MarkB
Legend
It's more the steed that I'm thinking of. That seems like something that should scale with your paladin level.
D&D (2024) Spell slot level for Find Familiar and Find Steed for rituals, Wild Companion and Faithful Steed
Ruin Explorer
Legend
An hour 10, not 20 minutes. You're thinking of Find Steed, which bizarrely only takes 10 minutes to cast where Find Familiar takes an hour because Sacred Cows. So Ritual Casting FF is 70 minutes. It's a Short Rest you don't get to take part in.
The Shadow
Hero
I'm still rather boggled that clerics can summon steeds now. I'd rather see it be a class feature of the paladin - it's one of their classic perks.
Chaosmancer
Legend
Setting aside the spell level issue, what are thoughts on the mechanical changes to familiars?
It obeys commands, without any commands it dodges and flees. You can spend your reaction to have it make a spell attack and it deals between 2 and 10 damage on a hit, but it must be in melee. So, that's cool they can attack now, but that is also pretty weak. Can still give the help action all the time, or use any skill, any magic item, any potions, ect.
Oh, this is slightly different I think? You cast the spell, the familiar can use its reaction to deliver it. Wait, no, that is the same. Honestly, I generally just have people have the familiar and caster's turns intertwine. It is easy enough and I don't think it truly breaks anything.
If a familiar hits zero hp, it hits 1 and vanishes for an hour, this can happen 1/day, so that's nice. HP is 4 to 20. AC is a bit weird. Land goes from 13 to 21, others go from 11 to 19. So, decently tanky. Especially compared to before.
They get darkvision, telepathy (no change) and you can look through their eyes from any range (that's a huge boost in theory, but I know a lot of people ignored the 100 ft anyways)
So, I think it definetly got stronger, but only in ways that make it more fun. Most of the things that were powerful before are unchanged... except! No flyby attack. We've got a wizard with an owl right now who uses flyby to deliver shocking grasps from a distance. Familiars no longer have that option, but I think it is worth it for the increase in interesting options.
Here is a weird thing. The spell specifically calls out that you summon the same familiar, that has the same memories. But it DOESN'T say that for Find Steed. You betray your familiar? It remembers. Betray your trusted steed, and get a new one with no memory of the event. Insert Mario/Yoshi meme
Interestingly, a Land familiar can have more AC than a Steed, since steed goes between 12 and 19. HP is 25 to 95, but the steed dies at 0, no pocket dimension. But you can heal it when you are healed.
I am a little disappointed in the 1/day abilities. The healing is a nice little boost, the teleport is AWESOME, but the fear? I'm not sure it is super good.
It obeys commands, without any commands it dodges and flees. You can spend your reaction to have it make a spell attack and it deals between 2 and 10 damage on a hit, but it must be in melee. So, that's cool they can attack now, but that is also pretty weak. Can still give the help action all the time, or use any skill, any magic item, any potions, ect.
Oh, this is slightly different I think? You cast the spell, the familiar can use its reaction to deliver it. Wait, no, that is the same. Honestly, I generally just have people have the familiar and caster's turns intertwine. It is easy enough and I don't think it truly breaks anything.
If a familiar hits zero hp, it hits 1 and vanishes for an hour, this can happen 1/day, so that's nice. HP is 4 to 20. AC is a bit weird. Land goes from 13 to 21, others go from 11 to 19. So, decently tanky. Especially compared to before.
They get darkvision, telepathy (no change) and you can look through their eyes from any range (that's a huge boost in theory, but I know a lot of people ignored the 100 ft anyways)
So, I think it definetly got stronger, but only in ways that make it more fun. Most of the things that were powerful before are unchanged... except! No flyby attack. We've got a wizard with an owl right now who uses flyby to deliver shocking grasps from a distance. Familiars no longer have that option, but I think it is worth it for the increase in interesting options.
Here is a weird thing. The spell specifically calls out that you summon the same familiar, that has the same memories. But it DOESN'T say that for Find Steed. You betray your familiar? It remembers. Betray your trusted steed, and get a new one with no memory of the event. Insert Mario/Yoshi meme
Interestingly, a Land familiar can have more AC than a Steed, since steed goes between 12 and 19. HP is 25 to 95, but the steed dies at 0, no pocket dimension. But you can heal it when you are healed.
I am a little disappointed in the 1/day abilities. The healing is a nice little boost, the teleport is AWESOME, but the fear? I'm not sure it is super good.
Whizbang Dustyboots
Gnometown Hero
I think familiars got a boost for 99% of the use cases.
I also think all of these changes were pretty predictable, as WotC clearly is uncomfortable with spell casters being able to look in every new monster book for overpowered combos. Moving summonings and shapechanges to templates permanently solves that problem and it means they don't have to worry as much about what's in future monster books (including the 2024 Monster Manual).
I'm looking forward to people getting weird with their familiars and steeds. Bring on the luna moth familiars and giant goat steeds.
I also think all of these changes were pretty predictable, as WotC clearly is uncomfortable with spell casters being able to look in every new monster book for overpowered combos. Moving summonings and shapechanges to templates permanently solves that problem and it means they don't have to worry as much about what's in future monster books (including the 2024 Monster Manual).
I'm looking forward to people getting weird with their familiars and steeds. Bring on the luna moth familiars and giant goat steeds.
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