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In my game the other day, I ran a new group of old players through Crypt of the Everflame. One of the players is a witch and for a little RP fun, I decided to RP the witch's familiar as being demanding. So to give the witch his spells I required him to get 4 hair strands from one PC, feed it the corpse of a recently slain enemy (its a centipede), and taste the blood of another PC who was injured. The player took it in stride and enjoyed the RP.
That being said, my question is fair or foul?
With the Witches Familiar described:
"Generally feared and misunderstood, the witch draws her magic from a pact made with an otherworldly power. Communing with that source, using her familiar as a conduit, the witch gains not only a host of spells, but a number of strange abilities known as hexes. As a witch grows in power, she might learn about the source of her magic, but some remain blissfully unaware."
later emphasized as:
"At 1st level, a witch forms a close bond with a familiar, a creature that teaches her magic and helps to guide her along her path. Familiars also aid a witch by granting her skill bonuses, additional spells, and help with some types of magic. "
Should the GM spice things up on the RP side by making the witches familiar more than a walking spell book? What about in Pathfinder Society play?
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If the players are enjoying it, great. The issues come up when the players feel "put upon", or that the GM is making playing the class too much effort, or the OTHER players start to object to the "screen time" given to the witch and her familiar.
Done well, it adds to the role playing opportunities, and makes the character come alive. Done poorly, it winds up in the same category of giving Paladins nothing but ethical Morton's Forks, or constantly destroying or losing a wizard's spellbook, or over-using rust monsters or disenchanters.
tl;dr: If they like it, run with it. If they don't, stop.
Just my opinion here.
1) If your players love it, go for it.
2) for myself personally, if my DM decided I had to jump through special hoops to get my spells, I would take that as a hint I needed to select a new class. (of course, my familiar wanting to eat the flesh of a sentient creature would cause other issues- but I have an improved familiar of good alignment. :P )
To me personally-
my familiar talking to me, having a personality (used by the DM) and such would be fine, but adding restrictions not listed by the class and such would be out of bounds. "you must do X or no spells for you" would be out of bounds, but the familiar wanting to talk sometimes about "The Master" (or mistress) or whatever it was giving the spells generally could make for some interesting Rp.
Just my opinion.
Others can and will disagree.
(in fact, there's a whole thread of folks disagreeing back and forth on this very topic..)
-S
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I am currently playing a Witch, and we are treating her familiar very similarly. There haven't been any tasks to be performed for the familiar, but the familiars actions are negotiated rather than commanded. (The GM has also, for plot reasons, given me a fully intelligent and communicative familiar, which is not the norm.) There are a few things that I can compel the familiar to do, but everything else is by negotiation.
The thing to remember about a Witch's familiar is that they don't work for the Witch, they work for the Witch's Patron. And the Patron (whose exact identity is probably unknown to the Witch) has given the Witch these powers for a Reason (which is almost certainly unknown by the Witch). As long as the Witch is advancing the goals of the Patron, the familiar should be very helpful and undemanding. But as soon as she stops doing so...she'll do about as well as a Cleric that goes against the dictates of her god.
All of which is to say, that a Witch who takes a Patron of Deception or Trickery or the like has implictly given the GM all *sorts* of power to mess with them.
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The thing to remember about a Witch's familiar is that they don't work for the Witch, they work for the Witch's Patron. And the Patron (whose exact identity is probably unknown to the Witch) has given the Witch these powers for a Reason (which is almost certainly unknown by the Witch). As long as the Witch is advancing the goals of the Patron, the familiar should be very helpful and undemanding. But as soon as she stops doing so...she'll do about as well as a Cleric that goes against the dictates of her god.
All of which is to say, that a Witch who takes a Patron of Deception or Trickery or the like has implictly given the GM all *sorts* of power to mess with them.
I am in complete agreement with you. It seems to imply within the fluff I quoted that as a "conduit" to the Powers-That-Be their should be more than just an automatic handing out of whatever spells that player wants.
As other have pointed out the tight rope walk is to make sure its not abusive to the player and enjoyable to the table. With the session I just ran I feel this was accomplished but will certainly monitor this.
Thanks for the input.
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This is a great discussion. I'm GMing and have a player thats an animal patron witch, who has a big mangey black cat. The player is new to role playing, so the first few sessions it was hard for her to bring out the cat's personality. She was mostly developing the PC's personality. I took over the cat's actions and personality, soon the player caught on. Now we started collaboratively improvising the familiar's personality, and the cat is always bringing allot of flavor and laughs to the game. For example, the black cat is always the reason for a critical miss and a failed diplomacy.
I got lots of ideas from the witch episode in Sean & Barry's The Gamer's Guide to Pathfinder. http://35privatesanctuary.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=categor y&id=53&Itemid=65
+1 all the statements of "if it's fun".
From both sides I think what you're doing adds to the game. As a DM players have always seemed to enjoy more personality in their familiars/animal companions/mounts, etc...
From a PC perspective, I enjoy it when the DM helps bring my "pet" into the game instead of it being meaningless window dressing. Just don't let it get to a point where the player feels like the familiar is an antagonist.
Nicely DMed sir.
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My take is that it's great for the DM to RP the familiar and it's OK for it to have an agenda, but at the end of the day it ought to have to do what the PC says and try to get it's way with guile and misdirection. As a player, I would be unhappy with a DM saying that I had to bargain to get my spells each day; I think that's going too far.
Ken
I agree to a point. If the PC was of an evil alignment then the familiar would probably reflect this in its RP interaction. That being said if the player was uncomfortable with it then the GM should certainly back off that line of RP.