Post/Author/DateTime	Post
obokurieeumi 10-02-07, 03:06 AM	I was having a big dispute with my PC over the handle animal skill, and teaching an animal a trick... It says it takes a week to train an animal, but he was saying that he would be able to train more than 1 the same trick.. Any advice on this? I would assume he could only train 1 per week because animals don't have the same intelligence as humanoids.
Kouk 10-02-07, 03:40 AM	I was having a big dispute with my PC over the handle animal skill, and teaching an animal a trick... It says it takes a week to train an animal, but he was saying that he would be able to train more than 1 the same trick.. Any advice on this? I would assume he could only train 1 per week because animals don't have the same intelligence as humanoids. Action Varies. Handling an animal is a move action, while pushing an animal is a full-round action. (A druid or ranger can handle her animal companion as a free action or push it as a move action.) For tasks with specific time frames noted above, you must spend half this time (at the rate of 3 hours per day per animal being handled) working toward completion of the task before you attempt the Handle Animal check. If the check fails, your attempt to teach, rear, or train the animal fails and you need not complete the teaching, rearing, or training time. If the check succeeds, you must invest the remainder of the time to complete the teaching, rearing, or training. If the time is interrupted or the task is not followed through to completion, the attempt to teach, rear, or train the animal automatically fails. So, apparently it takes 3 hours a day, for 7 days, to train a single animal a single trick, though you know after half a week in most cases whether you have done it successfully. I would say a person would have no trouble teaching two animals either the same, or different tricks in 6 hours a day, and probably you could squeeze another one or two in being taught the same tricks. Definitely at least 2 animals being trained concurrently, typical "work" on things like crafting considers 8 hours a "full day" of work. EDIT: And it is precisely because animals have less brainpower that you can't train them the entire time -- they have a short attention span and will begin to ignore you or ball up and cry (or just bite) if you try too long at once.
obokurieeumi 10-02-07, 04:39 AM	If i remember correctly, he wanted to train a large pack... approx 6-20 dogs to pull the sled he purchased.
Killydd 10-02-07, 03:57 PM	I'd probably allow the 3 at a time, but since it is a team trick really, I'd allow him to do it all at once, taking longer than the one week, but probably at a discount from the 2-3 weeks it says, possibly around 10% time reduction. Also consider selling him sled dogs at an increase. Although since the standard riding dog comes with 6 tricks already(note that it is trained for combat riding) you might actually get it at a discount since training it for heavy labor is substantially easier.
obokurieeumi 10-02-07, 11:27 PM	thanks much.. gives me a little more insight to the problem at hand. As for the tricks already known, should i roll them up randomly or be nice?
Killydd 10-03-07, 12:27 AM	At the least, I think that you would know what tricks were taught to the animals to be sold. After all, if you're selling something, you want to get the best price you can for it. The riding dog for sale in the PHB already knows the 6 tricks for combat riding, so the sled dog would sell for less. You might have two versions for sale, one trained just for heavy labor, and probably a more expensive version trained for heavy labor and either guarding or fighting. Using the pricing for horse vs. warhorse as a guideline, I'd cut the price of a riding dog in half for the plain sled-dog, but I might keep it the same for the other version, which would probably also be a more dominant dog in the sled-team. It is slightly less work to train one than a normal riding dog, but probably not enough to worry about a price difference. (I believe the guard dog mentioned there to be a normal dog with the guard trick, though I can't find the source.)
Kouk 10-03-07, 03:07 AM	thanks much.. gives me a little more insight to the problem at hand. As for the tricks already known, should i roll them up randomly or be nice? Well, that depends I guess. A professional trainer would most likely have them Trained for a Purpose, and maybe with a couple extra Tricks which might help that if the animal is smart enough. If you hire a trainer then you can tell him to do whatever you want. If you are getting it from like a pound, then I guess you could roll :P