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If you are not mounted on your Animal Companion, then it will use its own MAP progression for its attacks. If you are riding it, then you are using the Mounted Combat rules that specify that you and your mount use the same MAP progression.
Because of that, it could be more useful to go with Flurry instead of Precision since your normal attack routine involves attacks at full MAP.
And yes, full MAP attacks almost always miss - except for Flurry Rangers. With an Agile weapon, their MAP penalty at full MAP is only -4 - which is better than a lot of character's second attacks. It will still miss more than a first attack, but it isn't too bad.
That was my thinking too. However I am not sure why you automatically jump to full MAP. I think it would be Animal Companion attacks first therefore being at full bonus (which apparently is only +7 at level 2 :/) then you'd be in second bracket MAP which normally is -5 (-4 for an agile weapon) but for Flurry is -3 (-2 for an Agile Weapon) on the first attack of Twin-Takedown, and the second attack of Twin-Takedown would be at full MAP -10 normally (-8 for agile) but as a flurry ranger it would be, I believe -6 (-4 with an agile weapon) basically taking you to slightly worse than a normal person's second attack with a non-agile weapon.
However after actually seeing the bonuses on my character sheet it breaks down to more like +2/-2.
This leads me to look at Fighter and using Double Slice and just not getting an animal companion at level 1 at all (I couldn't find a way to do it) so turns look like Command An Animal: Stride + Strike with Wolf then Double-Slice at second attack MAP which looks more like +6 for a fighter and if my off-hand weapon is agile it takes no penalty.
So at that point we can be longsword+shortsword or Katana+Wakizashi or some other combination of regular martial + agile off-hand to get full +6 attack on double slice.
The last question I have is this: can you split of command an animal? Can you, say for example have a turn which looks like Command an Animal Part 1: Support Benefit, My 2 actions spent on Double-Slice, Command an Animal Part 2: Stride ?
The terrible part is, since you're riding your mount you share MAP with it.
So even with Flurry reducing the penalty to attack, either your 2nd attack or your wolf's attack are going to miss almost all the time.
And thrown weapons pay a heavy cost to be thrown in terms of weapon die, and then needing additional items (thrower's bandolier) to be functional especially when if your riding your mount you want to get up in the enemy's face for your mount to be anything more than extra movement speed/*
*Well generally, most supports require your mount to be in reach of the enemy and strikes obviously do.
My suggestion is go like 18 strength 16/14 dex (whatever you can afford) and use a bow as backup when you need to make ranged attacks. Most of the time you'll be trying to avoid that, to either get you wolf to use support, or make attacks, or move you both into position.
I could be wrong, but from my understanding (and the reason I took flurry, actually) was because it would go: Hunter's Prey, Command an Animal (Stride, then Strike no MAP), then Twin-Take Down with Agile weapons thinking Shortsword, or now possibly Hatchet at (-2, then -4).
Would they really almost always miss? Then another idea is trading out Swift Tracker at 6 for a level 6 Far Shot and now due to Hunt Prey we ignore the 2nd Range Increment when striking against our hunt prey target so we are now at 20 ft. default with Hatchets and with Far Shot we double that out to 40 ft. Since the Hatchets are already in my hands for melee combat it flexes into an admittedly short ranged range attack with doubling rings and returning runes.
Yeah, I got caught up in some opposing thoughts and forgot about if you and your animal companion are both using agile attacks it wont be so bad on the multiple attack penalty.
However, the wolf's jaw attack doesn't appear to be agile. However that doesn't matter as long as your wolf attacks first, because MAP and Flurry only seem to care what weapon you're using when you make the attack. It's not as though using a non-agile attack first causes a -5 penalty. MAP only care if your attack is agile and which number attack in the round it is.
So Your second attack will be at -2 with an agile weapon and -4 on third and later attacks. Which is workable. But you end up needing agile weapons, which takes you down to d6 weapons when you could have had d8. And precision would give you an extra d8 on the attack rather than reduced MAP.
I think precision, would probably come out ahead in terms of damage and definitely give more flexibility compared to Flurry but I haven't run the math to confirm.
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The terrible part is, since you're riding your mount you share MAP with it.
So even with Flurry reducing the penalty to attack, either your 2nd attack or your wolf's attack are going to miss almost all the time.
And thrown weapons pay a heavy cost to be thrown in terms of weapon die, and then needing additional items (thrower's bandolier) to be functional especially when if your riding your mount you want to get up in the enemy's face for your mount to be anything more than extra movement speed/*
*Well generally, most supports require your mount to be in reach of the enemy and strikes obviously do.
My suggestion is go like 18 strength 16/14 dex (whatever you can afford) and use a bow as backup when you need to make ranged attacks. Most of the time you'll be trying to avoid that, to either get you wolf to use support, or make attacks, or move you both into position.
I could be wrong, but from my understanding (and the reason I took flurry, actually) was because it would go: Hunter's Prey, Command an Animal (Stride, then Strike no MAP), then Twin-Take Down with Agile weapons thinking Shortsword, or now possibly Hatchet at (-2, then -4).
Would they really almost always miss? Then another idea is trading out Swift Tracker at 6 for a level 6 Far Shot and now due to Hunt Prey we ignore the 2nd Range Increment when striking against our hunt prey target so we are now at 20 ft. default with Hatchets and with Far Shot we double that out to 40 ft. Since the Hatchets are already in my hands for melee combat it flexes into an admittedly short ranged range attack with doubling rings and returning runes.
Yeah, I got caught up in some opposing thoughts and forgot about if you and your animal companion are both using agile attacks it wont be so bad on the multiple attack penalty.
However, the wolf's jaw attack doesn't appear to be agile. However that doesn't matter as long as your wolf attacks first, because MAP and Flurry only seem to care what...
How do you calculate such things? If we are doing Ranger and riding the wolf the wolf would probably make one attack, then it would go into twin-take down and since we are in the second bracket of MAP we would want agile weapons, and then we have a 3rd action for yet another strike, or something else entirely such as Twin Parry, or Stride, or something like that. Feint. Demoralize. Aid Another.
So if we are riding the Wolf is attacking at level 2 (because then it would be rideable via Cavalier) at I believe +7, and I don't know the rules but at the very least a Ranger's Animal Companion shares the Hunter's Edge. Then I would Twin Strike my Hunted Prey at -2 then -4 I believe and if my bonuses are +8 at level 2 then that would be +6 first strike, +4 second strike. Then leaves another action to yet again make a strike at +4, or do something else. The other action may be Hunt Prey because it is the first turn. The wolf is making one attack because we asked it to stride in range. Otherwise we command an animal to strike once and that's it unless we trust in +4 to attack for all of our own attacks, the Wolf if it shares our MAP as we are a Ranger and it is an Animal Companion is therefore at +4 its second attack (-3 instead of -5 because it is flurry, but not agile).
If it were a Fighter I think it would look more like Command an Animal to stride then Strike, then we double slice at our 2nd MAP bracket purely looking like +5 to both (so basically compared to the ranger we are setting at -1/+1) with a Longsword for the first attack and a Shortsword for the second. I think it's +6 for both if both are using Shortswords.
Then there's an entire other calculation if we are NOT riding the animal which looks more like +8/+6 for Ranger (Twin-Takedown) on the floor and again like +7/+4 for the wolf if striking twice. If on the floor we are using actions to stride ourselves at certain points so it may look like turn 1 we go Hunt Prey, then Command an Animal (Stride+Strike), then stride and we don't attack yet. Turn 2 would be more like Command an Animal (Strike+Strike), Twin-Takedown (+8/+6), then Strike again (+4), or stride, or whatever. So at level two dismounted my overall character is putting out up to 5 attacks a turn. Then there's the Fighter math.
I don't know. I don't know how to do the math or which option is best or what to do. I didn't think it would be so hard to make a mounted combat character who duel-wields, or hell even a regular animal companion user who duels wields for that matter.
How do you calculate such things?
I don't know. I don't know how to do the math or which option is best or what to do. I didn't think it would be so hard to make a mounted combat character who duel-wields, or hell even a regular animal companion user who duels wields for that matter.
My recommendation - don't stress over it so much. At this point we are talking about squeezing the last 3% of effectiveness out of the build. A character that is 97% optimized is going to be just fine. So play your mounted dual-wielding Flurry Ranger and have fun.
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How do you calculate such things?I don't know. I don't know how to do the math or which option is best or what to do. I didn't think it would be so hard to make a mounted combat character who duel-wields, or hell even a regular animal companion user who duels wields for that matter.My recommendation - don't stress over it so much. At this point we are talking about squeezing the last 3% of effectiveness out of the build. A character that is 97% optimized is going to be just fine. So play your mounted dual-wielding Flurry Ranger and have fun.
So one would need to know how to perform the act of making an Expected Value graph through some sort of math to figure it out. Which I do not know how to do, personally.
How do you calculate such things?
It's a bit complicated because you have to look at your attack bonus, damage, against an (assumed) enemies AC and you have to figure in what routine to calculate for.
And then to get a really good view you have to do it across all 20 levels.
And you need to do it across a range of ACs at each level.
And then you need to account for potentially variation in attack routine.
Before your companion is mature, likely your first round is hunt prey, command your companion, (companion moves and strikes), and then you use double strike. Second round you probably command your companion and it probably strikes twice.
But for a mature companion on the second round, your companion doesn't need to be commanded to be able to make a single action strike. And so you probably don't spend that action to command it, and instead make extra attacks.
It's really complicated TBH.
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So one would need to know how to perform the act of making an Expected Value graph through some sort of math to figure it out. Which I do not know how to do, personally.
Pretty much. I think there is some spreadsheet tool floating around. I haven't ever used it.
But like I said, don't stress out so much over it. In this case Flurry Ranger and Precision Ranger are reasonably equal - the differences are more in style and aren't very big. And the differences between riding your animal companion and fighting next to it are situational. Sometimes it will be better to do one, sometimes better to do the other.
But that is something that every character has to face - you can't do the perfectly optimal thing all the time. There are situations where your particular build choices don't work quite as well as other ones that you could have made. Being a Spell Blending Wizard is nice for combat casting, but Spell Substitution is better for dealing with unexpected environmental situations that don't really need their HP reduced.
At some point you just have to pick an option and play it.
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How do you calculate such things?It's a bit complicated because you have to look at your attack bonus, damage, against an (assumed) enemies AC and you have to figure in what routine to calculate for.
And then to get a really good view you have to do it across all 20 levels.
And you need to do it across a range of ACs at each level.
And then you need to account for potentially variation in attack routine.Before your companion is mature, likely your first round is hunt prey, command your companion, (companion moves and strikes), and then you use double strike. Second round you probably command your companion and it probably strikes twice.
But for a mature companion on the second round, your companion doesn't need to be commanded to be able to make a single action strike. And so you probably don't spend that action to command it, and instead make extra attacks.
It's really complicated TBH.
Is there a damage calculator for this kind of thing?
I've heard that this is what a lot of people use.
Nods wisely
Yes. That sounds approximately accurate. Statistics are rather intriguing, yes?
I tried it out and it seems, if I read the graphs correctly, not riding my AC and using it independently greatly increases my chances of doing 0 damage, haha.
Animal companions are terrible at successfully striking, which makes the rule about sharing MAP while mounted utterly nonsensical and ignored at my table.
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Well from what I can tell my Wolf would be at +6 to hit while I am at +7. Since I’m a Ranger it would gain the benefit of my Hunter’s Edge which would make its second attack, because it isn’t agile, to I believe +3 to hit which isn’t great but it’s not negative at least. That would be me not riding it. If I then follow up with a Twin-Take down it would be at +7 to hit then +5 to hit and I could then get in a third strike also at +5 to hit. Thats 5 strikes my overall character is generating and a big if here, but if they all somehow manage to hit I feel like that’s quite a bit of damage going through. Probably 3d6 then 2d6. (Wolf Attacks are 1d8 and I imagine I would carry a 1 handed 1d8 weapon such as a longsword and then an agile off-hand piece such as a shortsword).
That’s a lot of attacks. There may even be ways to get more attacks in but I am not sure how.
Keep in mind a level 1 creature has an AC of 15 or 16 on average.
Your +7 attack hits on a 8 or better, 65% chance to hit.
Your +5 attack hits on a 10 or better, 55% chance to hit.
Your +3 attack hits on a 12 or better, 45% chance to hit.
Keep in mind an minimally intelligent enemy can be smart enough if they find your high number of attacks is to effective, they can simply move away and deny you action economy.
Flurry is highly dependent on standing still and putting everything into attack rolls, which isn't really how the rest of PF2 is set up to work.
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Keep in mind a level 1 creature has an AC of 15 or 16 on average.
Your +7 attack hits on a 8 or better, 65% chance to hit.
Your +5 attack hits on a 10 or better, 55% chance to hit.
Your +3 attack hits on a 12 or better, 45% chance to hit.
Keep in mind an minimally intelligent enemy can be smart enough if they find your high number of attacks is to effective, they can simply move away and deny you action economy.
Flurry is highly dependent on standing still and putting everything into attack rolls, which isn't really how the rest of PF2 is set up to work.
Roughly translating that into a d6 system for my own understand it's more or less being on a 3+ to hit for the first attack, a +4 to hit on a second attack and then a 5+ for the final attacks. It seems like my wolf would be roughly around something like a 3+ then 5+ or 4+ then 5+
Not great, but what else would I do with an animal companion, haha, if apparently if I am flurry I want to be attacking or I am wasting my Ranger Hunter's Edge
Flurry wants you to make a lot of attacks.
Conversely, precision ranger doesn't friend in making as many attacks and will get you +1d8 on your and your animal companions first attack each round. It eventually scales up in how bonus damage you get and the number of attacks it will apply to.
Personally, I think if you want to ride your mount precision is going to be a better option.
It will give your companion the ability to move and attack without losing too much by not spending two actions to attack.
And same for you, it give you more flexibility. Remember prior to getting mature animal companion feat your companion won't take any actions if you don't command it, and it only gets 1 action once you have mature (if you don't command).
I just really hate that flurry locks you into spending all your actions to attack because it denies you flexibility or you take a big hit to your damage capacity.
The general wisdom of the board is that precision will deal more damage typically except when you get your ideal turns with flurry.
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Flurry wants you to make a lot of attacks.
Conversely, precision ranger doesn't friend in making as many attacks and will get you +1d8 on your and your animal companions first attack each round. It eventually scales up in how bonus damage you get and the number of attacks it will apply to.
Personally, I think if you want to ride your mount precision is going to be a better option.
It will give your companion the ability to move and attack without losing too much by not spending two actions to attack.
And same for you, it give you more flexibility. Remember prior to getting mature animal companion feat your companion won't take any actions if you don't command it, and it only gets 1 action once you have mature (if you don't command).
I just really hate that flurry locks you into spending all your actions to attack because it denies you flexibility or you take a big hit to your damage capacity.
The general wisdom of the board is that precision will deal more damage typically except when you get your ideal turns with flurry.
What I would not give to play in a home game utilizing Free Archetype. Then I could free Archetype into the Archer dedication and at some point, probably level 4, pick up Assisting Shot.
Flurry Ranger, with a bow, after first turn to get everything set up is looking at Hunted Shot (2 attacks) > Assisting Shot > Command an Animal (Strike with a +1 Bonus, Strike with a +1 Bonus) all benefit from flurry.
First turn as usual would be something like Hunt Prey, Hunted Shot, Command An Animal Stride then Strike, or Stride twice to get into position depending on far away-ness of the opponent.
Another reason I favor Shortbows for ranged characters. It seems like all the enemies start within 1 or 2 strides which is uncomfortable close for Volley.
The general wisdom of the board is that precision will deal more damage typically except when you get your ideal turns with flurry.
Even on perfect turns, weapons with low damage per strike (which unfortunately includes bows) tend to have a little trouble really shining. If you're going flurry you really want to find some damage bonuses to help you leverage that accuracy.
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The general wisdom of the board is that precision will deal more damage typically except when you get your ideal turns with flurry.Even on perfect turns, weapons with low damage per strike (which unfortunately includes bows) tend to have a little trouble really shining. If you're going flurry you really want to find some damage bonuses to help you leverage that accuracy.
Well presumably it is a team game, and seeing as how I simply don't have the feats to do that myself, I will just have to hope I have nice allies.
Although my group will be random every week because I don't have a group. I only have Pathfinder Society. Although I still find it very fun.
Yeah, if you weren't looking specifically looking at a two weapon fighting character, my advice would be to take a ranger with a gisarme and precision Hunter's edge.
Hook swords are both uncommon and advanced weapons, so very hard to access in PFS and you're weapon proficiency wont advance with them. And they not an ancestry or culture specific weapon, so there aren't any good ways to advance it either.
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im throwing this character in the dumpster. I'll just play an elf or even maybe a half-elf with a cat and a bow. Cats are better than wolves anyway. And elves are a top tier race. Or human with half-elf. Also top tier.
I'm sorry that is how you've ended up feeling.
If it makes you feel better, I think using a wolf while riding it, but using Precision Hunter Edge's will work well. And once you get you companion to mature you'll be using it to knock enemies prone. While TWF doesn't drops your weapon damage die a bit, I think you can still do it well with Precision.
For weapons, I would recommend something like a bastard sword (because it'll give you an option to two hand it sometimes if you need) and a dogslicer. Remember that sword crits cause flat-footed, as does your wolf's attack when it hits (technically it causes prone, which also causes flat-footed).
Is it the most mechanically effective character? No, but if this is acceptable to you it's a decent mix or optimization and flavor.
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im throwing this character in the dumpster. I'll just play an elf or even maybe a half-elf with a cat and a bow. Cats are better than wolves anyway. And elves are a top tier race. Or human with half-elf. Also top tier.I'm sorry that is how you've ended up feeling.
If it makes you feel better, I think using a wolf while riding it, but using Precision Hunter Edge's will work well. And once you get you companion to mature you'll be using it to knock enemies prone. While TWF doesn't drops your weapon damage die a bit, I think you can still do it well with Precision.
For weapons, I would recommend something like a bastard sword (because it'll give you an option to two hand it sometimes if you need) and a dogslicer. Remember that sword crits cause flat-footed, as does your wolf's attack when it hits (technically it causes prone, which also causes flat-footed).
Is it the most mechanically effective character? No, but if this is acceptable to you it's a decent mix or optimization and flavor.
Would you still take Twin-Takedown? I guess everything would be the same just with Precision Edge instead of flurry giving you a sort of pseudo-sneak attack.
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Yeah, your first couple class feats are going to be animal companion and twin takedown. Probably also disrupt prey as you're likely going to be tripping them at some point and they will provoke when they crawl or stand up.