Familiars, Useful?
- Thread starter BV210
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Plane Sailing
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The share spells ability can be a godsend/decent powerup, however. Take polymorph. I change into a Treant and share the spell with my familiar who turns into a treant right next to me. We both proceed to pummel the heck out of the target. Probably works even better with recent spells like 'trollform' etc. As long as you stay within 5ft of one another, the share spells works wonderfully.
The gnome illusionist has used his song thrush famillair to frighteningly good use. Granted, it's a cops and robbers campaign heavy on investigation but at first level he's; used the familliar to track an escaping suspect after they got away, used it to distract a gunman shooting at the party from a moving carriage, and used it to deliver messages to other PC's all the way across the city and get help when he got kidnapped by bad guys.
So, at the least, bird familliars can be very useful.
So, at the least, bird familliars can be very useful.
zoroaster100
First Post
I would be interested to see a prestige class specifically for making a wizard or sorcerer into a character with a powerful and useful familiar. I guess the cost would have to be one spell casting level, and the benefit would have to be significant to make up for that, such as allowing the familiar to enlarge itself to small size at will and allowing the familiar better fighting stats, and/or allowing the familiar to cast spells as a caster of half the character's level, etc.
In one of the campaigns I play in, one of the other players has a wizard with a cat familiar. We ran into a dungeon with a locked door guarded from inside by bugbears. My changeling got them to open the "porthole" in the door. I trued to bluff them into opening the door but it wasn't working. Our wiz sent his cat in with a shared spell. The cat killed or incapacitated both bugbears and we were able to get with out much more fuss. Since then, the party has gone out of its way to protect our new mascot. 
That's one killer cat.
That's one killer cat.
I've only rarely seen wizards or sorcerers using their familiars for much of anything. However...
- One of my current players took Improved Familiar for a small fire elemental. Very useful for CDGing trolls.
- Another player in that group is a multiclassed sorcerer / bard, and she uses her familiar to deliver cure spells by touch in combat.
- One of my current players took Improved Familiar for a small fire elemental. Very useful for CDGing trolls.
- Another player in that group is a multiclassed sorcerer / bard, and she uses her familiar to deliver cure spells by touch in combat.
HeavenShallBurn
First Post
The class ability as written really does need work and doesn't give enough really with too many drawbacks.
The most interesting and useful familiar I ever saw was by one of my players. He had to roll up a replacement character and decided on a wizard. So he points out the Tressym from the FRCS and it's already designed to be a familiar so I allow it(they've got a very high int for a familiar about 10-11 base). Then he springs a netbook feat that allows a familiar to take an alternate form of the same race as the master once per day. I'm fairly permissive and I can already see where he's going and since it sounds interesting and entertaining I go with it.
Since this was done between sessions his character introduces the familiar as his apprentice to the other PCs. For the longest time even the players never connected the familiar and the apprentice. It led to one of the most memorable lines in all my years of gaming when the familiar in her guise of "apprentice" seduced one of the other party members. The wizard PC walked in on this and his player blurted out IC "CEASE MOLESTING MY FAMILIAR" A LINE THAT SHALL LIVE FOREVER
The most interesting and useful familiar I ever saw was by one of my players. He had to roll up a replacement character and decided on a wizard. So he points out the Tressym from the FRCS and it's already designed to be a familiar so I allow it(they've got a very high int for a familiar about 10-11 base). Then he springs a netbook feat that allows a familiar to take an alternate form of the same race as the master once per day. I'm fairly permissive and I can already see where he's going and since it sounds interesting and entertaining I go with it.
Since this was done between sessions his character introduces the familiar as his apprentice to the other PCs. For the longest time even the players never connected the familiar and the apprentice. It led to one of the most memorable lines in all my years of gaming when the familiar in her guise of "apprentice" seduced one of the other party members. The wizard PC walked in on this and his player blurted out IC "CEASE MOLESTING MY FAMILIAR" A LINE THAT SHALL LIVE FOREVER
For my wizard the familiar was cool in roleplay and occasionally helped out.
The real pay off came around level 11/12 when Imbue Familiar with Spell Ability became available. Load him up with 4 spells of up to 4th level and let him go.
While it is all still from the same spell pool the ability to get off another spell per round in the initial fighting proved its worth.
The real pay off came around level 11/12 when Imbue Familiar with Spell Ability became available. Load him up with 4 spells of up to 4th level and let him go.
While it is all still from the same spell pool the ability to get off another spell per round in the initial fighting proved its worth.
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