Companions

[Bohemond]

I have a question about building a companion during character creation. When you choose to have a companion, you get 3 abilities, 1 at 17 and 2 13. How much does this cost you in terms of your starting abilities or 12 bonus points? Does a follower cost 1 ability or bonus point? That seems to be an extremely ‘good deal’, because you’re getting three abilities for the price of one, especially because you then get 15 points to spend on increasing the companion’s abilities. Or do you pay 1 ability or bonus point per companion ability? The later makes more sense to me from a game balance standpoint, but perhaps I’ve missed an explanatory rule somewhere.

[Harald Smith]

It costs you one starting ability (which is applied to the companion). It does not cost you any of your bonus points.
Then the companion automatically gets two additional abilities (at starting levels noted) plus 15 bonus points to spend on those. One of the companion’s abilities, though, should be used to define the companion’s form/species (e.g. Alynx).

Personally, I’ve found that this strongly encourages character creation with a companion (and penalizes the character who chooses not to have a companion). My House Rule is that if you do not apply one of your starting abilities to creating a companion, then the character gets to add two additional starting abilities (but does not add any additional bonus points beyond the basics).

[Bohemond]

I like that house rule. Thanks for your take on it.

My player is looking at giving his Orlanthi character a Eurmali companion, so I think I’ll give him the three abilities but also the flaw that he has a Eurmali companion.

[Christopher Kubasik]

As a sidebar thought, and HQG mentions this as well, defining the relationship with an NPC is often able to provide more juice than simply, “Flaw: [NPC].” Is there a debt owed? Is there love? Is there a promise from the PC to the NPC? Each of these can easily be turned into Flaws in action, but also allows lots of flexibility and is a story generator.

[Harald Smith]

Yes, for something like an Eurmali trickster as a bonded companion, I’d require one of the abilities to be that:
Bonded Eurmali trickster 17
and then the two additional abilities.
And, yes, I’d definitely require the Flaw. While I’d probably describe it as: Bonded Trickster Companion, I do like Christopher’s suggestion that there be some definition of that relationship.

[Author]

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