.
How would I put together an ECL 7 dog?
An ECL Dog would probably be a 7HD critter. Maybe awakened? But def not 21 HD.
Actually; such does not always hold. A level 0 Ogre is CR3 but ECL 6, whilst a Mind Flayer is CR 7 and ECL 14 (or so I believe?)
The thing is that dogs aren't meant to be taken as Cohorts; Cohorts are loyal followers that join the adventurer because look up to him or are otherwise willing to follow his lead. Dogs are animals and thus incapable of such actions; they would follow because their master would guide them, nothing more. You need a creature with a Level Adjustment to use it as a Cohort.
But, since the DM's word is always final, you could replace the Leaderships Cohort with an animal companion of a Druid of roughly equal level (ie: if you get a 7th level Cohort, you can replace it by a Dog (or Wolf, as far as stats go) companion of a 7th level Druid.)
It's not exactly the same, but I think that'd work best for what you want. In any other way... a Dog is simply not a player character due to not having an Intelligence of 3 or greater. So it doesn't have an ECL...
In the monster manual it tells you on each creature improves as you "level it up". 90% of it is based on what type it is. Don't have manual in front of me to tell you what page (I'm at school between classes).
This is where I feel some of 3.0 and 3.5 is kinda broke. CR refers to the Challange Rating of the creature. Whatever its CR is means its supposed to take a party of 4 being that level to beat it. Further examination show where this gets broken something I will get into when I get home after my next class which is in 5 minutes.
|
Actually; such does not always hold. A level 0 Ogre is CR3 but ECL 6, whilst a Mind Flayer is CR 7 and ECL 14 (or so I believe?)
As a general rule, the ECL and the CR is usually fairly close. The difference is greater the more special abilities and the more powerful the special abilities are.
The reason for the difference is that having a special ability for one fight is one thing. Having a special ability for every fight for every day for the entire adventure is another thing. A troll with regeneration is a minor inconvenience for a group of adventurers -- 3 hp a round doesn't amount to that much. The ability to regenerate is MUCH more powerful in the hands of an adventurer -- almost never needing healing, being able to heal up 150 points of damage in 5 minutes is very powerful. A mind flayer that can mind blast a group of adventurers is powerful. A party member that can open up EVERY encounter with a mind blast without any "cost" is bordering on the insane for power level.
At least that's my take on it.
ECL and CR and completely different. That for some characters they are the same doesn't matter; they represent different things entirely.
At minimum, ECL is equal to CR. Usually, though, for more powerful creatures (those with racial HD especially), ECL can be much higher.
Examples:
Astral Deva - CR 14 - ECL 20
Human Vampire, 5th level Fighter - CR 7 - ECL 13
Hill Giant - CR 7 - ECL 16
However, the issue here is that ECL is really only useful for party parity. It's not really a DM tool beyond that - you don't need to calculate the ECL on NPCs.
Giving the baddie a 'cohort' that has a CR 1 to 2 less than his own will generally work fine. You don't *really* need to give him the Leadership feat. That, again, is only useful for party parity. I mean, you're still going to give them the XP for defeating the cohort, right? So the baddie is deriving no bonus whatsoever for having the feat slot taken up by Leadership. Give him Skill Focus (Handle Animal) instead, and things will go much smoother.
On a technical note, dogs can't normally be advanced in Hit Dice (with the exception of the Titanic template). But it sounds fine to me if you want to give them an unusual challenge. Expect them to be suspicious of the dog when it doesn't die in the first couple of hits - especially if the baddie is obviously not a druid or ranger. They may think that the dog is a transformed Outsider or perhaps a polymorphed warrior.
a ECL7 Drow (lvl 5 Fighter +2LA) is CR7.
Technically a Drow Fighter 5 is a CR 6 encounter. Drow have a CR 1 higher than their total hit dice, while their level adjustment is 2 higher.
This is where I feel some of 3.0 and 3.5 is kinda broke. CR refers to the Challange Rating of the creature. Whatever its CR is means its supposed to take a party of 4 being that level to beat it. Further examination show where this gets broken something I will get into when I get home after my next class which is in 5 minutes.
The thing you have to keep in mind is that CR is at best a rough estimate of a creature's power in comparison to a standard party of adventurers - typically a fighter, a rogue, a cleric, and a wizard, with perhaps a bard as backup. If anything in the formula deviates from the normal, the system can easily break down.
For example, if there is no one in the party with access to an Area of Effect type spell, then an encounter with a diminutive swarm can easily turn deadly for that party, regardless of the CR on the swarm. For a party of 4 evokers, the first battle of the day will more than likely be pathetically easy (all four in unison: fireball!), while the last might be really hard if they've run out of spells or if they run up against something with high spell resistance.
For best results when using the D&D CR system, you need to look at the creature's statistics *and* the statistics of your PCs. Imagine what would happen if everyone rolled either a 10 or an 11 on their d20 rolls for the whole combat, and that all other dice rolls were similarly averaged. Now, if your PCs would win said combat but take perhaps 4 rounds to do so, then you should award XP for an actual combat against said creature as a CR equal to your party's average level. If the party would win or lose quickly, then adjust the CR to match.
Now, it would be nice if we had the time to crunch these numbers for every combat ahead of time, but that would be enormously time consuming; so, you have to learn to adjust things on the fly to fit your group of adventurers. It's a process of trial and error.
This is where I feel some of 3.0 and 3.5 is kinda broke. CR refers to the Challange Rating of the creature. Whatever its CR is means its supposed to take a party of 4 being that level to beat it. Further examination show where this gets broken something I will get into when I get home after my next class which is in 5 minutes.
Yeah, that was how I initially read the rule, but it is an incorrect interpretation. Actually, the CR shows the level where four fairly standard adventurers should be able to take the creature, have some fun fighting it, but be in no real danger (assuming a straight-up, one on one fight). CR is unbelievably circumstantial and subjective. I wouldn't say it's "broken," but one definitely has to understand that different parties facing different foes will have wildly varying experiences, and plan for their party accordingly.