Animal Companion Question, Offical answer needed.

[Andrew Williamson]

Okay, so here is the deal:

Recently a friend said "it is too bad you can't get your animal companion to intelligence 3 to take feats" and I say "it will in one more level" he asks how, I say ability score increase from the druid animal companion advancement to which he says "no because then it would not be an animal companion because animals can't have higher than 2 int"

I provide evidence that they indeed can have higher intelligence than 3 by providing the following examples.

PG 52 of the pathfinder rule book under explanation of skills for table 3-8:
"If an animal companion increases its intelligence to 10 or higher, it gains bonus skill ranks as normal"

PG 53 of the pathfinder rule book under Animal Skills:
"Animal companions with an intelligence of 3 or higher can put ranks into any skills"

PG 53 (again) under Animal Feats:
"Animal companions with an intelligence of 3 or higher can select any feat they are physically capable of using"

his arguments include: pg 307 of the bestiary
"intelligence score of 1 or 2 (no creature with an intelligence score of 3 or higher can be an animal)."

and

Paladin bonded mounts which have a minimum intelligence of 6 (however they function as a druid's animal companion does.)

What is the actual case here?

Can druid animal companions have an intelligence score of 3 or higher or not?

I really would like an official (*cough*Jason*cough*) answer here as it would help greatly.

[Louis IX]

You win.
1) you listed more clues leaning towards your side
2) your clues come from the book for players, not the book the players don't generally have
3) your clues specifically refer to the animal companion, which is a specific subset of animals
4) it's logical: why would a cherished animal companion disappear when it gains a mere point of Int?

So what if your Companion began its life as an "Animal Companion" and ended, numerous years later (or not), it as a dear friend? It's even thematically compatible with the Druid!

But I'm not Jason. Sadly (monk's INA still smarts ;-)

[Phasics]

well techinally if you cast awken on your animal companion it becomes a magical beast and you lose it ;)

[Abraham spalding]

Phasics wrote:

well techinally if you cast awken on your animal companion it becomes a magical beast and you lose it ;)

Awakening isn't the same case as is being discussed here though.

[Marc Radle]

I'm certainly not official, but I have done quite a bit of work with animal companions etc.

You are correct. Normal animals cannot have an INT higher than 2. However, there are various special exceptions to this general rule and Animal Companions are the most obvious.

A specifically stated rule always trumps, and is always treated as an exception to, a more general rule. In this case, there are numerous rules (which you correctly list in your original post) that specifically state that an Animal Companion (but not a normal animal) CAN have an INT higher than 2.

In fact, raising an Animal Companion's INT to 3 is a fairly common thing to do. Not only do you open up more skill and feat options, you also give it the ability to understand spoken commands and instructions which negates the need to use tricks, the handle animal skill etc to get it to do things.

[wraithstrike]

You can raise the int to 3. The rules even say you can.

PS: Those guys don't normally pop in to answer questions if the answer is right there in the book.

[Andrew Williamson]

Thanks all for the replies.