Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Elessar 06-19-06, 12:19 AM	I'm interested in knowing of any non-traditional familiars (i.e. those not listed as possible familiars in the PHB 3.5) that people have used for wizards in their games. In a game I am running, I ruled that one of my players could have a monkey familiar (it grants her character a +3 to Climb checks, appropriately enough). I was also thinking while I was driving around looking at road kill today that it would be cool to make a mage with a raccoon familiar. Maybe since raccoons are crafty little guys, they grant their masters a +3 to Sleight of Hand checks. Anyways, I was just reading the consolidated list in the PHB 2 and I was a little dissappointed to see that the gamut of 1st level familiar possibilities allowed by the official rules is somewhat sparse. Any other 1st level familiar that you people have used/ plan to use?
lukelightning 06-19-06, 09:49 AM	The list is a good start; you can "invent" most new animal familiars by taking an existing familiar and changing its name and bonus, i.e. use cat stats for a racoon but change the bonus to sleight of hand as you suggested. Some people like to use entirely new stats for these different animals; there's nothing wrong with that but I like the simpler method. Yeah, cats and racoons are different but the cat stats are fine, maybe switch some skills around or something.
Insane Pixie 06-19-06, 02:23 PM	Some people like to use entirely new stats for these different animals; there's nothing wrong with that but I like the simpler method. Yeah, cats and racoons are different but the cat stats are fine, maybe switch some skills around or something. I was thinking more along the lines of a weasel, but I believe either would would fine. Their ability scores are identical, except for the weasels lower Charisma score. (And to be honest, who really embraces raccoons moving into their neighborhood.)