So without giving anything away I am making a fighter who uses the Eldritch Guardian archetype to get an armadillo familiar.
Anyway I was going to give the familiar the Mauler archetype and found the battle form fun. However for reasons I can't say without giving to much away (I am posting the build in the forums later) I want to delay Battle Form till after I do a certain thing. Would this be possible for it not to activate it till later in combat, per say after my turn.
On a side note, how do you deal with damage of improvised thrown weapons, such as ones with an ac score... hint hint
I think I know what you're doing with this...
Anyway. The way it's worded, it seems like it's an activated ability, so i'd assume you could keep him tiny for the purposes of buying him cheap equipment. However, activating the ability would be a standard action, which I wouldn't assume he'd be able to do if you're doing what I think you're doing.
Improvised weapon mastery is probably going to be your friend here. I don't think the thing's AC is going to factor in... probably just going to count as a similar object of similar size (so in your situation I'd assume it would deal 1d4 bludgeoning, though it could be 1d6).
I think I know what you're doing with this...
Anyway. The way it's worded, it seems like it's an activated ability, so i'd assume you could keep him tiny for the purposes of buying him cheap equipment. However, activating the ability would be a standard action, which I wouldn't assume he'd be able to do if you're doing what I think you're doing.
Improvised weapon mastery is probably going to be your friend here. I don't think the thing's AC is going to factor in... probably just going to count as a similar object of similar size (so in your situation I'd assume it would deal 1d4 bludgeoning, though it could be 1d6).
The object is thrown, then uh grows when its about to land...
Anyway, my second question is, if the mauler familiar can't communicate, how should I make sure it does what I want, such as mauling the guy's square it's in. Should I say it's instinct to fight or I just have a special communication system with it?
You still have your two-way empathic link, as a start.
The object is thrown, then uh grows when its about to land...
Anyway, my second question is, if the mauler familiar can't communicate, how should I make sure it does what I want, such as mauling the guy's square it's in. Should I say it's instinct to fight or I just have a special communication system with it?
Yeah, I honestly don't think that'd work RAW. You could ask your DM if you'd be allowed to do that, though. Why would you need it to be tiny to throw it, though? Would it weigh too much when it's enlarged?
And as Rogue Eidolon said, you still have an empathetic link, and the familiar still has your best interest in mind and can make intelligent decisions to achieve that end (so while you can't directly tell your armadillo to charge in and attack, it'll feel your aggression toward the target, and will instinctively know if a charge is going to benefit you more than some other action it might take).
Oh. Did you plan on taking mutation warrior as well? If you have the feats to spare you could make the armadillo a tumor familiar so it can also share mutagen with you. You'd just need to take skill focus (knowledge (dungeoneering)), eldritch heritage (aberrant/warped), and aberrant tumor. Generally tumor familiars are better for guardian familiars, but since they can share their master's mutagen via share spells unlike other familiars can, you could easily pop a strength mutagen onto the armadillo this way.
The object is thrown, then uh grows when its about to land...
Anyway, my second question is, if the mauler familiar can't communicate, how should I make sure it does what I want, such as mauling the guy's square it's in. Should I say it's instinct to fight or I just have a special communication system with it?
Yeah, I honestly don't think that'd work RAW. You could ask your DM if you'd be allowed to do that, though. Why would you need it to be tiny to throw it, though? Would it weigh too much when it's enlarged?
And as Rogue Eidolon said, you still have an empathetic link, and the familiar still has your best interest in mind and can make intelligent decisions to achieve that end (so while you can't directly tell your armadillo to charge in and attack, it'll feel your aggression toward the target, and will instinctively know if a charge is going to benefit you more than some other action it might take).
Oh. Did you plan on taking mutation warrior as well? If you have the feats to spare you could make the armadillo a tumor familiar so it can also share mutagen with you. You'd just need to take skill focus (knowledge (dungeoneering)), eldritch heritage (aberrant/warped), and aberrant tumor. Generally tumor familiars are better for guardian familiars, but since they can share their master's mutagen via share spells unlike other familiars can, you could easily pop a strength mutagen onto the armadillo this way.
I was planning on making it a clockwork tumor at lvl 7. Also already going be taking point blank shot, throw anything and precise shot to help with shooting into melee. Then at level 5 wounded wing and lvl 6 wounded paw gambit, so that my mauler can keep feigning weakness then I am constantly firming a crossbow. Though I could try the mutagens to beef up his con.
Anyway on another note (well related). I just was trying to figure out how to make sure it uses wounded paw gambit...
The best way I can think of to ensure you can use wounded paw gambit would be to have your armadillo in melee range, everyone else farther out, and have someone use an effect that makes the target attack the nearest creature once you've activated broken wing. If you can figure a way to have your armadillo able to inflict this rage effect with its natural attacks, even better. The armadillo could use AoOs to trigger broken wing over and over. Balling himself up is a standard action from what I gather, but there's nothing technically stopping him from making attacks in ball mode. The entry for armadillos says nothing about unballing, though, so if the enemy moves out of the armadillo's space he'll have to unball to give chase.
The best way I can think of to ensure you can use wounded paw gambit would be to have your armadillo in melee range, everyone else farther out, and have someone use an effect that makes the target attack the nearest creature once you've activated broken wing. If you can figure a way to have your armadillo able to inflict this rage effect with its natural attacks, even better. The armadillo could use AoOs to trigger broken wing over and over. Balling himself up is a standard action from what I gather, but there's nothing technically stopping him from making attacks in ball mode. The entry for armadillos says nothing about unballing, though, so if the enemy moves out of the armadillo's space he'll have to unball to give chase.
Or you know... Just do what you do with the small character of the party and throw him! Anyway best ways to provoke AoO?
Well, the AoO is provoked by the enemy striking an ally with broken wing gambit while it has the bonus provided by it, and since the armadillo isn't technically restricted from attacking while in ball mode (though your DM might reasonably force it to leave ball mode to attack), it should be able to hit with its melee AoO so long as it's in the enemy's space. That's why I suggested using an ability that'd force the enemy to attack the nearest creature and keeping your armadillo adjacent to it. If you take the fighter's tactics advanced weapon training ability, the enemy could technically hit any of your opponents and they'd trigger both the armadillo's broken wing gambit and your wounded paw gambit (although they themselves wouldn't be able to make AoOs or pseudo-AoOs with ranged attacks unless they had those feats themselves). Beyond giving your pet a magic item that can force enemies to attack it or allowing fighter's tactics to let your allies trigger broken wing and wounded paw, though, I can't think of any especially reliable way to force enemies to attack the armadillo and thus trigger the feats.
Ya know, there's actually an idea I had for this involving an aether kineticist. Taking two levels would allow you to get telekinetic blast and have it strong enough to throw your armadillo while it's tiny, assuming the DM lets you count it as an object you can throw (they're listed as being roughly 10 lbs, and telekinetic blast lets you throw an object as heavy as 5 lbs per kineticist level). The problem with this is that a kinetic blast isn't typically considered to be in one's hand, which is technically a requirement for wounded paw to function, but a kinetic blast could be considered always ready to be used. You'd have to get a ruling from your DM and it definitely wouldn't work RAW, but if the DM is willing to let you get away with it, you could use the throwing variant of telekinetic blast as your ranged weapon, allowing you to almost always keep the armadillo in your target's space by having allies trigger wounded paw gambit when they get hit. Interestingly, since telekinetic blast would treat your armadillo as if it was a 1h improvised weapon, you might be able to apply some very funky synergies here (such as two-handed thrower if you describe your telekinetic blast as being used two-handed, or using feats that would typically only affect 1h melee weapons). Once again though, keep in mind that this will not work in RAW so only go for this in a casual game.