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Chapter 3: Classes

Companions

Source Player Core pg. 206
Some adventurers travel with loyal allies known as animal companions and familiars. The former begin as young animals but acquire impressive physical abilities as you level up, while the latter share a magical bond with you.

Animal companions and familiars are special benefits for certain classes or class feats. If you simply want a pet regardless of your class, you can take the Pet feat (page 259). You can have a familiar or pet, but not both. Because animal companions function much differently, you can have both an animal companion and a familiar or pet.

Animal Companions

Source Player Core pg. 206
An animal companion is a loyal comrade who follows your orders. Your animal companion has the animal and minion traits, and it gains 2 actions during your turn if you use the Command an Animal action to command it; this replaces the usual effects of Command an Animal, and you don’t need to attempt a Nature check. If your companion dies, you can spend a week of downtime to replace it at no cost. You can have only one animal companion at a time.

Young Animal Companions

Source Player Core pg. 206
The following are the base statistics for a young animal companion, the first animal companion most characters get. You adjust these statistics depending on the type of animal you choose. Animal companions calculate their modifiers and DCs just as you do with one difference: the only item bonuses they can benefit from are to Speed and AC (their maximum item bonus to AC is +3). As you gain levels, you might be able to make your companion stronger by advancing it as described on page 211.
An animal companion's starting statistics are as follows.
Level: Your animal companion's level is equal to yours.
Proficiencies: Your animal companion is trained in its unarmed attacks, unarmored defense, barding (a type of armor for animals), all saving throws, Perception, Acrobatics, and Athletics. Animal companions can't use abilities that require greater Intelligence, such as Coerce or Decipher Writing, even if trained in the appropriate skill, unless they have a specialization that allows it. Attribute Modifiers: An animal companion begins with base attribute modifiers listed in its stat block.
Hit Points: Your animal companion has ancestry Hit Points from its type, plus a number of Hit Points equal to 6 plus its Constitution modifier for each level you have.

Companion Types

Source Player Core pg. 206
The species of animal you choose is called your companion's type. Each companion type has its own statistics, as follows.
Size The companion's size
Unarmed Attacks One or more entries with the companion's unarmed attacks and their traits and damage
Attribute Modifiers Starting attribute modifiers
Hit Points The companion's ancestry Hit Points
Skill An additional trained skill your companion has
Senses Special senses your companion has
Speed Your companion's Speeds
Special If present, this lists any special ability your companion has, such as whether it often serves as a mount.
Support Benefit A special benefit you gain by Commanding the Animal to use the Support action (see below).
Advanced Maneuver A powerful new action your companion learns how to use if it becomes a nimble or savage animal companion.

Companion Advancement

Source Player Core pg. 211
You can advance an animal companion, usually due to one of your class feat choices. Normally, you can advance a young animal companion to a mature animal companion, advance a mature companion to either a nimble or savage companion, and advance a nimble or savage companion into a specialized companion.

Mature Animal Companions

Source Player Core pg. 211
When you advance a young animal companion to a mature animal companion:
  • If your companion is Medium or smaller, it grows by one size.
  • Increase its Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, and Wisdom modifiers by 1.
  • Increase its proficiency rank for Perception and all saving throws to expert. Increase its proficiency ranks in Intimidation, Stealth, and Survival to trained, and if it was already trained in one of those skills from its type, increase its proficiency rank in that skill to expert.
  • Increase its unarmed attack damage from one die to two dice (for instance 1d8 to 2d8)

Nimble Animal Companions

Source Player Core pg. 211
To advance a mature animal companion to a nimble animal companion:
  • Increase its Dexterity modifier by 2 and its Strength, Constitution, and Wisdom modifiers by 1.
  • Increase its proficiency ranks in Acrobatics to expert.
  • It deals 2 additional damage with its unarmed attacks. Its attacks become magical for the purpose of ignoring resistances.
  • It learns the advanced maneuver for its type.

Savage Animal Companions

Source Player Core pg. 211
To advance a mature animal companion to a savage animal companion:
  • If your companion is Medium or smaller, it grows by one size.
  • Increase its Strength modifier by 2 and its Dexterity, Constitution, and Wisdom modifiers by 1.
  • Increase its proficiency rank in Athletics to expert.
  • It deals 3 additional damage with its unarmed attacks. Its attacks become magical for the purpose of ignoring resistances.
  • It learns the advanced maneuver for its type.

Specialized Animal Companions

Source Player Core pg. 211
Specialized animal companions are more intelligent and engage in more complex behaviors. Most animal companions can have only one specialization. The first time an animal gains a specialization, it also gains the following.
  • Its proficiency rank for unarmed attacks increases to expert.
  • Its proficiency ranks for saving throws and Perception increase to master.
  • Increase its Dexterity modifier by 1 and its Intelligence modifier by 2.
  • Its unarmed attack damage increases from two dice to three dice, and it increases its additional damage with unarmed attacks from 2 to 4 or from 3 to 6.
  • The extra benefit of the specialization listed below.

Ambusher: In your companion's natural environment, it can use a Sneak action even if it's currently observed. Its proficiency rank in Stealth increases to expert (or master if it was already an expert from its type), and its Dexterity modifier increases by 1. Its proficiency rank for unarmored defense increases to expert.

Bully: Your companion terrorizes foes with dominance displays and pushes them around the battlefield. Its proficiency ranks for Athletics and Intimidation increase to expert (or master if it was already expert from its type), its Strength modifier increases by 1, and its Charisma modifier increases by 3.

Daredevil: Your companion joins the fray with graceful leaps and dives. It gains the deny advantage ability, so it isn't off-guard to hidden, undetected, or flanking creatures unless such a creature's level is greater than yours. Its proficiency rank in Acrobatics increases to master, and its Dexterity modifier increases by 1. Its proficiency rank in unarmored defense increases to expert.

Racer: Your companion races. It gains a +10-foot status bonus to its Speed, swim Speed, or fly Speed (your choice). Its proficiency in Fortitude saves increases to legendary, and its Constitution modifier increases by 1.

Tracker: Your companion is an incredible tracker. It can move at full Speed while following tracks. Its proficiency rank in Survival increases to expert (or master if it was already an expert from its type), and its Wisdom modifier increases by 1.

Wrecker: Your companion smashes things. Its unarmed attacks ignore half an object's Hardness. Its Athletics proficiency increases to master, and its Strength modifier increases by 1.

Familiars

Source Player Core pg. 212
Familiars are mystically bonded creatures tied to your magic. Most familiars were originally animals, though the ritual of becoming a familiar makes them something more. You gain the Pet general feat (page 259), except that your pet has special abilities. Common choices for familiars include bats, cats, foxes, ravens, and snakes. Some familiars are different, usually described in the ability that granted you a familiar; for example, a druid’s leshy familiar has the plant or fungus trait instead of animal. A familiar is different from a basic pet in the following ways.

Modifiers and AC

Source Player Core pg. 212
For Perception, Acrobatics, and Stealth, you can have your familiar use your spellcasting attribute modifier + your level instead of 3 + your level if it’s higher.

Communication

Source Player Core pg. 212
Your familiar can communicate empathically with you as long as it’s within 1 mile of you, sharing emotions. It doesn’t understand or speak languages normally, but it can gain speech from a familiar ability.

Selecting Familiar and Master Abilities

Source Player Core pg. 212
Instead of choosing two abilities only when you gain your familiar as you do with a normal pet, you can choose the two abilities each day during your daily preparations. You can choose from familiar abilities and master abilities. You can choose the pet abilities from the feat as familiar abilities as well. You can’t swap out abilities that are innate to your familiar. For example, you couldn’t choose not to give a raven familiar flying.

Familiar Abilities

Source Player Core pg. 212
Familiar abilities primarily affect the familiar itself. A familiar can have no more than one ability that changes its creature trait (such as construct or plant). You can choose a pet ability (from the Pet feat, page 259) as a familiar ability: amphibious, burrower, climber, darkvision, echolocation, fast movement, flier, manual dexterity, scent, or tough (see the sidebar).

Master Abilities

Source Player Core pg. 214
Master abilities primarily affect you or the magic that passes between you and your familiar.

Archetypes

Source Player Core pg. 215
Character concepts come in infinite possibilities, but you might find that the feats and skill choices from a single class aren't sufficient to fully realize your character. Archetypes allow you to expand the scope of your character's class.

You gain an archetype by selecting archetype feats instead of your normal feats. First, find the archetype that best fits your character concept. Then select that archetype's dedication feat, using one of your class feat choices. Once you've taken the dedication feat, you can select any feat from that archetype, as long as you meet its prerequisites. Most archetype feats are taken in place of class feats, and so these are called archetype class feats.

An archetype feat is subject to any restrictions on the class feat it replaces. For example, if you had an ability at 6th level that granted you a bonus class feat, but that class feat had to be 4th level or lower and have the dwarf trait, you could use that class feat to take an archetype class feat, but only one of 4th level or lower with the dwarf trait.

Dedication Details

Source Player Core pg. 215
Each archetype’s dedication feat represents your character’s dedicated effort learning a new set of abilities, making it impossible to split your focus and pursue another archetype at the same time. Once you take a dedication feat, you can’t select a different dedication feat until you complete your dedication by taking two other feats from your current archetype. You can’t retrain a dedication feat as long as you have any other feats from that archetype.

Multiclass Dedications

Source Player Core pg. 215
All archetypes in this book have the multiclass trait. These allow you to diversify your training into another class’s specialties. You can’t select a multiclass archetype’s dedication feat if you are already a member of that class.

Additional Feats

Source Player Core pg. 215
Some archetypes include a list of “Additional Feats” that appear in other sources. The list includes each feat’s level, which might be different than normal when gained from the archetype. You can take the feat as an archetype feat of that level, meaning it counts toward the number of feats required by the archetype’s dedication feat. When selected this way, a feat that normally has a class’s trait (such as the fighter trait) doesn’t have that class trait.

Feats that Grant Feats

Source Player Core pg. 215
Sometimes an archetype feat lets you select another feat, such as a class feat of a lower level. You must always meet any prerequisites of the feat you gain in this way. These always count as only one feat for the purposes of your dedication; for example, taking the cleric archetype’s Basic Dogma feat to gain the Healing Hands class feat counts as only one feat, not two.

Spellcasting Archetypes

Source Player Core pg. 215
Some archetypes grant you a substantial degree of spellcasting, albeit delayed compared to a character from a spellcasting class. A spellcasting archetype allows you to use scrolls, staves, and wands in the same way that a member of a spellcasting class can.

Spellcasting archetypes always grant the ability to cast cantrips in their dedication, and then they have a basic spellcasting feat, an expert spellcasting feat, and a master spellcasting feat. These feats share their name with the archetype; for instance, the druid's master spellcasting feat is called Master Druid Spellcasting. All spell slots you gain from spellcasting archetypes are subject to the restrictions within the archetype. For instance, the witch archetype allows you to pick a patron when you take its dedication feat. If you pick patron granting occult spells, the archetype then grants you spell slots you can use only to cast occult spells you prepare as a witch, even if you are a bard with occult spells in your repertoire.

Basic Spellcasting Feat: Usually available at 4th level, these feats grant a 1st-rank spell slot. At 6th level, they grant you a 2nd-rank spell slot, and if you have a spell repertoire, you can select one spell from your repertoire as a signature spell. At 8th level, they grant you a 3rd-rank spell slot. Archetypes refer to these benefits as the “basic spellcasting benefits.”

Expert Spellcasting Feat: Typically taken at 12th level, these feats make you an expert in spell attack modifiers and spell DCs and grant you a 4th-rank spell slot. If you have a spell repertoire, you can select a second spell from your repertoire as a signature spell. At 14th level, they grant you a 5th-rank spell slot, and at 16th level, they grant you a 6th-rank spell slot. Archetypes refer to these benefits as the “expert spellcasting benefits.”

Master Spellcasting Feat: Usually found at 18th level, these feats make you a master in spell attack modifiers and spell DCs and grant you a 7th-rank spell slot. If you have a spell repertoire, you can select a third spell from your repertoire as a signature spell. At 20th level, they grant you an 8th-rank spell slot. Archetypes refer to these benefits as the “master spellcasting benefits.”

Special Archetypes

Source Player Core pg. 215
Some archetype feats in other books have the skill trait, allowing you to take them in place of a skill feat rather than a class feat. A skill feat still counts to satisfy the requirement of the dedication. There are also class archetypes that can modify your class’s abilities as soon as 1st level. You can never have more than one class archetype.