Familiars and animal companions
The creature that comes when a wizard calls a familiar or a druid calls a companion is not the one the base game gives you. Every single one of the twenty has been rewritten here to scale with its master, and a level 40 caster's familiar is a serious combatant rather than a mascot.
Who gets one
| Class | What they call | From class level |
|---|---|---|
| Wizard | a familiar | 1 |
| Sorcerer | a familiar | 1 |
| Druid | an animal companion | 1 |
| Ranger | an animal companion | 6 |
Calling one is once per day, so once per rest. A familiar and a companion sit in different slots, so a druid/wizard multiclass can have both out at once, and either can stand beside an ordinary summon and a henchman.
If your familiar dies you take 1d6 damage, and you cannot call it again until the next day. A dead animal companion costs you nothing but the wait.
You choose which creature at character creation, and it cannot be changed afterwards. There is no in-game way to swap a raven for a pixie; the only route is a new character, which is what the re-roll does.
Possessing your familiar is switched off on this server. The quickbar button is still there and will tell you so.
How the scaling works
When the creature appears it is rebuilt from the ground up. Two numbers drive everything:
- Your caster level.
- One ability modifier - for a familiar, the higher of your Intelligence and Charisma; for a companion, the higher of your Wisdom and Strength. If you are polymorphed, your original Strength is used, not the form's.
If that modifier is +0 or worse, none of this happens. The whole rebuild is skipped and you get the plain base-game creature. A wizard with Intelligence 10 has a pet; a wizard with Intelligence 30 has a bodyguard.
Both numbers then feed, at a rate written per creature and per statistic:
- all six ability scores;
- attack bonus, armour class and all three saving throws;
- eight skills - Concentration, Discipline, Listen, Spot, Hide, Move Silently, Tumble, Intimidate;
- regeneration, and damage reduction against bludgeoning, piercing and slashing;
- a damage bonus on its natural weapons, of a type fixed per creature;
- an enhancement bonus on those weapons;
- up to eight feats, which arrive at caster level thresholds.
Three more things happen at the end, and they matter more than any single line above:
- Its maximum hit points become its own maximum plus ten times its Constitution score. This is the single largest change: a companion whose Constitution has been pushed to 30 gains 300 hit points from this line alone.
- Its challenge rating is raised to your caster level, so it counts as a real creature for anything that reads CR.
- Attacks are capped at five per round.
Armour class scales fastest of all: roughly half your caster level plus half your modifier, added to the creature's own base. A familiar at caster level 40 is carrying about +20 base AC before the ability modifier is counted.
Which one to pick
They are not variations on a theme - each has a different damage type and a different set of feats, and the choice is permanent. This is the table to read before you make the character.
Familiars
| Familiar | Damage type | What it is built to do |
|---|---|---|
| Cragcat | Electrical | Sneak attack - up to Epic Improved Sneak Attack 6, with Epic Dodge and Improved Evasion |
| Eyeball | Magical | Caster: Epic Warding and Mage Armour, Epic Improved Combat Casting |
| Fairy Dragon | Magical | Caster, offensive: Hellball and Ruin, plus Mage Armour |
| Fire Mephit | Fire | Durable skirmisher: Improved Evasion, Improved Critical, Search and Listen focus |
| Hell Hound | Fire | The heaviest-hitting familiar - Knockdown, Power Attack, Improved Evasion |
| Ice Mephit | Cold | As the fire mephit, cold instead |
| Imp | Fire | As the mephits |
| Pixie | Magical | Rogue work: Open Lock and Disable Trap, Search, and sneak attack up to rank 7 |
| Pseudodragon | Magical | Caster with Ruin, Blind Fight, Improved Critical |
| Raven | Negative | Scout: Move Silently, Spot, Blind Fight, Called Shot |
| Bat | Negative | Pure stealth: Hide in Plain Sight and Epic Self Concealment up to 50% |
Animal companions
| Companion | Damage type | What it is built to do |
|---|---|---|
| Badger | Sonic | Rage - Barbarian Rage up to Epic Thundering Rage, Great Cleave, Knockdown |
| Bear | Divine | Front line: Epic Overwhelming Critical, Improved Knockdown, Improved Power Attack |
| Boar | Sonic | The hardest hitter: Epic Devastating Critical, Overwhelming Critical, Great Cleave |
| Dire Rat | Negative | Sneak attack up to rank 5, with Hide, Move Silently and Discipline focus |
| Hawk | Electrical | Fast skirmisher: Spring Attack, Mobility, Blind Fight, Improved Critical |
| Panther | Electrical | Sneak attack up to rank 5, with Epic Dodge and Improved Evasion |
| Spider | Acid | Its bite carries poison - 1d2 Constitution damage on hit - plus Improved Knockdown |
| Wolf | Sonic | Knockdown specialist, and one of the three with the faster weapon enhancement |
| Dire Wolf | Sonic | Knockdown with Epic Overwhelming Critical and Great Cleave |
Companions hit harder than familiars, and it is not close. At the top of the scale a familiar's weapons carry 2d6 bonus damage where a bear's carry 2d12.
The damage bonus in full
The tier is picked on your caster level plus your ability modifier added together.
| Caster level + modifier | Most familiars | Hell Hound | Badger, Bear, Boar, Dire Wolf | Other companions |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| over 55 | 2d6 | 2d10 | 2d12 | 2d10 |
| over 45 | 1d12 | 2d8 | 2d10 | 2d8 |
| over 35 | 1d10 | 2d6 | 2d8 | 2d6 |
| over 25 | 1d8 | 2d4 | 2d6 | 2d4 |
| over 15 | 1d6 | 1d10 | 2d4 | 2d4 |
| over 10 | 1d4 | 1d8 | 1d8 | 1d8 |
| over 5 | +2 | 1d6 | 1d6 | 1d6 |
| below that | +1 | 1d4 | 1d4 | 1d4 |
The top row needs caster level plus modifier above 55 - at level 40 that means a modifier of +16, so an ability score of 42. It is reachable, and it is worth building toward.
The enhancement bonus on those same weapons is about caster level divided by 7. The spider, wolf and dire wolf divide by 5.5 instead, so they arrive a point or two ahead.
If you are undead
If your character is one of the undead races - Vampire, Lich, Mummy or Skeleton - your familiar or companion is turned undead with you. It changes appearance and racial type, and then:
| Immune to | ability decrease, critical hits, mind-affecting spells, death effects, fear |
| Resists | cold and electricity, and is healed by negative damage |
| Vulnerable to | positive damage (doubled), divine and fire |
| Costs | -4 Strength and -4 Constitution |
| Gains | turn resistance of 2 plus a quarter of your hit dice |
This is the same trade every undead makes, applied to the creature standing next to you - so a cleric channelling positive energy will hurt it badly, and negative energy will heal it.
In play
- Order it about with Associates Control, the quickbar ability that commands everything travelling with you at once. The old party-bar commands still work and clear any override.
- Magic Fang and Greater Magic Fang target your animal companion specifically, adding attack and damage on top of everything above.
- They show on your map as blue diamonds along with your other associates.
- They cannot disarm traps, whatever their skill says - the companion AI will not attempt it. Send a henchman or do it yourself.
- An arena match takes them away. Starting a fighting-pit round at an event removes every associate a fighter has, yours included. Call it again once the round is over.