Thought of a suggestion while reading the about the Blightcaster's black wolf companion being able to find traps and secret doors at the skill level of its master. Shouldn't our robot doggos be a bit more advanced? I think with some investment, it'll be neat if the iron defender could actually disarm traps.
Perhaps this could be with some scaling ability; Originally at 1/4th effectiveness of master ->1/3->1/2->full effectiveness? With heavy/full investment it could find and disable late game traps?
Checks and balances could include:
*Heavy point allocation to avoid multiclass splashing just for the benefit
*Cooldown on trap disarming (not finding) abilities, and/or restriction on number of traps it can disarm per quest (less disireable, admittedly)
Always wanted our AI doggo to be able to more meaningfully contribute, so this is at least one way it could.
Even outside of this though, in the next Archetype or class rehaul, they shoulld still give them some kind of love. Stronger and tougher at least so they arent mega-blitzed in higher tier content. Take the companion synthesis a step further and tie their survivability into their masters somehow, idk.