Dire Elephant Hide - change Aminal Empathy bonus to something else

[Bounty]

Like the title suggests.

Currently dire elephant hide gives a major skill bonus to concentration +2 (+4 when enchanted) and a minor skill bonus to animal empathy +1 (+3 when enchanted)
Due to the material being the only one that provides concentration, every caster who would want such is stuck with the animal empathy bonus as well.

Animal empathy is a skill that is lock to a very limited amount of classes (ranger and druid) if which only one really has need for concentration.
Further more animal empathy does not require a whole lot of investment in the first place, due to how the DCs are calculated and the checks are made (take 20 and lowish DCs based on hit dice).
There is also a great amount of common found items that provide ample bonus to animal empathy already.

Now i am not suggesting to change it to something crazy "meta" like discipline or spellcraft, just another bonus that has a minor benefit to a majority of classes.

Some options could be:

- Lore (elephants never forget they say)
- Antagonize (because elephants do be scary sometimes)
- Listen (they do have big ears i guess)
- +1 save vs fire or another conditional saving throw
- Search
...

One could find a justification for pretty much any skill or other bonus, I'd just like to see something that is at least of a little use to most classes.

[Anastian]

but I really like the animal empathy bonus
There should be an alternative then as there are no other animal empathy options unfortunately

[Bounty]

but I really like the animal empathy bonus
There should be an alternative then as there are no other animal empathy options unfortunately

Same as for concentration yes^^
Just two odd fellas stuck together in the same boat.

Creating another leather that has concentration + something else, would also be a good option yes

afaik the razorback boar hide does not have any stats now after the last crafting updated, maybe that could be a +2 concentration +1 search (because boars are really good at sniffing out things  )

[MAB77]

There is nothing inherently wrong in having a material providing a concentration/animal empathy bonus. On the contrary, they were chosen precisely to offer variety for armors. Even if you do not use animal empathy yourself, the +2/+4 bonus to concentration remains useful enough to any spellcaster. Not everything has to be optimal for everyone, it is proper that players be forced to make choices, and changing the bonuses would negatively impact some other players as well.

It would be more productive to suggest a new type of hide instead. There is even actually room for a new one now that we got rid of the old hippopotamus model* for a proper one! But you should look for bonuses not offered by other hides. I was thinking maybe Discipline now that it is no longer offered as an enchantment bonus on armors. Fair warning though, it would be very low on my list of priority, the Avenger Knight and Tattooed Monks are currently taking all my attention and I won't touch anything else until they are completed.

* Aka the story of how the originally planned hippopotamus hide became the rhinoceros one.

[zDark Shadowz]

If you make a discipline hide I'd like to be able to refund everything into an adamantine / redsteel + extra discipline combo.

For alternative suggestions to hippo hide properties;

Concentration + Spellcraft (nearly hairless, probably makes for good vellum scribing)
Concentration + Antagonize (they're stupidly aggressive)
Concentration + Saves vs Disease (their blood-sweat has antimicrobial properties)

[Bounty]

There is nothing inherently wrong in having a material providing a concentration/animal empathy bonus. On the contrary, they were chosen precisely to offer variety for armors. Even if you do not use animal empathy yourself, the +2/+4 bonus to concentration remains useful enough to any spellcaster. Not everything has to be optimal for everyone, it is proper that players be forced to make choices, and changing the bonuses would negatively impact some other players as well.

Noted.
But just to restate its not about being optimal, just that animal empathy is literally unusable by all but two classes.
Dire elephant hide however being the only source of concentration, still makes it a good choice even though the AE bonus is dead weight.
That being said, i do agree now that it is for the best if the current hides do not get altered as to not negatively affect other players.

...I was thinking maybe Discipline now that it is no longer offered as an enchantment bonus on armors...

I might make myself unpopular with this opinion, but i don't think adding a leather material with discipline is a good idea.
You already get a +5 discipline bonus on enchanted plated boots/gloves, adding another +4 or +5 from lining on top of that would make for some ludicrous bonus.

For alternative suggestions to hippo hide properties;

Concentration + Spellcraft (nearly hairless, probably makes for good vellum scribing)
Concentration + Antagonize (they're stupidly aggressive)
Concentration + Saves vs Disease (their blood-sweat has antimicrobial properties)

Those are some solid suggestions.

would also love to see hippos in game in general, in Markovia at the river and in Har'Akir at the oasis, now that they don't look like 3 polygon eldritch horrors anymore.

[Water]

Personally I like that the elephant is animal empathy because it’s not on any other crafted gear.