Getting the most out of your familiar

[PhaedrusXY]

Original Message:

Spells that specifically target familiars:
- Animate Dead Familiar: instant duration; makes your dead familiar undead ... it has to die first, so there might be xp-loss (SB)
- Augment Familiar: +4 to Str, Dex, Con, 5/magic DR, and +2 to saving throws (CW)
- Elemental Familiar: instant duration; turns your familiar into a tiny elemental (SB)
- Enhance Familiar: can be permanency'd; +2 competence to attack/saves/damage, +2 dodge AC (T&B)
- Familiar Pocket: can be permanency'd; creates an extradimensional pocket on your clothing that the familiar can enter/leave as a free action (T&B)
- Fortify Familiar: can be permanency'd; +2 enhancement to natural armor, 25% fortification, 2d8 temporary HP (T&B)
- Imbue Familiar with Spell Ability: transfers some of the casters daily spells (T&B)
- Planar Familiar: instant duration; turns your familiar into a Celestial/Fiendish/Axiomatic/Anarchic creature, depending on the alignment of your god (SB)
- Dragon 280 also has the following spells: Familiar's Sense, Familiar's Touch, Share Life, Familiar's Form, Call Familiar

Feats:
- Bonded Familiar (PH2)
- Celestial Familiar (BoED)
- Combat Familiar (PH2)
- Construct Familiar (Drag 280) ... change type
- Dragon Familiar (Drac)
- Enspell Familiar (Drag 280) shared spell works up to 1 mile
- Extra Familiar (Drag 280)
- Familiar Concentration (LEoF) familiar can maintain concentration for caster
- Familiar Spell (DMG:epic, Und:general) - familiar can cast spells
- Improved Familiar (CW: Guardian Familiars) (FRCS) (RoF) (SK) (T&B)


check out the nice list further on in this thread:
http://boards1.wizards.com/showpost.php?p=8838824&postcount=167

- Lurking Familiar (PH2)
- Obtain Familiar (CA) gives you a familiar, with the familiar abilities depending on your total arcane caster class levels
- Planar Familiar (Plan)
- Shadowform Familiar (CoR) familiar gains incorporeal subtype (you have to be a Krinth)
- Spell-Linked Familiar (PH2)
- Stitched Flesh Familiar (LM) get an undead version of a normal familiar and control more undead
- Token Familiar (Drag 280) familiar can assume statue-like form
- Undead Familiar (Drag 280) ... start with an undead familiar, without xp-loss

(Prestige) Classes:
- Alienist PrC lvl 5: adds pseudonatural template to your familiar (CA)
- Bonded Summoner PrC: turns your familiar into a powerfull elemental (MH)
- Changeling wizard 5 substitution level: "Morphic Familiar" lets your familiar change between it's possible forms at will. Very cool for a standard familiar, but once you add in Improved Familiar ... (RoE)
- Elf wizard 3 substitution level: doubles the bonus you gain from your familiar (RotW)
- Fleshwarper increases your familiar's size
- Raptorian wizard 1 substitution level: gives you a small air elemental as familiar (RotW)


alternative familiars
- Dragon 277 page 65: badger, chipmunk, dog, eagle, groundhog, lizard, monkey, otter, small constrictor snake
- Dragon 280 page 60: bird, dog, fox, hare, lizard, mouse, otter, raccoon, skunk, squirrel
- Dragon 323 has two good familiar options. The Moth/Butterfly gives +3 to spellcraft checks. The Hummingbird, quite possibly the best basic familiar (although the raven can be better), grants +4 initiative.

the "casting" familiar
- max out use magic device and give him your wands / staffs
- imbue familiar with spell ability (T&B) / contingency / improved contingency (T&B) / symbul's spell matrix/sequencer (MaF/PgtF) ... all allow your familiar to cast spells
- cast a spell and let your familiar "hold the charge" untill you really need the spell ... works just like a quickened spell

tips & tricks
- the raven and some of the "improved familiars" can speak, so can use command word items
- alter self (this thread by PhaedusXY), polymorph and shapechange can also change your familiar into something more suited to combat/survival/whatever ... the alter self/polymorph bit works best when your familiar already is an outsider
- familiars use the masters skills, so use the aid another action to get +2 on the masters checks
- for "Clever uses of the Share Spells ability", check out this thread by PhaedusXY


BoED: Book of Exalted Deeds
CA: Complete Arcana
CoR: Champions of Ruin
CW: Complete Warrior
Drac: Draconomicon
Drag: Dragon Magazine
FRCS: Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting
LEoF: Lost Empire of Faerun
LM: Libris Mortis
MaF: Magic of Faerun
MH: Miniatures Handbook
PgtF: Players Guide to Faerun
Plan: Planar Handbook
RoE: Races of Eberron
RoF: Races of Faerun
RotW: Races of the Wild
SB: WotC - Spellbook Archive
SK: Serpent Kingdoms
T&B: Tome and Blood
Und: Underdark

You can also check:  WotC's Rules of the Game: Familiars ... although sometimes it brings only more obscurity.

And another trick: If you take Improved Familiar to get a Pseudodragon, and find a way to trade out its Alertness feat (Dark Chaos Feat Shuffle, Psychic Reformation, retraining, etc), you can give it Mindsight from Lords of Madness.

[PhaedrusXY]

Clever Uses of Shared Spells

Edit: I don't think the original idea I had about using share spells to double the capacity of the transportation spells is legal myself anymore. So I deleted that part and pruned my list of useful spells to use with the ability. Please feel free to add ideas to this thread, and check out the How to get the maximum out of your familiar thread in the Character Optimization forum for more ideas on how to get more use out of your familiar.

Any "buff" type spell that you normally would use to make yourself tougher or a better fighter is great to share with your familiar, if you don't mind the risk of getting it into combat with it's lower hit points. There are tons of these spells, and I'm not going to list them all, as they are pretty obvious. One of the best ones is Polymorph (and Shapechange later).

Imbue with Spell Ability (cleric) + Rary's Mnemonic Enhancer or Mordenkainen's Lubrication seems like it would work to give your familiar a few spells to cast. I'm not sure if the Mnemonic Enhancer would actually do anything, because it says "You prepare and cast these spells normally." That might invalidate it, as the familiar can't prepare spells "normally". So again, it's more fishy than Mordenkainen's Lubrication, which would definitely work.

Legend Lore seems like it might work, also. You could use it to learn about two things at the same time. One your familiar learns about, and one you learn about. It seems weird... but I think it's legal, heh. Of course, the DM might rule that you both learn about the same thing. Several other Divination spells would work also, like Locate Object, Detect Evil, Discern Location, etc.

Here is a wierd one, and I'm not sure if it's technically legal, but I've been pondering it for an NPC: Magic Jar. The Target line in the spell says "one creature", but that's not really describing what the spell does at all. The target is really the caster, who puts himself inside a gem and then tries to possess other creatures. And you're not limited to possessing just one creature, either, so the target line is totally misleading and incorrect I think. I was considering doing something crazy like Magic Jarring the caster into one body and the familiar into another body that the caster would use as a mount. Then you could share all of your buff spells, as a palladin does with his mount. You'd probably need two focuses though, unless you try to put both souls into the same one... which would be weird.

One thing that definitely seems legal is sharing Wishes to increase both your attributes and your familiar's, for no extra cost. And if you combine this with Magic Jar, you can get some strange things going on. What happens if you Magic Jar your familiar into your friend's body, and then share a Wish to increase your Constitution with your familiar. Does it increase the Constitution of the body the familiar is in at the present, or it's real body? If it is the former, does the inherent bonus go with the familiar when the spell ends (an entirely different debate I realize), or stay with the body it was in at the time of casting? If it's the latter, you could double up on increasing your group's inherent bonuses to stats. And alot of DMs like to rule this way to "cheat" players out of their inherent bonuses if they do alot of body swapping.

So if your DM is "cheating" you out of your inherent bonuses when you Magic Jar, then you can cash in on it, heh. I think the bond between familiar and master is definitely between their souls, not their bodies. So you should be able to share spells just fine if either your familiar or you are in a different body. And if inherent bonuses to physical stats are ruled to stay with whatever body got them, then combining these two rulings means clearly that you can get 2 for 1 inherent bonuses for your party with a little body swapping via Magic Jar.

Moment of Prescience could be useful to share and use the +25 to a skill check, since your familiar has the same ranks in skills as you have.

Most spells which gives you some kind of attack you can use repeatedly, like Eyebite, Produce Flame (druid) and Chill Touch, work. These are nice if you share a bunch of buffs with your familiar beforehand.

All the Repel So-and-so spells could be shared to get two lines of effect out of them instead of one (which might make these otherwise subpar spells somewhat useful). Sharing Repulsion would force them to make two Will saves to approach you. Sharing Antilife Shell (druid, cleric) and other spells like it would make creatures make two Spell Resistance saves.

Sharing many spells like Antimagic Field, Antilife Shell and others like them might seem pointless at first. But if someone tries to bring down your defenses with a Dispel Magic (or MDJ for AMF), they will have to beat both the spell on yourself and the one on your familiar.

I just looked through the Player's Handbook to get these. There are others in other books I'm sure.

Edit: Depending on how the DM rules on the manifester level for the Familiar, Mental Pinnacle could be an insanely good spell to cast on your familiar via Share Spells. In this case, you have it affect only your familiar, and not you. In this way, you turn your familiar into a powerful psion for a few rounds.

[altpersona]

if your done with the basic posting, i have a topic.

familiars and initiator lvls.

1/2 there HD in initiator lvl, 3 manuvers and limited stance options.

if your familiar were to pick up some of that stuff... whats going to work best...

i assume its going to be buffs..

am i wrong that these are even options? if they are is it worth pursuing?

[PhaedrusXY]

I don't own ToB, but I have read through it and about it on here. How is a familiar going to gain access to that stuff? Items? Feats (via Psychic Reformation, etc)?

[Tshern]

There are items that grant maneuvers that can be used once per day. You can also get maneuvers and stances with feats (maneuvers are 1/encounter and stances are always active). If you wish to have some more specific information, feel free to PM me.

I added all the threads you started to the Handy Links. Cheers for moving these things here.

[Runestar]

There was a rather humourous thread in the CO boards some time back about optimizing the cerebrant of sharess prc (mainly on how to make full use of the accelerated familiar progression it granted), which resulted in a cat wearing a pink woolen sweater (really a glamered mithral fullplate) and using familiar spell to cast mass charm monster.

Would be subpar in terms of strength, but the article was extremely entertaining to read, and I take my hat off to the author (can't recall his name off-hand) for his creativity.

I will see if I can find it.

[Archmage Joda]

Well, it's not quite the same thing, but similar to a familiar, so perhaps someone could direct me to some information on making the most of the Imbued Staff alternative from Dragon #338?

[Sinfire Titan]

I don't own ToB, but I have read through it and about it on here. How is a familiar going to gain access to that stuff? Items? Feats (via Psychic Reformation, etc)?

The items probably.

One thing I never noticed was that you can add HD to certain construct familiars, like the ones in CW or the ECS. THis means that they can get feats and skills of their own and keep up with the party in terms of abilities. That also means that they can learn a few tricks of their own at your leisure.

[Prime32]

There was a feat in one of the last Dragons that you haven't included - I think it was called "Wedded to the Light" or something, and it gave your familiar positive-energy powers, including the ability to absorb an attack that would kill you.

[Runestar]

A familiar that can use insightful strike sounds interesting...

[altpersona]

when scanning the book of broken swords for feats a familiar might be good with, i only found a couple. unless your using alter self on it, if it turns into a big grappler, then there could be more..

[Skara Brae]

Well, it's not quite the same thing, but similar to a familiar, so perhaps someone could direct me to some information on making the most of the Imbued Staff alternative from Dragon #338?

I think the feats that accompany this alternate familiar are more useful than the familiar by itself.  Enchant Staff and Invest Spell are no-brainers, as they let you put spells into the staff, freeing you from prepping them if you're a wizard.  (If you're a sorcerer, they're not so useful. )  Imbued Defense is best used with something that benefits from high Wis -- probably a monk or cleric multiclass?  I don't hold out much hope for Imbued Strength, but I am not the person to talk to about melee casters.

I might consider taking an enlightened fist build with this option -- the Wisdom synergizes nicely, and you can actually use the staff's abilities (including the enhanced weapon and mighty weapon abilities inherent to the staff) because you can use it as a weapon.

[The_Mad_Linguist]

Secondary note about Planar familiar:

Mirror Mephits are awesome.

That's pretty much all there is to say about the matter.

[PhaedrusXY]

Secondary note about Planar familiar:

Mirror Mephits are awesome.

That's pretty much all there is to say about the matter.

Are they legal familiars?

[The_Mad_Linguist]

Secondary note about Planar familiar:

Mirror Mephits are awesome.

That's pretty much all there is to say about the matter.

Are they legal familiars?

As long as you have spellcaster level seventh.  Planar handbook is just lists "mephit"/

[ninjarabbit]

Fiendblooded from Heroes of Horror grants your familiar the fiendish template.

[Wyrd]

Wow ... it's awesome that a topic of mine got archived and saved here ... thanx

[PhaedrusXY]

Wow ... it's awesome that a topic of mine got archived and saved here ... thanx

Thank you.

[Wyrd]

Hehe  ... this is why I made the thread in the first place:

I had never played an arcane character, started a campaign at lvl 24 (to try out epic, everyone played something they never did before).
So I started with wizard 5, and 4 different prestige classes, all but one finished.

But without any idea what to do about my familiar, so I tried to find ways to improve him. (and the topic) ... my efforts got the DM as far as to invent an "epic familiar" feat
Also made/improved the "persistant spells for wizards" thread for the same reason.

[Tr011]

It's some kind of special but for some people it could be really useful (if your familiar has nothing better to do with it's actions in a combat): Fire Breath (Complete Arcane) let's you deal decent damage via range touch attacks - for 1 round/lvl. But it's Wu Jen only :/ (at least any Wu Jen with Obtain Familiar can deal additional 45 damage/round with only one action required.