So I am planning a caster character, and I am thinking of taking improved familiar. My main problem is with the flavor of it all.
So a familiar is supposed to be your friend and assistant, how do other people justify just throwing out the creature you've adventured with for 7 levels and summoning an imp?
Even worse, I am planning on getting improved familiar at 3rd level, So I may want to trade my familiar multiple times before I get to the one I actually want...
On a related note: I am not a big fan of all the Level 7 outsider familiars, and I am currently undecided between the sprite and rakshasa. Would it be fair to give them a mechanical boost at 7th level? And if so, how much is that power difference worth?
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If you have a mundane familiar, like a cat, you don't have to throw the cat out. You just keep it around the house as a mundane pet after transferring your magical power from it to something else. There's no reason the cat can't continue to have a long happy life as any pet would. Intelligent familiars, like those you mentioned, can return to their families and friends. It could be that they realize you have "outgrown" them. If you're getting an imp or rakshasa, I doubt you care what they think anyway. An evil caster with one of those familiars goes for power and both wizard and familiar know it. Getting used up and tossed away is a fact of life for evil creatures.
just throwing out the creature you've adventured with for 7 levels and summoning an imp
I did for 9 levels with a bat, before getting an arbiter using lesser planar binding (I know I didn't need it but it made me feel better :p).
The bat is still with me, and since the new summoning she lost her intelligence and is an animal again, I asked a druid to cast awaken on her. 2000gp for getting an old friend back to herself and maybe ask her to scout (the arbiter isn't as stealthy).For the "boost", ask your GM for this sort of things, and note the rakshasa is a lvl7 familiar, no candy for him. I myself may tweak the sprite with some of the lyrakien's ability if the boost is given.
their hd is based off your level
Only concerning effect related to HD, and an ability is arguably not an effect. Old debate comming back on this one. However you can craft an 20HD homonculus and make it a familiar, but it might not have been intended :).
So I am planning a caster character, and I am thinking of taking improved familiar. My main problem is with the flavor of it all.
So a familiar is supposed to be your friend and assistant, how do other people justify just throwing out the creature you've adventured with for 7 levels and summoning an imp?
Even worse, I am planning on getting improved familiar at 3rd level, So I may want to trade my familiar multiple times before I get to the one I actually want...
On a related note: I am not a big fan of all the Level 7 outsider familiars, and I am currently undecided between the sprite and rakshasa. Would it be fair to give them a mechanical boost at 7th level? And if so, how much is that power difference worth?
The personality of your familiar is largely at your disposal, absent DM intervention.
With that in mind, you could easily fluff any number of things.
1) that your old familiar is changing into the new.
2) that the body is largely mutable and that the "core" of it is just evolving over time (if you plan to change it regularly)
3) that you are specifically altering its form.. RP out talking to it about it, discuss the options and ramifications. The fact that it will say yes at the end doesn't make the Rp any less fun.
(if, for example, you are planning to change it at level 3, rp it out for 3 levels.. the disadvantages of the current form over the advantages of hte next and so on);
He's still your same ole loving buddy.. just with a different form.
Or he's the pesky twit you hate who you just got to exchange for a new one to love.. or whtaever :)
-S
Thinking about it, some familiars provide a really good "evolution path." Like viper > fiendish viper > rakshasa or Cat > celestial cat > silvanshee.
For the sprite, I was thinking it would be fun to RP a particularly curious sprite deciding that she wants to be my character's familiar. Though in this case, I'd feel like a great big jerk if I took away an existing familiar's sentience just to have a better pet.
Um, random familiar death not related to the actions of your character in game? Maybe your familiar suddenly gets eaten by something without warning or the ability to resist?
On the other hand for a witch an evolving familiar probably makes sense.
- Maybe your Toad earned its retirement.
- Or your Raven wants to finally settle down and start nesting.
- The Cat has had enough of being smart, and requests to be dismissed and so return to a more natural two-point intelligence.
- "Irreconcilable differences."
- Your nephew entered Wizard school, and you hand down your experienced familiar to help him while getting a better one yourself.
RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16
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Um, random familiar death not related to the actions of your character in game? Maybe your familiar suddenly gets eaten by something without warning or the ability to resist?
On the other hand for a witch an evolving familiar probably makes sense.
Yeah I like the idea that the magic bond you have with the familiar lets it evolve into a more powerful creature.
I used to have a cat once.
What are you talking about? You still have a cat. Fluffy is right over there.
I killed fluffy and offered him up as a sacrifice to a god of evil in exchange for the services of a consular imp. My fiendish master thought the misbegotten love of the creature, that I had been nurturing over the years for just this purpose, was quite the entertaining gift--particularly when it learned of its betrayal and the true meaning of its pitiable existence.
But then, that means... *looks over at Fluffy* Oh no...
My raven familiar always was an imp, it just hadn't spent enough time on the material plane to manifest its powers and so has had to stay in raven form. Now that it has had time to develop its powers a bit, it can assume its true form and access it's powers. It still stays in the raven form much of the time though.
I know what you mean though Knight Magenta. Our Gaming Group is quite small so we find ways of multi-tasking. One of mine was to set my Magus' Familiar up as a party scout. Got my Magus to take cross-class ranks in sneak and perception (both class skills for Raven). Built up quite a personality for him in the end, and even the other PC's ended treating him as a party member in his own right, particularly after The Magus got hit by a poisoned bolt and ended up on his arse for the whole of the showdown at the end of the first module!
I contemplated taking the improved familiar feat but felt too guilty to do so after all the loyalty and outright comedy value he had given us.
The familiar always was an imp, silvanshee, or whatever: it just hid in animal form until now. (This works better for familiars with shapechanging abilities; make sure one of its shapes is the old form. Also helps if you're trying to keep some secrets from people around you.)
For evil spellcasters, I do like the "sacrifice old familiar as part of pact to gain new familiar" -- if you don't want to do that because it feels like a vile betrayal, well, congratulations: it is, and you are avoiding temptation and reacting in a Good manner.
For good spellcasters, maybe your familiar died heroically or expired of old age, and your patron/god/protector picked up the soul, empowered it, and sent it back to you in a new and magnified form. (Also works quite nicely if the familiar has just had a heroic death. It Got Promoted.)
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My raven familiar always was an imp, it just hadn't spent enough time on the material plane to manifest its powers and so has had to stay in raven form. Now that it has had time to develop its powers a bit, it can assume its true form and access it's powers. It still stays in the raven form much of the time though.
Ha, I was planning to do practically the same thing.
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My Illusionist summoner gnome "justified" his transition from Cat familiar to Silvanshee familiar via lots of Conjuration magic, Illusion magic, and gnomish trickery.
Simile the Cat basically evolved into Simile the Angel Cat through a week-long ritual of xyz.
I'd speak with the GM and see how she feels about this, and work something out with her. If you're planning on Imp. Familiar at the earliest possibility, playing the Pokemon Trainer Wizard is not such a bad theme for it.
Just a note:
Technically, that should scale with HD, so as written, a wiz20's silvanshee improved familiar would have 7 uses of 10d6 LOH per day. Which is, of course, way too good. We're probably going to errata the silvanshee so the damage still scales up with HD but it remains capped at 1/day.
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Just a note:
Technically, that should scale with HD, so as written, a wiz20's silvanshee improved familiar would have 7 uses of 10d6 LOH per day. Which is, of course, way too good. We're probably going to errata the silvanshee so the damage still scales up with HD but it remains capped at 1/day.
and luckily they havent ever gotten around to erattaing that. :)
for now the 7th level spell casters rejoyce