Familiar + Shadow Projection + Form of the Dragon

[outshyn]

A player is running a sorceress and wants to put up the personal range spell Shadow Projection, but not on herself only on the familiar. OK so far? Then wants to cast Form of the Dragon on the shadow to give it extra powers.

How does that play out, by the rules?

Which thing -- shadow or familiar -- counts for conferring the familiar powers to the sorceress? In other words, within 1 mile the sorceress has a link to the familiar. Which thing needs to be within 1 mile to share a link? The body or the shadow?

[Java Man]

I'd say the familiar, not the summoned shadow, is the target of the Form of the Dragon, so it kinda doesn't matter.

As for the distance I'd also say that is based on the familar's body, nothing about Shadow Projection makes the actual body not count.

[Diego Rossi]

outshyn wrote:

A player is running a sorceress and wants to put up the personal range spell Shadow Projection, but not on herself only on the familiar. OK so far? Then wants to cast Form of the Dragon on the shadow to give it extra powers.

How does that play out, by the rules?

Which thing -- shadow or familiar -- counts for conferring the familiar powers to the sorceress? In other words, within 1 mile the sorceress has a link to the familiar. Which thing needs to be within 1 mile to share a link? The body or the shadow?

Form of the dragon on the familiar using Shadow projection does almost nothing.

Shadow Projection wrote:

Description
With this spell, you infuse your life force and psyche into your shadow, giving it independent life and movement as if it were an undead shadow (see Pathfinder RPG Bestiary 245). Your physical body lies comatose while you are projecting your shadow, and your body has no shadow or reflection while the spell is in effect.

While projecting your shadow, you gain a shadow’s darkvision, defensive abilities, fly speed, racial stealth modifier, and strength damage attack. You do not gain the creature’s create spawn ability, nor its skill ranks or Hit Dice. Your shadow has Hit Dice and hit points equal to your own. Your shadow projection has the undead type and may be turned or affected as undead.

If your shadow projection is slain, you return to your physical body and are immediately reduced to –1 hit points. Your condition becomes dying, and you must begin making Constitution checks to stabilize.

Shadow wrote:

Defensive Abilities incorporeal, channel resistance +2; Immune undead traits[/quoite]

Incorporeal creatures don't benefit from natural armor.
A familiar hit point isn't affected by its constitution. They are 1/2 the master hp.
The Shadow already flies.

incorporeal wrote:

It has no Strength score, so its Dexterity modifier applies to its melee attacks, ranged attacks, and CMB.

The increase in strength is added to a value of null, so it has no effect.

Apparently, the Shadow will get the claw and bite attacks, with no strength bonus.

All it gets is resistance to an element and a breath weapon.

- * -

For conferring the familiar benefit to the sorceress, I would say that what matters is the location of the Shadow.

[Diego Rossi]

Java Man wrote:

I'd say the familiar, not the summoned shadow, is the target of the Form of the Dragon, so it kinda doesn't matter.

As for the distance I'd also say that is based on the familar's body, nothing about Shadow Projection makes the actual body not count.

Shadow projection wrote:

Description

With this spell, you infuse your life force and psyche into your shadow,

My opinion is that the location of the familiar life force and psyche matters. The rules are really vague on how splitting body and life force/psyche works.

[Azothath]

GM ADVICE
Are you okay as a GM killing off her familiar?
Has this been tried out of combat to see how it works?
It is not your job as a GM to qualify questionable spell uses and be a font of free information (above DC 10), only decide how it works in RAW and your Game. Tell her to roll some Spellcraft or Knowledge Arcana checks as that is what skills are for.

Basically you could go down one or a combination of the statements below. Testing this spell combo outside of combat is best rather than waiting until a critical juncture in the game. So let the PC test it out to discover your decisions rather than telling them up front so they don't even try and know you are protecting them giving them consequences and decisions BEFORE they even try it out. It's like reading the scenario before you play it.

RAW
Familiar basics
Shadow Projection:N4 lets you animate your shadow with your life force (see Magic Jar).
Form of the Dragon:T6 polymorphs do not change your type, only provide a fancy disguise and some magical bonuses/abilities.

the crux is does shadow projection benefit from an ongoing polymorph. The fact that it is a familiar is a side topic (see Familiar basics above).

When Shadow Projection is cast an ongoing polymorph ends as the body is no longer a valid spell target. I think that's a bit harsh but it is RAW. You could cast it on the shadow if the GM feels that's a valid target now so spell order may be important. I think most GMs will handwaive this.

Shadow template will override some polymorph effects as the undead type wipes away some abilities. Again spell order may be important.

There's the 'dead' body to deal with and returning at -1 HP (dying) and Heal checks may be needed to notice in a timely manner as the HP damage is not obvious.

I would use where the active creature is to determine distance for empathic link as the body is just a corpse during Shadow Projection.

When Form of the Dragon ends on the body, it ends on the shadow.