First of all, I have to say that I hate them too. They aren't very powerful, are picked for some random bonus, and are difficult for roleplay (do you kill the evil Wizard's pet ferret, or let the evil thing live? Why does the Werewolf Sorcerer living in the wolfgod temple with a pack of Dire wolves have a pet snake?).
That being said, Dungeon has been making Wizards and Sorcerers without Familiars for years now. Most months, about half the Familiar-capable NPCs have them. Sometimes, there is even a little flavor text to explain why the Familair is missing (like the old Familiar died and now the wizard has a broken heart, for example).
The last issue that I picked up was 0/4 on Familiars. Four NPC Sorcerers, and not a single familiar.
My question is this: why not just make some kind of "Dungeon rules variant" that adjusts for this fact. Give those arcane casters another metamagic feat or something.
I know that NPCs are seldomly minmaxed, but throw these guys a bone here!
Creative Director
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Ha! Your observation about familiars has struck a festering open sore in this editor's brain.
Familiars are a source of constant distress to me, actually. It's important to give wizards and sorcerers familiars for the same reason it's important to give a fighter all his bonus feats; without the familiar, the wizard/sorcerer isn't complete. Which is unfortunate, because not all wizards and sorcerers should have familiars; they don't fit with everyone's character concept. In a perfect world, the ability to summon a familiar would be a feat, and wizards and sorcerers could have the option to choose it or some other magic-related feat as a bonus feat at first level
Anyway, if I had to guess, I'd say that abot 75% of the sorcerer and wizard NPCs we get in adventurers don't have familiars, usually because the author simply forgot to give them one. In this case, when I remember, I either put in a familiar or explain why the character doesn't have one. Often, I forget to do either. And just as often, adding a familiar stat block pushes the adventure's word count over the maximum we have alloted for that particular story. So, in short, yes, Dungeon does hate familiars.
Animal companions cause a similar problem, especially for rangers. You'll note that a lot of "rangers" are actually multiclassed, and aren't above 3rd level in their ranger class. This is because the character concept doesn't work well with an animal companion, usually, but sometimes it's due to the fact that there simply isn't room for an animal companion stat block in the issue.
Anyway, since Dungeon adventures have to use the core rules as a baseline to make it easier for more DMs to use in their campaigns, you can expect to see wizards and sorcerers with familiars more often than not. When they don't have them, it's an error... or perhaps it's a cranky editor railing against the man for a moment...
Perhaps D&D "4.0" will just ditch classes and make every class ability a feat? Man, that would be sweet...
That was a nice answer, James. Amusing yet informative.
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My mind has tried to wrap itself around just the same thing, Yamo.
I do think that, given enough time for mountains of prestige classes to pile up from the products of dozens of publishers, a LOT of similarities will be noticed, in theme if not in transposed abilities. Another thing that'll probably be clear is that very, very few PCs are played from the lowest to highest levels without multiclassing or dipping into prestige classes.
While it's kind of unrealistic to imagine iconic character classes at the heart of the game being gone altogether in "D & D of the Future" and level progression going out the window, I do think that we might see the ability to customize with Feats and choices from menus of "class abilities" at certain levels, probably every other or every third level.
Who knows! I'll enjoy 3.5 to the hilt for now.
Thanks for the answer. Its nice to know that my conspiracy theory was correct. Paranoia wins!
But yeh, Rel was pretty cool.
... It's important to give wizards and sorcerers familiars for the same reason it's important to give a fighter all his bonus feats; without the familiar, the wizard/sorcerer isn't complete. Which is unfortunate, because not all wizards and sorcerers should have familiars; they don't fit with everyone's character concept. In a perfect world, the ability to summon a familiar would be a feat, and wizards and sorcerers could have the option to choose it or some other magic-related feat as a bonus feat at first level...
Excellent idea! I'm already scribbling this down on my house rules list. Same should go for rangers and druids, at least in my notebook.
- Chris Shadowens
Perhaps D&D "4.0" will just ditch classes and make every class ability a feat? Man, that would be sweet...
That's my prediction and has been for awhile. It's also the basis for my alternate d20 system, as it is for many others. I think it would work well if you could get a team of people dedicated towards balancing it out. It's simply too much work for one person though, despite it being relatively easy to do.
It might be interesting, and it might even be logical, but remember some changes that seemed logical were axed becuase of tradition. There is only so much you can change before you can say . . . "this is a fun d20 game, but its not D&D"
And I think the interesting thing about this discussion is that we are discussing that a feature that was optional was made mandatory for the character classes . . . I have a hard time picturing Elminster or the Simbul or Khelbun, or even Raistling, Dalamar, or Palin with a familiar, and in a way the "everyone's got a familiar" deal seems to go against tradition.
If anyone is interested though, there are some interesing optional abilities in Unearthed Arcana.
In a perfect world, the ability to summon a familiar would be a feat, and wizards and sorcerers could have the option to choose it or some other magic-related feat as a bonus feat at first level
So do you have any other ideas on what to give to wizards and sorcerers at first level? And would you restrict the possible bonus feats to a limited list?
Just a couple of questions...it is an intriguing idea, since most of my players never choose familiars...
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Creative Director
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So do you have any other ideas on what to give to wizards and sorcerers at first level? And would you restrict the possible bonus feats to a limited list?
Just a couple of questions...it is an intriguing idea, since most of my players never choose familiars...
I do, actually. In my home-brew campaign, wizards can take a familiar or cash that in for a bonus feat. They also get better benefits for specializing in a school of magic. I can't remember what I did for them exactly, since there's not a wizard in my current campaign.
Sorcerers can't get familiars at all in my world. Instead, they all have sorcerous birthmarks that they can use to supercharge their spells; they also get wu jen style spell secrets.
It might be interesting, and it might even be logical, but remember some changes that seemed logical were axed becuase of tradition. There is only so much you can change before you can say . . . "this is a fun d20 game, but its not D&D"
For a system that worked like d20 does and had the flexibility of GURPS character creation, I'd dump the entire D&D concept like a hard-hooker on a Friday night after I'd run out of 20's...
I do, actually. In my home-brew campaign, wizards can take a familiar or cash that in for a bonus feat. They also get better benefits for specializing in a school of magic. I can't remember what I did for them exactly, since there's not a wizard in my current campaign.
Sorcerers can't get familiars at all in my world. Instead, they all have sorcerous birthmarks that they can use to supercharge their spells; they also get wu jen style spell secrets.
Cool, I do a similar thing IMC. I've expanded the rules from Arcana Unearthed and used the concept of simple, complex and exotic spells to differentiate the spell-casting traditions of various human and demi-human sub-cultures. For instance, unless you're an elf, it's very hard to become a mage-blade (not impossible, just gotta justify it in your character history, or roleplay towards that goal). Wizards are the only ones with free and ready access to exotic spells which sets them apart as a step above every other spell-casting class, however they get that in return for the sacrifice of inflexibility in spell-casting, which all the other classes have. Sorcerers get bonus spell templates from AU (like Fire Mage, which allows you to add 1d6 fire damage to any spell when you sacrifice a 20gp ruby, or 2d6 to any already fire-based spell) at various levels, as well as getting more of the 'Aspects of Power' at earlier levels, so that they end up being super-trippy looking without really boosting their power. Sorcerers, however, only ever have access to simple spells (there are ways around this through feats, but that's too complex to go into here).