Witches and the Poppet Familiar Feat

[cetra02]

Does anyone have any thoughts on a witch using the Poppet Familiar feat? I'm going to be playing a Tatterdemalion Witch with the Time patron in Rise of the Runelords, and I was wondering in anyone has any thoughts or experience to offer?

[blahpers]

Never tried it. I'm nervous enough exposing witch familiars to possible destruction as it is without having said familiar requires specialized means to heal. But if you're careful it should be fine. Any particular thing you're looking to accomplish with this combination or is it more of a thematic "marionette" thing?

[Dave Justus]

In my opinion the most important consideration for a witch's familiar is to survive, and the best way for it to survive in most games is for it to do absolutely nothing. If you are going with this method of survival, Poppet familiar is obviously a bad idea.

Personally, I think that is an unfortunate design error in the witch's class. I could see not letting a witch learn new spells if their familiar was dead, maybe even a caster level penalty, but they should be able to memorize without it and losing their familiar shouldn't be losing their spellbooks too. That would give a witch better roleplaying options with their familiar rather than just leaving them in the armored familiar satchel all the time.

[blahpers]

Agreed. If they wanted such a penalty, at the least it should be more durable than half of a squishy class's hit points.

[Decimus Drake]

I Love the theme but as others have said it's risky since your familiar is also your spellbook. Do you think your GM is likely to go after your familiar?

Also what are the rules on changing your familiar at level 3? Would you lose your spells known?

[Mark Hoover 330]

How dark are the worlds some folks play in? I'm not being snarky I promise; more, I'm genuinely concerned.

I have had exactly one witch in my games I've run over the past 10 years, but also a handful of wizards with what I'd consider "active" familiars. These helpers have scouted encounter sites, spied on rooms, and employed magic items in combat. In all of that time I've directly targeted a familiar once, and that was specifically to get the wizard it belonged with to follow the monster that grappled his thrush.

Of course my own anecdotal experience is not helpful to this discussion. If the OP is looking to make a Poppet they might also try to give said familiar an Archetype. I don't see anything in the feat that precludes the poppet from taking one of these unless the archetype replaces Speak with animals of its kind with another ability.

A Sage for example would slowly increase in Int over the course of the witch's career. Since the Poppet's Wisdom is a function of it's Int an argument might be made that its Wisdom could similarly increase. Regardless, once the creature hits Small size at level 5 there are other feats the witch could have taken, plus the poppet taking Extra Traits as it's own feat, that would guarantee the familiar has a Use Magic Device ability of at least +17 or more, depending on buffs and magic items.

It would also have 2 augmentations. Between these, wands it might wield, buffs the witch can cast and such the poppet should have a good chance at being protected.

If the witch had 8 HP at level 1 and an average of 5.5/level afterwards, this means by level 5 our poppet has a starting HP of 15. Taking an augmentation to give it an added +10 HP sounds like a good idea. The creature has a delayed Natural Armor bonus because of the Sage archetype so perhaps giving it an augmentation to remove vulnerability to fire or increase its Dex are good ideas.

Consider spending money on scrolls, wands or other consumables with spells to enhance these protections. The poppet may be able to use some of these themselves with UMD. Plus, since the familiar is using devices to buff itself these buffs can come from any class. Aid, Invisibility, Mirror image, Mage Armor, Shield and so on.

There are other archetypes too, if you don't like the Sage angle. Ambassador gives you a more charismatic poppet; Emissary for Guidance at will and a minor Domain ability; Prankster if you've got a burning need for a comedian on your side; a School Familiar if you're going to specialize.

In short there's a lot of ways for a familiar to be helpful as more than a living spellbook you keep locked up in your familiar satchel, in my humble opinion. Certainly I agree; this creature is a liability to its caretaker, especially a Witch, and it requires a lot of resources to protect them long term. There are ways however to mitigate this liability and the danger to the PC. Heck, if your familiar can survive to level 9, at that point you've got the spell Duplicate Familiar; just make a copy, have that poppet sitting on your shoulder casting spells from wands and either when it takes catastrophic damage or the duration ends, you're none the worse for it!

[Mark Hoover 330]

A must have: Shield Companion

At Witch 1 your familiar has 4 HP but takes only half damage from attacks, with you taking the other half. It also has a +1 Deflection bonus to AC and a +1 Resistance bonus on saves.

The biggest fear I've heard from players in my games about their familiars is the lack of HP. At level 3 you pick up a poppet; the creature likely has about 9 HP and the average High Attack of a monster at CR 3 is 13 damage, so there's reason for concern. However through the use of this spell ahead of time you'd be dividing that 13 damage between the 2 of you, meaning that a single attack doesn't wipe out your precious poppet.

Said attack would have to: target your poppet, not you; hit an unmodified AC of 16 or a Touch AC of 12, likely at range since I don't know too many witch builds that put you near the front line and I'm assuming that having a Tatterdemalion in combat your Dancing Strings are threatening out to about 10' from you.

By level 5 your poppet might have 25 HP. If you go the Sage route it might also only need a 3 or better on a D20 to give itself an AC of 18 thanks to Mage Armor in a wand. A Sage Familiar, with the Sealed augmentation to remove fire vulnerability, 25 HP, and a wand of Mage Armor is Small sized, has an AC of 18, Construct traits against a lot of spells, and with Shield Companion takes only half damage from a single attack.

All of that is based on survival at low level. At mid level you're looking at better buffs until you get to CL9 and Duplicate Familiar. After this spell hits your list you should try never to be without your familiar either hiding on your person or duplicated. So long as you've got your Familiar Duplicate spell running your enemies would have to somehow recognize your familiar is a simulacrum, get to Melee with you, remove the real familiar from your person and then inflict enough damage on it to destroy it outright.

If an enemy can know and do all of that, it likely wasn't meant to survive the encounter in the first place.

[Cevah]

Mark Hoover 330 wrote:

How dark are the worlds some folks play in? I'm not being snarky I promise; more, I'm genuinely concerned.

The general rule I have seen used by GMs is to ignore the familiar unless the familiar attacks or is actively thwarting the enemy. They they are fair game.

Spying familiars may be attacked, but if they leave, they are generally not pursued.

UMD using familiars that help the party or spell delivery service to the party will gain some consideration for targeting, but at a lower priority than an active caster.

/cevah