Ways to gain a witch's familiar

[Blue_Sky]

As the title says, are there any ways other than going Unlettered Arcanist and Witch to gain a witch's familiar?

[blahpers]

For the wizard, there are the spirit whisperer and familiar adept archetypes.

[Blue_Sky]

Is there a way for a bard or magus to gain such a familiar? (Sorry. Finally narrowing down on what classes I'm aiming for.) If not either of those, I'm simply looking for a 6th level caster that has a familiar instead of a spellbook.

[blahpers]

There are ways to get a familiar as a bard or magus, but I don't know of any way to use one as a spellbook for those classes, and that's the main distinction of a witch's familiar as opposed to a wizard's. Bards generally don't need spellbooks at all, though, so having to store your spells in a familiar would likely be nothing but drawback.

[Blue_Sky]

I don't mind. This is for story purposes.

[Geruvurrda]

There is variant multiclassing as a wizard, or there is the feat

Familiar bond, it needs iron will as a pre-req, and unfortunately it doesn't give you everything...

[avr]

It doesn't store their spells, but a magical child vigilante's familiar is important to them.

Shamans depend on their familiar (spirit animal) for their spells. They're a full spellcaster rather than 6-level though.

A bunch of prestige classes can turn a full spellcaster into something like a 6-level spellcaster too.

[Blue_Sky]

From a mechanical standpoint, the vigilante is kinda complicated to me. What are the advantages of playing a magical child?

[avr]

Basically you get a familiar which can change into different improved familiar forms at levels 3, 5 and 7, then can shift between them all at level 9. The familiar also gets DR/magic and can use a bunch of first strike/intimidation abilities of the vigilante.

Magical child gets the worst spell list in the game (unchained summoner) but that list does include a reasonable selection of buff/support spells. Social vigilante talents can make you a very effective face if you want to go that way.

[Cevah]

Blue_Sky wrote:

As the title says, are there any ways other than going Unlettered Arcanist and Witch to gain a witch's familiar?

Kill the witch?

/cevah

[Meirril]

Cevah wrote:

Blue_Sky wrote:

As the title says, are there any ways other than going Unlettered Arcanist and Witch to gain a witch's familiar?

Kill the witch?

/cevah

The animal stops being a witche's familiar 24 hours later.

For a longer duration I'd recommend the tried and true method of a pillow case and then an appropriate cage.

More serious answer for the OP: If you need it for plot reasons, just make up a reason this NPC has a witch's familiar. Like his grandmother was a witch with X patron and the kid adopted X patron before he became a bard. Now he's got 1 or 2 hexes he can use (-1 spell per level) and he has a frog familiar that is the source of all his magic (spells). Treat this like a template rather than an archetype since you don't want to put in the effort to figure out what it would be like for a player. Actually you could make the familiar part of the encounter and actually have it be dangerous. Like CR-2 from the master?