D&D 5E Warlock's Pact of the Chain's Imp, Quasit, and Psuedodragon.

[Paul Farquhar]

They're using the spellcasting mechanic.

So does fireball. So what?

Notably, the connection is that they neither of them really changes the creature

Yes, yes they do. Specifically, Find Familiar does:
"the familiar has the statistics of the chosen form, though it is a celestial, fey, or fiend (your choice)"

A familiar summoned by a Find Familiar spell uses the (modified) stat block of the form it takes, but it is not actually that creature.

Note that there is no "Variant Imp" in the Monster Manual. There is a "variant familiar" in the Monster Manual. The variation being, the familiar is acquired by the master entering into a contract, not by casting Find Familiar. If you get a familiar in this way it is different to a familiar gained by casting Find Familiar. This contract gives the imp a telepathic link with it's master, and the shared magic resistance ability. The shared resistance is gained from the contract, not the imp, which is a perfectly ordinary imp.

 

[Chaosmancer]

By "Polymorph" I include both 4th-level Polymorph and True Polymorph.

True Polymorph and spellcasting is a bit of a grey area, but mostly with fiends. For Dragons, I would say no. True Polymorphing into a dragon does not give you new spells that you can cast 1/day on top of your normal spell allotment. Can you cast spells as a dragon? Sure, but they are the spells you normally had access to.

For fiends... well, is it fair to be able to cast a spell to gain access to new spells and new spell slots? I don't think it will is. But, maybe you could cast those new spells with the spell slots you have? It is a grey area.

As for the Familiars, I think the main reason that Chain is seen as weaker than Tome is because Tome can also get Find Familiar for 90% of the value. The Sprite (from personal experience) can be incredibly valuable... but only in the right style of campaign. I'd rather find other ways to buff all the familiars for chainlocks rather than give them better powers in certain forms. I mean... I'd love a chainlock to be able to have a raven, think that'd be cool, but the Imp statistics are still so far superior that I would feel compelled to take the Imp instead

 

[Asisreo]

Yes, yes they do. Specifically, Find Familiar does:
"the familiar has the statistics of the chosen form, though it is a celestial, fey, or fiend (your choice)"

A familiar summoned by a Find Familiar spell uses the (modified) stat block of the form it takes, but it is not actually that creature.

Note that there is no "Variant Imp" in the Monster Manual. There is a "variant familiar" in the Monster Manual. The variation being, the familiar is acquired by the master entering into a contract, not by casting Find Familiar. If you get a familiar in this way it is different to a familiar gained by casting Find Familiar. This contract gives the imp a telepathic link with it's master, and the shared magic resistance ability. The shared resistance is gained from the contract, not the imp, which is a perfectly ordinary imp.

Let me rephrase:

Vampires' statblocks are in the monster manual. Vampire spellcasters are not, but they are listed as a Variant near the vampire's official statblock (MM 298).

A vampire with the exact spellcasting abilities as the Variant can be considered a RAW vampire, not homebrewed. As such, if a spell like Antipathy: Vampire would take affect, both the Variant and Regular version should be affected by RAW unless the DM adjudicates counter to that.

Now, a Wizard meets a Vampire with the spellcasting variant. He thinks the vampire is cool and wants to True Polymorph into that spellcasting Vampire. Would you consider that spellcasting creature a compatible, RAW, and legitimate form that the wizard can take?

 

[Bolares]

I don't think that true polymorph is a good comparison....

 

[ad_hoc]

By RAW I''d say you can't get the benefits from the variant. Because the MM specifically mentions what I'd have to do to make those creatures become your familiar and grant you the benefits... also, the familiar in the find familiar spell is a spitir that takes the form of a creature listed on the find familiar (or pact of the chain) spell.

That's what I read as RAW, but I'd probably allow the variants in my game, because I like powerfull PCs in my games.

Also if you take the variant then it is free to leave you at any time which is in contradiction to the Find Familiar spell.

 

[Bolares]

Also if you take the variant then it is free to leave you at any time which is in contradiction to the Find Familiar spell.

Yeah, you can't take part of the variant rule and ignore the rest. It's either a creature that agrees to be your familiar and can leave at any time, and gives you resistance OR has all the benefits and restrictions of the find familiar spell. You either have the cake or eat it

 

[Asisreo]

Also if you take the variant then it is free to leave you at any time which is in contradiction to the Find Familiar spell.

Could just be a case of general vs specific.

I don't think that true polymorph is a good comparison....

The point is:

There's 2 points that need clarification:

Are variants considered compatible with player-facing features?

Are the forms of creatures considered that creature?


In other words:

Is a Variant Vampire a vampire for the purpose of spells that affect only vampires?

Is something that is in the form of a different creature (like a polymorph target) considered that creature if its not truly that creature?

An example:

Druids can/cannot turn into diseased giant rats. Which would you allow?

 

[Bolares]

Could just be a case of general vs specific.

The point is:

There's 2 points that need clarification:

Are variants considered compatible with player-facing features?

Are the forms of creatures considered that creature?


In other words:

Is a Variant Vampire a vampire for the purpose of spells that affect only vampires?

Is something that is in the form of a different creature (like a polymorph target) considered that creature if its not truly that creature?

An example:

Druids can/cannot turn into diseased giant rats. Which would you allow?

I get what you are saying but I say it's not a good comparison because the thing with familiar is not that the familiar imp (or the others) are variants. It's that the variant has very specific conditions for when it's applied and can give bonuses, and none of this conditions are met by casting the find familiar spell. even if the chain warlock can call a fey/fiend spirit to take the form of a imp, it doesn't fill the requirements for the variant bonuses.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Let me rephrase:

Vampires' statblocks are in the monster manual. Vampire spellcasters are not, but they are listed as a Variant near the vampire's official statblock (MM 298).

A vampire with the exact spellcasting abilities as the Variant can be considered a RAW vampire, not homebrewed. As such, if a spell like Antipathy: Vampire would take affect, both the Variant and Regular version should be affected by RAW unless the DM adjudicates counter to that.

Now, a Wizard meets a Vampire with the spellcasting variant. He thinks the vampire is cool and wants to True Polymorph into that spellcasting Vampire. Would you consider that spellcasting creature a compatible, RAW, and legitimate form that the wizard can take?

No.

To take this a step further, if Malenar the Vampire Wizard has the Ritual of Eternal Night as something he knows, could you True Polymorph into him and learn that ritual? Could you True Polymorph into him and learn the layout of his castle and his plans? Obviously not.

Some beings, like Fiends, it makes a lot of sense to say that their magic is part of their very being, and so turning into them would grant you those powers, mechanically debatable, but lore-wise it makes sense. Others, it is knowledge, and you can't True Polymorph and gain specific knowledge. So, you couldn't True Polymorph to learn the spells of a vampiric Wizard.

 

[moving-target]

The Warlock's Pact Boon "Pact of the Chain" allows it to cast Find Familiar as a regular spell as well as a ritual, but it gives additional options for the familiar's form. These are the sprite, imp, quasit, and psuedodragon. This thread will focus on the last three.

These three compatible creatures have a variant form of themselves, namely, "Variant: Familiar" which gives the owner of the familiar the ability to sense what the familiar senses while they are within 1 mile of each other and when they are within 10ft of each other, the summoner shares their Magic Resistance feature. I've seen some DMs take issue with allowing a player to summon these variants as they aren't a "base creature" in the MM and therefore aren't a RAW option. I disagree because, while its true they are a variant, that doesn't mean they aren't a compatible creature from the MM. A variant imp is still an imp and therefore can be summoned.

I believe this also does some cool two-fold alleviation for concerns about the pact boon as I've coincidentally heard that its the weakest pact boon for the warlock. Firstly, it becomes an active defensive buff for the Warlock and therefore becomes a pact that's relevant for combat. Secondly, it also makes warlocks' familiars better scouts than a wizard's. Having the ability to have an imp turn into a raven or quasit into a bat means that the familiar still gets to be stealthy to a useful degree while being able to share its senses up to a mile. And if the familiar gets into a scuffle or falls into a trap, it has more ways to avoid getting killed and having a decent chance to fight back.

What do you think? Overpowered? Still underpowered? Would you allow this or you find it too much? I'm interested in the community's thoughts.

The creature variant familiars are singular specific creatures with whom someone must make a Familiar Pact with.

• gazer-familiar-variant
• imp-familiar-variant
• pseudodragon-familiar-variant
• quasit-familiar-variant

When a Chain Pact Warlock casts the spell Find Familiar, they do not get one of the above creature variant familiars. Instead what they get is a celestial, fey, or fiend spirit who takes on the form selected by the caster, which for a Chain Pact Warlock can include imp, pseudodragon, quasit, or sprite.

• Warlock
• Find Familiar
• Imp
• Pseudodragon
• Quasit
• Sprite

The Find Familiar spell does not properly cover alignment, which creates confusion. But, from the reading of the spell and considering the True Polymorph spell, it follows that the Find Familiar Spirit will have an alignment and personality which will stay with it regardless of which form it assumes. It also makes sense that this alignment should match the alignment of the caster, given that the caster will be able to perform actions through their Find Familiar Spirit as an extension of themselves. If it were wrongly allowed for the Find Familiar Spirit to change it alignment with the form assumed then that would allow breaking of some important alignment related elements within the game. For example, an evil character could perform evil actions through what detects and acts for magic as a good creature even though it was acting with evil intent. Another example would be a character being able to get past some alignment limitation by doing it through a familiar which they could easily change the alignment of. Thus, it would clearly be a violation of the rules to allow a Find Familiar Spirit to easily change its alignment by simple changing form from a pseudodragon to a quasit.

Now, an actual imp familiar variant is different. It could easily have a different alignment from the PC it makes a pact with. But, it would be seeking to influence that PC to bein lawful evil. It would have its own personality and agenda. Whatever pact was made would almost certainly includes means of breaking that pact. If it died, it would leave a body and be dead and its spirit would return Hell. Casting the Find Familiar spell would have no effect upon it, instead giving you a Find Familiar Spirit which would be separate.