Following up on the success of animal companions in Wasteland 2 (screaming goats excepted), Wasteland 3 introduces an even more robust animal companion system, alongside a very broad selection of bonuses that can be used to further tailor the performance of your rangers in the field.
Overview
Taming animals requires the Animal Whisperer rank and all requirements are hard requirements, unlike the previous game. The companions will typically follow the party member who tamed them, but with patch 1.4.0 and the additional of an animal companion kennel at Peterson Air Force Base, they can be stored and moved around between party members. When dismissed, they will automatically return to the kennel (and if you really don't want them, you can just kick them out).
However, all original Animal Whisperer restrictions still apply.
There are some Wasteland 3 companions that behave similarly to pets but they do not provide bonuses and do not require Animal Whisperer to recruit into the party (with the exception of Poultron that requires Animal Whisperer for the initial Cyborg Chicken components).
Strategy
- Leveling up the Animal Whisperer skill and taking the Animal Training perk will increase the constitution of a character's pets, helping to avoid their deaths.
- Every time you travel to another map or reload the game, your pets and followers will be at full health, that is the easiest and fastest way to heal them.
- If you have pets or followers, avoid using area of effect attacks that apply damage over time, like molotov cocktails, because they don't avoid the area of these attacks and might die because of it.
- It's possible to have more than only one pet per character, since some pets are recruited through dialogue; however if any character that has more than one pet is removed from the party, the pets won't be tamed anymore and you won't be able to tame all the pets again with only one character. To maximize the size of your "pet legion", first tame any pet that isn't in the list bellow (I recommend Billy and Jean, because technically they are two pets in one), then:
- Major Tomcat: tame it through dialog (if it is not in the map so you can talk to it, just take it from the kennel and dismiss it first, so it stays in the map);
- Cyborg Chickens: tame them through dialog, at Colorado Springs (however might be better to take them to the kennel to create the Poultron later);
- Polly: buy it from Six-Fingered Larry, at the The Bizarre (exterior);
- Young Man Vinters: tame it through dialog, at the scrapyard in the Steeltown gates;
- Flesh Prince: create it, at the Research Level in Cheyenne Mountain;
- Young Bison: be rewarded by completing Hard Knox Life, at the Knox Bison Ranch.
Friendly reminder that you can unite your "pet legion" with your "followers legion" (the followers information is at the bottom of the companions page).
List
| Animal | Difficulty | Bonus | Spirit Animal Bonus | Location | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1/cigarettes | +2% Strike rate | +4% Strike rate | Ambush Site (Prologue) | Has a unique appearance and much higher CON than other cats. | |
| 1 | +10% Critical damage | +20% Critical damage | Hoon Homestead | Unique 2-headed goat with large CON; can stun  enemies. Cannot be acquired if the player does not choose to confront Erastus Dorsey during Heads or Tails mission.
| |
| 1 | +3% Experience bonus | +6% Experience bonus | Garden of the Gods, Snowed Inn Resort etc. | ||
| Various | - | - | Various | All 5 are needed to be brough to the coop at Ranger HQ to assemble Poultron. | |
| 1 | +10% Initiative | +20% Initiative | Aspen, Garden of the Gods etc. | ||
| 1 | +3M Leadership range | +6M Leadership range | Aspen, Garden of the Gods etc. | ||
| 2 | +3% Critical chance | +6% Critical chance | Colorado Springs etc. | ||
| 3 | +0.1 Combat Speed | +0.2 Combat Speed | Colorado Springs, Peterson Air Force Base etc. | Can cause Poisoned  status effect to enemies.
| |
| 4 | +10% Critical damage | +20% Critical damage | Denver, Gett Family Homestead etc. | Can stun enemies.
| |
| 4 | +15 CON | +30 CON | Clown Museum, Warrens etc. | ||
| 4 | +0.5s Detection time | +1.0s Detection time | Denver Airport, Santa's Workshop | ||
| 4 | +5% Evasion | +10% Evasion | The Bizarre | When bought or convinced (require Animal Whisperer 7), Polly starts following the current 'leader' of the party in addition to any present pets following that character. After being dismissed returns to normal pet behavior. | |
| 5 | +5% Sneak attack damage | +10% Sneak attack damage | Hoon Homestead (after choosing to save the Arapaho Caravan), The Bizarre | Terrifies enemies (AOE), decreasing enemies' AP by 2. | |
| 5 | +2 Armor penetration | +4 Armor penetration | Denver, Department Of Energy | Very loud animal; constantly making noises. Poison ranged attack. Has Spiked  buff.
| |
| 6 | +10% Melee damage | +20% Melee damage | Denver Airport, Aspen etc. | ||
| 7 | +2 Armor | +4 Armor | Aspen (holding cells with 'bears'), Snowed Inn Resort | Large CON, can also terrify enemies but does it less often than waste wolf. | |
| 7 | +15 CON recovery per Turn/per 10 second | +30 CON recovery per Turn/per 10 second | Research Level | Poison enemies in area.
| |
| 8 | +15% Cold resistance +15% Energy resistance +15% Fire resistance |
+30% Cold resistance +30% Energy resistance +30% Fire resistance |
Steeltown gates | Most of the time cowers during combat. May throw yellow snowballs from a distance. | |
| 9 | +5% Crit resistance | +10% Crit resistance | Knox Bison Ranch | Is recruited by a 'leader' character as long as there is any AW 9 character in the party.
If the 'leader' already has an animal follower, the bison becomes the second one. | |
| 10 | +1 Downed time | +2 Downed time | Massacre Site | Enormous CON |
