Does this give a character two familiars?

[Æthernaut]

The Occultist has access to an ability via the Necromancy implement called

Soulbound Puppet (Su):

As a full-round action, you can expend 1 point of mental focus to create a soulbound puppet from a bone, doll, or skull. If you use a bone or a skull, your power builds a Tiny or Small flesh puppet around it that vaguely resembles the original creature from which the bones were taken. If the implement is a doll, the doll comes to life. Treat this as a familiar, using your occultist level as your wizard level to determine its powers and abilities. By using a bone or skull from the appropriate creature or a doll shaped like that creature, you can select any of the familiar choices available to a wizard. You can instead use a humanoid bone, doll, or skull, to give the puppet the base statistics of a homunculus (Bestiary 176), but without a fly speed or the poison bite or telepathic link abilities. No matter the form, this creature is a construct with an alignment matching your own. You can have no more than one soulbound puppet active at any given time. The soulbound puppet remains animated for 10 minutes per occultist level you possess.

If the character is dual class with something that gives her a familiar, can she still make a temporary 2nd familiar with this focus power?

[Baval]

I dont see why not. He could have as many familiars as classes that gave them to him.

[kyrt-ryder]

Yes, it lacks the typical 'levels in other classes that grant a familiar stack with this class for your total familiar level' verbiage that prevents multifamiliars in other such cases.

['Sani]

Reading over this ability, I'm wondering how useful it would be to carry around a Handy Haversack filled with stuffed animals to create specific familiars on the fly.

[Æthernaut]

And if I use it on a

Grim Lantern:

[UE pg. 301] Aura faint evocation; CL 5th Slot none; Price 5,800 gp; Weight 2 lbs.
This macabre lantern is composed of a humanoid skull dangling from a short length of chain. A small fragment of soulstuff is trapped inside, burning slowly in a heatless flame. Its flickering light shines from the skull’s eye sockets, casting light as a bullseye lantern. On command, the lantern can consume its soulstuff in a sudden blast of heat, as burning hands. Doing so extinguishes the lantern. Whenever a living creature with at least 1 HD is slain within 30 feet of an empty grim lantern, the lantern absorbs a fragment of that creature’s soul, restoring its glow.

do I end up with a flightless, fire-breathing homunculus with a head-mounted hand hold that hangs around for about an hour?

[Æthernaut]

'Sani wrote:

Reading over this ability, I'm wondering how useful it would be to carry around a Handy Haversack filled with stuffed animals to create specific familiars on the fly.

If you were thinking of using them like trap detectors, then what I'm not clear on is whether the caster suffers from the same 'familiar death' damage and penalties that generic wizards do.

[kyrt-ryder]

Wizards don't have 'familiar death' damage and penalties in Pathfinder. That's a 3.0/3.5 thing.

[Æthernaut]

kyrt-ryder wrote:

Wizards don't have 'familiar death' damage and penalties in Pathfinder. That's a 3.0/3.5 thing.

Right you are. It's witches and shamans that are punished (with no access to their spells or increased cost of replacement), which shouldn't have any effect on this Occultist's Focus Power.

[Markov Spiked Chain]

Quote:

Yes, it lacks the typical 'levels in other classes that grant a familiar stack with this class for your total familiar level' verbiage that prevents multifamiliars in other such cases.

That text is actually part of the familiar ability (with all the other rules for familiar like Int, evasion, etc) and so would still apply here.

This does look like it could be a cool ability, when combined with familiar archetypes and maybe some of the familiar feats.

[kyrt-ryder]

Having this exclude other familiar classes [or stack levels between them while also having a familiar from said other class] doesn't even make sense.

[Æthernaut]

'Sani wrote:

Reading over this ability, I'm wondering how useful it would be to carry around a Handy Haversack filled with stuffed animals to create specific familiars on the fly.

As a small side note, your bag of bones isn't free. They have an app for that:

Occultist's Implement:

PRICE 10 GP WEIGHT 1/2 lb.
This bauble, bit of clothing, or relic has some minor historical significance. Though not especially valuable, it’s useful to an occultist, who can use it as an implement. Any such item is nonmagical, even if it appears to be a rod or wand. Implements that already have a mundane version with a price higher than 10 gp (such as armor, shields, weapons, and harrow decks) use their normal item entries instead of this catchall.

And this is from the notes on

Implements:

Every day, the occultist selects one item from that school’s list to be his implement for the day for each implement school he knows. The occultist needs only one such item to cast spells of the corresponding school, unless he selected that implement school multiple times, in which case he needs one item for each set of spells gained from hat school.
...Each implement school also grants a base focus power. This power is added to the list of focus powers possessed by the occultist (see Mental Focus below). In addition, each implement school grants access to a number of other focus powers that the occultist can select from using his mental focus class feature.

This sounds like one bone, and therefore only one familiar type per day. It could still be useful, though.
But, If the familiar goes bye bye, it could put a kink in your necromancy powers for the rest of the day.

[Æthernaut]

Or maybe the implement (which could be a bone, coin, doll, drum, robe, or skull) is completely separate item from the bone or skull that is becoming a Soulbound puppet.

[Baval]

No, it seems like youre correct. Youd have to take the necromancy implement multiple times to get multiple implements to turn into multiple familiars. The soulbound puppet thing isnt clear though, the first line doesnt specify implement, but the second does. Does it intend you use your implement, or is it just refering to implement as a word for tool? Thats very open to interpretation.

['Sani]

Yeah, it is unclear whether you have to create the familiar using your implement bone/skull/doll as the base, or whether you can use any bone/skull/doll as the base.

It could even be interpreted as you can cast it on any bone/skull/doll if your necro-implement is a bone or skull, but if it's a doll then the doll implement itself comes to life.

[Markov Spiked Chain]

It would be nice if they cleared up whether it turns your focus into the familiar, both limiting the familiar's form and potentially leaving you without an implement for other spells while your familiar is out.

You could use Conjuration(Conjure Implement) to create a spare implement and use it on that for a flexible familiar type.