I haven't seen people use familiars nor animal companions in EFU at all. Then again, I'm guessing it's because people can lose 200XP/level for them? (Not sure if the amount is right.)

I understand familiars and animal companions are not made for tanking, but honestly what good is my Deep Hound if I can't hunt with him in combat without risking 1200 XP at level 6? Or as a new player, 400-600XP for just having him along.

What I'm asking here is that there is no XP Penalty for the death of a familiar or animal companion. To me, it's silly. I think familiars, with the extremely low amount of HP they get with anyways, can't be used as tanks for wizards. While Animal Companions this way could still be used as tanks, I'm sure if the DMs disencouraged that then it will be minimal.

If anything, please lower the XP loss. Personally, I'm looking forward to having an animal companion when my character hits level 6, but I doubt I'll ever use him if I'll lose such an enormous amount of XP over it. They have lots of potential in EFU with the extra /o tools given to us.

I think this makes sense.

On flip side I do realize that there is a penalty in pnp style. Then again it's not nearly as hefty. I wish they'd change it make it lesser. Still i doubt dm's will, because there omniopotent with power ^_^

I thought animal companions were not supposed to take any XP, at least per PnP, only familiars? Could be wrong but I'd best make sure.

Just to let you know what the PnP familiar penalty is. Not only is it 200 per level, you also can't summon another one for a year. If you are in combat, having a familiar out is a bad plan. It's that simple.

And Animal companions are really strong in combat, and the potential xp loss is what keeps them balanced. I have a druid and use my companion ALL THE TIME. I've never lost it yet. All my magic goes to protecting it, not myself, so if anything is going to die, it's me.

Also, as a note, unsummoning a companion in the middle of combat is highly cheesy and discouraged.

Feel free to command it to retreat with you, get to a safe place, and then send him away.

I'd unsummon an animal companion in the middle of a fight anytime I had to.

It WON'T retreat with you. It'll stay and fight, run away, run back, run away, take three attacks of opprotunity and then follow you.

Absolutely ridiculous to encourage them to stick around and let the PC eat the XP penalty. An XP penalty doesn't exist in PnP for companions, rather a DM is free to forbid you to gain one if you "abuse them".

Oroborous I'd unsummon an animal companion in the middle of a fight anytime I had to.

It WON'T retreat with you. It'll stay and fight, run away, run back, run away, take three attacks of opprotunity and then follow you.

Absolutely ridiculous to encourage them to stick around and let the PC eat the XP penalty. An XP penalty doesn't exist in PnP for companions, rather a DM is free to forbid you to gain one if you "abuse them".

I totally agree with Oro here.

I actually use my companion quite a bit, however, it is rather selective use. In fact, it saved my life last night in a fight. I was laying on the ground bleeding while he fought off three gnolls, three rats, and three skeletons. :D

The unsummoning is a touchy issue, given the game mechanics/pathfinding/lag, etc. I do tend to agree with Oro's line of thinking, but, like Thrawn, I do give a considerable amount of protection to my companion when it is summoned in a combat situation whenever I can. I even make it drink invis potions sometimes when things get real bad. XD

I use my companion pretty much, and for my luck it has never been killed. There has been many very near situations, and my friends companion got owned by troglodyte chieftains crit.

The exp penalty coming from the death is needed in my opinion. Companions are not some creatures coming from a magical portal, but they are your friends, companions that come when you call them. If you loose it, it's supposed to hurt somehow. The exp penalty just makes you not to just use it as a easy tank, or bate while you escape. And yes, I think you should atleast try to call it follow you, if you can get a little further from battle, then I'd use a little rule I made: If it is not in fight for 5 secs after running away from that fight, I'd say it is fair enough to unsummon it and assume I told it to run away. The point is to give it a spot where it truly isn't fighting and enough far from enemies to really get away.

For IC reasons though, some creatures should be capable of outrunning others. I have always loathed that a Human in Fullplate with a low Strength score can still manage to keep up with running along a Bear (who, if I'm not mistaken, hit the 30-35 Mph). In the case of a familiar in battle, and you don't want him there, and you order him to run (which automatically means you'll have to run yourself, incuring countless AoO's and stubborn Familiar/ Companion AI's, resulting in more mayhem than otherwise), he'll almost outrun any other creature. But no. Therefore, I just unsummon him to replicate that effect. That's the way I do it, and it's the only sane solution I see to this problem. I'm backing Oro a 100% on this one.

I agree, while the rp notion of *telling* your pet to run is a nice though. Game Mechanics come into play. Familiar do not follow your every command, it's not pnp it's NWN, so I think some exceptions make sense.

Now if the companion is a magical creature summoned through a magical gate: the XP penalty can be explained just like with familiars. But then you can summon and unsummon them in combat.

They are also fixed into DnD's balance so they should be used. Not axed, as they are part of the ranger and druid class.

yea and with druid and mage it will just lead to other tactics

like run lag shooting

transition fighting

just bad stuff.

As I said in the other post i'm still in favour of drastically reducing the xp penalty if not removing it completely, and instead implementing the "cant summon it for quite a while" option instead. Which flavourwise is much more realistic then an xp hit.

As for unsummoning in combat, I dont really care how cheesy it seems, if you're going to get slugged such a massive loss that other classes dont have to put up with to function, unsummon away. (not to mention compared to summoned spell creatures that last a shorter time, are usually stronger and have no xp hit)

Not everyone should have to play like the companion/familiar is the focus of everything (ie. the tank), it's too bad the AI cant be made smarter so the familiar/companion itself will retreat behind you etc when it's in trouble.

I'm not yet at a level that the companion/familar (because of NWN AI and xp penalty) is not the liability it currently is rather than the useful addition to a party it could be. I'm all in favour of xp hits on death (or higher level undead drains) but i'm not in favour of xp hits on particular classes with regards to things you often have no chance to control properly. Things go wrong sometimes, a lot is out of your control, thats to be expected. But xp hits for it, is just unfair.

Another thing you could think about flavour wise is having to actually "buy" or "find" your companion when it dies. (or get a rare component to summon the familiar) as a way of controlling how often they get used.

p.s. I like the changes/additions to the familiars/companions/summons content wise , a lot of work has been put in obviously and it shows. Very well done.

chaosprism As I said in the other post i'm still in favour of drastically reducing the xp penalty if not removing it completely, and instead implementing the "cant summon it for quite a while" option instead. Which flavourwise is much more realistic then an xp hit.