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I had a game yesterday where the GM and I had fairly different opinions on what a familiar can do in exploration mode. So, I thought I'd solicit opinions. ESPECIALLY when I realized that I'd taken a position much closer to the GMs when I ran the scenario :^). Which side of the table I was on made a vast difference in what seemed intuitively fair.
It's pretty trivial to get a flying familiar that talks. A 1st level gnome can get this as a race feature. Various classes can get this at 1st level too.
Can this be used to usefully scout around (ie, fly overhead and look out for enemies, fly around a large building to get the general layout, etc)?
The GMs interpretation was that, basically, that translated to my character scouting so the ONLY benefit was a +1 to initiative. Essentially, the familiar was only flavour.
On the one hand, this seems terribly unrealistic. When wandering through a zombie infested wasteland having a talking eye in the sky should have a huge potential benefit.
On the other hand, giving a huge potential advantage to a level 1 racial or class feat seems unfair, especially to the poor rogue.
Just asking this question has solidified my opinion. But I'm still interested in what others think
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In my opinion:
- The familiar should give a +1 to Initiative in most circumstances.
- In some circumstances, the familiar can spot the enemies ahead, if they are easy to spot from above. For example if the enemies are waiting inside a trench.
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Unless I am mistaken you have to take an action to have your pets do something useful. Given that, I would say you only get +1 if you are acting to guide your familiar. Otherwise it is eating bugs or looking out for its own interests.
It’s relatively consistent with other actions that cause you to move at half speed.
At the very least, having your familiar should enable your character to execute two exploration mode activities at the same time, say Searching and Scouting. You may need to move at half speed, though, as you'll use up one of three actions every round.
You can also remind the DM that familiars have no combat abilities, but that perception is one of the few abilities that they do have. Enabling your familar to scout a different location (ahead, to the side, whatever) should be possible. Trouble will come if and when its Stealth DC gets challenged by the perception roll of a hostile creature, since it would be fairly easy to bring it down with an arrow or two.
As a DM, I would treat it like splitting up the party. It's scouting, but it's in a different location. The familiar should in fact be using the Search action (so that it can get perception checks.
Familiars are really items that you have to constantly control: in the OP, a flying, talking familiar if more like a modern drone than an intelligent creature. As such, your DM was right to give you both a single action. So less smart animal and more smart construct that requires round to round, constant instruction and supervision to move AT ALL
"Can this be used to usefully scout around (ie, fly overhead and look out for enemies, fly around a large building to get the general layout, etc)?": This isn't really something a familiar can do anymore. At best your familiar can do is fly 50' then sits there and looks stupid unless start yelling loudly at it, making scouting useless. Scouting at best is what a familiar can see in it's 25' flight before it flies back that doesn't require any independent action. AS such, it's can't even fly AND seek unless you're yelling at it as it flies through the air every round. Honestly, with as neutered as familiars are in PF2, your DM was pretty nice in allowing it to count as scouting since it can't really scout ahead in any meaningful way on it's 12.5' 'leash'. [1/2 speed for scouting]
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"Scouting" in exploration mode is nothing like real scouting, because it assumes the scout is still part of the party and can't have a solo encounter. Real scouting would send your rogue/familiar out ahead, and it would roll stealth/perception/initiative checks as an individual and then observe/flee/sneak away to return to the party if it isn't detected and decisively engaged (i.e. killed or captured) while it's alone.
I don't htink it's unreasonable in many circumstances to let the rogue/ranger/familiar/whoever engage in real solo scouting where they have no backup if they encounter an enemy and will just have to run away back to the rest of the party if they're spotted and pursued. Elven monks have their own merits as scouts, I guess.
Do people think the same thing for an animal companion? How do they act in exploration mode? Can they not be an extra set of eyes? Or is there some default action they take?
I'd say a familiar could definitely spot and report things that aren't hidden, but it might have trouble discerning hidden hazards or enemies with animalish intelligence at high altitude.
Honestly, with as neutered as familiars are in PF2, your DM was pretty nice in allowing it to count as scouting since it can't really scout ahead in any meaningful way on it's 12.5' 'leash'. [1/2 speed for scouting]
Nothing in the familiar description specifies that it has to be that limited. I agree that familiars are more limited than in the past, but you can give them the order to scout ahead. They'll have to come back to tell you what's happening, or just shriek as an alarm, hence the limited bonus, but they are not forced to stay at arms length all the time.
Do people think the same thing for an animal companion? How do they act in exploration mode? Can they not be an extra set of eyes? Or is there some default action they take?
Animal companions are more limited than in the past. They don't have a distinct initiative and they wait for your orders. So, if you fail your Perception check and don't act in the surprise round, they won't act either whatever their Perception check.
Appart from that, I would allow them to be in Exploration mode just like familiars, to give the +1 to Initiative to the party. As long as they are able to recognize the enemy as an enemy despite their limited intellect.| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Do people think the same thing for an animal companion?
Yep, they are 100% useless as they MUST be comanded to do anything: they are items not real intelligent independent creatures.
How do they act in exploration mode?
You can use your exploration action to make them do something n a VERY limited way.
Can they not be an extra set of eyes?
No, as you'd have to COMMAND them to look around and then YOU can't look around.
Or is there some default action they take?
Drool, maybe breathe... They don't even follow you by default, meaning that if you have a mount AND an animal companion, you automatically exhaust yourself as you have to make multiple actions in exploration mode 'hay stupid animal companion, follow me!' and 'hey mount, that way'.
Nothing in the familiar description specifies that it has to be that limited.
Minion trait...
"A creature with this trait can use only 2 actions per turn and can’t use reactions. Your minion acts on your turn in combat, once per turn, when you spend an action to issue it commands."
Command is "you issue a verbal command, a single action with the auditory and concentrate traits."
They MUST hear your VERBAL command each and every round or they do nothing except "to defend themselves or to escape obvious harm."
As such, you can't have them secretly scout as they have to hear your shouts. They can't scream an alarm, come back to you unless attacked or anything else on their own. AT best, you might be in the right direction when they run if attacked...
I would imagine if the familiar can beat their stealth DC, they can probably see the enemy in advance.
More importantly, they might be able to find monsters or locations that you would otherwise miss since you're on the ground.
You should probably have your familiar Search and roam around the party a bit, rather than Scout.
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Yeah Search is better but I suspect the rules intent is that since you have to take an action for them to act, you are using your exploration to command them.
As others have noted I would certainly allow a player to send his hawk forward on his own to scout ahead and report back. After all there are plenty of monsters out there that would find him delicious! (I joke, I joke... sort of)
The important thing I think is that the game is carefully built to maintain the action economy so essentially allowing a player with a familiar to take two actions would overshadow everyone else’s abilities.
Hmm, come to think of it I don't see any evidence that familiars (and certainly not animal companions at lower levels) are smart enough to scout and report back even with communication. Talking familiars probably just speak a pidgin of single words on the level of what my dog or cat would say if it could talk.
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hmm, further reasons to dislike exploration mode. There is too much verisimilitude lost. I prefer the DM to handle this stuff like in previous editions.
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Familiars at least seem to have some intelligence: they are able to use quick alchemy without extra guidance so they'd have to be reasonably smart and have to have a good recall and comprehension to understand and remember alchemical formulas. So, IMO, if you can get over the logistical issues with a familiar scouting, I wouldn't give them a hard time trying to communicate ideas if they've taken speech.
Familiars at least seem to have some intelligence: they are able to use quick alchemy without extra guidance so they'd have to be reasonably smart and have to have a good recall and comprehension to understand and remember alchemical formulas. So, IMO, if you can get over the logistical issues with a familiar scouting, I wouldn't give them a hard time trying to communicate ideas if they've taken speech.
Alas, I don't think the one thing drives the other. You have to invest that ability daily, and it's quite easy for me to imagine that they just receive that limited ability, not a generalized intelligence that also lets them reason out how to scout, use intravisibility lines for cover during movement, distinguish important/unimportant creatures (lots of reports of cattle or deer vs. wolves or even manticores), etc.
Alas, I don't think the one thing drives the other.
As hard as the familiar had been hit in the utility area, I'm willing to err on the side of them having some use other than an item that buffs you that you stuff in your backpack at the start of the day and forget unless you want to changed the settings.
"If it attempts an attack roll or other skill check, it uses your level as its modifier." So it's better than untrained in every skill, so I think it can manage generalized intelligence... It has EVERY lore skill at 'level' bonus after all. [and no minus for intelligence] ;)
Familiars at least seem to have some intelligence: they are able to use quick alchemy without extra guidance so they'd have to be reasonably smart and have to have a good recall and comprehension to understand and remember alchemical formulas. So, IMO, if you can get over the logistical issues with a familiar scouting, I wouldn't give them a hard time trying to communicate ideas if they've taken speech.
Nothing in the book says that familiars are intelligent. My understanding is they are of animal intelligence and any abilities they gain are magical / alchemical in nature.
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Familiars at least seem to have some intelligence: they are able to use quick alchemy without extra guidance so they'd have to be reasonably smart and have to have a good recall and comprehension to understand and remember alchemical formulas. So, IMO, if you can get over the logistical issues with a familiar scouting, I wouldn't give them a hard time trying to communicate ideas if they've taken speech.Nothing in the book says that familiars are intelligent. My understanding is they are of animal intelligence and any abilities they gain are magical / alchemical in nature.
See my last post: they roll EVERY skill at a minimum of your level bonus: ANY skill. Want to know math, ask the familiar and it can roll. Metaphysics? occult lore? How to bake a pie? How to tame a horse? How to make a hammer? What the weaknesses of a dragon are? What the law is in the shining sea? They literally can roll for everything: that seems a bit higher than animal intelligence.
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Thanks for the replies everybody.
I think the very clear bottom line, especially for PFS, is
1) Expect a huge amount of table variation
2) Don't be at all surprised if the familiar has no mechanical benefit whatsoever. Although at some tables it will have some use
3) Either live with the fact that the familiar may be pure flavour with no mechanical benefit at all or don't take a familiar.
I can actually live with that :-). I'll decide if I'm willing to pay the price, knowing full well that it may have NO benefit whatsoever. Winged talking cat is SO cool that I may well keep it :-).
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Thanks for the replies everybody.
I think the very clear bottom line, especially for PFS, is
1) Expect a huge amount of table variation
Yes. This is clearly one of the new and poorly understood (poorly explained?) parts of the rules.
2) Don't be at all surprised if the familiar has no mechanical benefit whatsoever. Although at some tables it will have some use
3) Either live with the fact that the familiar may be pure flavour with no mechanical benefit at all or don't take a familiar.I can actually live with that :-). I'll decide if I'm willing to pay the price, knowing full well that it may have NO benefit whatsoever. Winged talking cat is SO cool that I may well keep it :-).
The problems that a flying, talking, scouting familiar can cause at a PFS table aren't really different than they were in PFS1. There, too, enough GMs would be upset that their scripted adventure goes off the rails because an effective and inconspicuous scout warns the PCs. You can get a talking raven at level 1, or perhaps an earth elemental gliding underground ahead of the PCs at level 5, or a perpetually invisible imp at level 7.
But looking at this thread, I see a lot of misconceptions about the Minion trait. Let's take a good look at the rules:
minion (trait) Minions are creatures that directly serve another creature. A creature with this trait can use only 2 actions per turn and can’t use reactions. Your minion acts on your turn in combat, once per turn, when you spend an action to issue it commands. For an animal companion, you Command an Animal; for a minion that’s a spell or magic item effect, like a summoned minion, you Sustain a Spell or Sustain an Activation; if not otherwise specified, you issue a verbal command, a single action with the auditory and concentrate traits. If given no commands, minions use no actions except to defend themselves or to escape obvious harm. If left unattended for long enough, typically 1 minute, mindless minions usually don’t act, animals follow their instincts, and sapient minions act how they please.
Familiars go into the "not otherwise specified" category; you can just talk to them, but it still takes an action in combat.
Familiars are mystically bonded creatures tied to your magic. Most familiars were originally animals, though the ritual of becoming a familiar makes them something more. You can choose a Tiny animal you want as your familiar, such as a bat, cat, raven, or snake. Some familiars are different, usually described in the ability that granted you a familiar; for example, a druid’s leshy familiar is a Tiny plant instead of an animal, formed from a minor nature spirit. Familiars have the minion trait (page 634), so during an encounter, they gain 2 actions in a round if you spend an action to command them. If your familiar dies, you can spend a week of downtime to replace it at no cost. You can have only one familiar at a time.
Familiars are not just animals. Exactly what they are is a bit vague; just how smart they are is unclear but they can use your skills and have your perception, so it's not too shabby.
Also, the Minion trait mostly limits the familiar during Encounter Mode. It doesn't actually impose these limits during Exploration mode. The last line of the Minion trait actually indicates that you can leave your familiar alone and it'll do things on its own.
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My take on the new companions is that they decisively wanted to break with the sordid past of PF1. In PF1 familiars get introduced as familiars and scouts, and then get turned into wand-wielding action multipliers. That's something these rules put a hard stop to. But going back to their old role as scouts and companions is quite supported.
My advice for PFS GMs worried that an aerial scout will cause an adventure to go off the rails, is to relax. It's relatively rare that it will actually make a big difference. The PCs might circumvent some encounters if they were easy to spot for an advance scout, and something you actually don't need to confront. But much of the time the monster is blocking the path, or has something you want. So then scouting just gives you some chance to prepare more. But this game system drastically cut down the role of buffing, so foreknowledge does only so much. It's an advantage, but the players paid to have that advantage by taking a familiar instead of another feat or two.
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3) Either live with the fact that the familiar may be pure flavour with no mechanical benefit at all or don't take a familiar.
I think the safe way to use a familiar is to focus on the mechanical features they can always use: extra cantrips, spells, reagents, ect. They are one of the few ways to get back more than one focus without having to spend a focus first.
And it CAN expand the exploration actions you can use: for instance a familiar might be able to track with scent, search with darkvision or could expand a search to places only a tiny creature would see easily. It's just not going to be an extra exploration action.
I think the very clear bottom line, especially for PFS, is
1) Expect a huge amount of table variation
"Table variation" is fundamental to RPGs, so I think you should expect that no matter what.
With regards to PFS, I think that has more to do with how the PFS community wants to handle this aspect of the rules at PFS tables.
With that said, I also am grateful that we have a community here, where we can actually talk rationally about the rules (most of the time ;))
2) Don't be at all surprised if the familiar has no mechanical benefit whatsoever. Although at some tables it will have some use
3) Either live with the fact that the familiar may be pure flavour with no mechanical benefit at all or don't take a familiar.I can actually live with that :-). I'll decide if I'm willing to pay the price, knowing full well that it may have NO benefit whatsoever. Winged talking cat is SO cool that I may well keep it :-).
The problems that a flying, talking, scouting familiar can cause at a PFS table aren't really different than they were in PFS1. There, too, enough GMs would be upset that their scripted adventure goes off the rails because an effective and inconspicuous scout warns the PCs. You can get a talking raven at level 1, or perhaps an earth elemental gliding underground ahead of the PCs at level 5, or a perpetually invisible imp at level 7.
But looking at this thread, I see a lot of misconceptions about the Minion trait. Let's take a good look at the rules:
minion (trait) Minions are creatures that directly serve another creature. A creature with this trait can use only 2 actions per turn and can’t use reactions. Your minion acts on your turn in combat, once per turn, when you spend an action to issue it commands. For an animal companion, you Command an Animal; for a minion that’s a spell or magic item effect, like a summoned minion, you Sustain a Spell or Sustain an Activation; if not otherwise specified, you issue a verbal command, a single action with the auditory and concentrate traits. If given no commands, minions use no actions except to defend themselves or to escape obvious harm. If left unattended...
This is what I was, more or less, thinking. Thanks for bringing it up, Ascalaphus.
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3) Either live with the fact that the familiar may be pure flavour with no mechanical benefit at all or don't take a familiar.I think the safe way to use a familiar is to focus on the mechanical features they can always use: extra cantrips, spells, reagents, ect. They are one of the few ways to get back more than one focus without having to spend a focus first.
And it CAN expand the exploration actions you can use: for instance a familiar might be able to track with scent, search with darkvision or could expand a search to places only a tiny creature would see easily. It's just not going to be an extra exploration action.
In my opinion Graystone has the right of it. It expands options, but does not expand actions. I think minions were built that way by design.
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Do people think the same thing for an animal companion? How do they act in exploration mode? Can they not be an extra set of eyes? Or is there some default action they take?
Note the fine print in the sidebar on p249 for the 'Command an Animal' action.
The animal does what you commanded as soon as it can, usually as its first action on its next turn. If you successfully commanded it multiple times, it does what you said in order. It forgets all commands beyond what it can accomplish on its turn.
Sending it on a scouting mission that lasts >6 seconds is going to be problematic with that limitation. Hopefully the devs can clarify this in future, because Familiars and Animal Companions act more like mindless Contructs/Undead in 1st edition, with fewer options.
even cats have an attention span greater than 6 seconds :-):-)
Cats enjoy messing with our minds, so we may never know the truth. :)
Turns in Exploration mode are probably house rule territory, at this stage? If Exploration mode lasts until an encounter occurs or something changes, a turn could be a few minutes in an underground dungeon, or hours in a desert where you can see for miles.
Treating the Familiar as an extra set of eyes for initiative sounds like a decent interpretation at this stage.
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I feel like the big takeaway here is that htere's no clear indication of WHAT familiars/companions/minions can do in exploration mode. All of the rules surrounding them seem completely focused around encounters.
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It would really suck to build a ranger scout only to have your primary contribution to the party in exploration mode be overshadowed by someone’s cat.
People can rule it that way but consider the impact on other character roles before you rush to that decision.
Agreed.
Niche protection IS important.
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I feel like the big takeaway here is that htere's no clear indication of WHAT familiars/companions/minions can do in exploration mode. All of the rules surrounding them seem completely focused around encounters.
I agree with this. To give a true take on rules as written as people are usually looking for here there are no explicit rules about familiars, animal companions, or minions in general that I can find.
6 seconds of time in exploration mode is not equatable to a round in encounter mode. Those are different modes of play RAW.
Actions in the same index are described as part of a turn, and turns are described as part of encounter mode. During any other non encounter mode of play there is no explicit rules I can find to support much of what people are proposing here about the limitations of what a familiar or animal companion can or can’t do during other modes of play.
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even cats have an attention span greater than 6 seconds :-):-)Cats enjoy messing with our minds, so we may never know the truth. :)
Turns in Exploration mode are probably house rule territory, at this stage? If Exploration mode lasts until an encounter occurs or something changes, a turn could be a few minutes in an underground dungeon, or hours in a desert where you can see for miles.
Treating the Familiar as an extra set of eyes for initiative sounds like a decent interpretation at this stage.
Exploration mode isn't turn-based.
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It would really suck to build a ranger scout only to have your primary contribution to the party in exploration mode be overshadowed by someone’s cat.
People can rule it that way but consider the impact on other character roles before you rush to that decision.
Well I think they're doing different things. If your flying talking cat (or maybe less conspicuous, flying talking raven) is flying ahead of the party, then it has a chance to spot encounters before the party is in the encounter. The ranger staying 10ft in front of the party doesn't have that opportunity. But then he's not taking the same risks as your familiar.
If your ranger went 100ft in front of the party, then he would have those opportunities, but he'd also be at greater risk.
The familiar is less at risk because it flies and doesn't necessarily look like something enemies hiding in ambush for humanoids would think to attack. Taking shots at every raven is likely to give away your ambush site. (Flying cats are a different story.)
The ranger who really wants to scout ahead on his own... is, and has in every previous edition since 3.0, been a very dangerous proposition. Encounters are generally built on the assumption that the whole party is confronting them. Given the skill setup of PF2, your odds of beating enemy perception are not actually that good, so scouting on your own is risking your life.
So yeah, familiars get to do something that PCs themselves are not well suited for. I'd say though that "forward scout" is a PC concept that should be evaluated as "is that really a good idea?" - it can work well in other game systems, but not really in this one. It would still not work well, even if there wasn't a wizard with a familiar to make you jealous.
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I was reading through the first part of this thread and discovered Ascalaphus had voiced all the comments I wanted to make. To summarize:
- Familiars are "something more" than animals. The CRB doesn't specify how intelligent they are, but depending on daily ability selection they can talk and understand, so it seems plausible by RAW that they must be fairly smart.
- The minion trait only restricts how they are used during Encounter mode, primarily combat. It says nothing about their role in Exploration mode. Or how you deal with a situation where the master gives orders that require more than one round to execute.
I suspect that the Game Mastery guide will give us a lot more info about Exploration mode. We can only hope that the role of familiars and animal companions is also expanded upon.
I agree a raven familiar should be able to scout and warn his master about something odd in the vicinity. As clever as it could be, he shoudn't have the same acuity or analyse as his master. Yes it can speak, but I think it should possess at best the vocabulary of a really stupid humanoid, enough to describe common feelings (fear, hunger, joy,..) but It shouldn't be able to describe his environnement as a real adventurer.
It will be able to hear a conversation, but won't be interested in it, and as a matter of fact, won't be able to report it to his master.
His senses can be very accurate, but his analyse and explainations won't be.
So it could warn the party: an eagle would be a greater danger for it than an orc with a great sword. Although the same orc with a bow could scare it. A bear or an ant swarm woudn't be a risk at all...
In this way, a third level spell like clairaudiance or a fifth level spells like prying eye (requiring 1 minute casting time that must be sustained while sending a familiar is faster and lets you free in the meantime) could keep a real interest.
Never forget that a Familiar can be obtained at first level, usable at will, while high level spells can't be used indefinitly.
The GM has to be smart enough to give valuable informations via the pet, keeping in mind it is a low ressource.
Perhaps he should fool the players from time to time: should he see it, a raven won't report a pit with spikes ahead of the party, but will fly back at full speed to his master to warn him of a great danger because the wind shook a a scarecrow the opposite way.
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Familiars who scout ahead of the party also have the disadvantage of looking like lunch to a wider variety of creatures.
It seems like some of you are making arguments over whether they “can” when part of the discussion should be over whether they “should”.
One of the design strategies of 2e seems to be focusing more on the heroes rather than their gear, pets etc like in 1E.
All of the arguments for why familiars CAN act independently would equally hold true in encounter mode. The developers have clearly chosen to place some limits on them for reasons of game balance over realism. I for one support that as I remember the idiotic days of the pole arm wielding, Druid turned into horse riding gorillas and other such abuses. Pets can easily get out of hand and overshadow the actual heroes of the story.
They do get to take limited actions on their own at high level at which point I would be more inclined to agree they could act independently.
Even with the limitations they can be very useful. They don’t need to be the heroes of the story or equal to the heroes to matter.
So would having the familiar or animal companion take exploration activities not be fatiguing?
Only if you took another action too. If all you do is yell at your familiar every 6 seconds to tell it what to do, you're free from exhaustion.
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Nobody knows how it works in exploration mode except the GM who determines what they will allow and the devs who might have something in the works for the GMG or wherever.
Minion trait: Minions are creatures that directly serve another creature. A creature with this trait can use only 2 actions per turn and can’t use reactions. Your minion acts on your turn in combat, once per turn, when you spend an action to issue it commands. For an animal companion, you Command an Animal; for a minion that’s a spell or magic item effect, like a summoned minion, you Sustain a Spell or Sustain an Activation; if not otherwise specified, you issue a verbal command, a single action with the auditory and concentrate traits. If given no commands, minions use no actions except to defend themselves or to escape obvious harm. If left unattended for long enough, typically 1 minute, mindless minions usually don’t act, animals follow their instincts, and sapient minions act how they please.
(emphasis mine)
turn During a round in an encounter, each creature takes a single turn. A creature typically uses up to 3 actions during its turn.
Most familiars were originally animals, though the ritual of becoming a familiar makes them something more.
So based on the above I would argue that the minion trait is only designed to impact what a creature does in encounter mode. Because everything it says references turns and turns only exist in encounter mode. The intelligence of a minion is clearly AT LEAST that of an animal. So in exploration mode I would expect it to behave like an animal unless you have commanded it to act otherwise. If you have commanded it to act otherwise then those commands only have a duration of 1 minute away from the party before it stops following the command.
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If you have commanded it to act otherwise then those commands only have a duration of 1 minute away from the party before it stops following the command.
That's not right though as pointed out right before your bolded statement: "if not otherwise specified, you issue a verbal command, a single action with the auditory and concentrate traits. If given no commands, minions use no actions except to defend themselves or to escape obvious harm." Minions can't follow a command past a single round. So for 1 min they'll "defend themselves or to escape obvious harm" if not commanded then after that min "mindless minions usually don’t act, animals follow their instincts, and sapient minions act how they please."
I don't see anything that'd allow a minion to follow a command past the round it was given.
Turns and rounds only exist in encounter mode. Therefore any rules that reference it do not necessarily apply outside of encounter mode.
I appreciate you have a different understanding. Under your interpretation I would consider animal companions to be absurd and have no place existing in the in game fiction.
When given two competing interpretations where the first creates what I consider to be absurd situations and the second doesnt, I am always going to lean towards the second interpretation.
You are of course free to use whichever one you want.
Minions can't follow a command past a single round. So for 1 min they'll "defend themselves or to escape obvious harm" if not commanded then after that min "mindless minions usually don’t act, animals follow their instincts, and sapient minions act how they please."
I don't see anything that'd allow a minion to follow a command past the round it was given.
This is an absurd reading of the rules, and projecting the rules for Encounter mode on situations that do not take place during Encounter mode.
I could counter that since familiars are "something more" than animals, they should be categorized as "sapient minions" who "can act how they please" which generally means they want to please their master and hence follow his instructions, even if the mission lasts several minutes, hours or days.
But that's neither here nor there. The minions rules were designed to limit players with pet fantasies, and to prevent them from dominating the table with a class feature that was objectively as or more powerful than some other players. Now, pets or minions of any stripe eat into a PC's action economy, regardless of how powerful they are (which isn't very, as it turns out).
But that doesn't mean a player with a familiar or a companion shouldn't be able to think outside the box and do something in Exploration mode that goes beyond this absurd minute (or one round!) limit that some folks here are trying to project from Encounter mode.
This is an absurd reading of the rules, and projecting the rules for Encounter mode on situations that do not take place during Encounter mode.
I could counter that since familiars are "something more" than animals, they should be categorized as "sapient minions" who "can act how they please" which generally means they want to please their master and hence follow his instructions, even if the mission lasts several minutes, hours or days.
But that's neither here nor there. The minions rules were designed to limit players with pet fantasies, and to prevent them from dominating the table with a class feature that was objectively as or more powerful than some other players.
So now that we've established there are different interpretations to the rules, the OP said that their GM was concerned about familiars being too good a feat to use for scouting. Doesn't really have anything to do with the rules but more of a "allowing this seems too good for a level 1 feat so I'm not going to allow it."
So how could a minion go scouting? In any underground situation I think I would treat a familiar with most appearances (bat, owl, anything from the surface) with great suspicion. Yes a bat might be appropriate, but it shouldn't be acting so strangely so I'm going to shoot it just to be safe. Because this is a world where any tiny animal can be a wizard's minion.
On the surface I would probably allow a familiar to scout, although perhaps putting a range of however far it can move in 30 seconds. So useful in certain situations, but not so good that it replaces an entire other PC.
What do other people think?
[EDIT]: Also unless the familiar stays inside a backpack it's going to die sooner or later unless you spend the damage avoidance feat.