I think I know the RAW ruling on this, but I've been toying with the idea of an ulfen druid who has two wolves as companions for a while now and want to pitch the idea to my GM. He will probably be open for it but I'd like to get some opinions from you guys here so I can point him here for "unbiased" info.
So the general rule is that if two archetypes replace or modify the same class feature or ability, it is not possible to take both of them.
Now in this particular case both change the way Nature's Bond works but kind of in the same way. Pack lord says you have to choose an animal companion and wolf shaman says it has to be a wolf.
Would you allow this combination in your game? Do you think it would be too powerful?
I am not looking for the biggest bang for my buck, I just think that those two archetypes form a very interesting concept.
If it were just the Nature Bond changes, then that might be OK, with GM permission. Wolf Shaman restricts available choices of animal companion or domain, while Pack Bond replaces Nature Bond; not quite the same thing, but somewhat compatible (IMO).
The problem comes with the pack lord's Improved Empathic Link and the wolf shaman's altered Wild Shape. By strict RAW, the wolf shaman doesn't have an additional use of wild shape at 6th level; they gain the ability as a druid of two fewer levels. If they change into a canine, then the effect (for size of animal form, beast shape version, and duration) is at druid level +2; they do not gain additional uses per day (otherwise it turns into a bookkeeping nightmare of tracking canine uses and non-canine uses).
In short, no, the two archetypes cannot be taken together.
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I would say its ok. Basically with the two archtypes put together, you have to take animal companion(s) [Pack Lord] and it has to be wolf [wolves]. But you should lose the Wolf Shaman Wildshape ability at 6th level due to the Pack Lord Improved Empathic Link ability.
As for being overpowered? I don't see that happening but I may be missing something. Of course, your GM makes the final decision on this.
Hope this helps.
Thanks for the feedback!
I don't see why the Improved Empathic Link is a problem:
At 6th level a pack lord wolf shaman could wild shape 1/day with an effective druid level of 4 for non-canine and 8 for canine creatures.
A 6th level wolf shaman can only Wild Shape one time per day ("At 6th level, a wolf shaman's wild shape ability functions at her druid level – 2"), not two. The pack lord's Improved Empathic Link specifically replaces the second use of Wild Shape gained by a 6th level druid ("This ability replaces the 6th-level additional use of wild shape"), which the wolf shaman does not have.
You can't trade an ability you don't have for a new ability.
A straight wolf shaman would not get a second use of wild shape at 6th level?
The way I read it, a wolf shaman could wild shape 2/day at 6th level, but in terms of duration and creature size and so on it would be like beast shape I for non-canine creatures and like beast shape II for canines.
I'd love to get a third opinion on this.
The original author of the archetype is pretty clear in a number of different forum posts that he didn't intend the animal shaman archetypes to gain any uses of wild shape until 6th level, and that he'd like to see it run that way. (Here, among other places) He does say that at 6th you can mix and match, using two uses of wild shape in wolf form as an 8th level druid, and a third use as either a wolf at 8th or a different animal as a 4th level druid. It seems fair that it works that way, since the animal shaman gets totemic transformation for free, not giving up any abilities, at 2nd level.
So, as written, the combo doesn't work. However, it's cool, and doesn't seem hugely overpowered so in one of my games I'd be happy to house rule it in. Probably I'd say the pack lord doesn't get improved empathic link until 8th level (replacing the first 'bump' to their wild shape ability). I'd be happy to delay that ability by a couple of levels since it's the one place that I'd have some slight power concerns. Being able to have multiple sets of roving eyes and ears is better than just one set, so having it happen later makes some sense.
This is an archetype stack that I have looked at a few times in the last couple of months as well.
I wouldn't disagree with a GM that said no to it based on RAW, but I would certainly allow it in my games as the concept is pretty dang cool.
Thank you for the link to the designer's clarifications, bodhranist.
So by RAW, these two archetypes definitely cannot work together. That's a pity, but I'll see what my GM will say about this.