Fixing Beast-Bonded Witch

[Arden Oakwald]

The Witch's Beast Bonded archetype does not fully function properly when using an Improved Familair because of the semantics of its level 8 ability.

Spoiler:

Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Ultimate Magic wrote:

Familiar Form (Sp)

At 8th level, a beast-bonded witch may take the shape of her familiar (or a giant version of her familiar or a similar kind of animal) as if using beast shape II. For example, a witch with a rat familiar can turn into a Tiny rat, Small dire rat, or a larger rodent; one with a cat familiar can turn into a Tiny cat or a Large feline such as a tiger or lion; one with a monkey familiar can turn into a Tiny monkey or a Large gorilla, and so on. The witch can remain in animal form for a number of minutes per day equal to her level.
This ability replaces the witch’s 8th-level hex.

The consensus in the rules board seemed to be that it is incompatible with most Improved Familiars, since they no longer are an animal that would qualify under Beast Shape II.
However, I feel like this was probably just an oversight, (as familiars are magical beasts, not animals, and it doesn't call to point even some non-improved familiars, such as vermin familiars.)
I'm disappointed that it hasn't been formally addressed yet. I feel like Paizo actually already has a working solution right under their nose now, since 4 years after introducing the Beast Bonded archetype, they came out with the Synergist witch archetype.

I think we could use the following verbage from that archetype to solve the issue:

Spoiler:

Pathfinder Player Companion: Familiar Folio wrote:

At 1st level, during symbiosis the synergist gains darkvision or low-light vision if the familiar possesses it.
At 5th level, during symbiosis the synergist gains any abilities the familiar possesses that are listed under beast shape I, except flight.

At 8th level, during symbiosis the synergist gains any abilities the familiar possesses that are listed under beast shape II. If the familiar can fly, the synergist can fly for a total of 1 minute per witch level she possesses per day while in symbiosis. This duration need not be consecutive, but it must be spent in 1-minute intervals.

Emphasis mine.

This simple change of phrase would solve the whole issue while keeping things balanced and the end result would look something like this:

Spoiler:

Quote:

Familiar Form (Sp)
At 8th level, a beast-bonded witch may take the shape of her familiar (or a giant version of her familiar or a similar kind of animal) as if using beast shape II gaining any abilities the familiar possesses that are listed under beast shape II. For example, a witch with a rat familiar can turn into a Tiny rat, Small dire rat, or a larger rodent; one with a cat familiar can turn into a Tiny cat or a Large feline such as a tiger or lion; one with a monkey familiar can turn into a Tiny monkey or a Large gorilla, and so on. The witch can remain in animal familiar form for a number of minutes per day equal to her level.
This ability replaces the witch’s 8th-level hex.

It's a pretty small change, but I think it would really help a lot.

If you agree that this fix would fix up the Beast Bonded archetype, I guess please mark it for an FAQ so hopefully it gets Paizo's attention?

[Sam Phelan]

Moved to Rules Questions

[Dave Justus]

The proposed change might work for an improved familiar, but it would weaken beast-bonded witches without improved familiar. A cat familiar doesn't have pounce, but a large cat does for example.

Beast bonded witches only working for witches that bond with beasts seems fine to me...

[DaPenguins]

1. It does work with many improved familiar options just not all. For instance any template familiar save for maybe clockwork. It also works with a few others. Such as Dire Rat and bat sootwing along with others that might fit animal descriptions. Ya you can't do it with outsiders but the point is you are Beast Bonded.

2. A larger version of itself or a similar kind of animal is a very large category so you could just be a large imp or large lantern archon with the abilities listed in bs2 or if you have a permissive GM you could argue a giant bat is like an imp or a pipefox is like a snake.

So the ability works just fine.