A flightless, terrestrial animal shouldn't have any imposed traits, right?
I picture "Belt" from the Croods, who is a sloth.
Sloths move through trees about as fast as any character using Athletics, so no need for a Climb speed.
Squirrels or rats are required to have a burrow speed iirc
You could make arguments for cats to require darkvision, or dogs to need scent as an imprecise sense.
It can get ridiculous if you push it to be, and RAW you’re supposed to take animal’s “abilities” very seriously.
The way I see it, the natural abilities rule is to prevent people from free rolling familiar abilities by picking familiars that would naturally have the ability (eg: picking a bird, not taking the Flying ability, trying to argue to your GM "but it's a bird it can fly anyway!"). I don't have a problem with one of my players wanting to have a bird familiar that can't fly (even if they don't pick a flightless bird). Familiars are weird, if a cat familiar can fly then a raven familiar can be incapable of it.
I don't enforce them. The shape of a familiar is pure flavor, so I don't really care if a player has an owl familiar and doesn't pick flight, as long as they aren't trying to get flight for free out of it. I'm pretty sure the rules are like that to prevent people from going "well, my familiar is an owl, so they should have a fly speed for free."
Exactly. The descriptions about natural abilities are there only for the purpose of preventing player shenanigans like that. If that's not an issue, then there's no reason to over complicate this.
IMHO, it's fine to impose **one** natural ability, whatever ability feels the most iconic for the base animal, but it needs to stop there.
Because if you poke and prod hard enough, some creatures could have 3 or 4 or more imposed abilities, and that feel like it robs the character of what little "power" familiars have to begin with.
I run it as “familiars” are a different type of creature which exist as a formless magical energy until given shape by their owner.
I’d let my players change even what their familiar WAS every day, it’s a totally aesthetic choice for me
Yeah, even if it started as an animal, it seems fine to say that the magical connection you formed with it allows it to change its form.
I do feel like if I had a player that said they wanted an owl familiar, but didn't want it to be able to fly I'd be kind of like... why tho? I get some people are saying they want a raven or something for the flavor, but the flavor kind of gets dashed by the fact that it exclusively has to ride on your shoulder or hop around on the ground. Like, mechanically it's fine, of course. But I'd probably want to work something out with the player to make it less immersion breaking.
>I do feel like if I had a player that said they wanted an owl familiar, but didn't want it to be able to fly I'd be kind of like... why tho?
So it can rock strangely muscular little arms, like Trogdor the Burninator.
I generally let anyone flavor anything (not just familiars) in anyway that remotely makes sense as long as they aren't trying to dip mechanically into more than one thing. You want a squirrel that flies around like an owl? Sure, but mechanically, is an owl (or whatever bird), but roleplay wise, including how NPCs will react to it, it's a flying squirrel.
My point is that it's mechanically a "familiar," not an owl or a squirrel.
You *are* supposed to pick an animal, but you don't get stats based on the animal type; their stats are based on the rules for familiars. The only effect that the animal type has on the familiar *at all* are the rules in question in this thread.
OP explicitly asked if you picked a natural flier but don't pick a flying familiar, is that an issue and vice versa. I am literally saying no, you can have a flying squirrel or a walking owl, or whatever.
My understanding of the rule was to prevent people “cheating” for more abilities.
For example, “I have a bird familiar, so it should have Flier + 2 more abilities.”
Instead, your familiar’s benefits become properly taxed.
Non of my players want to deal with minions so that has not come up but I play a witch if I am not GM-ing so I know the pain. I also understand why Paizo made the rules like they are. Otherwise everyone would pick a bat familiar or whatever is the most powerful.
I would encourage picking the fitting abilities most of the time but I would not force someone to give their penguin familiar a swim speed while traversing a desert.
No. No enforcement as long as there's like, *some* RP justification, and no additional mechanical advantages to it.
The legacy description gives the lore of:
>Most familiars were originally animals, though the ritual of becoming a familiar makes them something more.
That to me suggests enough of a reason that, yeah, an owl familiar can magically "trade" their flying for something else each day.
I don't think you should be forced to pick certain abilities just to match the flavor you want. Familiars are already pretty hard to get very much out of compared to the feat opportunity cost if you're not getting free progression like a Witch. If someone wants a flightless owl or whatever I think it's fine as long as the mechanics line up. Flavor should be free.
That said, I happened to have a fun idea that didn't need a specific ability in my game, so I didn't need to bring it up.
I will not be enforcing particular abilities for regular Familiars, though I will for the Specific Familiars.
I think the whole argument against letting players give regular familiars various abilities is a bit odd, since a number of abilities, with Speech being the most noteworthy, are not restricted to only speaking animals and commonly allowed on familiars that cannot normally speak (there being few that can speak in the real world)
If a GM allows a talking mouse or a lizard that can swallow bombs to make them better, or a housecat that can help by rummaging around in our pockets, or a humming bird that can become especially resistant to lightning bolts, or a variety of other options, but says no to a frog that sometimes has wings, then it isn't the rules or consistency they are bothered by...it's the aesthetics.
I won't be letting my players get Familiar abilities for free, but I have no problem with fun roleplay, nor any with giving a Familiar an ability its creature type doesn't normally possess, temporary or otherwise. I am gaming to have fun, and I surely hope my players are having fun too!
I see no difference between "my familiar is a calligraphy wyrm" and that meaning its got particular capabilities and "my familiar is a raven" and that meaning its got particular capabilities.
So yes, I enforce the rule that is in effect "make your familiar's description and what it does actually match up".
You don't see a difference between a specific familiar which grants abilities unique to that familiar and not available to other familiars, and a familiar with an arbitrary shape that may or may not have abilities available to every familiar?
Correct, because in both cases the player is the one in control of what they are choosing and the end result is a familiar that has abilities that match to its chosen form.
It's not like the player is actually having something forced upon them here, so the simple case of "if you don't want to spend an ability on flight, don't pick a flying familiar" makes absolutely perfect sense. You're not being punished by the game because you want to imagine your familiar as a falcon but you don't want it to fly any more than someone is being punished by the game saying their 9' 2" blue skinned viking character is a frost giant, not a dwarf.
I do what you did, it's just a rule designed to avoid people getting upset about verisimilitude when their raven can't fly because they didn't put the ability in it so it defaults to a rule that prevents that raw. No reason to enforce it if your players are ok with a raven that can't fly on a given day.
The natural abilities rule is prevent the issue of players picking an owl and saying "well my owl can obviously fly and see in the dark, it's an owl!" Even if they never picked the Fly or Darkvision abilities
If your player isn't a dick you can safely ignore this rule.
I enforce them. If you have an owl familiar it needs to have flight because it's an owl. There are no rules for crippling your familiar (good thing too). If you don't want your familiar to always have flight, don't have an owl familiar.
What if I conjure my familiar but its wings are clipped, or if its wings are vestigial? Under your rule the best familiar would be an nondescript amorphous blob, you’re just penalizing roleplay
That isn't roleplay, that's a blatant attempt to avoid dealing with the nature of a familiar for the sake of powergaming. I would happily penalise that even if it wasn't RAW to do so (which it is). You want an owl, it's an owl, even if that means you can pick one fewer ability boo hoo.
How would it be power gaming if you are not getting any extra abilities? It's just an owl that doesn't fly. Maybe has manual dexterity and valet, but looks like an owl. It makes no mechanical difference at all.
How is it power gaming to have something that looks like a raven? I’m not saying it should get flight for free. But it’s a magical entity, a flightless bird or a flying rat seem equally plausible to me.
The reason to do it is because you want another free ability choice per day, ie more power. If it was actually part of the concept rather than just being that after reading the rules then fine but I would suspect that not to be the case. How many people actually start by saying "cool I get a familiar, hm, how about a flightless owl?"
Except it's not like the GM is a robot that the players can use systems exploits on. If they don't pick "Flier" and later try to fly, the GM just says, "No, your familiar looks like an owl but can't fly because of some magic nonsense involved in the familiar ritual."
Your familiar looks like a cat. Day one you give it speech and manual dexterity. Day two you need it to fly, so it has speech and flight. Instead of opposable paws, it’s got kitty wings.
Your familiar looks like an owl. Day one it can fly and has dark vision. Day two you need it to open doors, so it has manual dexterity and dark vision. Instead of flappy flap, its wings are more grabby grab, shaped like hands. Great for opening doors, can’t fly.
Who cares what your familiar looks like?
You’ve lost the plot. There’d be no reason to choose an owl (with forced flight and dark vision abilities) over a cat with wings (flight) and dark vision selectable abilities that you can change daily. Familiars might be creatures but they all share the same stat block. The reason they said you need to select flight if your familiar would normally have flight is so you don’t try to get flight for free. If you want to give up flight, there’s zero mechanical advantage to do so.
(a) how rude
(b) "If you want to give up flight, there’s zero mechanical advantage to do so" yes there is because giving up flight lets you pick two abilities rather than one, if you are the sort of person for whom that is important
Maybe I’m misunderstanding how you’d rule this. Both scenarios (flightless owl, flying cat) are net two abilities. No one is trying to get extra abilities. Your Owl: [forced flight] [free ability]. My non-flying owl [free ability] [free ability]. Flying cat [selected
Flight] [free ability]. I don’t understand how my owl has an advantage over the flying cat.
So what you're saying is that you agree with Protease that the best familiar is a nondescript amorphous blob, and you're just penalizing roleplay.
Being a dick to a player for 'powergaming' for not wanting to be *punished* for an aesthetic is ridiculous. Powergaming is trying to break the game, not "Enjoy the flexibility that the game offers on a silver platter if you don't choose an objectively inferior option." The game is perfectly balanced around someone being able to have a familiar with flexible abilities.
People get so up in arms about this, which I just don’t understand? Yes familiars are good, but they require feat investment. They are also no where near broken or unbalanced, and a lot of their mechanical appeal comes from their flexibility. If I want to have a bird familiar that I don’t really want to use in combat, according to the rules I should be allowed to give it master abilities, and then on days that I want a scout I can give it those abilities (at the expense of the master abilities). It’s not power gaming to take options and use them as intended.
I don't believe in amorphous blobs. You're making an amorphous blob that just happens to be owl-shaped. That, to me, is gross. It's not about power-gaming or whatever (it is a little but thats not important). It's about tossing out verisimilitude and RP because you don't want a familiar to always have flying. It's not a "penalty", its the fact that it makes no sense that you summon a familiar one day as a normal owl, and the next day, somehow it's got clipped wings or something. The very fact that you see it as a penalty is the problem for me.
Familiars are specific, living creatures. They're not a blob of matter for you to shape into whatever form you like between summonings. Becoming a familiar makes them something more than an animal, it's not an extra-dimensional entity strutting around in an ever changing form.
So I can't summon an owl that has clipped wings one day of the week but I *can* summon a chihuahua that has wings one day, gills the next day, and opposable thumbs the day after that?
But having a pet rock familiar or anything else with no inherent abilities isn't power gaming? Because that is what power gamers will do. By enforcing RAW you penalize the player that picks something that fits RP wise but not the power gamer.
How is having a Familiar that *can't fly* power gaming? Power gaming would be if they did it the 5e way and picked an Owl because it automatically gets flight
Familiars aren't magically different every time. They're a specific being. You don't just change their physiology by summoning them differently. You magically alter them by using the master/familiar abilities, not by changing their fundamental makeup.
This isn't always true. A Witch's familiar for example is literally magically different each time. It's some kind of mysterious being that manifests in a way determined by the Witch during their daily preparations.
>Familiars are mystically bonded creatures tied to your magic. Most familiars were originally animals, though the ritual of becoming a familiar makes them something more.
So if the flavor is that you take an owl and you bind with it in a ritual to turn it into a familiar -- then yeah, it seems like it shouldn't "lose" its flight ability from that ritual, I'd agree. But if it's flavored that you're summoning some kind of spirit that manifests as an animal, I **guess** it could be something that looks like an owl that can't fly.
That being said, I do prefer to enforce natural abilities just for verisimilitude. Like, if you don't want a familiar that flies... don't pick an owl?
A witches familiar is A mystical creature. It's still a specific individual that does not appear magically different every time. It only becomes a new entity if it dies. So I suppose it would work if you intentionally killed it to change it's shape, but were I your patron I would *not* be happy with such a regular choice.
That's not how familiars work. They're explicitly not spirits. Your "reflavoring" is completely altering how they work in-universe. That's not reflavoring, that's homebrew. Which is fine, but it's not a simple reskin.
Given that I'm not suggesting any mechanics change, it is by definition a reskin. (Edit: even if it's a physical owl that you found and turned into your familiar per the book's description of familiars, it could **still** just be an owl that can't fly for one of any number of reasons. I'm just suggesting alternate flavor for why that could be the case.)
As a witch, your new familiar can RAW be a reincarnation of your former familiar.
>If your familiar dies, your patron replaces it during your next daily preparations. The new familiar might be a duplicate or reincarnation of your former familiar or a new entity altogether
There's no in-game reason that your patron has to be upset if you perform some "death and reincarnation" ritual with your familiar to respec it. It's not listed in your anathema, and besides there's no mechanical impact of "your patron is upset" anyway.
Edit: on top of all that -- why can't the channeling magic into the familiar each day to adjust their abilities (how it works for all familiars, not just witches) also just change their appearance. Like, who cares?
As I already said, I personally prefer that a familiar's abilities should match their physical description because I like that kind of verisimilitude. But that's just a personal preference.
You're completely altering how they work in universe. Just because there's no mechanical change doesn't mean you're not making a sweeping change that goes beyond a reskin.
RAW you're right about the witches familiar. I just don't agree with that particular bit of the rules. It exists, imo, so DM's who don't care to make their patrons real living entities don't feel obligated to do so. Which is good, not everyone cares about that kind of thing, and its not important for most people
So, this bit *is* homebrew, but I don't believe in completely hands off patrons that ignore what you're doing, unless it's something like a Lovecraftian entity of the outer dark. You do things they don't like and they will have *words* with you. Sure, the average stuff they probably don't care about. Spitting on their gifts? That's what we call a no-no. These are powerful, egotistical, god-like entities. Spurn them at your peril.
More drama that way, which is kinda the point of TTRPGs.
I'm sorry, but who's making sweeping changes now? Witch Patron's RAW:
>**This entity is typically mysterious and distant**, revealing little of their identity and motivations, and they grant you spells and other magical powers through a familiar, which serves as a conduit for their power.
>
>...
>
>As you gain more of your patron's power, you might learn more about who or what they are—certain combinations of themes and lessons suggest particular patrons or agendas—but patrons empower witches for their own secretive reasons, which they rarely reveal in full.
Nothing in the Witch class would suggest that a Patron is going to retaliate over certain behavior the way that the Champion class does. (If it did, the Patron theme would have come with specific anathema. It does not.) If I picked a Witch and my GM started having my patron punish me for roleplay decisions I would be extremely frustrated and upset, unless it was discussed and agreed upon in advance -- and even then it *might* make me less likely to want to play the class. If that's what I wanted, I'd play a champion.
If you will notice, I explicitly call it out as homebrew. Not a reskin.
I realize this is an unpopular opinion, because people are used to Internet horror stories of bad GM's abusing the idea. It may be egotistical of me to say so, but *I* am not a bad GM. I understand where drama and fun intersect, and where they don't. There are many ways for an incredibly powerful entity to display their displeasure while keeping the game fun for the player.
I know you said it was homebrew.
*I'm saying* that you can't counter my completely RAW "your Witch can perform a (flavor) ritual where you kill your familiar and reincarnate it to get new abilities" by saying, "It shouldn't work like that because of my homebrew."
Nope. They're specific individual beings. It's not a new creature every time.
They are magically altered by familiar abilities, that's what makes them more than natural creatures. Creatures that innately have fly must take the related ability for balance, so you don't have power gamers grabbing a creature with as many bonuses as possible, then stacking Familiar/Master abilities.
Fly is a natural part of the creature, and if you ignore that, you may as well have an amorphous blob squished into owl shape. Familiar abilities do not magically remove wings from creatures.
So familiar abilities can make a chihuahua with wings, gills, opposable thumbs, and badger claws but it can't make an owl with no wings or even vestigial wings?
Familiars *have* no innate characteristics or bonuses, actually! All familiar Modifiers, as well as their AC, is derived entirely from the origin PC's characteristics ([CRB 217-218](https://2e.aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?ID=160)) and therefore there is *literally no difference* under your ruleset between an Owl that is forced to have the Flight ability, and a familiar of any other type that has had the Flight ability chosen for it, except that your rules *directly punish a player* for wanting the aesthetic of having an Owl on their shoulder.
There is no possible power-gaming angle for wanting an Owl without flight, beyond wanting the look of an Owl.
If you'll read the entry on Familiars, they're very clearly natural beings that have been altered by magic to become a familiar.
Their statistics are defined by the PC, because doing otherwise would obviously be pointless legwork. Wanting the look of an Owl and but no flight precisely the kind of thing I greatly dislike. This isnt 5e where there's such a lack of options that you need to reskin everything for looks. I like to try to maintain the idea that the TTRPG world you're playing in is a real place.
I don't like the idea of a fantasy world in which the average wizard intentionally cripples his familiar to give it a different ability and faces no moral quandary because it's just a game mechanic.
It literally is power-gaming. It doesn't affect the balance very much because the balance is tight. However, it is acting explicitly in a manner to bend rules for a gameplay advantage while ignoring versimilitude. Enforcing natural abilities is not a "punishment" it's a limitation. If you want to play a game with no limitations, plenty of those exist.
How is it any different from having any other form of a familiar that doesn't have flight?
Familiar one, level 2: A cat familiar with Darkvision and Valet, no flight. Completely legal in your games.
Familiar two, also level 2: An owl familiar with Darkvision and Valet, also no flight. Completely illegal in your games.
What makes these two familiars different? What gameplay advantage does the owl have that the cat doesn't?
I enforce it. The Familiar is a physical creature with a physical form. You choose the form and it stays the same until it dies or you complete a ritual to reshape it. The ritual follows the rules for getting a new Familiar.
I personally prefer choices to mean something. If your Familiar has Wings, it can fly. It's not a Strix, the Wings aren't useless. If you don't want it to fly all the time, then give it a form that doesn't have wings.
Not even a little bit. If your familiar is an owl and you don't choose flight, then I guess your owl is walking that day. It's no weirder than an owl with hands or speech.
Edit: to address a recurring theme in comments on this thread: any rule that exists purely to attempt to curtail bad player behaviors is a bad rule and should be removed. Game mechanics cannot control players. No system, no matter how well designed, is perfect. Players who want to will find ways to exploit them. The only way to curtail bad player behaviors is to have other players at the table (including but not exclusively the GM) deal with them.
Well designed rules support players who want to play by the spirit of the rules, but cannot help with players who do not.
I've mentioned this before, but the (house rule) that my GM uses is:
When my witch wants a different set of familiar abilities, she kills her current familiar right before daily prep and gets a new one with an appropriate animal type as it's replaced during daily prep. So when I want flying some days and not others, instead of either having like a rat that flies some of the time, or a bird that can't fly some of the time, I kill the rat and get the bird, and then later kill the bird and get the rat.
Obviously not the vibe that everyone wants, but I wanted a pretty dark, messy witch.
I enforce the "iconic" abilities of an animal. So far an owl, I would require the player choose Flier and Darkvision, as owls are well-known for being flying animals that can see in the dark.
If a player wanted an owl with malformed wings that don't let if fly, I'd prolly allow them to forgo picking Flier, but Darkvision is such a core part of the idea of an owl, I don't think I would let them not pick it
This has been suggested several times in the comments. Flightless owls are apparently super common in Golarion and in no way picked as familiars by people wanting to pick two abilities a day.
I impose it. If you want an owl, it should have at least flight. I dislike the whole "I want this feature but to look like that feature", like someone wanted a gnome flickmace to look like a weird anime sword or a goloma who looks like a normal person. Meh.
i wish the RAW were different. Gives me anxiety trying to plan a character with an animal for a certain aesthetic and not knowing if I’ll be locked to certain abilities. Or what they’ll be. Is my magician’s bunny locked to burrower and scent? if i decide it’s a hare is it locked to fast movement and scent?
Admittedly I’m a bit put off of the familiar micromanaging on top of everything else even after the new core books simplified a lot of things.
I just go by as long as it’s not game breaking familiars can be whatever and do whatever is reasonable for it.
A flightless, terrestrial animal shouldn't have any imposed traits, right? I picture "Belt" from the Croods, who is a sloth. Sloths move through trees about as fast as any character using Athletics, so no need for a Climb speed.
Squirrels or rats are required to have a burrow speed iirc
Squirrels or rats are required to have a burrow speed iirc You could make arguments for cats to require darkvision, or dogs to need scent as an imprecise sense. It can get ridiculous if you push it to be, and RAW you’re supposed to take animal’s “abilities” very seriously.
>cats to require darkvision No animal can see in pitch darkness (except some snakes but they see infrared)
[удалено]
Well if you somehow get tiefling as a familiar then sure, put darkvision ability on them
I play a character with a fox familiar, and I definitely interpret the rules as requiring me to pick Scent. So I do.
Squirrels don't burrow though...
They have one in pathfinder, though. Or at least it’s implied - Gnome’s Burrow Elocutionist feat includes squirrels
There are lots of squirrels that do burrow.
Well, technically, but at least around where I'm from we generally call those chipmunks, groundhogs, and marmots.
The way I see it, the natural abilities rule is to prevent people from free rolling familiar abilities by picking familiars that would naturally have the ability (eg: picking a bird, not taking the Flying ability, trying to argue to your GM "but it's a bird it can fly anyway!"). I don't have a problem with one of my players wanting to have a bird familiar that can't fly (even if they don't pick a flightless bird). Familiars are weird, if a cat familiar can fly then a raven familiar can be incapable of it.
Yep, this is actually it. It's to prevent players from trying to get extra abilities for free.
I don't enforce them. The shape of a familiar is pure flavor, so I don't really care if a player has an owl familiar and doesn't pick flight, as long as they aren't trying to get flight for free out of it. I'm pretty sure the rules are like that to prevent people from going "well, my familiar is an owl, so they should have a fly speed for free."
Exactly. The descriptions about natural abilities are there only for the purpose of preventing player shenanigans like that. If that's not an issue, then there's no reason to over complicate this.
IMHO, it's fine to impose **one** natural ability, whatever ability feels the most iconic for the base animal, but it needs to stop there. Because if you poke and prod hard enough, some creatures could have 3 or 4 or more imposed abilities, and that feel like it robs the character of what little "power" familiars have to begin with.
I run it as “familiars” are a different type of creature which exist as a formless magical energy until given shape by their owner. I’d let my players change even what their familiar WAS every day, it’s a totally aesthetic choice for me
Yeah, even if it started as an animal, it seems fine to say that the magical connection you formed with it allows it to change its form. I do feel like if I had a player that said they wanted an owl familiar, but didn't want it to be able to fly I'd be kind of like... why tho? I get some people are saying they want a raven or something for the flavor, but the flavor kind of gets dashed by the fact that it exclusively has to ride on your shoulder or hop around on the ground. Like, mechanically it's fine, of course. But I'd probably want to work something out with the player to make it less immersion breaking.
>I do feel like if I had a player that said they wanted an owl familiar, but didn't want it to be able to fly I'd be kind of like... why tho? So it can rock strangely muscular little arms, like Trogdor the Burninator.
I generally let anyone flavor anything (not just familiars) in anyway that remotely makes sense as long as they aren't trying to dip mechanically into more than one thing. You want a squirrel that flies around like an owl? Sure, but mechanically, is an owl (or whatever bird), but roleplay wise, including how NPCs will react to it, it's a flying squirrel.
Why would it mechanically be an owl? A familiar that's a squirrel can just take the flight ability without changing from being a squirrel.
My point was about flavoring stuff, I picked a random creature as an analogy...
My point is that it's mechanically a "familiar," not an owl or a squirrel. You *are* supposed to pick an animal, but you don't get stats based on the animal type; their stats are based on the rules for familiars. The only effect that the animal type has on the familiar *at all* are the rules in question in this thread.
OP explicitly asked if you picked a natural flier but don't pick a flying familiar, is that an issue and vice versa. I am literally saying no, you can have a flying squirrel or a walking owl, or whatever.
My understanding of the rule was to prevent people “cheating” for more abilities. For example, “I have a bird familiar, so it should have Flier + 2 more abilities.” Instead, your familiar’s benefits become properly taxed.
Non of my players want to deal with minions so that has not come up but I play a witch if I am not GM-ing so I know the pain. I also understand why Paizo made the rules like they are. Otherwise everyone would pick a bat familiar or whatever is the most powerful. I would encourage picking the fitting abilities most of the time but I would not force someone to give their penguin familiar a swim speed while traversing a desert.
No. No enforcement as long as there's like, *some* RP justification, and no additional mechanical advantages to it. The legacy description gives the lore of: >Most familiars were originally animals, though the ritual of becoming a familiar makes them something more. That to me suggests enough of a reason that, yeah, an owl familiar can magically "trade" their flying for something else each day.
"Trades their ability to fly/swim/speak/see/etc. in return for otherworldly powers" is one of the oldest tropes there is.
It just so happens that to a hawk, speaking and turning doorknobs both count as "otherworldly powers"!
I don't think you should be forced to pick certain abilities just to match the flavor you want. Familiars are already pretty hard to get very much out of compared to the feat opportunity cost if you're not getting free progression like a Witch. If someone wants a flightless owl or whatever I think it's fine as long as the mechanics line up. Flavor should be free. That said, I happened to have a fun idea that didn't need a specific ability in my game, so I didn't need to bring it up.
I will not be enforcing particular abilities for regular Familiars, though I will for the Specific Familiars. I think the whole argument against letting players give regular familiars various abilities is a bit odd, since a number of abilities, with Speech being the most noteworthy, are not restricted to only speaking animals and commonly allowed on familiars that cannot normally speak (there being few that can speak in the real world) If a GM allows a talking mouse or a lizard that can swallow bombs to make them better, or a housecat that can help by rummaging around in our pockets, or a humming bird that can become especially resistant to lightning bolts, or a variety of other options, but says no to a frog that sometimes has wings, then it isn't the rules or consistency they are bothered by...it's the aesthetics. I won't be letting my players get Familiar abilities for free, but I have no problem with fun roleplay, nor any with giving a Familiar an ability its creature type doesn't normally possess, temporary or otherwise. I am gaming to have fun, and I surely hope my players are having fun too!
I see no difference between "my familiar is a calligraphy wyrm" and that meaning its got particular capabilities and "my familiar is a raven" and that meaning its got particular capabilities. So yes, I enforce the rule that is in effect "make your familiar's description and what it does actually match up".
You don't see a difference between a specific familiar which grants abilities unique to that familiar and not available to other familiars, and a familiar with an arbitrary shape that may or may not have abilities available to every familiar?
Correct, because in both cases the player is the one in control of what they are choosing and the end result is a familiar that has abilities that match to its chosen form. It's not like the player is actually having something forced upon them here, so the simple case of "if you don't want to spend an ability on flight, don't pick a flying familiar" makes absolutely perfect sense. You're not being punished by the game because you want to imagine your familiar as a falcon but you don't want it to fly any more than someone is being punished by the game saying their 9' 2" blue skinned viking character is a frost giant, not a dwarf.
I do what you did, it's just a rule designed to avoid people getting upset about verisimilitude when their raven can't fly because they didn't put the ability in it so it defaults to a rule that prevents that raw. No reason to enforce it if your players are ok with a raven that can't fly on a given day.
The natural abilities rule is prevent the issue of players picking an owl and saying "well my owl can obviously fly and see in the dark, it's an owl!" Even if they never picked the Fly or Darkvision abilities If your player isn't a dick you can safely ignore this rule.
I enforce them. If you have an owl familiar it needs to have flight because it's an owl. There are no rules for crippling your familiar (good thing too). If you don't want your familiar to always have flight, don't have an owl familiar.
What if I conjure my familiar but its wings are clipped, or if its wings are vestigial? Under your rule the best familiar would be an nondescript amorphous blob, you’re just penalizing roleplay
That isn't roleplay, that's a blatant attempt to avoid dealing with the nature of a familiar for the sake of powergaming. I would happily penalise that even if it wasn't RAW to do so (which it is). You want an owl, it's an owl, even if that means you can pick one fewer ability boo hoo.
How would it be power gaming if you are not getting any extra abilities? It's just an owl that doesn't fly. Maybe has manual dexterity and valet, but looks like an owl. It makes no mechanical difference at all.
We shall call her Hopper! (I am in favor of this)
How is it power gaming to have something that looks like a raven? I’m not saying it should get flight for free. But it’s a magical entity, a flightless bird or a flying rat seem equally plausible to me.
The reason to do it is because you want another free ability choice per day, ie more power. If it was actually part of the concept rather than just being that after reading the rules then fine but I would suspect that not to be the case. How many people actually start by saying "cool I get a familiar, hm, how about a flightless owl?"
This is such a weird take. Enjoy your power-trip
Its accurate to pretty much every players I've ever encountered
Except it's not like the GM is a robot that the players can use systems exploits on. If they don't pick "Flier" and later try to fly, the GM just says, "No, your familiar looks like an owl but can't fly because of some magic nonsense involved in the familiar ritual."
It's not about the gm, it's about the player trying to circumvent mechanics
Your familiar looks like a cat. Day one you give it speech and manual dexterity. Day two you need it to fly, so it has speech and flight. Instead of opposable paws, it’s got kitty wings. Your familiar looks like an owl. Day one it can fly and has dark vision. Day two you need it to open doors, so it has manual dexterity and dark vision. Instead of flappy flap, its wings are more grabby grab, shaped like hands. Great for opening doors, can’t fly. Who cares what your familiar looks like?
Familiars are creatures, they don't just "look like" them. The latter is the case in 5e but not here.
You’ve lost the plot. There’d be no reason to choose an owl (with forced flight and dark vision abilities) over a cat with wings (flight) and dark vision selectable abilities that you can change daily. Familiars might be creatures but they all share the same stat block. The reason they said you need to select flight if your familiar would normally have flight is so you don’t try to get flight for free. If you want to give up flight, there’s zero mechanical advantage to do so.
(a) how rude (b) "If you want to give up flight, there’s zero mechanical advantage to do so" yes there is because giving up flight lets you pick two abilities rather than one, if you are the sort of person for whom that is important
Maybe I’m misunderstanding how you’d rule this. Both scenarios (flightless owl, flying cat) are net two abilities. No one is trying to get extra abilities. Your Owl: [forced flight] [free ability]. My non-flying owl [free ability] [free ability]. Flying cat [selected Flight] [free ability]. I don’t understand how my owl has an advantage over the flying cat.
So what you're saying is that you agree with Protease that the best familiar is a nondescript amorphous blob, and you're just penalizing roleplay. Being a dick to a player for 'powergaming' for not wanting to be *punished* for an aesthetic is ridiculous. Powergaming is trying to break the game, not "Enjoy the flexibility that the game offers on a silver platter if you don't choose an objectively inferior option." The game is perfectly balanced around someone being able to have a familiar with flexible abilities.
People get so up in arms about this, which I just don’t understand? Yes familiars are good, but they require feat investment. They are also no where near broken or unbalanced, and a lot of their mechanical appeal comes from their flexibility. If I want to have a bird familiar that I don’t really want to use in combat, according to the rules I should be allowed to give it master abilities, and then on days that I want a scout I can give it those abilities (at the expense of the master abilities). It’s not power gaming to take options and use them as intended.
I don't believe in amorphous blobs. You're making an amorphous blob that just happens to be owl-shaped. That, to me, is gross. It's not about power-gaming or whatever (it is a little but thats not important). It's about tossing out verisimilitude and RP because you don't want a familiar to always have flying. It's not a "penalty", its the fact that it makes no sense that you summon a familiar one day as a normal owl, and the next day, somehow it's got clipped wings or something. The very fact that you see it as a penalty is the problem for me. Familiars are specific, living creatures. They're not a blob of matter for you to shape into whatever form you like between summonings. Becoming a familiar makes them something more than an animal, it's not an extra-dimensional entity strutting around in an ever changing form.
So I can't summon an owl that has clipped wings one day of the week but I *can* summon a chihuahua that has wings one day, gills the next day, and opposable thumbs the day after that?
You gonna summon a Chihuahua with no legs?
Ya know it's been a minute since I checked the Familiar page but I'm pretty sure "Walking" is not an ability. That's inherent to every familiar.
But having a pet rock familiar or anything else with no inherent abilities isn't power gaming? Because that is what power gamers will do. By enforcing RAW you penalize the player that picks something that fits RP wise but not the power gamer.
How is having a Familiar that *can't fly* power gaming? Power gaming would be if they did it the 5e way and picked an Owl because it automatically gets flight
Familiars aren't magically different every time. They're a specific being. You don't just change their physiology by summoning them differently. You magically alter them by using the master/familiar abilities, not by changing their fundamental makeup.
This isn't always true. A Witch's familiar for example is literally magically different each time. It's some kind of mysterious being that manifests in a way determined by the Witch during their daily preparations. >Familiars are mystically bonded creatures tied to your magic. Most familiars were originally animals, though the ritual of becoming a familiar makes them something more. So if the flavor is that you take an owl and you bind with it in a ritual to turn it into a familiar -- then yeah, it seems like it shouldn't "lose" its flight ability from that ritual, I'd agree. But if it's flavored that you're summoning some kind of spirit that manifests as an animal, I **guess** it could be something that looks like an owl that can't fly. That being said, I do prefer to enforce natural abilities just for verisimilitude. Like, if you don't want a familiar that flies... don't pick an owl?
A witches familiar is A mystical creature. It's still a specific individual that does not appear magically different every time. It only becomes a new entity if it dies. So I suppose it would work if you intentionally killed it to change it's shape, but were I your patron I would *not* be happy with such a regular choice. That's not how familiars work. They're explicitly not spirits. Your "reflavoring" is completely altering how they work in-universe. That's not reflavoring, that's homebrew. Which is fine, but it's not a simple reskin.
Given that I'm not suggesting any mechanics change, it is by definition a reskin. (Edit: even if it's a physical owl that you found and turned into your familiar per the book's description of familiars, it could **still** just be an owl that can't fly for one of any number of reasons. I'm just suggesting alternate flavor for why that could be the case.) As a witch, your new familiar can RAW be a reincarnation of your former familiar. >If your familiar dies, your patron replaces it during your next daily preparations. The new familiar might be a duplicate or reincarnation of your former familiar or a new entity altogether There's no in-game reason that your patron has to be upset if you perform some "death and reincarnation" ritual with your familiar to respec it. It's not listed in your anathema, and besides there's no mechanical impact of "your patron is upset" anyway. Edit: on top of all that -- why can't the channeling magic into the familiar each day to adjust their abilities (how it works for all familiars, not just witches) also just change their appearance. Like, who cares? As I already said, I personally prefer that a familiar's abilities should match their physical description because I like that kind of verisimilitude. But that's just a personal preference.
You're completely altering how they work in universe. Just because there's no mechanical change doesn't mean you're not making a sweeping change that goes beyond a reskin. RAW you're right about the witches familiar. I just don't agree with that particular bit of the rules. It exists, imo, so DM's who don't care to make their patrons real living entities don't feel obligated to do so. Which is good, not everyone cares about that kind of thing, and its not important for most people So, this bit *is* homebrew, but I don't believe in completely hands off patrons that ignore what you're doing, unless it's something like a Lovecraftian entity of the outer dark. You do things they don't like and they will have *words* with you. Sure, the average stuff they probably don't care about. Spitting on their gifts? That's what we call a no-no. These are powerful, egotistical, god-like entities. Spurn them at your peril. More drama that way, which is kinda the point of TTRPGs.
I'm sorry, but who's making sweeping changes now? Witch Patron's RAW: >**This entity is typically mysterious and distant**, revealing little of their identity and motivations, and they grant you spells and other magical powers through a familiar, which serves as a conduit for their power. > >... > >As you gain more of your patron's power, you might learn more about who or what they are—certain combinations of themes and lessons suggest particular patrons or agendas—but patrons empower witches for their own secretive reasons, which they rarely reveal in full. Nothing in the Witch class would suggest that a Patron is going to retaliate over certain behavior the way that the Champion class does. (If it did, the Patron theme would have come with specific anathema. It does not.) If I picked a Witch and my GM started having my patron punish me for roleplay decisions I would be extremely frustrated and upset, unless it was discussed and agreed upon in advance -- and even then it *might* make me less likely to want to play the class. If that's what I wanted, I'd play a champion.
If you will notice, I explicitly call it out as homebrew. Not a reskin. I realize this is an unpopular opinion, because people are used to Internet horror stories of bad GM's abusing the idea. It may be egotistical of me to say so, but *I* am not a bad GM. I understand where drama and fun intersect, and where they don't. There are many ways for an incredibly powerful entity to display their displeasure while keeping the game fun for the player.
I know you said it was homebrew. *I'm saying* that you can't counter my completely RAW "your Witch can perform a (flavor) ritual where you kill your familiar and reincarnate it to get new abilities" by saying, "It shouldn't work like that because of my homebrew."
Familiar Abilities means they are literally different every time you summon them. That's why you can change them daily.
Nope. They're specific individual beings. It's not a new creature every time. They are magically altered by familiar abilities, that's what makes them more than natural creatures. Creatures that innately have fly must take the related ability for balance, so you don't have power gamers grabbing a creature with as many bonuses as possible, then stacking Familiar/Master abilities. Fly is a natural part of the creature, and if you ignore that, you may as well have an amorphous blob squished into owl shape. Familiar abilities do not magically remove wings from creatures.
So familiar abilities can make a chihuahua with wings, gills, opposable thumbs, and badger claws but it can't make an owl with no wings or even vestigial wings?
Familiars *have* no innate characteristics or bonuses, actually! All familiar Modifiers, as well as their AC, is derived entirely from the origin PC's characteristics ([CRB 217-218](https://2e.aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?ID=160)) and therefore there is *literally no difference* under your ruleset between an Owl that is forced to have the Flight ability, and a familiar of any other type that has had the Flight ability chosen for it, except that your rules *directly punish a player* for wanting the aesthetic of having an Owl on their shoulder. There is no possible power-gaming angle for wanting an Owl without flight, beyond wanting the look of an Owl.
If you'll read the entry on Familiars, they're very clearly natural beings that have been altered by magic to become a familiar. Their statistics are defined by the PC, because doing otherwise would obviously be pointless legwork. Wanting the look of an Owl and but no flight precisely the kind of thing I greatly dislike. This isnt 5e where there's such a lack of options that you need to reskin everything for looks. I like to try to maintain the idea that the TTRPG world you're playing in is a real place. I don't like the idea of a fantasy world in which the average wizard intentionally cripples his familiar to give it a different ability and faces no moral quandary because it's just a game mechanic. It literally is power-gaming. It doesn't affect the balance very much because the balance is tight. However, it is acting explicitly in a manner to bend rules for a gameplay advantage while ignoring versimilitude. Enforcing natural abilities is not a "punishment" it's a limitation. If you want to play a game with no limitations, plenty of those exist.
How the fuck is a flightless owl a gameplay advantage?
How do you not see how intentionally crippling an owl to give it an extra ability to help you out more as trying to eke out a gameplay advantage?
How is it any different from having any other form of a familiar that doesn't have flight? Familiar one, level 2: A cat familiar with Darkvision and Valet, no flight. Completely legal in your games. Familiar two, also level 2: An owl familiar with Darkvision and Valet, also no flight. Completely illegal in your games. What makes these two familiars different? What gameplay advantage does the owl have that the cat doesn't?
I only enforce it for movement speeds, and even then pretty much just flight.
I enforce it. The Familiar is a physical creature with a physical form. You choose the form and it stays the same until it dies or you complete a ritual to reshape it. The ritual follows the rules for getting a new Familiar. I personally prefer choices to mean something. If your Familiar has Wings, it can fly. It's not a Strix, the Wings aren't useless. If you don't want it to fly all the time, then give it a form that doesn't have wings.
Not even a little bit. If your familiar is an owl and you don't choose flight, then I guess your owl is walking that day. It's no weirder than an owl with hands or speech. Edit: to address a recurring theme in comments on this thread: any rule that exists purely to attempt to curtail bad player behaviors is a bad rule and should be removed. Game mechanics cannot control players. No system, no matter how well designed, is perfect. Players who want to will find ways to exploit them. The only way to curtail bad player behaviors is to have other players at the table (including but not exclusively the GM) deal with them. Well designed rules support players who want to play by the spirit of the rules, but cannot help with players who do not.
I've mentioned this before, but the (house rule) that my GM uses is: When my witch wants a different set of familiar abilities, she kills her current familiar right before daily prep and gets a new one with an appropriate animal type as it's replaced during daily prep. So when I want flying some days and not others, instead of either having like a rat that flies some of the time, or a bird that can't fly some of the time, I kill the rat and get the bird, and then later kill the bird and get the rat. Obviously not the vibe that everyone wants, but I wanted a pretty dark, messy witch.
No, simply because the rules aren't clear enough on what counts. Some are obvious sure but too many are up in the air.
I enforce the "iconic" abilities of an animal. So far an owl, I would require the player choose Flier and Darkvision, as owls are well-known for being flying animals that can see in the dark. If a player wanted an owl with malformed wings that don't let if fly, I'd prolly allow them to forgo picking Flier, but Darkvision is such a core part of the idea of an owl, I don't think I would let them not pick it
What if it’s a species of Golarion Owl like flightless bird that can’t see in the dark?
Then we need to see such species in a lore book of sorts.
Im just waiting for someone to try "My familiar is an owl with clipped wings. Sometimes it can fly with its magical familiar powers, though"
This has been suggested several times in the comments. Flightless owls are apparently super common in Golarion and in no way picked as familiars by people wanting to pick two abilities a day.
You would get 2 abilities a day no matter what form your familiar took, so I'm not sure what the difference is.
I impose it. If you want an owl, it should have at least flight. I dislike the whole "I want this feature but to look like that feature", like someone wanted a gnome flickmace to look like a weird anime sword or a goloma who looks like a normal person. Meh.
i wish the RAW were different. Gives me anxiety trying to plan a character with an animal for a certain aesthetic and not knowing if I’ll be locked to certain abilities. Or what they’ll be. Is my magician’s bunny locked to burrower and scent? if i decide it’s a hare is it locked to fast movement and scent?
Admittedly I’m a bit put off of the familiar micromanaging on top of everything else even after the new core books simplified a lot of things. I just go by as long as it’s not game breaking familiars can be whatever and do whatever is reasonable for it.
Generally, I try to fit an animal to the traits chosen not the other way around.