Quote:
Tier I: Your companion gains a +1 to all skills and defenses.
You gain +2 to all Beast Lore and Ride (if applicable) checks
when dealing with your companion.
Tier II: Your companion gains +2 to all Action Skill Rolls
and defenses. You gain a +2 bonus to all Empathy checks
when dealing with your animal companion. Lastly, from this
point onwards, your companion’s Stamina is equal to your
own.
Tier III: Your companion gains +2 to all
Action Skill Rolls and defenses.
Tier IV: Your companion gains +3 to all
Action Skill Rolls and defenses.
Tier V: Your companion gains +4 to all Action Skill Rolls
and defenses.
There little-to-no difference between them. With, say, a Wolf you gain a base version of the animal, and automatically gain a +1. At Tier II you gain
a further +2, giving a net increase of +3 over the base animal. At Tier III you gain
an additional +2, for a net gain of +5 over the base animal. At Tier I you gain
an additional +3, for a net gain of +8 over the base animal. At Tier V you gain a +4, for a net gain of +12.
Normal monsters typically gain +3 to their stats/tier (+4 at IV and V IIRC). This means that at Tier III they gain a total of +9 for skills (and defences), plus whatever talents and bonus' they have. At the same point, the above wolf will have +5 IN ADDITION to whatever skill bonus they already had, which for an Alpha Wolf is +5. This means that at the same Tier, the Wolf would get a +10.
? I thought you got an animal at tier 1 and it got a +1 (cumulative) each tier. So at the end it is only at wolf +4. These are all just talents, so each tier doesn't stack with the previous.