| Post/Author/DateTime | Post |
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| #1pukunuiOct 30, 2014 22:02:34 | Hi everyone,
One of the players in my group has chosen to play a chain pact warlock. Her patron is Lurue, the archfey of talking beasts. She wants her familiar to be a faerie dragon. However, she thinks just casting find familiar as a ritual and having the familiar magically appear is boring. She wants to roleplay finding a faerie dragon in the game and convince it to be her familiar or something. I think she's thinking of it as more of an animal companion than a familiar.
How would you handle a request like this?
Thanks, Jonathan |
| #2AsperdnOct 30, 2014 22:45:06 | 1. If the player does not speak draconic they have to learn that language in there down time. 2. The play must do research and find out where fare dragons live and what they eat in your campaign. 3. She could end up with a nasty encounter with pixie cavalry riding faerie dragons in a swamp they try to leader deep into the swamp and drowned her... 4. She must stalk a wild faerie dragon and make friends with it. I would suggest the first time she meets it that it be in the form of a squirrel or blue bird. This should be an epic quest that goes on for months. |
| #3AaronOfBarbariaOct 30, 2014 22:45:57 | Honestly, I would probably have to explain to the player that they aren't going to like what they think they are asking for because it isn't fair to the other players to spend enough time on the finding and befriending/negotiating with their familiar for it to be satisfying, and would be better off just casting find familiar and being done with it to avoid the sour taste generated by their "finding" a familiar being nothing more than a one-line description along the lines of "...while the party was traveling through the forest, a faerie dragon began following you around," but they should maybe see about finding time to have a 1-on-1 game so that such a personal interaction scene would not be a detriment to the overall game.
For a tl;dr version: "Nah, that's not a good idea since this is a multi-player game and doing that well would require putting an unfair focus on your character." |
| #4pukunuiOct 30, 2014 23:10:49 | That's kind of my thinking. I'm not sure where she thinks she's going to find a faerie dragon in Icewind Dale anyway ... |
| #5NevvurOct 31, 2014 2:05:32 | Pact of the chain grants pseudodragon, not faerie dragon. Not game breaking, as the quasit and imp are CR1 creatures as well, though the faerie dragon grows into CR2 with age. Your table, your call.
I agree with Aaron's assessment, but he offered an idea that can easily be expanded upon, I think without realizing it. "...a faerie dragon began following you around." They are reasonably intelligent creatures, and may not like the idea of being compelled as a familiar. This particular faerie dragon could be curious about the warlock, allowing itself to be seen but not bound by the ritual... until it feels confident the warlock is a worthy ally. No need to make it a session long quest, just have the creature pop up once in awhile, engage in a little role playing, maybe make a social skill check if you want to bring dice into it.
As for what it's doing in Icewind Dale, perhaps Lurue sent it to keep tabs on the warlock.
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| #6cowleymenOct 31, 2014 3:00:06 | This sounds like down time activities to me. You could exchange emails or do a small session with them, but I dont think it should be done at the table major. As for a fairie dragon in middle of the cold, there are fairie folk of winter as well as spring and summer fey |
| #7pukunuiOct 31, 2014 4:58:27 |
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| #8TimboramaOct 31, 2014 5:54:52 | The problem is she wants something creative to do with her character, but it would detract from play (potentially taking spotlight from others purely for her benefit) and the main quest. Maybe give some sort of "downtime" if available (even if just a day or two) to break from the main quest-line, and the player can come up with how, exactly, she got the dragon. I know you said there's no room for non-quest related things, but would even a single 24-hour period be asking too much? You could even have a simple text-based out-of-session session inbetween games to get her to snag a faerie dragon somehow. She gets her fun quest at her expense only (well, and yours), so if you have the time, could you try that?
But! Since the PC died, I'd honestly ask if she just wants to make a new character. It's a playstyle difference, I know, but my table never really likes to use resurrection magic and are more of the "well, them's the breaks!" when a PC dies. But hey! Maybe this is a boon! Can she just suddenly appear with a dragon companion to "keep an eye on her"? |
| #9pukunuiOct 31, 2014 15:09:22 |
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| #10QuestorTellocNov 06, 2014 6:36:09 | My character in 4E took the familiar feat, and did all the ritual stuff I gave him to do. It seemingly went bust. The next morning, he had a life-size tattoo of a faerie dragon wrapped around his dominant arm, extending across his back. Connecting the dots, he figured out how to summon his familiar. There was a great moment when he was stripped to his waist and his weapons removed. Being a drow, the other gladiators tried to put him on the bottom of their heirarchy... until the tattoo came to life. So cool. That same character later woke up to find a blue bird staring at him, standing on his forehead. After a largely one-sided conversation, he recognized the signs, grabbed the bird, woke up the other party member with one foot, and said, "Here's your familiar. Tell it to shut up." It's your game- play familiars however you want. If she wants to convince a flesh-and-blood creature to become a magical companion, go for it! Specifically, I can say that in my campaign world, she'd have to do a specific ritual to transform the animal, otherwise it truly would e an animal companion. That spells "QUEST" to me... |
| #11Coredump00Nov 06, 2014 12:00:10 | Give her an egg at first level, perhaps she found it, perhaps it was a gift from her paton... She needs to carry it and care for it, when she getst to Warlock 3, the egg finally hatches, and she gets her familiar. She could even telepathically bond with it while its still in the egg.
Aside from that... I don't think a quest would be a hardship on the other players. Perhaps they need to trek to where the dragons live... and all sorts of fun stuff can happen along the way. Or she tracks down someoene with an egg (or dragon) who will give her the dragon and some gold for a 'favor'. She gets the egg, the party gets the gold. Etc.
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| #12pukunuiNov 06, 2014 12:37:45 |
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| #13Danny_MontannyNov 07, 2014 4:54:26 | Send the familiar to cast the spell. That way it'll be there when she wakes up and it explains everything nice and neatly. Also, the spell generally summons a fey, celestial, or fiendish version of a regular animal. Since the faerie dragon is already fey, and the Chain Pact feature works a little different, there's nothing more needed. |
| #14BRJNNov 07, 2014 19:46:39 | Didn't the character in question die in a dragon den? When the party returns, the PC's body is gone but there are TWO BIG EGGS in that nest / lair. Ask somebody to make an Arcana or Handle Animal check... |
| #15DrycanthNov 07, 2014 23:15:48 | If you are ok with the power differance. And If you have no problem with incorporating player quests as part of the game And If none of the other players have an issue with taking on this long quest
Go for it! There is little differance between the pact familiar pseudo dragon and a fairy dragon. It is a semantic differance between a pact familiar and a pet. |
| #16pukunuiNov 08, 2014 3:36:47 |
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