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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Man in the Funny Hat" data-source="post: 5609715" data-attributes="member: 32740">Problem the first: the player of the mephit should have been immediately disabused of the notion that mephits (or indeed any familiar, much less an outsider) either has mates or human-like reproductive processes. Problem the second: the implied notion that summoning a familiar has ethical or moral implications at all. The PH says a familiar serves as a companion and servant. It does not say it does so unwillingly or by being removed from some other path through life which it would prefer at any point for any reason. You summon the familar... you get a companion/servant... end of story. If DM or players want to editorialize and create content and controversy where there is none, well game on and enjoy. It actually sounds somewhat interesting. Kudos to the player for good roleplaying. But it immediately and irrevocably means the DM in particular assumes responsibility for figuring out what moral and ethical implications this then creates for any spellcaster. The PH says nothing about such things, probably because there IS nothing that needed to be said. Again, more good roleplaying but this is strictly house rules territory. Myself, I have always sensibly assumed that even if there were some potential issue of free will (or lack thereof) in summoning a familiar that this would be rendered moot by the process itself.  That is, a familiar who in ANY way/shape/form is not willing to serve forever and without question the master who summons it would not actually BE summoned. A LG character can summon the same animal familiars for example as a CE character and yet there's no issues about a LG spellcasters rabbit familiar having a more deep-seated need to "go home" and make a bunch more little bunnies than serving the spellcaster, much less any potential obligation of the LG spellcaster to LET IT as a matter of ethics/morality. At the very least it would then have to be assumed that in order to serve unto death the caster who summoned it, whatever life the familiar may have had is either willingly sacrificed, non-existent, or otherwise in all ways rendered irrelevant. A few - but they don't last too long and/or are not taken seriously.</blockquote>

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