With Paizo saying that the witch class will be slightly improved in the upcoming Pathfinder Player Core rulebook, and some related threads started about this, I have been wondering about familiars. They seem to exist in a weird place, a class feature that resembles a creature but is not fully a creature.
I started analyzing the minion trait in my thread, The Minion Trait, in the Homebrew and House Rules subforum. The mathematics for minion trait are well balanced for animal companions and hired NPCs. But the trait does not seem to fit familiars. For further analysis, I should learn more about the role that familiars have served in the game, both PF1 and PF2. Could you please tell the stories of your and your friends' familiars in your games? Why are familiars fun? If they weren't fun, how could they be fun?
I myself played a GMPC Val Baine in the PF1 Iron Gods adventure path who at 7th level gained a clockwork familiar with the Valet archetype, shaped like a toy dragon, and named Sparky. Four of the five party members--bloodrager Val Baine, magus Elric, gunslinger Boffin, and fighter/investigator Kheld--were heavily into crafting. Since Val was an NPC, I focused on her as a assistant. She tried to be helpful in six different kinds of crafting: alchemy, armor, bow, mechanical, tools, and weapons. Each specialty required its own skill ranks, so she was happy to acquire Sparky who gave a +2 bonus to crafting checks regardless of specialty. She trained in a seventh specialty, craft(clockwork), to keep Sparky in good condition.
She and Sparky would work together in a secret workshop making all sorts of items. Val even had the Technologist and Craft Technological Items feats to repair the Androffan high technology found in Numeria. In addition, bloodragers lack cantrips (though Val got some by other means), but Sparky's valet archetype game him Prestidigitation to help clean up.
Yet in Numeria, the evil Technic League tried to maintain a monopoly on Addroffan technology. Thus, the party hid their high tech whenever they visited home in the town of Torch. Though Sparky was clockwork rather than high technology, he was too much a clue that the party was digging into restricted knowledge, so Val had to keep Sparky's clockwork secret. She sewed a fur costume for Sparky to disguise him as a ferret. The costume would not fool everyone, but Sparky stayed in his familiar satchel so no-one got a close look.
Sparky rode in full glory on Val's shoulder when she was out adventuring with all her technological gear in full display. He had no abilities to help in combat. He was just her silent buddy helping her look cool. Val tried Improved Spell Sharing (Teamwork) so that Sparky could participate more, but it didn't work out.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I have three short stories about Familiars, one of which was strictly PF1, the second was in PF1 but migrated to PF2 towards the end, and the third in PF2 exclusively
The first was in PF1, and was acquired by a Winter Witch after defeating it in battle; it was a specialized Ice Imp by the name of Killakatz that was able to do some minor magical powers in battle, and it served as a fun little creature for our Evil party to help torment and do our bidding (we were in an adventure path where we took over an Evil castle and ran it like a base of operations). In a few fights, it was able to finish off enemies before they escaped, and took care of some small fry when the party needed it. While not a true combatant, it wasn't useless, either.
The second was also in PF1, but migrated into PF2 much later; a Weasel familiar by the name of Merlin that basically functioned as the mascot of the party, whom was surprisingly quite effective in combat. During the Rise of the Runelords AP, it was being used at 2nd level to suplex Goblins into submission, as well as delivering potent damaging spells to enemies unsuspecting. It did die a couple times due to collateral damage, but through ritualistic replacement, was brought back as needed. It was eventually ascended to become a specialized Outsider Familiar, with claw blades for hands and feet, and still remained a potent member of the group through and through. However, towards the end, when the group switched to PF2 rules, the party died due to an overwhelming number of potent martial Giants with AoOs; I will also point out at this time that the Familiar did practically nothing special in this combat, whereas in previous combats, it participated pretty significantly, and a lot of the things it did in PF1 were no longer possible with the new ruleset.
The third was strictly in PF2, which was a bat Familiar that went by the name Gloomdread; it was made for a Chaotic Neutral Cavern Elf Wizard that was enslaved by Dark Elves as a means of attempting to channel the negativity of that time from himself. That being said, it ran into issues of being extremely useless and underwhelming, leading it to be extremely forgettable (so far as its presence being there, anyway), and by 9th level, it was basically "retconned" in exchange for having a Wizard Thesis that actually did something meaningful (like Spell Blending).
PF2
I have an Android Witch with a familiar. I have it perma-set with Speech and it is a full RP-character along with the rest of the group.
Really useless in combat. The best I have gotten mechanically is having the familiar carry or wear an object with the Light cantrip on it. Hands-free, non-sustained, mobile light source that can be moved with an action.
And mostly for out of combat, it is role-play. There have been a few things, such as being an emotional guide animal (rolling charisma checks that the Android character is terrible at).
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
So far familiars are forgotten class features that players barely remember after the novelty of having a talking RP class feature. They don't want to remember them when hit by an AoE spell and rarely remember them in battle because they do next to nothing.
In PF1 they were at least moderately useful. But in PF2 the familiar is like having a pet housecat: nice to pet and look at, but not real useful when you need something done.
So far familiars are forgotten class features that players barely remember after the novelty of having a talking RP class feature. They don't want to remember them when hit by an AoE spell and rarely remember them in battle because they do next to nothing.
In PF1 they were at least moderately useful. But in PF2 the familiar is like having a pet housecat: nice to pet and look at, but not real useful when you need something done.
Do you have any stories about familiars being moderately useful in PF1 and not really useful in PF2? I already heard that that is their value in the two systems, but I am curious about figuring out why.
Plus, I like stories.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
So far familiars are forgotten class features that players barely remember after the novelty of having a talking RP class feature. They don't want to remember them when hit by an AoE spell and rarely remember them in battle because they do next to nothing.
In PF1 they were at least moderately useful. But in PF2 the familiar is like having a pet housecat: nice to pet and look at, but not real useful when you need something done.
Do you have any stories about familiars being moderately useful in PF1 and not really useful in PF2? I already heard that that is their value in the two systems, but I am curious about figuring out why.
Plus, I like stories.
I don't know if I have stories.
In PF1 the familiar was a separate entity. It acted independently. It could use magic items from what I recall. You could buy it the PF1 Trick Magic Item equivalent and it would be able to use magic items.
The familiar gave you a mechanical benefit like a save bonus or extra hit points.
You could use it for scouting. You could cast individual spells on it like it was you. It could attack on its own.
It had built in defenses against AoE damage to ensure it did not die easy.
The PF1 familiar could be tricked out pretty nicely for combat. It acted on its own. It was a real power up in PF1 for a caster. It was another way the witch and wizard were far more powerful in PF1.
Basically, in PF1 the familiar made the PC more powerful in a mechanically meaningful way, thus it saw a lot of use by casters that received it for free or had an option to pick it up.
Awesome. There are plenty of threads bashing on PF2 familiars though.
Are there any more stories from people who have used familiars in either PF1 or PF2?
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The best stories are from Raving Dork. His DM allows him to use his familiar with a lot of narrative power.
|
My PF1 Sorcerer had a Thrush familiar. Everyone in the party rejoiced when she reached 5th level and the familiar became more intelligent than she was (PC build dumped INT).
She would ask her familiar to do stupid things and she would then put herself in danger to get the bird out of trouble.
I often play a level 1 Baba Yaga Witch in PFS these days. His familiar is his stylus whom he talks to and whom he communes with during his daily preparations. The stylus teaches him spells and lores but nobody else hears it (telepathy).
I wonder if I will change its style to a more scouting one when I go Familiar Master at level 2.
So far familiars are forgotten class features that players barely remember after the novelty of having a talking RP class feature. They don't want to remember them when hit by an AoE spell and rarely remember them in battle because they do next to nothing.
In PF1 they were at least moderately useful. But in PF2 the familiar is like having a pet housecat: nice to pet and look at, but not real useful when you need something done.
Do you have any stories about familiars being moderately useful in PF1 and not really useful in PF2? I already heard that that is their value in the two systems, but I am curious about figuring out why.
Plus, I like stories.
One thing I loved in PF1e was the eldritch guardian. It is mechanically simple- they got a familiar, and they could share their feats with their familiar.
Since familiars in that edition had their own set of actions, this meant you could double up on things that were NEVER meant to be done in a single turn.
Dirty tricks were a catch all maneuver that let you do things like pull a guy's shirt over his head to blind him, or plug his ears to deafen him. Creative, comic kind of things. That seems powerful, but the enemy could just use their actions to cure the status on their turn. You'd just trade your turn for their turn, like an early level grappler.
However, things got silly with Dirty Trick master.
This is part of the standard feat path for this maneuver. It lets you hit enemies while they were down and upgrade their status conditions. For example, did your wizard cast a fear spell on the target and just debuff them? Well now you can upgrade that to the stage where they run away in fear.
Because of the maneuver's action economy, you normally couldn't set up your own conditions. But with this feat packed familiar? Now you could, since you basically have two fighter running around, both built for this one trick.
The worst part is that you could upgrade shaken (a small stat debuff) into "nauseated"- which prevented EVERY ACTION other than a single move action each turn. Which meant that they suddenly couldn't do the one thing that removed dirty trick status conditions. All they can do is crawl around and try not to lose their lunch.
You could zip around the field, disabling enemy after enemy for the entire fight. It was the kind of combos that would later make the devs put in the incapacitation rules so bosses wouldn't get one shot so easily.
While this build is cheesy, this seemed on brand for the archetype. It is meant to defend against magical threats using your familiar. The best magical defense is making sure the wizard never gets to cast a spell. And wizard would be a high priority target with very poor defense against maneuvers.