Death and familiars/animal companions/special mounts

[Ashtagon]

Core rules:

A sorcerer can obtain a familiar. Doing so takes 24 hours and uses up magical materials that cost 100 gp. A familiar is a magical beast that resembles a small animal and is unusually tough and intelligent. The creature serves as a companion and servant.

The sorcerer chooses the kind of familiar he gets. As the sorcerer advances in level, his familiar also increases in power.

If the familiar dies or is dismissed by the sorcerer, the sorcerer must attempt a DC 15 Fortitude saving throw. Failure means he loses 200 experience points per sorcerer level; success reduces the loss to one-half that amount. However, a sorcerer’s experience point total can never go below 0 as the result of a familiar's demise or dismissal. A slain or dismissed familiar cannot be replaced for a year and day. A slain familiar can be raised from the dead just as a character can be, and it does not lose a level or a Constitution point when this happy event occurs.

So, costs 100 gp and a 24-hour ritual to acquire a familiar, regardless of previous circumstances.

Losing a familiar costs 200 xp per class level (DC Fort save halves)., and you cannot replace it for a year and a day.

Considering that core rules assume you can (potentially) gain a level every 3 1/3 days, a year is essentially forever (optimally, you hit level 20 in 60 days of solid adventuring). Even if you assume half your time is downtime and the period is a month, that's still four (almost five) levels without a familiar.

Contrast with paladin's mount:

Should the paladin’s mount die, it immediately disappears, leaving behind any equipment it was carrying. The paladin may not summon another mount for thirty days or until she gains a paladin level, whichever comes first, even if the mount is somehow returned from the dead. During this thirty-day period, the paladin takes a -1 penalty on attack and weapon damage rolls.

30 days or one class level, whichever comes first. During this period, the character suffers -1 on attack and damage rolls.

Druid's animal companion:

If a druid releases his companion from service, he may gain a new one by performing a ceremony requiring 24 uninterrupted hours of prayer. This ceremony can also replace an animal companion that has perished.

24-hour ritual which can be begun starting one round after Wolfie gets pushed off a cliff.

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Clearly, some of these are better than others. This is an area that can benefit from a more unified mechanic. To whit:

Pets - General Rules

Generically, animal companions, special mounts, and arcane familiars are referred to as "pets". Where the specific type of pet is important, that type's name (animal companion, etc.) will be noted.

If a pet dies or is somehow lost, there is a delay ("requiem period") of 30 days or one class level, whichever comes first. During this requiem period, the character suffers a -1 penalty on attack rolls, damage rolls, and caster level.

After this period has ended, a ritual requiring 24 hours is required to summon a replacement pet.

Animal Companions

A master of an companion can freely choose to release an animal from service back into the wild (ie. the animal companion cannot currently be imprisoned or in an environment unsuitable for it to live naturally and free). If this is done, he must still wait the requiem period (30 days or one class level) before gaining a new companion. However, he does not suffer any penalty to attack rolls, damage rolls, or caster level in this period. This would typically be done if the druid knows he is going to travel to an environment where his current animal companion cannot survive.

Once the requiem period has ended, a master of an animal companion must be in an environment where the type of animal in question lives in order to summon a replacement animal companion. The ritual requires one full day in a natural environment, but does not cost any money to perform.

Arcane Familiar

If an arcane familiar dies or is lost, in addition to the usual penalties, the master takes two points of Constitution damage. This Constitution damage does not heal and cannot be healed until the requiem period has ended, after which it heals naturally, and can be healed magically.

Once the requiem period has ended, a master of an arcane familiar spend one full day and 100 gp on arcane ritual components, and be in an environment where the arcane familiar animal type in question lives. This ritual is most typically performed in an area sheltered from natural elements, but with open access to the outside so that the familiar can wander in from its natural habitat.

Improved Familiars: For familiars summoned with the Improved Familiar feat, the master must be in a location that has no obvious connection to a concept or material opposite to the familiar - no summoning celestial hawk familiars in Greyhawk's Horned Society or ice mephits in Eberron's Xen'drik, for example). This is summarised below:

Familiar's affinity - cannot be summoned in:
* Evil - good states and empires
* Chaotic - lawful states and empires (this pretty much limits things to unclaimed lands or obviously chaotic nations)
* Good - evil states and empires
* Lawful - chaotic states and empires
* Neutral - As a general rule, these tend to be magical beasts rather than extra-planar. If they could be found on the prime plane, use the same criteria as for regular familiars. Otherwise, consider any strongly non-neutral state or empire as unfriendly for summoning purposes.
* Air - Underground, or in the lower floors of a multi-storey building.
* Earth - At sea or on small islands (definition of small island would be campaign-specific).
* Fire - Any cold environment; at sea or on small islands.
* Water - Deserts and dry places (note that there are both hot and cold deserts in the world).
* Electricity - Underground, or in the lower floors of a multi-storey building.
* Cold - Any hot environment.
* Construct - no special environment; however, the wizard must craft the construct himself.

Change from core rules regarding Improved Familiar feat: The homunculus is a construct under the core rules, not undead, and so there is no particular reason why it should have any special affinity for undead. Generally, as long as the master is not opposite in affinity to the familiar, he can summon that familiar type (a master with the water subtype could not summon a familiar with the fire subtype, for example). However, unless he has a strong affinity (same subtype or alignment, for example), the familiar will sometimes act to frustrate his interests.


Special Mounts

Once the requiem period has ended, a master of a special mount can spend one full day praying in a temple in order to regain his ability to call his special mount. Depending on the deity in question and current needs of the specific temple being used (campaign-specific), this may also require a donation to the temple coffers (100 gp). Until he spends this day in prayer, he cannot call his mount, but suffers no other penalty.

Pets and Action Points

A master of an animal companion who releases his animal companion back into the wild can spend an action point to immediately end the requiem period, and can then summon a replacement in the usual manner.

If a pet (animal companion, special mount, or familiar) is lost through any other reason, the former master can spend an action point to allow him to summon a replacement pet. However, the penalties to attack rolls, damage rolls, caster level, and Constitution (familiars only) will remain for the full requiem period (30 days or one class level). If several pets are lost and replaced in this manner in a short period, the penalties stack.

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Comments?

(crosspost from The Piazza • View topic - [d20a] Death and familiars/animal companions/special mounts)

 

[El Mahdi]

deleted

 

[Ashtagon]

ok, some justifications:

Familiars: At low levels, there is no real way to stop a determined enemy from attacking your familiar if it is anywhere at all on the battle map. All it takes is a single enemy archer and *pow* - no familiar for the rest of the campaign (that's effectively what a year and a day means). At mid-high levels, about the only way to protect a familiar from monsters (and remember, familiar hp do not usefully scale up for level-appropriate encounters) is to employ "I win" spells, which works, but isn't fun. Seriously, considering the penalty is effectively no familiar ever again until you make a new character, the only reasonable solution is to keep it off map and hope the DM doesn't say poachers shot it while hunting for rabbits. Note that the tactics I am suggesting essentially amount to "keep your familiar in the same square as yourself or a few squares behind" or even "keep your familiar as far from enemies as possible while still within your own sight". Considering you yourself aren't in combat, that isn't an aggressive use at all. And it still dies.

In general, if it is anywhere on the battle map and it is not level appropriate, the only reason Team Evil isn't shooting at it is because you let the DM have the last slice of pizza.

Animal Companions: A druid who goes through six wolves every week is more a menace to wolves than any number of wolf hunters. The RAW do not encourage druids to pay any attention to the safety of his companions at all, since there is no consequence for losing it.

Also, CoDzilla. Druids really don't need a spare tank on top of full casting AND wildshaping into tank form. Animal companions do 'level up' anyway (SRD) - not only do they gain extra HD, but every 3 class levels they can be swapped out for a newer model that is level-appropriate.

Aside: It's worth bearing in mind too that even the 1e and 2e druid was considered overpowered, and he didn't even have an animal companion back then.

Special Mount: From the paladin's point of view, the only change this makes is that he now also loses a caster during the 30day/level-up delay period level if his mount dies. Oh, and a campaign-specific optional 100 gp fee to use the temple prayer rooms (trivial at any level the mount is available). Since casting isn't a paladin's primary role anyway, this isn't a major loss.

In practice, most campaigns that include paladins tend to have them pick alternate class features to lose the mount anyway, since they are basically impossible to use in dungeon or urban encounters.

Overall: Paladin special mounts are the least affected by these changes. Druids will find they can no longer treat their companions as disposable meat shields, and wizards will find they can have a familiar and not worry that if it dies to a kobold archer in the shadows he will never have another.

 

[El Mahdi]

deleted

 

[Ashtagon]

It's fair enough saying the DM won't by fiat target a familiar that isn't being actively risked. And that even makes some sense for unintelligent enemies, since a raven or toad isn't an obvious threat (not unless the monsters are sufficiently genre-savvy anyway). But for an intelligent enemy, a spell-caster even, not to prioritise targeting a familiar, which he knows is a potential major threat and an easy one-shot kill, is just playing the NPC at something far below what his Intelligence rating should indicates. It just strains believability for the DM to give the familiar such an easy out against smart foes. This has nothing to do with teh DM trying to beat on players, and everything to do with the DM playing them with half teh intelligence they actually have.

One additional advantage of this system of mine is that it actually gives a wizard a way to take advantage of some of the advanced familiar feats (Improved Familiar, Construct Familiar, etc) without having the DM say... "one year later...". The campaign shouldn't go into downtime just because a player got a feat.

 

[El Mahdi]

deleted

 

[Kerrick]

I kinda like it. I unified the companion/mount/familiar mechanics (see here; someone suggested making them cohorts (via the Leadership feat) instead of class features, and after some thought I decided it was a good idea. I had tentative plans to make some kind of bonding ritual - alter Leadership to account for getting minions at lower levels; if you get a cohort that you want to make into a minion (assuming it's a valid creature), you can undergo a ritual to bond with it, gaining the benefits noted on the Minions table. Your rule about penalties would tie into this quite well - it makes sense that there would be some side effect of the bond being broken unwillingly.


Re: Minions dying. My take on it is this: Yes, paladin mounts have a greater chance of dying, but if you're careless or unlucky enough to get one killed, you deserve the penalty. It's not just a horse, it's a bonded mount.

Druid's companions aren't supposed to be in battle; wild animals should not engage in combat except to protect themselves or their master (in a defensive capacity). Players using them as combat aids is one of the reasons that class is so badly broken. Druids who lose an animal companion should suffer a penalty, and the 30-day wait period along with the penalties sounds good.

What bugs me about familiars is that they're not all that useful. They don't give you anything besides a piddling skill bonus and some possible RP benefits; all the abilities apply to them. Sure, that makes them more durable, but what's the point of having one in the first place (let alone bringing it along on adventures), especially with the harsh penalties? It's like bringing along your main spellbook instead of your travelling book - if you lose a travelling book, you're SOL until you get home; if you lose the main book, you're really screwed. If familiars actually gave some kind of benefit, like +1 caster level (even to a school), they'd be worth the effort.

This gives me an idea; improved familiars can grant +1 CL for spells with the descriptor tied to their affinity (for example, an ice mephit grants it for Cold spells). I'm not sure what to do with normal familiars, though.

 

[Ashtagon]

Actually, one of my ideas for making your basic familiar more useful is to turn them into spell batteries. A wizard can choose to 'cast' a 1st level spell into his familiar, storing it for later use. Provided the familiar in in line of sight, he can later (even weeks later) cast that same spell again this time for real, in addition to his normal spells per day. Essentially, this allows him to take a little of his spell-casting from a downtime-day into an adventuring day.

This spell battery idea could also operate in reverse, allowing the familiar to soak up a hostile spell cast against the wizard of the familiar. This should probably involve opposed caster level checks; failure has no effect, and very bad failures injuring the familiar.

Your idea of a caster level bonus is entirely appropriate, although I probably wouldn't extend that down to basic familiars from 1st level.

Another possibility is to allow a familiar to apply a meta-magic effect to a spell cast by the wizard.

I like what WFRP (1e and 2e) has done with arcane familiars, and I plan on adapting a lot of it to my needs.

 

[Nimloth]

But for an intelligent enemy, a spell-caster even, not to prioritise targeting a familiar, which he knows is a potential major threat and an easy one-shot kill, is just playing the NPC at something far below what his Intelligence rating should indicates.

I disagree with this statement. Which target should have priority, a wizard who can bend reality to his whim or the wizards pet? Attack the wizard and possibly kill him, maybe get a crit? Target the pet (which is usually a softer target) which may or may not effect the wizards power, but is sure to make him angry? Hmm, which one sounds smarter?

Unless there is a solid tactical reason to attack the familiar (it's running away with something important or it has actually attacked before or it is dangerous on its own, like a viper snake), there should be plenty of other higher priority targets to choose from. The reasons an npc might choose to target a familiar is for roleplaying reasons;
- HATRED of the wizard and the desire to HURT him/her
- No other targets readily available (and if this is the case, the wizard has bigger problems than having his familiar die or someone made a mistake)

 

[Ashtagon]

Actually, targeting the familiar does make sense. Since enemies remain fully capable of delivering an "alpha strike" any time they are not on the floor, it makes sense to always go for the biggest thing you can be sure of downing in a single attack sequence. While for the BBEG, that is likely to be a PC or a major henchman, for his goblin archer meat shields, that raven familiar looks suspiciously like tomorrow's lunch, as well as being the biggest thing they are likely to be able to down in one attack sequence.