Any guides to building Animal Companions?

[Rycaut]

I have a few characters and concepts that would include animal companions (some as mounts) and would love to see how people have built out their animal companions.

Clearly there are a LOT of options. This would be for PFS play so it has to fit into the restrictions.

One would be a mount for a paladin - probably a horse as there aren't many other options for PFS paladins to select.

The other would be a reptile of some form for a Naga Aspirant (Nagaji Druid and yes I have a race boon to play a Nagaji). I was looking at a Spinosaur but could be convinced of the virtues of another reptile. The naga aspirant build I'm considering would be focused on buffing her pet who would do most of the heavy lifting in combat. So feats and tricks should reflect that (might want to boost the AC's int for even greater feat flexibility). Naga aspirants get a bunch of unusual spells for Druids (Mage armor, see invisibility, shield, shield of faith, divine power, mirror image etc. so those on top of the usual Druid buffs should be a very strong AC)

So anyone have a good guide to ACs?

[lemeres]

Half orcs actually always have the option for many different mounts or animal companions, even in PFS. This is because of the Beast Rider feat

No prerequities beyond race, level 7, and an AC or mount class feature. It gives orcs and half orcs the option to pick elephants, rhinoceroses, triceratops, stegosauruses, or pteranodons. Yes, as in a flying animal is a legal choice (although they all look like fine choices over all)

Anyway, while it is not a comprehensive guide to builds, Peterrco's Guide to Druids does go into a lot of detail on the available choices for AC's in section 1, giving comparative analysis on how effective each animal is over a range of levels.

The problem with making a comprehensive guide to animal companions is that they are so varied, and many have vastly different fighting styles (constrictor snakes serve well as grapplers, but poorly otherwise for example). This is further complicated by the fact that any animal companion with int 3+ can actually take any fear they can physically perform. You might as well look as build guides for humanoids that use similar fighting styles. One word of warning though: AC's have 'hit dice,' not 'levels.' That can limit their options just as much as a lack of thumbs.

[Rycaut]

Yes. I know a complete guide would be a lot of work and I'm familiar with some of the Druid guides. But I mostly wanted to see some sample builds to see how folks made decisions about feats, tricks and stat boosts for a variety of build types.

For PFS play I think elephants aren't allowed but if they are an option via the beast rider feat that would be awesome. However if it is from the Orc section of the advanced race guide I'm not sure it is currently allowed for PFS play.

[lemeres]

The feat lists "orc or half orc" and the list of PFS legal material says:

Additional Resources wrote:

all half-orc feats except Tenacious Survivor is legal for play

So I assume the feat is legal. You do have the point however that individual choices listed on the feat may or may not be PFS legal.

[Rycaut]

It is something I would like to get clarification about - but it certainly gives me ideas about a Half-Orc Paladin....

(it is also a great feat if you want to play a character with a 2 level dip outside of a class granting the mount or animal companion (or if you take the boon companion feat it would work well with a 6 level "dip" outside of the class with an animal companion or mount - so could really open up some interesting builds (though it might take a while to get going). It does take 7 levels before you get the extra mount abilities - though if you did a paladin/oracle or other paladin multiclass build and took it as your level 7 feat and also gained your 5th Paladin level you could start with the beat mount from when you got your companion.

Also seems like a great feat for a Ranger...

hmmm now I'm thinking about all kinds of builds to use this feat at 7th level... (I like dipping and this is far more fun than taking Boon Companion - especially if I only wanted to dip 2 levels) and really who doesn't want to play an half-orc riding a flying dinosaur... (or a big large dinosaur...)