D&D 5E Updating Improved Familiar to 5e?

QuietBrowser · Feb 25, 2017

Find Familiar. We all remember this spell, or class feature, from previous editions. There's another thread up now arguing about whether or not the Pact of the Chain Warlock is supposed to exclusively benefit from Quasit/Pseudodragon/Imp familiars or if the sidebards from the MM and VGTM stating that "any spellcaster who can cast Find Familiar can have a Tiny monster as a familiar" applies to PC spellcasters as well as NPC ones.

That's not what this thread is about.

Instead, this thread is looking back to 3.5 and Pathfinder. For those of you who missed those editions or don't remember, there was a feat called Improved Familiar, which allowed a caster to swap out their original familiar (which was a small animal that gave some minor bonus, usually +2 to a set of skill checks or a bonus feat) for something more powerful, depending on the caster's level and alignment.

This was an interesting idea and it's one I'd like to discuss and see if it could be made to work in 5e.

I don't really have any mechanical justifications for it, just that I think this idea sounds cool and would be a great bit of fluff for a magely character, where their familiar changes and grows more powerful alongside its master.

So, do you think 5e could mechanically handle Improved Familiar as a feat? How would make it work? Do you need to see the original writeup for it in 3e and PF to have an opinion? Let me know in the comments.

Shiroiken · Feb 25, 2017

I think it would be better handled by casting Find Familiar at higher levels, rather than a Feat. Feats are rare and powerful, and spending one on increasing your familiar feels bad. I did this with Find Steed to allow the paladin to eventually summon a Pegasus, and it's worked out great.

ppaladin123 · Feb 25, 2017

I think improved familiar = warlock pact of the chain in 5e. If you created such a feat you might look at that feature but you'd also want to be careful not to take away the thing that makes PoC warlock unique. So you'd probably want to weaken it relative to PoC and attach a much higher level requirement (PoC kicks in at level 3).

Corwin · Feb 25, 2017

ppaladin123 said:
I think improved familiar = warlock pact of the chain in 5e. If you created such a feat you might look at that feature but you'd also want to be careful not to take away the thing that makes PoC warlock unique. So you'd probably want to weaken it relative to PoC and attach a much higher level requirement (PoC kicks in at level 3).

You can already take an existing feat to steal the Warlock's other unique cookie (Eldritch Blast)...

Fanaelialae · Feb 25, 2017

I think that making it a feat is the way to go. It isn't something you should give for free to casters at higher level because then you're making Pact of Chain largely irrelevant. The improved familiars grant significant benefits (such as poison that can render most enemies unconscious), therefore you should have to give up something for them. I'd design the feat so that it also grants PoC something nice (perhaps the familiar can now attack on its own, without the warlock forgoing an attack).

Fanaelialae · Feb 25, 2017

Here's what I came up with:

Improved Familiar
Prerequisites: Can cast find familiar

When you cast find familiar, you can choose one of the normal forms for your familiar or one of the following special forms: imp, pseudodragon, quasit, sprite. Additionally, when you take the Attack action, you can forgo one of your own attacks to allow your familiar to make one attack with its own reaction.

If you have the Pact of the Chain feature, your familiar can make one attack on its own turn.

If you have the Pact of the Chain feature, if your familiar is an imp, pseudodragon, or quasit, it shares its Magic Resistance trait with you so long as you are within 10 feet of it. If your familiar is a sprite, you may add your proficiency bonus to the DCs for the sprite’s Shortbow poison and for its Heart Sight trait.

QuietBrowser · Feb 25, 2017

My only issue with that, [MENTION=53980]Fanaelialae[/MENTION], is that one can legitimately argue that Find Familiar can already be used to take Any Tiny Monster as a familiar, with DM permission. That means, RAW, if your DM allows it, any wizard can already claim one of the following creatures as a familiar:

Crawling Claw
Quasit
Imp
Faerie Dragon
Flameskull
Homunculus
Pixie
Pseudodragon
Sprite
Stirge
Will-o'-Wisp
Gazer
Cranium Rat
Velociraptot
Neogi Hatchling
Quickling
Vargouille

And that's leaving out the Demilich and Intellect Devourer, for obvious reasons.

So, yeah, simply making it a feat to duplicate the Pact of the Chain isn't really a worthy use of Improved Familiar in 5e, because honestly, it seems more like the Warlock is just getting a much weaker variant of Find Familiar as an innate ability so it doesn't have to waste its limited array of spells known on Find Familiar.

Instead, I think we need to look back on what Improved Familiar actually gave you in 3.5. This amounted to a more powerful magical creature to serve you, something that actually some level of fighting ability.

In the corebook alone, a caster with Improved Familiar could get a Shocker Lizard, a Stirge, a Celestial or Fiendish version of the default animals, a Small Elemental, a Mephit, a Homunculus, an Imp, a Quasit, a Pseudodragon, or a Formian Worker.

This list only got bigger in subsequent splatbooks. For example, Complete Warrior allowed a caster to use Improved Familiar to take a Krenshar, Worg, Blink Dog, Hell Hound, Hippogriff, Howler or Winter Wolf as familiars. We got all manner of outsiders (Lantern Archons, Musteval Guardinals, Coure Eladrins) and magical beasts (tressyms, deathfangs, jaculi).

As for what Pathfinder offers... well, better to let you have it straight from the horse's mouth: http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/improved-familiar/

So, yeah, if Improved Familiar is supposed to be a feat - and there's no reason it needs to be a Wizard Only feat, it could work just fine for a Chainlock to take this so they can ride around on a Nightmare or whatever - then it should take inspiration from what it could actually do in the past, and offer much more powerful monsters. Maybe even bring back the idea of "the higher your level, the more powerful a familiar you can have bound to you".

Fanaelialae · Feb 25, 2017

QuietBrowser said:
My only issue with that, [MENTION=53980]Fanaelialae[/MENTION], is that one can legitimately argue that Find Familiar can already be used to take Any Tiny Monster as a familiar, with DM permission. That means, RAW, if your DM allows it, any wizard can already claim one of the following creatures as a familiar:

Crawling Claw

Quasit

Imp

Faerie Dragon

Flameskull

Homunculus

Pixie

Pseudodragon

Sprite

Stirge

Will-o'-Wisp

Gazer

Cranium Rat

Velociraptot

Neogi Hatchling

Quickling

Vargouille

And that's leaving out the Demilich and Intellect Devourer, for obvious reasons.

So, yeah, simply making it a feat to duplicate the Pact of the Chain isn't really a worthy use of Improved Familiar in 5e, because honestly, it seems more like the Warlock is just getting a much weaker variant of Find Familiar as an innate ability so it doesn't have to waste its limited array of spells known on Find Familiar.

Instead, I think we need to look back on what Improved Familiar actually gave you in 3.5. This amounted to a more powerful magical creature to serve you, something that actually some level of fighting ability.

In the corebook alone, a caster with Improved Familiar could get a Shocker Lizard, a Stirge, a Celestial or Fiendish version of the default animals, a Small Elemental, a Mephit, a Homunculus, an Imp, a Quasit, a Pseudodragon, or a Formian Worker.

This list only got bigger in subsequent splatbooks. For example, Complete Warrior allowed a caster to use Improved Familiar to take a Krenshar, Worg, Blink Dog, Hell Hound, Hippogriff, Howler or Winter Wolf as familiars. We got all manner of outsiders (Lantern Archons, Musteval Guardinals, Coure Eladrins) and magical beasts (tressyms, deathfangs, jaculi).

As for what Pathfinder offers... well, better to let you have it straight from the horse's mouth: http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/improved-familiar/

So, yeah, if Improved Familiar is supposed to be a feat - and there's no reason it needs to be a Wizard Only feat, it could work just fine for a Chainlock to take this so they can ride around on a Nightmare or whatever - then it should take inspiration from what it could actually do in the past, and offer much more powerful monsters. Maybe even bring back the idea of "the higher your level, the more powerful a familiar you can have bound to you".

With DM permission I could have an ancient red dragon as a familiar. That doesn't change that, by RAW, it only allows a limited selection of beasts. To me at least, it is quite clear that Find Familiar is not intended to grant the creatures you listed. If WotC were to publish stats for a mouse, for example, that would be an appropriate substitution for the creatures allowed by find familiar, with DM permission of course.

If you want to expand the list of what is allowed via improved familiar, go for it. However, some of the creatures you listed (such as the Flameskull) seem a bit too good regardless of the Pc's level.

raleel · Feb 25, 2017

I personally like the spell slot increase idea.

But if I were to do a feat, I would have it allow a higher CR level of miscellaneous creature from the MM. this leaves the pact options in the bulk of the monster manual. An ape feels about right, or a constrictor snake. Even a dire wolf or a warhorse doesn't seem particular bad. A feat to have a warhorse at your beck and call seems fine. I'd probably cap it at CR 1. That leaves out phase spiders and mammoths and the like, but includes lions and tigers and bears.

This seems far more incremental and allows for a fairly serious player, st least for a bit. Some of them are pretty useful even.

Gardens & Goblins · Feb 25, 2017

With 5E's shying away from pet-classes and pet features (classes may feature a pet-like power but typically they function as spell effect, themed as a creature), and with Pact of the Chain Locks one-and-only distinguishing featuring being am improved familiar, I'd simply make the feature grant a bonus or two to the existing standard familiars.

First, we need to appreciate that Find Familiar doesn't produce an actual animal. It's a spirit in the shape of an animal.

Working with this, we can buff the spirit. Perhaps granting Evasion (Familiars are already toast if caught in an AOE. This way, they'd have a chance to escape) and a have them re-summon faster, say in 10 turns (or even as an action 1/day) and for free. Maybe even a stat bump in Int/Wis/Cha.

Then the player can fluff their familiar as they like. It's not an spirit masquerading as an Owl anymore folks, it's a spirit masquerading as a cherub/winged minion/mechanical whatsit. It's not a Weasel, it's an crawling hand creature. It's not frog, it's a hopping horned midget - and so on.

This way, a Wizard/whoever can benefit from it - those sending their familiar into dangerous situations can make use of it more readily, those looking for a helper get a smarter helper, and everyone enjoys a familiar that doesn't automatically explode near a fireball - and the Pact of the Chain Lock can also apply it to their familiars, letting the shine even brighter.

All this for the low low cost of a Feat!

D&D 5E Updating Improved Familiar to 5e?

QuietBrowser

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Shiroiken

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ppaladin123

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Corwin

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Fanaelialae

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Fanaelialae

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QuietBrowser

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Fanaelialae

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raleel

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Gardens & Goblins

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