I'm currently playing a druid/cleric (team healer). I took magic initiate (wizard) for find familiar. I can now spare the dying at range and cure wounds at range, which opens up a prepared spell to replace healing word (since you'd only take healing word over cure wounds for range). I picked owl so I could get that flyby and just have it be my flying ranged healer. The only drawback is aoe, but I usually have it fly well above the battle until it needs to dive and heal.
Since I'm a water genasi my DM let me reskin it to be a seagull (just with owl stats).
Might take healing word because it is a bonus action too, which can be critical at times. Good pick on the flying beach rat : )
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"Where words fail, swords prevail. Where blood is spilled, my cup is filled" -Cartaphilus
"I have found the answer to the meaning of life. You ask me what the answer is? You already know what the answer to life is. You fear it more than the strike of a viper, the ravages of disease, the ire of a lover. The answer is always death. But death is a gentle mistress with a sweet embrace, and you owe her a debt of restitution. Life is not a gift, it is a loan."
You simply hold ur action so when your owl flies by it can deliver the spell
That's possible, but very cumbersome.
So on Caster's turn s/he spent an Action to ready a spell. On the familiar's turn it moves into touch range. Caster spends a Reaction to activate the Readied Action. Caster uses their Readied Action Familiar spends a Reaction to deliver the touch spell remotely
In order to do this, you have spent the spell as an Action, and spent your Reaction for this, then the familiar has to spent its reaction to deliver the touch spell. Keep in mind if the Caster takes *any* damage between their turn and the familiar they have to make a Concentration check or lose the spell, wasting the spell slot. If the familiar takes any damage between the Caster's turn and it's turn it will be dead, invalidating the Readied Action and wasting the spell slot.
You spend a huge amount of resources on a ridiculously circuitous plan to do a simple thing.
Oh I have to amend my favorite familiar after playing in the jungles of Chult. I no longer have a white rabbit familiar but after catching a rabbit/unicorn and roasting it with over some incense for an hour or so I now have a white rabbit teleporting from dark hole to dark hole staring down the thief of the party with knowing pink eyes. Where ever the party thief looks into the darkness, out of the shadows Bunny hops with a knowing look that says "I know where the bodies are hidden".
It helps that I have the Message cantrip and a special little rabbit voice I project into the thief's head whispering all kinds of unspeakable things...… that naturally get spoken.
A player in one of my first adventures (me being the DM) was a ranger (subclassing as Beastmaster) who had a raven as their familiar/ animal companion.
This is where RAW ends, and the homebrewing begins:
One quick glance at the monster list shows a CR 1/4 enemy called "Swarm of Ravens". You don´t have to guess what happened next.
The rule the group ended up agreeing on was that the ranger could "transform" their raven into the swarm when rolling initiative, at the cost of their movement speed being halved for the first round. The swarm would then effectively act as temporary hitpoints, and when depleted, the raven would return to the ranger and stay with them for 1 minute while recuperating. In the interest of variety, i also gave the raven the ability to store spells, very similar to what a shield guardian has.
Also because ranger is ranger, and because that means that they can change their spells only on level increases, i gave them an option to switch a long for a short rest to revive the raven (unless the corpse had been disintigrated, in which case they´d have to find another familiar).
I have a half-elf mage that is sent to the dwarven clan that raised his father. To get by in the under-hill strong-hold he calls a familiar in the form of a large fruit bat, that he wears like a "took" hat on his head. 60 ft. blind-sight makes move around in tunnels a whole lot easier.
And yes, fruit bats use echolocation too... University study shows...
My gnome transmutation wizard employs a homunculus as a familiar. We began running before XGE came out, and even when it did we were surprised to see a create homunculus spell was 6th level basically to create an interesting familiar.
I use all the same rules as a familiar created with the find familiar spell (i.e no attacking etc) with the exceptions being that he can only be healed via the mending cantrip, and his creature type is a construct. Plus, he's got hands with opposable thumbs, so super useful for carrying items.
My current familiar is a fey spider named Fickle, whose caster is a divination wizard information specialist for the black network. Fickle makes for a stellar spy with his silent movement and ability to squeeze into tight spaces in both natural and constructed environments. Mechanically not the best familiar but the little fellow has character and sticks to a theme. The ability to weave webs has come in handy on a couple of occasions as well. Useful for casting invisibility on other party members while staying out of the line of fire, Fickle can hang out easy enough in a pocket or backpack until needed where a raven or other bird would be uncomfortable. Also adds that little bit of discomfort in some when they do see a larger than average bone white spider with strange joint sitting on a person's shoulders. Sadly he does get popped rather often these days... being dependent on stealth to live will do that.
As soon as my Celestial warlock levels up again, he'll be picking up Tome and find familiar. My primary familiar is planned as an owl named Thaco.
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Any time an unfathomably powerful entity sweeps in and offers godlike rewards in return for just a few teensy favors, it’s a scam. Unless it’s me. I’d never lie to you, reader dearest.
As soon as my Celestial warlock levels up again, he'll be picking up Tome and find familiar. My primary familiar is planned as an owl named Thaco.
Depends if you are going for familiar as a bit more of a pet or is it for utility? A pet owl is nice, but everyone has them see if your DM will let you reskin it so it looks like a baby dragon (or similar) just using the owl stats, as the familiar is just a spirit that takes animal form! My familiar is developing a bit of a multiple personality depending on what creature he is summoned as. Frazzle - Spider, Ca-Caw - Raven, Longshot - Weasel, Buggsy - Rat, Four eyes - Bat and Grabby - Octopus.
My divination wizard isn't very optimized so naturally his familiar isn't either - it's a possum named Mountain Dew.
My warlock isn't optimised either, as I only had the basic choices from the SRD when I created him. I have unlocked a lot more now and realised that I could've made him a lot stronger, but min-maxing seems to defeat the point of D&D (in my opinion anyway). However I am smart enough to realise that different situations call for different familiar forms, your wizard should be able to figure that bit out at least (unless he is a really bad wizard lol)
I'm currently playing a druid/cleric (team healer). I took magic initiate (wizard) for find familiar. I can now spare the dying at range and cure wounds at range, which opens up a prepared spell to replace healing word (since you'd only take healing word over cure wounds for range). I picked owl so I could get that flyby and just have it be my flying ranged healer. The only drawback is aoe, but I usually have it fly well above the battle until it needs to dive and heal.
Since I'm a water genasi my DM let me reskin it to be a seagull (just with owl stats).
Might take healing word because it is a bonus action too, which can be critical at times. Good pick on the flying beach rat : )
"Where words fail, swords prevail. Where blood is spilled, my cup is filled" -Cartaphilus
"I have found the answer to the meaning of life. You ask me what the answer is? You already know what the answer to life is. You fear it more than the strike of a viper, the ravages of disease, the ire of a lover. The answer is always death. But death is a gentle mistress with a sweet embrace, and you owe her a debt of restitution. Life is not a gift, it is a loan."
My DM let me have a beagle as a familiar because he thinks they are mean.
You simply hold ur action so when your owl flies by it can deliver the spell
That's possible, but very cumbersome.
So on Caster's turn s/he spent an Action to ready a spell.
On the familiar's turn it moves into touch range.
Caster spends a Reaction to activate the Readied Action.
Caster uses their Readied Action
Familiar spends a Reaction to deliver the touch spell remotely
In order to do this, you have spent the spell as an Action, and spent your Reaction for this, then the familiar has to spent its reaction to deliver the touch spell.
Keep in mind if the Caster takes *any* damage between their turn and the familiar they have to make a Concentration check or lose the spell, wasting the spell slot.
If the familiar takes any damage between the Caster's turn and it's turn it will be dead, invalidating the Readied Action and wasting the spell slot.
You spend a huge amount of resources on a ridiculously circuitous plan to do a simple thing.
Oh I have to amend my favorite familiar after playing in the jungles of Chult. I no longer have a white rabbit familiar but after catching a rabbit/unicorn and roasting it with over some incense for an hour or so I now have a white rabbit teleporting from dark hole to dark hole staring down the thief of the party with knowing pink eyes. Where ever the party thief looks into the darkness, out of the shadows Bunny hops with a knowing look that says "I know where the bodies are hidden".
It helps that I have the Message cantrip and a special little rabbit voice I project into the thief's head whispering all kinds of unspeakable things...… that naturally get spoken.
FUN FUN FUN!
It's not Magic its Science
For the familiars not included in the spell description, I would use a arcana check to see if I could summon one.
A player in one of my first adventures (me being the DM) was a ranger (subclassing as Beastmaster) who had a raven as their familiar/ animal companion.
This is where RAW ends, and the homebrewing begins:
One quick glance at the monster list shows a CR 1/4 enemy called "Swarm of Ravens". You don´t have to guess what happened next.
The rule the group ended up agreeing on was that the ranger could "transform" their raven into the swarm when rolling initiative, at the cost of their movement speed being halved for the first round. The swarm would then effectively act as temporary hitpoints, and when depleted, the raven would return to the ranger and stay with them for 1 minute while recuperating. In the interest of variety, i also gave the raven the ability to store spells, very similar to what a shield guardian has.
Also because ranger is ranger, and because that means that they can change their spells only on level increases, i gave them an option to switch a long for a short rest to revive the raven (unless the corpse had been disintigrated, in which case they´d have to find another familiar).
I have a half-elf mage that is sent to the dwarven clan that raised his father. To get by in the under-hill strong-hold he calls a familiar in the form of a large fruit bat, that he wears like a "took" hat on his head. 60 ft. blind-sight makes move around in tunnels a whole lot easier.
And yes, fruit bats use echolocation too... University study shows...
My gnome transmutation wizard employs a homunculus as a familiar. We began running before XGE came out, and even when it did we were surprised to see a create homunculus spell was 6th level basically to create an interesting familiar.
I use all the same rules as a familiar created with the find familiar spell (i.e no attacking etc) with the exceptions being that he can only be healed via the mending cantrip, and his creature type is a construct. Plus, he's got hands with opposable thumbs, so super useful for carrying items.
I have had 2 hawks - Lincoln Hawk and Stringfellow Hawk. You can tell im old.
My Hexblade has a raven familiar, named, of course - Eric Draven.
My current familiar is a fey spider named Fickle, whose caster is a divination wizard information specialist for the black network. Fickle makes for a stellar spy with his silent movement and ability to squeeze into tight spaces in both natural and constructed environments. Mechanically not the best familiar but the little fellow has character and sticks to a theme. The ability to weave webs has come in handy on a couple of occasions as well. Useful for casting invisibility on other party members while staying out of the line of fire, Fickle can hang out easy enough in a pocket or backpack until needed where a raven or other bird would be uncomfortable. Also adds that little bit of discomfort in some when they do see a larger than average bone white spider with strange joint sitting on a person's shoulders. Sadly he does get popped rather often these days... being dependent on stealth to live will do that.
Could be worse, could be Hudson Hawk ;) ....
Would you like to swing on a star
carry moonbeams home in a jar
and be better off than you are
or would you rather be a mule
I have a spider familiar called Frazzle, it seems to "know" the Shocking Grasp cantrip rather well lol
From Within Chaos Comes Order!
As soon as my Celestial warlock levels up again, he'll be picking up Tome and find familiar. My primary familiar is planned as an owl named Thaco.
Any time an unfathomably powerful entity sweeps in and offers godlike rewards in return for just a few teensy favors, it’s a scam. Unless it’s me. I’d never lie to you, reader dearest.
Tasha
Depends if you are going for familiar as a bit more of a pet or is it for utility? A pet owl is nice, but everyone has them see if your DM will let you reskin it so it looks like a baby dragon (or similar) just using the owl stats, as the familiar is just a spirit that takes animal form!
My familiar is developing a bit of a multiple personality depending on what creature he is summoned as. Frazzle - Spider, Ca-Caw - Raven, Longshot - Weasel, Buggsy - Rat, Four eyes - Bat and Grabby - Octopus.
From Within Chaos Comes Order!
My divination wizard isn't very optimized so naturally his familiar isn't either - it's a possum named Mountain Dew.
My warlock isn't optimised either, as I only had the basic choices from the SRD when I created him. I have unlocked a lot more now and realised that I could've made him a lot stronger, but min-maxing seems to defeat the point of D&D (in my opinion anyway). However I am smart enough to realise that different situations call for different familiar forms, your wizard should be able to figure that bit out at least (unless he is a really bad wizard lol)
From Within Chaos Comes Order!
Nope still in love with the rabbit in the hat. Defence: none Attack: none skills: poop (then eat own poop) Fun: tons!
It's not Magic its Science