So there's something that's been irking me about the familiar, and mostly it has to do with its skill ranks. Let me be more specific:
My group has 4 individuals, including a half-elf gunslinger with full ranks in perception and skill focus in it. It also has a monk with full ranks in stealth, and a bard with decent ranks in intelligence skills. The party also has a human witch with a faerie dragon familiar, who's invested a tiny bit in all of these.
When it comes to perception, the faerie dragon has a higher score than the gunslinger, without as much investment into it. What's more, the witch, by virtue of playing both human and dragon, can roll perception twice when situations arise. Because of this, the witch virtually always gets the higher roll.
This is true for stealth for sure, where the familiar completely outclasses the monk in a lot of ways.
On knowledge, the bard is doing pretty good still. But he's focused on it. Even then, the witch tends to do better from time to time simply by virtue of getting to roll twice on account of being two dudes.
I feel like I'm doing something wrong. I've never seen familiars addressed as a "must have" for knowledge builds, or for a good perception or good stealthy character. But here, it strikes me as the best possible tool for any skill based on receiving info (ie appraise, sense motive, knowledge, perception, spellcraft).
Am I doing something wrong, or have I just underestimated the value of the familiar? Or am I exaggerating, and this isn't as big a deal as I thought?
You probably have just underestimated the value of the familiar :)
i like when players deal with what they have!