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So the recent threads got me pondering this again and I can see it as falling somewhere on the following scale . . .
1) You
The figment familiar is something you have complete and total control over all the time. Basically its the real life version of a players familiar. You determine where it goes, what it does, what it says every little detail and if you forget about it it vanishes till you resummon it.
2) Semi-concious
The figment is shaped guided by your subconcious desires but you still retain control. It goes where it wants, does what it wants and is shaped by your subconcious desires giving it a personality. However you can still assume direct command and make it say or do something specific if you want.
3) Subconcious
The figment is shaped by your unconcious desires when you shape it for the first time and acts accordingly but your only control is being able to summon or unsummon it.
4) Superconcious
The figmen familiar has basically partitioned off a part of your brain. Its shaped by your desires the first time you create it but after that it has its own wants, desires and can become something completely different to what you intened. A super lenient GM might even allow it to be the cohort of your leadership feat and take its own levels and skills.
I don't see 1 or 4 being likely for a number of reason but I'm not sure how much independance and free will an imaginary being would actually have (archetype below). How would you play a figment familiar and how independant would you make it. Would you change how you treated it if the mage took sage (familiar gets its own skill points and higher in) or leadership and asked to make the figment a cohort (no debate on whether this is actually allowed assume the GM house ruled it as I'm interest in how they'd act not is it legal)?
Figment
Figments are born from their masters’ imaginations rather than being ordinary creatures that are awakened.
Recurring Dream (Su): A figment has a total number of hit points equal to 1/4 of its master’s total hit points. If the figment dies, it vanishes, appearing again with 1 hit point after its master awakens from a full night’s sleep. If a figment ever strays more than 100 feet from its master or enters an antimagic field, or if a figment’s master is unconscious or asleep, the figment disappears until the next time its master prepares spells or regains her spells per day. Because it is a being of its master’s mind, a figment can never serve as a witch’s familiar, a shaman’s spirit animal, or any other spell-granting familiar, and it can’t use any divination spells or spell-like abilities the base creature has.
This replaces improved evasion.
Manifest Dreams (Su): At 3rd level, a figment is shaped by its master’s dreams. Each time the master awakens from a full night’s rest, he can apply to the figment 1 evolution point’s worth of eidolon evolutions that don’t have a base form requirement. At 7th level, he can apply 2 points’ worth of eidolon evolutions; at 13th level, he can apply 3 points’ worth of eidolon evolutions.
This replaces deliver touch spells, speak with animals of its kind, and scry on familiar.
Considering the fact the archetype does not change its mental stats it may be none of the above. It is quite possible for a figment familiar to have a higher WIS than the character. Less likely but still possible they could also have a higher CHA. When you figment has higher mental stats than you character that makes it unlikely it is part of your mind. It could be something you summoning from somewhere else and being shaped by your imagination.
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That is a possibility though it seems more a Eidolon choice than a figment choice which specifically states its a construct of a mages mind. Especially since it vanishes if your asleep/unconcious. To me it feels sort of a step up from the unseen servant still a construct of magic but one with its own desires. A magical AI rather than a technological one as it were. Though I'd feel happier with something like the 3rd party paaracosmist summoner archetype so it at least didn't have the 100' range limit (They kind of went overboard with restrictions on the figment in my opinion). Vanishes if your asleep, can't go more than 100' from you, can be dispelled, 1/4 hitpoints and generally ruled as not valid for improved familiar in exchange it gets a few evolutions and can be resummoned if killed.
Anyway my personal inclination depending on my mood tends to swing between 1 and 4 with dips into 3. Mainly depending on how sociable I'm feeling at the time if she weren't stuck within 100' I'd be more solidly with 4 but since the two of you can never be seperate I keep swinging back towards 1 for a "Let me have some peace and quiet." option.
Sorry for the delayed reply computer was being repaired though this thread seems to draw little interest.
Curently I use number 2. My gm and i came to this conclusion, and as part of my imagination it is part of my mind, or at least takes up residence in there, so i can use its skills and know what it knows, making it a good scout, becuse if it takes damage/dies it retreats to my mind.
There are a lot of similarities between a figment familiar and an Eidolon. Both of them vanish if the master loses consciousness or get separated by too great a distance. The Eidolon has a greater distance before it disappears but the limit is still there.
Just because something is a construct of your mind does not mean it does not have independent thought. You could be forming a body for a creature to inhabit. Without the body it cannot manifest in the world, but its intellect is its own.
Consider the case of a tiefling wizard who dumps CHA but chooses a snark figment familiar. The Wizard has the following stats mental stats INT 19 WIS 10 CHA 5, his familiar has INT 6 WIS 12 CHA 13. The lesser INT can easily be the familiar is only part of the wizards mind so does not have the full INT. But what about the fact the familiar has a higher WIS and CHA?
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It gets even more confusing if you take figment/sage which is I think the only dual template you can apply. So you can potentially have a figment that is smarter/wiser/more charismatic and literally know's things that you don't. It put points into profession tailor because it likes fashion and now has 7 ranks in there while you have zero or it can lecture for hours on the various techniques to make clothing then berate you for making a mess of the outfit it wanted you to make. Evilserran's example is fine for a figment that only uses its masters skills but in this case you start running into issues of how the figment can know things its creator doesn't.
You also have the question of learning. There is a huge difference between my summoning a figment familiar who see's something, disperses when I sleep then remembers that event from the previous day when resummoned than one that functions like the girl in 50 first dates. Has all the memories/skills/etc up to the day of her accident, can apply them and form memories througout the day then "resets" to the morning on the next day forgetting all the new information but retaining the existing ones. I would far prefer the former for a figment familiar even if it raises its own issues but you could very easily apply the later. The figment functions fine during the summoned period, has a number of skills and abilities it can apply but each time its unsummoned (You sleep, its subjected to dispel magic) it resets to that initial default state.