I noticed that the Campaign document does not address any limits on animals or other "pets". I think this is an oversight. I would propose a limit of two clocks worth of combat pets at the same time in combat per player. This would be two war dogs, or a war horse and a war dog, or two groups of four skeletons, ect. More than that would cause the player with a surplus of pets to dominate the table's action clocks. I would not count riding dogs or other non-combat pets against this limit.

I bring this up not because it is currently a problem, but it could quickly become a problem with the amount of Gold that is floating around in the campaign. By example for the cost of a single rune, I can field a pack of five fully trained war dogs, in addition to any skeletons or zombies granted by spells, and war horses granted by backgrounds or paths. This would create a number of issues related to summoning that occurred under 3.x rules.

A limit of two clocks worth of pets would have minimal impact on the current characters in the campaign.

I haven't looked at all the rules, but at least under "Beast Lore" it takes a Complex Action to have your pet attack and another to call it off (if you don't want it vanquishing something). They also need Fearless to attack anything other than humanoids and other animals. I'll admit there is going to be a problem later on with a ton of animals/pets, but it *seems* that commanding each one takes time and could occupy most of what a character does in combat?

John

Its in an obscure place but if you look at page 148 in the Core Rulebook there is a small sidebar that says that ALL of your animals and summoned creatures act as a single unit in combat (much like a block of minions).

You are welcome to bring as many war dogs as you can afford. If I find the number offensive as a judge I can stop pulling punches until the pack is thinned. See also the thread on adjusting encounter difficulty started by Matt Flinn.

Just because the rules allow for it, doesn't mean its a good idea. I fully imagine if you wanted to spend your money in such a manner, the sum of the Arcanis judges would deal with it in short order.

we could resurrect the chariot thread, for a demonstration on how the judges deal with people that have too much going on for them, or put all of their resources in one place.... LOL

So you are of the mind that there is enough limiting factors in place to keep things reasonable?

For the record I was going to bring two war dogs as that seamed to be reasonable. But if Eric wishes to thin the herd that is fair game. Likewise bumping up the encounter is fair as well.

Also I'm fully open to even more restrictive guidelines if they are felt to be needed.

Two dogs are hardly a herd. But yes they count for figuring out APL. Or whatever new acronym we use I place of APL

Back in the LG days, we had someone bring a flock of sheep to a dungeon crawl... ostensibly to send them through one at a time (and because they were cheap, etc).

If I recall, one well-placed delayed fireball trap resolved that issue... although the party was not short on food for a few weeks.


My point is, from my end, so long as what animals you bring is in the spirit of the game, I don't care. If you want to bring something that stretches credibility, the rules or common sense, then I, as a GM or player, will be annoyed and likely do something about it.


In regards to tiering, just remember that if the animal comes from a talent (ie, heirloom), then it likely shouldn't be counted as extra. Its all a bit of a fuzzy grey area there anyhow

i think the bigger question here should be how many loyal companions can a person have at one time. i personally don't have any issue with a pc having multiple animals, as long as 1) the extras are treated as just the base animal with none of the bonuses that would basically make it an additional pc 2) they show that they have purchased said extra animals. lets be realistic here a base hunting dog costs 75 Sc while a war dog costs 1Gc. thats as much or more then most basic equipment. and other then a wolf lizard, and the suggested horse from the heirloom talent and the mount from the kickstarter, i don't believe there is any other critter that is given in a mod. and my understanding of the talent (loyal companion) is that it clearly says you have to acquire/own your own, not one is given to you.

now some my argue that master of the hounds should give you as many L.C. as you wish due to the nature of the name "hounds" in the title, as mentioned before i totally disagree with that.

Quote:

and so long as the two of them are
together, they make a formidable foe indeed.

the last line of the fluff spells out you have a very strong bond between you and one dog. so in the instance of the MotH go ahead have that strong bond with the "alpha" dog of the pack....the rest of the dogs you may have are just that base pack dogs, nothing special about them and as such should be treated as a run of the mill dog unless you pay for an exceptional speciman

you may only take Loyal Companion once and improve upon that companion

no place in the talent does it say you can take it more then one time and apply it to a different pet

see that is what i thought the rules stated but this past weekend at arcanicon, i sat at a table with an individual who had brought 2 companions with them. my mind was blown when it was insisted that it was ok'd and approved by either you pete or another pci staff memeber. seeing as this time around i was just a player and not judge i left it as it was and decided i would bring it up here for official answer.