How do you keep your familiar alive?

[Black Omega]

Well, Tome and Blood defines the pocket as providing total cover and concealment both. You aren't tucking that rat away into a hip pocket, you are putting it in a pocket dimension.

I usually treat that as the familiar being safe from any harm. No point being all that hard on familiars until they are used in combat.

 

[Hypersmurf]

Well, Tome and Blood defines the pocket as providing total cover and concealment both. You aren't tucking that rat away into a hip pocket, you are putting it in a pocket dimension.

Ah.

I didn't know he was talking about a magic pocket

While the familiar is extra-planar, does it count as being within one mile?

-Hyp.

 

[Black Omega]

Ah.

I didn't know he was talking about a magic pocket

While the familiar is extra-planar, does it count as being within one mile?

You know...I think you are right. I got it in my mind he was talking about the Familiar pocket, not a mundane one. A mundane one would not be a whole lot of protection.

 

[ConcreteBuddha]

An adamantine familiar carrier.

 

[Tyrrell]

Before I had my character change his familiar to an air elemental, the familiar always ran away at the first sign of trouble. Only if the party got hit by area of effect spells before the character acted did the familiar ever really come into to danger.

 

[Sagan Darkside]

If you are lucky enough to have a non-standard familiar, such as a dog, wolverine, wolf, etc., how would you go about keeping it out of harms way since it is fairly large size, can't fly out of danger, etc.?

My last character was a wizard with a german shephard for a familiar- he used in combat a majority of time.

How? A few ways:

1)There was a feat in a dragon magazine that allowed the casting of personal spells to effect the familiar if it was within a mile: this allowed mage armor and shield to benefit the dog. It usually had the highest ac in the party.

2)The char had one level of fighter- the extra hp's did not hurt.

3)The char created magic items for the dog. Equivilant of bracers of ac and such.

4)My wizard was going for the Elemental Savant PrC- and he spent a lot of gold researching a spell to add the air-elemental template to living creatures. Once he was succesful- his familiar was the first recipient.

It was still scary at times, but the familiar out survived my wizard- so I guess I did something right.

SD

 

[Buttercup]

Sagan, welcome back. I've missed you a great deal.

 

[Sagan Darkside]

Sagan, welcome back. I've missed you a great deal.

Thank you- you are kind to say so.

I missed sharing ideas back and forth with you as well.

I hope the holidays are treating you well.

SD

 

[0-hr]

I am talking about the classic toad in the wizard's (normal) robe pocket. It has been argued her before that such a critter cannot take damage unless the robe takes damage. And the robe will only take damage if the wearer rolls a "1" on a reflex save and then has the robe somehow come up as the one item harmed.

I agree that it sounds silly, but the point was put forth by someone with a good reputation, and it was not refuted. Do you, instead, apply all area-of-effect damage to familiars even if they are completely covered by the wizard's equipment?

 

[AuraSeer]

If the familiar is inside the master's robes, or even on his shoulder or something, we treat it as part of his equipment. Since it's not participating in the battle, we simplify things by not tracking its hit points.