Is using a familiar in combat to grant advantage a common tactic?

[Charlaquin]

Yeah, scouting and getting advantage in combat seem to be the main uses of familiars. I do tend to throw in some AOE attacks that'll peg the familiar, if the PC overuses this tactic.

Part of me thinks losing a familiar should be more of a detriment, like the old days, so that PCs would be more cautious about sending a familiar ahead on its own, or spamming the help action in combat.

I don’t know, I feel like being able to scout ahead and distract enemies is like... the primary and secondary appeal of having

 

[iserith]

Yeah, scouting and getting advantage in combat seem to be the main uses of familiars. I do tend to throw in some AOE attacks that'll peg the familiar, if the PC overuses this tactic.

Part of me thinks losing a familiar should be more of a detriment, like the old days, so that PCs would be more cautious about sending a familiar ahead on its own, or spamming the help action in combat.

I think the cost is the 1 hour casting time (or 1 hour, 10 minutes for a ritual) which is the real setback when the familiar is taken out, but that requires the DM to actually consider time as a resource. In most of my adventure locations, there's a wandering monster check every 10 minutes, so that means the PCs have to hunker down and potentially have up to 7 wandering monster encounters while the caster brings in another familiar.

 

[tglassy]

Yeah, scouting and getting advantage in combat seem to be the main uses of familiars. I do tend to throw in some AOE attacks that'll peg the familiar, if the PC overuses this tactic.

Part of me thinks losing a familiar should be more of a detriment, like the old days, so that PCs would be more cautious about sending a familiar ahead on its own, or spamming the help action in combat.

I've never seen getting advantage as overusing or spamming, but as the main use. It can scout and sometimes sense things you can't, but the only consistent use is to get advantage.

That said, scouting can break things. I had a Sprite familiar once, and used it to great utility for our party, ruining whole questlines in Curse of Strahd the first time I played it by having the Sprite, invisible, map the area so we could plan our attack. In the werewolf den, the DM said "Your sprite won't leave your side, he's scared." I took it, cause I had used him quite a bit. Then, in the Amber Temple, I had the Sprite go check out the statue with the darkness on it, where the Arcanoloth was hiding, and the book specifically said the Arcanoloth could see through invisibility, so it ate a fireball. Because of how much I'd come to rely on the familiar, it was a great blow to my strategies. i was not as effective. I was much more cautious with him from that point on.

So yeah, be careful being too smart with it or relying on it too heavily. Knocking it out is a perfectly legit means to handicap you if you do.

 

[Charlaquin]

Yeah, scouting and getting advantage in combat seem to be the main uses of familiars. I do tend to throw in some AOE attacks that'll peg the familiar, if the PC overuses this tactic.

Part of me thinks losing a familiar should be more of a detriment, like the old days, so that PCs would be more cautious about sending a familiar ahead on its own, or spamming the help action in combat.

I don’t know, I feel like being able to scout ahead and/or spy on people is like... the primary appeal of having a familiar. I appreciate that the rules encourage using them that way.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

I don't tend to get really grognardy, but I preferred how you got different special abilities from different familiars in the old editions. It gave each familiar more of a different feel.

I've seen some players show legitimate attachment and concern for their familiars, and others just name them Bill I through VI..., treating them like an expendable resource. It's really with the latter that I tend to get grumpy.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

The Help Action generously gives your ally an entire turn to make their attack. The two notable concerns are:

1) The familiar rolls initiative and sometimes goes after you, so you don't get the benefit until next turn.
2) The monster might get a turn between the familiar and you, which means the monster can wander off. This can include the monster going to attack someone else, weaving between its own allies to make you suffer attacks of opportunity to reach it, or just ending its turn around a corner.

You could hold your action until your familiar has it's turn.

 

[Istbor]

"Is using a familiar in combat to grant advantage a common tactic?"

I'm not sure ... I am not .... familiar ... with this tactic.



THANK YOU! I'M HERE ALL DAY!


S'pose it depends. I mean, is the individual in question kind of like, "Hey, I need to exterminate a lot of owls." If so, why not?

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

Yeah, scouting and getting advantage in combat seem to be the main uses of familiars. I do tend to throw in some AOE attacks that'll peg the familiar, if the PC overuses this tactic.

Part of me thinks losing a familiar should be more of a detriment, like the old days, so that PCs would be more cautious about sending a familiar ahead on its own, or spamming the help action in combat.

Yeah not a fan of the expendable familiar idea. I liked them a lot more in older editions where you were bound to that beast, got advantage but if it dies its not pleasant.

 

[jayoungr]

From what I've seen, it's the main thing people use familiars for, apart from scouting.

 

[Warmaster Horus]

Happens all the time. As a DM I have no problem targetting Familiars and including them in AoE spell targets if the wizard hasn't specifically said they're somewhere safe (like that handy interdimensional space they can hang in).