Reading through familiar rules I found out, unlike eidolons, only the master takes a penalty at ranges further than a mile from his familiar.
Upon further reading I found that the BAB, hit points, and skills a familiar has are based on the owner's character as a whole, not just its familiar granting levels.
With this in mind I've set about to build the biggest baddest (pfs legal) familiar. For added fun, the owner stays at home for the entire campaign.
So far I'm taking one level of witch to start off the shenanigans, and focusing on feat granting levels, preferably with full BAB.
Here is what I have so far
Race: Human (+2 Con) Eye for talent(+2 Dex to familiar)
Levels:
1 Witch
2 Fighter
3 Fighter
4 Monk
5 Monk
6 Fighter
7 Fighter
8... Bard for Arcane Strike? I don't know what to level after this.
I'm planning to spend most of my personal feats on evolved familiar, but I honestly am really floundering here. It's such a weird build I don't know where to start.
I thought this was in Advice, can somebody move it?
Sorry
You do understand that beyond one mile you have NO contact with your familiar at all? And to your party he's essentially dead weight?
Why would it be dead weight?
Familiar's have access to a lot of stuff regular characters can never touch. Regeneration is a big one, so is at will invisibility.
If you make up for their low stats with full gear and tons of feats, IDK why they wouldn't be effective.
DiscOH wrote: Why would it be dead weight?
Familiar's have access to a lot of stuff regular characters can never touch. Regeneration is a big one, so is at will invisibility.
If you make up for their low stats with full gear and tons of feats, IDK why they wouldn't be effective.
Familiars don't have hit dice, so they can't gain feats.
Beast Bonded Witch wrote:
Transfer Feats (Ex): Whenever the beast-bonded witch is capable of learning a new feat, she may choose to instead have her familiar learn the feat as a bonus feat. The familiar must meet the prerequisites for any feats that it learns this way. If her familiar is lost or dies, the witch can reclaim the feat slots and select new feats for herself, or apply the slots toward her new familiar.
I thought this was obvious given the title but I guess I should quote the ability.
Also for people who don't know how familiars work.
Hit points = 1/2 owner's
BAB = owner's
Saves = owner's
skills = owner's
You should probably nab Improved Familiar. After that it depends on what you want your familiar to do. If you want a front-line fighter, than pick a tough familiar and take a bunch of fighter levels for the transferable feats. Bare in mind, you won't get as good a front-liner as an actual fighter. If you want your familiar to devastate with touch spells, you are going to need a lot more witch levels.
Updating this as I solve more of it.
Base feat 1 - Evolved familiar (tentacle)
Base feat 2 - Evolved Familiar (tentacle)
Base feat 3 - Boon Companion
Base feat 4 - Improved Familiar (Pooka)
Base feat ... Evolved Familiar (tentacle) till the end of time
Why tentacle?
Familiars have no limit on attacks.
If a creature only has a single natural attack, it deals 1.5x str on hit.
Pooka has no natural attacks. Thus tentacle is the only natural attack Pooka has.
With an agile AoMF the tentacles then hit for 1.5x dex (agile has no damage limit for natural attacks).
I'm considering spending my levels on a drunken master/ninja combo to forgotten trick > combat feat. There is no range on feat replacement so I can "remember" feats from a bar at home. This is tricky as I either need to choose the same ability(s) over and over (because my PC has no knowledge of the familiar) or I need some sort of scry ability to check in with my Pooka while in combat. Any help here would be appreciated.
Other notes: Improved familiar requires an arcane caster level of X, not X levels of a specific familiar granting class. With the trait magical knack and boon companion, I qualify as a 7th level arcane caster with only 1 level of witch.
LazarX wrote: You do understand that beyond one mile you have NO contact with your familiar at all? And to your party he's essentially dead weight? DiscOH wrote: Why would it be dead weight? Pretty sure he means that you won't necessarily be able to control your familiar, as you would have no contact with it. And they aren't PC's, they're considered an Ally you control.
Depends pretty heavily on your GM.
Teatime42 wrote:
Pretty sure he means that you won't necessarily be able to control your familiar, as you would have no contact with it. And they aren't PC's, they're considered an Ally you control.
Depends pretty heavily on your GM.
There aren't any rules in place that give a character "control" over a familiar in the first place. Empathetic link (the ability I lose) doesn't even allow real communication. With that in mind any argument about a loss of control at range would apply equally well in normal play.
Pookas are within the PFS alignment laws, so they should have motives to co-operate with the party.
I have a level 7 fighter level 3 beast bonded witch. She is a Lyrakie focused in butterfly sting and she has a+1 demon bane scimitar with improved critical. Also she has a +21 UMD so she can use anything. She goes in full attacks and Critz at least ever other round. I finish up my x4 tetsubo. You can save your wealth for wands and just make her a wand monkey. Give her a wa nd of enervation or stone skin. Lead blades and gravity bow and your party members will love you.
DiscOH wrote: Updating this as I solve more of it.
Base feat 1 - Evolved familiar (tentacle)
Base feat 2 - Evolved Familiar (tentacle)
Base feat 3 - Boon Companion
Base feat 4 - Improved Familiar (Pooka)
Base feat ... Evolved Familiar (tentacle) till the end of time
Why tentacle?
Familiars have no limit on attacks.
If a creature only has a single natural attack, it deals 1.5x str on hit.
Pooka has no natural attacks. Thus tentacle is the only natural attack Pooka has.
With an agile AoMF the tentacles then hit for 1.5x dex (agile has no damage limit for natural attacks).
I'm considering spending my levels on a drunken master/ninja combo to forgotten trick > combat feat. There is no range on feat replacement so I can "remember" feats from a bar at home. This is tricky as I either need to choose the same ability(s) over and over (because my PC has no knowledge of the familiar) or I need some sort of scry ability to check in with my Pooka while in combat. Any help here would be appreciated.
Other notes: Improved familiar requires an arcane caster level of X, not X levels of a specific familiar granting class. With the trait magical knack and boon companion, I qualify as a 7th level arcane caster with only 1 level of witch.
Yeah, you're build doesn't work.
First Magical Knack only affects caster level for spell effects not your class abilities so it does nothing to improve your familiar abilities.
Second, Boon companion doesn't actually do anything for familiars at all, it treats your familiar as if it were 4 levels higher to a maximum of your druid level. Since druid levels don't affect your familiar it does NOTHING for you.
boon companion wrote: The abilities of your animal companion or familiar are calculated as though your class were 4 levels higher, to a maximum effective druid level equal to your character level. With that change you no longer qualify for improved familiar and without that you can't have a familiar that can use items.
Add to that the Pooka is not on the list of familiars that can use wands or spell trigger items.
@Titania, you also do not qualify to be able to take a lyrakien as a familiar, your spellcaster level is too low.
I like the arms evolution and an ioun stone of battle poi proficiency because.... then you automatically get MWF on it and it deals 1d4 fire damage
That's an interesting comment about boon companion not increasing the range of familiars available.
Fair point though.
Solution:
Qualify as a 7th level arcane caster through racial spells.
New race: Gnome?
Alternatively we could take some rogue levels and minor magic to get our arcane caster levels there. For the purpose of improved familiar magical knack does work. It's only looking at caster level, nothing else. It would do nothing for familiar abilities though.
On the topic of familiar abilities and feats, do homonculous gain feats as you give them extra hit dice? I'm sure we could see some interesting returns if we dumped ~40-50k into making a huge one.
As a neat idea, you could circumvent the homonuclous range limit with Arcane Bond from a 9th level infiltrator.
Bonus question: does a wizard's arcane bond[item] enable half price homonuclous crafting in PFS?
EDIT:
Dustyboy wrote: I like the arms evolution and an ioun stone of battle poi proficiency because.... then you automatically get MWF on it and it deals 1d4 fire damage It looks like the poi deals size based damage, so you're looking at ~1d2 damage per attack. This by itself is alright (especially if I start investing in agile weapons), but the arms evolution costs 2 points, which makes it unobtainable for familiars as far as I can tell.
Your natural attack only becomes a primary with 1.5x str/dex if it's the only natural attack period. Not the only natural attack form. or else all those creatures with only claws, slams, or wings would be significantly more dangerous.
So if you did get a phooka through whatever means you possess all of it's tentacles would be secondary attacks.
So at level 7 with Witch 1, Rogue 2, Fighter 4. Your familiar could have at best 3 tentacle attacks at a +4 to attack each that deal a whole 1d3+1 damage. Not very threatening at level 7. even if it crit with all it's attacks.
As for the homonculous? Yes it would gain feats as appropriate for it'd HD. Though you'd have to be it's creator and it's a bit of an investment to get one and i don't know about making it huge.
Edit: Forgot about crafting rules in PFS. You'd have to pay an npc to craft it for you in order to get one with more HD and it's at 4k gold per HD. That's a whole lot of money for something that'd be hard to fix and deal very poor damage.
WHy work so hard when a straight wizard can cast any spell on his familiar? Need a dragon...form of the dragon...need something else...poly-morph....need it to kick ass harder...haste it, Bull's strength it, and Transformation it. There is a ton of options to make a familiar a bad ass without trying so hard.
DiscOH wrote: Reading through familiar rules I found out, unlike eidolons, only the master takes a penalty at ranges further than a mile from his familiar.
Upon further reading I found that the BAB, hit points, and skills a familiar has are based on the owner's character as a whole, not just its familiar granting levels.
With this in mind I've set about to build the biggest baddest (pfs legal) familiar. For added fun, the owner stays at home for the entire campaign.
Race: Human (+2 Con) Eye for talent(+2 Dex to familiar)
I'm planning to spend most of my personal feats on evolved familiar, but I honestly am really floundering here. It's such a weird build I don't know where to start.
This build would come into its minimum power at level 7 with Improved Familiar: Faerie Dragon because it is a sorcerer. I don't know if it has been banned from PFS.
I argue that you go the OPPOSITE way. Instead of trying to give your familiar--which is made of glass, has bad AC, and will probably die in 1 - 2 hits at any level--strong melee abilities that you instead focus on its spell casting.
Level 1: Beast Bonded Witch (Familiar: Crow: it can talk. Infiltrator Familiar Archetype, this gains permanent telepathic link around level 9.)
level 2 - 12: Sorcerer (Arcane bloodline).
Familiar spell is needed at level 5 (so you can use it come level 6).
At level 6 you can give it 0-level spells as 3rd level slots.
At level 8 you can give it 1st level spells as 4th level slots.
At level 10 you can give it 2nd level spells as 5th level lots.
PFS stops at level 12, so you can't go higher than 2nd level.
Any feat you can find that increases your familiar's survivability is going to be useful, and stealth is the best way to survive. Evolved Familiar Stealth (+8 to familiar's stealth) is going to be a good choice.
You'll want to pick up Nature Soul, Animal Ally and Boon Companion if they are still allowed. Have the Familiar lead the Animal Companion.
Expect to buy tons of wands of magic missile.
If this was NOT PFS I'd recommend becoming a crafter, create golems with an infiltrator familiar, have the familiar lead golems into battle.
PFS only allows 1 companion, so I can't stack them like that.
Also, as far as casting is concerned you can do some really cool gish emulation with a spell storing shield and any wand (store the spell in the shield, make a touch attack on yourself, hit yourself with a level 12 version of the spell).
I had some builds where I could get a pooka to 40 AC. I don't think its going to have survivability issues in melee, especially if I pick up crane style.
jwtelesio wrote: Your natural attack only becomes a primary with 1.5x str/dex if it's the only natural attack period. Not the only natural attack form. or else all those creatures with only claws, slams, or wings would be significantly more dangerous.
...
Edit: Forgot about crafting rules in PFS. You'd have to pay an npc to craft it for you in order to get one with more HD and it's at 4k gold per HD. That's a whole lot of money for something that'd be hard to fix and deal very poor damage.
Good catch on the primary attack rules. I'll have to go back and math out better options.
Right now I'm looking at a Cythnigot Qlippoth (6 legs means 3 slam attacks and pounce. Maybe wing buffet too?). But I'm a little sad about the invisibility and fast healing losses.
The upside of the homonculous is that constructs are immune to basically everything, and I can get its BAB up to 20 by ~level 10 (with an asmir race I also get smite evil for +20 damage per hit and 26 SR). I think homonculous is the clear winner, but it doesn't come online till level 9 So I'll have to build some transitions into my character.
I feel like there might be some trick about arcane bond's pfs crafting rules and qualifying for a homonculous at half price, but I'm not sure yet.
Unfortunately, Since Evolved Familiar still requires you to conform to the limitations of the evolution you couldn't get Slam since it requires a pair of specifically Arms.
Considering a 20 BAB homunculus in PFS would cost you aroud 74k gold? I don't think you'd be able to afford it.
The half price rule is just for upgrading your Arcane Bonded item. You upgrade it at cost instead of price.
Also as a familiar despite the fact that they keep their BAB they use your BAB for their attacks. Yeah, i know.
They also get half your health and their AC is going to be pretty blech.
You also have to find ways to repair their health since they don't heal naturally or from spells.
One of the big things is that while you may be able to boost yourself up defensively, Your familiar isnt going to be outputting alot of damage. especially with small and tiny sizes.
jwtelesio wrote: Unfortunately, Since Evolved Familiar still requires you to conform to the limitations of the evolution you couldn't get Slam since it requires a pair of specifically Arms.
Considering a 20 BAB homunculus in PFS would cost you aroud 74k gold? I don't think you'd be able to afford it.
The half price rule is just for upgrading your Arcane Bonded item. You upgrade it at cost instead of price.
Also as a familiar despite the fact that they keep their BAB they use your BAB for their attacks. Yeah, i know.
They also get half your health and their AC is going to be pretty blech.
You also have to find ways to repair their health since they don't heal naturally or from spells.
One of the big things is that while you may be able to boost yourself up defensively, Your familiar isnt going to be outputting alot of damage. especially with small and tiny sizes.
That rule about master's BAB. lol... I guess homonculous isn't worth it.
We could do claw evolutions instead of slam. Its two primary attacks per evolution, specifically for legs. While we're at it, centipedes have way more than 6 legs (~300 legs means I'll always have more room for claws). That gets rid of the need for evolved familiar too.
Fruian Thistlefoot wrote: WHy work so hard when a straight wizard can cast any spell on his familiar? Need a dragon...form of the dragon...need something else...poly-morph....need it to kick ass harder...haste it, Bull's strength it, and Transformation it. There is a ton of options to make a familiar a bad ass without trying so hard. This problem boils down to the familiar being made of paper.
Lets assume the Wizard/Sorcerer dumped to get Con 20 at level 1, then used items to boost it to 26, and his attributes on con to get it to 30. That is +10 hp a level, + toughness for another 1 hp a level, and favored class to HP so another 1 hp a level.
Lets now assume he rolled MAX on all of his health dice.
360 hp(6+6+6+6+6+6+6+6+6+6+6+6+6+6+6+6+6+6+6+6+200+20+20).
His familiar has 1/2 his HP:
180 hp.
Hmm. My point here just sort of disintegrated since that is more than most characters at level 20.
Uhhh-- emergency kittens!
But--seriously, beyond being a melee gish that wants a flanking/DPRing buddy, it might not be worth it, though who needs AC when you have 360 hp.
Heading to bed so this is the end for me.
Unfortunately again Claw states it can only be applied to Legs once. As many times as you have arms though.
The centipede would also do only 1d2 damage with that claw attack so it's not terribly worth it.
With max con I get ~6-7 hp per level to my familiar. That's not great, but its not terrible either. The real advantage is the huge number of natural attacks and pounce.
Really, base damage doesn't mean anything. If I have an agile AoMF I'm doing dex damage on hit.
The issue, is since all of my damage is coming from attributes, I lose about half of it to secondary attacks.
Maybe I could do something with dragon ferocity and feral combat training?
I've got to admit, nothing really seems "strong" at this point.
http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2nsqb?Why-no-love-for-animal-familiars#17
http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2necu?unfamiliar-threat#1
Links for ease of use
FuelDrop wrote: No love
unfamiliar
I'm doing a build with a similar focus (though I'm not grabbing Beast Bonded).
Here's my thoughts on it.
Mark Hoover wrote: FuelDrop wrote: No love
Make sure both your wizard and the familiar has the Ioun stone that lets them be revived and you have maximum profit here since I'm sure that there isn't a single monster in the game that can survive that kind of insane damage.
Though, if your DM judges that AOE damage after you die targets your weapons and gear then you lose all of your wealth instantly under the 1000+ fire damage.
I wonder how much fire damage the ground has to take before it turns into lava.
Taku Ooka Nin wrote: Mark Hoover wrote: FuelDrop wrote: No love
Make sure both your wizard and the familiar has the Ioun stone that lets them be revived and you have maximum profit here since I'm sure that there isn't a single monster in the game that can survive that kind of insane damage.
Though, if your DM judges that AOE damage after you die targets your weapons and gear then you lose all of your wealth instantly under the 1000+ fire damage.
I wonder how much fire damage the ground has to take before it turns into lava. It gets better down thread :)
Add 'Fiery Body', which means that you're immune to fire and in fact heal 1/3rd of all fire damage done to you...
FuelDrop wrote: Taku Ooka Nin wrote: Mark Hoover wrote: FuelDrop wrote: No love
Make sure both your wizard and the familiar has the Ioun stone that lets them be revived and you have maximum profit here since I'm sure that there isn't a single monster in the game that can survive that kind of insane damage.
Though, if your DM judges that AOE damage after you die targets your weapons and gear then you lose all of your wealth instantly under the 1000+ fire damage.
I wonder how much fire damage the ground has to take before it turns into lava. It gets better down thread :)
Add 'Fiery Body', which means that you're immune to fire and in fact heal 1/3rd of all fire damage done to you... GENIUS! It is Wizard's Insta-heal. XD
hmmm... the Tarrasque has, what, 525 hp and is not immune to cold. If you max out your ability to punch through SR and assume it'll make all its saves then you're looking at...
504 + (118d8)/2 damage, give or take. It'll kill you, but you can deep six the fricking Tarrasque in one shot with that build!
Taku Ooka Nin wrote: FuelDrop wrote: Taku Ooka Nin wrote: Mark Hoover wrote: FuelDrop wrote: No love
Make sure both your wizard and the familiar has the Ioun stone that lets them be revived and you have maximum profit here since I'm sure that there isn't a single monster in the game that can survive that kind of insane damage.
Though, if your DM judges that AOE damage after you die targets your weapons and gear then you lose all of your wealth instantly under the 1000+ fire damage.
I wonder how much fire damage the ground has to take before it turns into lava. It gets better down thread :)
Add 'Fiery Body', which means that you're immune to fire and in fact heal 1/3rd of all fire damage done to you... GENIUS! It is Wizard's Insta-heal. XD If only there was some way to turn the overflow healing into temp hp. That'd be awesome!
This gives me an idea for a character. Not an optimized character. But the kind I like.
Say a fighter or rogue. One level of tattooed sorcerer. Tattoo on my buttocks.
Monkey is my familiar. Now I just have to find a way to get him some wings...
Quote:
Detonate stuff
I was playing around with the idea of spell storing an empowered intensified shocking grasp on my familiar (comes online at character level 3 for 15d6), but I really wanted to leave the owner at home for this build. That and detonate comes online a little late for PFS play (if you want something endgame, take a look at the barbarian rage powers. You can turn energy damage into temp hp and spit it back out in a cone, especially if you are playing as a bloodrager).
I really like the sneak attack familiar route, but I think PFS only allows 1 prestige class per character. Somebody correct me if I'm wrong with this (also, trying to leave the owner at home).
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