Animal Companion as mount...for familiar?

[Nik Gervae]

As a Tiny creature, a familiar can hitch a ride on a player character. Would you say it can also hitch a ride on a Small or Medium animal companion?

[Moppy]

I don't have a problem with this if you just want overland speed out of combat. If you're running a familiar jousting competition or trying to build a familiar cavalier for fighting or hide the familar against ambush on an "unsummoned" companion, we'd have to think harder.

[Fuzzy-Wuzzy]

Sounds like a good way for a wizard to reduce their encumbrance. (IIRC a Tiny creature has 1 Bulk.)

[Nik Gervae]

Well, there's definite potential for shenanigans with Familiar Master's Familiar Conduit feat. Get the animal companion—or heck, a fellow player character—to move into melee and carry the familiar into position for a close-range spell. If you wanted to put your familiar in such a dangerous position, that is.

I'm not sure what you mean by an "unsummoned" companion. Is that even a thing you can do? A Beastmaster can have their extra companions inactive, but they take time to call back.

[Moppy]

In certain games with certian GMs, animal companions have the tendency to suddenly and magically appear, a classic example being the paladin's horse.

edit: As in, I know at least one paladin who expects to be able to hold his sword up in the air and yell, and the thing rides in from a magic portal. I don't know whether to blame anime or he-man :-)

I'm OK with that if the players are OK with that, but then they'll live in perpetual fear of "sword of ---, summon my ---" everytime they engage NPCs, because they can do it too, right? :-)

[Plane]

This thread is hilarious, thanks!

[FLite]

Moppy wrote:

In certain games with certian GMs, animal companions have the tendency to suddenly and magically appear, a classic example being the paladin's horse.

edit: As in, I know at least one paladin who expects to be able to hold his sword up in the air and yell, and the thing rides in from a magic portal. I don't know whether to blame anime or he-man :-)

I'm OK with that if the players are OK with that, but then they'll live in perpetual fear of "sword of ---, summon my ---" everytime they engage NPCs, because they can do it too, right? :-)

Or you could blame the rule book? At least in PF1:

"Once per day, as a full-round action, a paladin may magically call her mount to her side. This ability is the equivalent of a spell of a level equal to one-third the paladin's level. The mount immediately appears adjacent to the paladin. A paladin can use this ability once per day at 5th level, and one additional time per day for every 4 levels thereafter, for a total of four times per day at 17th level."

Not sure if PF2 has an equivalent feat.

[FLite]

Nik Gervae wrote:

Well, there's definite potential for shenanigans with Familiar Master's Familiar Conduit feat. Get the animal companion—or heck, a fellow player character—to move into melee and carry the familiar into position for a close-range spell. If you wanted to put your familiar in such a dangerous position, that is.

That would be really hard to pull off given the action economy in PF2. The Familiar has to start in your space, has to end in your opponent's space, and has to do so in a single move action. You would need an animal companion that could share spaces with opponents.

[Nik Gervae]

FLite wrote:

Nik Gervae wrote:

Well, there's definite potential for shenanigans with Familiar Master's Familiar Conduit feat. Get the animal companion—or heck, a fellow player character—to move into melee and carry the familiar into position for a close-range spell. If you wanted to put your familiar in such a dangerous position, that is.

That would be really hard to pull off given the action economy in PF2. The Familiar has to start in your space, has to end in your opponent's space, and has to do so in a single move action. You would need an animal companion that could share spaces with opponents.

You're thinking of Spell Delivery. This is different. Familiar Conduit is a metamagic where you use a single action to make the next spell you cast emerge as if cast from where your familiar is at that moment.