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Message: <blockquote data-quote="chriton227" data-source="post: 6519414" data-attributes="member: 33263">A large predator like a dragon isn't going to waste its time eating a spider or bat, it would burn more energy in the effort than it would get from the snack. Sure some monsters may, but far from all.If intelligent enemies decided to kill all small creatures in the area, they would be spending all of their time being an exterminator instead of furthering whatever evil plot they are working on. This might actually be a good plan, get the enemy so paranoid about potential familiars that they no longer have time to be evil.  Go outside on a nice day and count how many birds and spiders you see.  Figure out how long it would take you to kill them all.  Then think about how many more there are you didn't see, and how many more will enter the area over time.  Medieval or Renaissance level architecture isn't some hermetically sealed space station that can keep out all pests, having insects and mice and such around is just part of life in that era, along with open windows and doors for ventilation and openings to allow the smoke from torches, fireplaces, and lamps to escape. There will be far more mundane wildlife than we see in our modern urban and suburban environments, and things are far less clean (instead of car exhaust you get horse poop, markets with live and livestock instead of grocery stores, and indoor plumbing is a rarity if it exists at all). The familiar doesn't even need to be in sight to overhear conversations, and at night would be able to see into an illuminated area without needing to enter the illumination.  And say somehow the enemy did manage to perpetually eradicate all familiar capable creatures in their vicinity, what would the ramifications be?  Far fewer predators keeping the mosquitoes, flies, mice, and other nuisance pests in check resulting in more distraction and annoyance to the enemies, plus a conspicuous absence of that wildlife and a very noticeable level of activity for the continuous eradication effort, which could draw a lot of unwanted attention to the enemy trying to keep their efforts a secret.Plus many enemies really aren't going to be either that intelligent, that dedicated, or that capable.  Sure the evil mage masterminding a scheme to dominate the world will be hyper aware of their surroundings (when not sleeping, eating, engaged in research, perceiving through their own familiar, etc.), but their mercenary guards resting between shifts are probably much less diligent, the orc tribe a few miles up the trail would probably be taking no notice at all of any surrounding wildlife that didn't present a physical threat or a good hunting opportunity, and the owlbear across the river couldn't do anything about the hawk flying overhead if it wanted to.  Even if you can only use the familiar to scout out the lackeys and lesser threats, that will still help you to surprise or avoid those threats using less resources, saving more for when you really need it against the major threats.How often does your party kill every hawk and raven flying overhead as they travel, every bat and owl flying overhead at night, every spider in the wilderness surrounding their campsite and trails, and every stray cat and rat they see around a city? Does your DM let you know every time a mundane creature of the sort is around?  If the party stopped to kill every cat, bat, snake, raven, owl, hawk, spider, frog, lizard, and fish, do you think they would even be able to travel between two cities before dying of old age?  It sounds like there may be some metagaming happening on the DM's side of the screen in your game, with some rationalizations going on to justify how enemies can somehow spot, identify, and eliminate familiars that are normally indistinguishable from mundane creatures of the same type.</blockquote>

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