Animal Companion with Survival

[RoseCrown]

I just noticed/realised that a druid's Animal Companion does not gain survival as a Class skill. Is this correct - and if so, how can I fix it? It's not like I can give the poor thing a trait, is it?

[Eltacolibre]

I see that survival is listed as a class skill for animal companions...so not sure what you mean.

[CrystalSeas]

Eltacolibre wrote:

I see that survival is listed as a class skill for animal companions...so not sure what you mean.

Core Rule Book wrote:

Animal Skills

Animal companions can have ranks in any of the following skills: Acrobatics* (Dex), Climb* (Str), Escape Artist (Dex), Fly* (Dex), Intimidate (Cha), Perception* (Wis), Stealth* (Dex), Survival (Wis), and Swim* (Str). All of the skills marked with an (*) are class skills for animal companions. Animal companions with an Intelligence of 3 or higher can put ranks into any skill.

Survival is not listed as a class skill in the Core Rule book

[CrystalSeas]

You fix it by giving him ranks in Survival. It doesn't have to be a class skill to add ranks. It *does* have to be in that list, though, which it is

[RoseCrown]

CrystalSeas wrote:

You fix it by giving him ranks in Survival. It doesn't have to be a class skill to add ranks. It *does* have to be in that list, though, which it is

Fair enough. but it's still a +3 I'd have liked to have. :(

[Jeff Morse]

Bump Int to 3 and skill focus it.

[RoseCrown]

Jeff Morse wrote:

Bump Int to 3 and skill focus it.

I think Skill Focus is on the list of available Feats already, but yeah.

Just really surprised it's not Class for animals :-/

[Grandlounge]

With an int of 3 you can take additional traits and get +4 total and a second trait.

[RoseCrown]

Grandlounge wrote:

With an int of 3 you can take additional traits and get +4 total and a second trait.

Oh goodie! Thank you.

[Ciaran Barnes]

Ultimately, it is not a class skill (no +3 training bonus) and can't be without increasing Intelligence and then using a feat to acquire a trait.

[RedDogMT]

RoseCrown wrote:

Jeff Morse wrote:

Bump Int to 3 and skill focus it.

I think Skill Focus is on the list of available Feats already, but yeah.

Just really surprised it's not Class for animals :-/

I am not surprised at all. It is a DC 10 Survival to hunt/forage for food for one individual. Every animal has above a 10 Wisdom. Most have a 12 or more. So if they take 10, they are able to automatically find food for themselves each day (not accounting for environmental modifiers, if any); and if they need to find food for their cubs, they would have to roll a die. Some days they would come home empty. This is for unskilled animals. Good hunters would likely have skill points assigned. If you want a good hunter, spend some points. This all sounds fine to me.

If anything, isn't kind of silly to say that skills like fly, swim, climb, intimidate are class skills for every animal companion? You know, it's a little known fact that bears have a knack for flying; and field mice are much more vicious and intimidating that you might think; and don't forget those mystical Mwangi-tree-climbing ponys...Death from above!!!

Some rules are set up not because they necessarily make sense, but because they choose to draw the line in a certain place.