I'm running a pyromaniac wizard (currently level 5) in a friend's Rise of the Runelords campaign and, having recently lost my compsagnathus in battle, am considering taking Improved Familiar a bit earlier than I had planned and getting a fire elemental familiar.
However, logistically (and I did find some related, but not identical threads via search), how does this thing ... work?!
Assuming it takes on a humanoid form as the entry says it can, can it hold things? That is, without melting them or setting them on fire? How hot is this thing anyway?
And, aside from stat block stuff, does it just, I don't know, set things aflame willy-nilly?
E.G. My familiar and I go into the bar. The bar is made of wood and, as we stand there, begins to burn?
Could it be contained in some form? How would you play it?
I suppose this is as much an advice question as it a rules question. Regardless, what say you all, boards?
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Burn only strictly speaking applies on a melee attack, so strictly speaking it shouldn't cause problems handling objects at all. However, for flavour I would probably agree with Xavier that a fire elemental shouldn't be able to handle small flammable objects like pieces of paper or fabric or wooden wands. Ruling that a small fire elemental would burn through a wood floor makes them much too inconvenient as familiars for a mobile caster because you'd basically have to cart them around in a metal wagon.