1. <snip>.... My point is simply to ask whether these were things you did without consideration for familiars. In your particular case, it's not a question that makes a lot of sense, because your first dealings with familiars were pre-5e. But in my case, having played other editions but never having dealt with familiars in them, it would make sense.
To put it simply, when I looked at the Familiar all I saw was a common household cat. The caster does get to do a few things but the cat itself is pretty much just a cat. Can you really imagine a cat mapping out a dungeon or looking for traps? When a caster is using the Familiars senses, they see things as the Familiar sees them and they don't gain control over the Familiar like some kind of drone. It is just a Cat doing its best to do what it is told using its extremely low intelligence to do so.
2. <snip> Do you recall your first dealings with said countermeasures from your DMs? Was there a period of expectation-readjustment, or were your impressions of the limits of the spell in sync with your DM's from the start? In other words, if you recall the time when you would have had the opportunity to feel you were being nerfed, did you at that time feel that way?
I never had expectations for a Familiar to be capable of much. I did and do use it to scout from time to time, but I don't expect much from the expeditions. Most of them can't see in the dark nor are they very stealthy so what would be the point of sending them into a dark room when they more likely to alert the enemy than provide useful information? That is not to say they don't have their uses, but they are extremely limited by their Stat Block. In combat, a creature with 1hp isn't going to last very long so I tend to hide them away unless I really need them to deliver a crucial spell, which is extremely rare.
If your players are expecting a Familiar to do all the things you listed in your OP, just remind them that it is just a Cat. If they insist on sitting around waiting for the Wizard to herd a cat through the dungeon, make sure they make the appropriate rolls using the Familiar's low stats and have the Familiar return (if it doesn't get squished) with information appropriate for a creature with a 2 Intelligence.
Literally herding cats lol....
But yeah after that 100 ft that cat is just going to wander to a corner and lay down.
I do think one of the issues might be people playing on VTTs. On Roll20 or whatever, when you send a familiar ahead to scout, it's a whole lot easier to just show the map for the next 100 feet then it is to keep it dark and try to narrate what the wee bestie is seeing and understanding.
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Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
Our DM has never had a problem where my familiars have been concerned.
Never underestimate how attached a wizard or in my case a sorcerer with ritual casting gets to their familiar. I've had two and I got very attached to them. So did the party. I know many wizards use them as disposable creatures but the DM gives mine personalities so we all hate it when they die even though we know I can bring it back when I have downtime. I play my character as getting very upset when my familiar "dies."
And don't underestimate how fun role play moments with the familiar can be. I once used my owl to try to distract an innkeeper (the ranger had snuck her bear inside and we were trying to get it outside unnoticed). The innkeeper ran after the owl with a broom and killed it. At the time my party thought my owl was a real bird. My character theatrically cried and the artificer used the death get free rooms and breakfast. Then the rest of the party decided to replace my bird. I was secretly recasting Find Familiar at the time. They all trooped out to find a bird, with the NPC traveling with us suggesting we get a goose. So the party went on a "wild goose chase." My character was touched by their concern. Then before we left, the innkeeper felt so guilty that he gave the inn to us. The artificer has a running gag about creating "Best Wester" style chain of inns, so we are always on the lookout for one. It was very funny and everyone got a chance in the spotlight.
As far as outshining other party members? Our ranger has done more to mess with encounters than my owl which can only communicate at 100 ft. It does so with pictures that can't always be interpreted. Sometimes it fails its perception checks (done with the owl stats, not mine). We had to a break a high level mage out of prison. I changed my raven into a rat intending to scout ahead. No go. The prison was surrounded by an anti-magic field. The DM played my familiar as being very upset it had to take the form of a rat and when changed back into a raven it sulked. A familiar can't pick a lot or check for traps. It doesn't get sneak attack. The rogue still has opportunities to shine. Resources can be scarce and not all towns have the components that I need - or there is only enough for one casting.
Also some of it depends on the DM. Being told that your familiar sees people doesn't mean those people are good or bad. Sometimes things are hidden underground so my owl doesn't see them. If you don't specifically ask it to scout it just does its thing. Sometimes I send my familiar to its planar pocket and forget about it until a party member suggests I send it ahead.
We are doing Icewind Dale right now and the owl hasn't been able to scout much because of snow, the darkness (dark vision only helps so much) hawks in the air, an enemy's familiar. Sometimes I get lucky and the familiar sees something but that just means the party comes in prepared and the DM doesn't get a surprise round. We still end up having the encounter (mostly because we get curious and go check it out anyway).
My point is that with a little creativity familiars can be a fun way to add levity to the campaign, they don't have to take anything away from rangers or rogues and they don't have to be a headache for the DM.
I am with the OP in terms of the problems that familiars can cause. Mostly the issue is that the familiar expands the party's capabilities dramatically but does so in a safe, resource-cost-free way. The DM shouldn't have to continually bring in unlikely solutions to deal with a pigeon or a rat, and as the OP states, the players become very aware that you're doing it because you just don't want it.
Here are some of the issues I've encountered:
Travelling: Why would I not have my familiar constantly flying 150ft up in the sky, searching all around the party for enemies? Unless the DM plans ambushes so that the creatures have total cover from the sky, then there are no ambushes. If the DM does this often, then the familiar has been neutralised. Lose-lose.
I've watched hawks swoop down and kill other birds for food. The scout familiar would be a prime target for other predators. In addition, 150' is out of communications range for most familiars so it can't actually report anything it sees.
Scouting ahead: The PCs rarely get to see things first time for themselves, because the familiar is always at the fore. This is much worse for outdoor locations than indoor ones.
Again, predators in a natural environment are a significant risk. Yes a familiar can provide some information and it is useful but it isn't game breaking unless the DM allows the familiar to do a lot. Consider this - in a world where familiars are common, most places would have trained predators on the walls or in the yards (cats, hawks etc) attacking anything that doesn't belong including strange birds or cats.
Communication range is not an issue. The familiar can fly up, have a look, fly down, communicate. Easy.
This thinking about "attack the familiar" falls into the trap of "There is a possibility that there could be a predator, so that rare possibility eliminates the constantly occurring problem." I have never, ever, seen a bird of prey attack another bird of prey. It would be the rarest of the rare. Moreover, flying predators are rare enough that as a DM you might get away with this once in a campaign: any more than that, and you're just shutting down a legitimate use of the familiar by making the world overly hostile to it. Most normal animals live out their whole lives without being killed by a predator - those that are eaten are the exception, not the rule. This is DM Metagaming, and the familiar's owner will just stop by the wayside and resummon it. Kill it twice and the metagaming becomes embarrasing.
I am down with the idea of trained hawks etc. but why would familiars be common? Adventurers are rare. Wizards and other spellcasters are rare. This is again, DM Metagaming if it's used frequently.
If the answer to prevent a single level 1 spell being overpowered is "I will design the world and add combat encounters specifically to deal with it" then the spell is a problem.
Setting off traps, or "I wonder what this does?": See Frumpkin in Critical Role. He's used like a disposable party member to test out magical traps or runic circles or whatever. A "live test" animal, essentially.
Most familiars should be incapable of setting off any trap. Tripwires, pressure plates, collapsing floors or walls - all of these are designed to not trigger for the light weight or force that most familiars can exert. Creatures don't usually design traps so that a random rat can trigger it. On top of that, when a familiar triggers a trap it is often just gone at that point.
Note: Warlock familiars might be somewhat of an exception since they are intelligent, flying and invisible but they still might not be able to trigger a trap - they are still tiny - and that assumes that they even notice it.
But they do set off certain traps, especially if being used as a test subject. I actually specify weight limits for pressure plates (50lbs for 1 person traps, 200lbs for pits I want to catch 2 characters in). Many magical traps have no physical trigger beyond "If a living creature enters the room/passes over point X." The point here though was less about traps and more about "We don't know what this circle of runes does. In you go, Frumpkin!" Can also be applied to "Here, drink this.
Familiar intelligence is good for shutting down far-ranging familiars (they will probably just start looking for food), but they can always remember what they saw when you get them back in range. The spell ought to prevent the familiar from going too far away. I once had a very annoying player running a Half Elf Paladin use Find Steed to bring out a mastiff she couldn't ride, then basically use it as a disguised telepathic spy in a town to a range of 1 mile (as DM, unless the dog starts acting weird or tries breaking in somewhere, on a town street it should not draw any attention).
At the point where the DM is having the NPCs cast spells like Prot Evil and Good before having a conversation, this is again metagaming to stop familiars. You're now painting the following picture:
The wilderness is so full of flying predators that it's too deadly for birds of prey to fly
Everyone keeps trained animals specifically to deal with familiars
NPCs cast spells in their own homes on the off chance that a familiar that they have not detected might be present. They expend their limited spell slots seemingly at random. Do the players do this?
If you're going to these lengths then you're building the world to counteract a single level 1 spell. The thing is, spells should get used, and it's fine if players use them to do cool stuff! The main issue with Find Familiar is that it's a permanent ability advantage. Most other spells - like the Prot Good and Evil etc. you mentioned - you cast once, and get a limited duration. If NPCs are burning their spells "just in case" then this is still a massive advantage to the PCs. They should have no spell slots by the end of a day.
You have a lot of opinions here that Familiars are overpowered, but also opinions that if anything kills a Familiar more than once then it’s DM meta gaming… and simultaneously don’t consider the cost or time to re-casting this spell… and then consider a first level spell to be rare.
I don’t think any game I’ve played has ever needed any of these things to make Familiars balanced. It’s honestly never come up in any campaign I’ve played in - if you consider a normal environment and playing by the rules, Familiars fit smoothly into the game without any balance issues.
Flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters. As a DM, just decide if you're willing to deal with flyers at all, and if not, tell people they can't have Familiars that can fly. That will pretty much solve any and all problems.
Given that Familiars aren't all that good at opening doors, few underground defensive fortifications will allow for proper mapping with a toad or such.
Even if you do allow for flight, Owls aren't all that good with doors either.
I'd like to also add a little context about the whole 100' distance thing.
When you're looking at a map provided in an adventure, 100' can seem like a long way because it covers a large amount of the provided map.
But, 100' is actually a very short distance. For comparison:
Olympic pool is ~150' in length. Minimum soccer field width is ~150' (minimum length is 300'). On an American football field, the distance from the goal line to the 34 yard line is 102'. Distance from home plate to first base in a regulation baseball field is 90'. A regulation basketball court is ~92' long.
Staying within 100' of your scouting familiar while also remaining hidden from enemy sight is not a given. It's not good enough to just be invisible. You need to be silent, too. It's close enough that even small noises would be audible.
Flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters. As a DM, just decide if you're willing to deal with flyers at all, and if not, tell people they can't have Familiars that can fly. That will pretty much solve any and all problems.
Given that Familiars aren't all that good at opening doors, few underground defensive fortifications will allow for proper mapping with a toad or such.
Even if you do allow for flight, Owls aren't all that good with doors either.
I never understood this - "flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters". Sure it can. So? Maybe as DMs we should stop building encounters where we want our PCs to follow the path exactly the way we laid it out. Or give our bad guys ranged weapons. Or actually use Earthbind. Or disrupt the concentration of the Spellcaster. I will never understand why we design things around a certain mechanic, instead of designing things regardless of the mechanic used.
Flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters. As a DM, just decide if you're willing to deal with flyers at all, and if not, tell people they can't have Familiars that can fly. That will pretty much solve any and all problems.
Given that Familiars aren't all that good at opening doors, few underground defensive fortifications will allow for proper mapping with a toad or such.
Even if you do allow for flight, Owls aren't all that good with doors either.
I never understood this - "flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters". Sure it can. So? Maybe as DMs we should stop building encounters where we want our PCs to follow the path exactly the way we laid it out. Or give our bad guys ranged weapons. Or actually use Earthbind. Or disrupt the concentration of the Spellcaster. I will never understand why we design things around a certain mechanic, instead of designing things regardless of the mechanic used.
Flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters. As a DM, just decide if you're willing to deal with flyers at all, and if not, tell people they can't have Familiars that can fly. That will pretty much solve any and all problems.
Given that Familiars aren't all that good at opening doors, few underground defensive fortifications will allow for proper mapping with a toad or such.
Even if you do allow for flight, Owls aren't all that good with doors either.
I never understood this - "flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters". Sure it can. So? Maybe as DMs we should stop building encounters where we want our PCs to follow the path exactly the way we laid it out. Or give our bad guys ranged weapons. Or actually use Earthbind. Or disrupt the concentration of the Spellcaster. I will never understand why we design things around a certain mechanic, instead of designing things regardless of the mechanic used.
Is that how you design "regardless of the mechanic used?" With a spell that appears on zero monster spell lists as printed?
I am with the OP in terms of the problems that familiars can cause. Mostly the issue is that the familiar expands the party's capabilities dramatically but does so in a safe, resource-cost-free way. The DM shouldn't have to continually bring in unlikely solutions to deal with a pigeon or a rat, and as the OP states, the players become very aware that you're doing it because you just don't want it.
Here are some of the issues I've encountered:
Travelling: Why would I not have my familiar constantly flying 150ft up in the sky, searching all around the party for enemies? Unless the DM plans ambushes so that the creatures have total cover from the sky, then there are no ambushes. If the DM does this often, then the familiar has been neutralised. Lose-lose.
I've watched hawks swoop down and kill other birds for food. The scout familiar would be a prime target for other predators. In addition, 150' is out of communications range for most familiars so it can't actually report anything it sees.
Scouting ahead: The PCs rarely get to see things first time for themselves, because the familiar is always at the fore. This is much worse for outdoor locations than indoor ones.
Again, predators in a natural environment are a significant risk. Yes a familiar can provide some information and it is useful but it isn't game breaking unless the DM allows the familiar to do a lot. Consider this - in a world where familiars are common, most places would have trained predators on the walls or in the yards (cats, hawks etc) attacking anything that doesn't belong including strange birds or cats.
Communication range is not an issue. The familiar can fly up, have a look, fly down, communicate. Easy.
This thinking about "attack the familiar" falls into the trap of "There is a possibility that there could be a predator, so that rare possibility eliminates the constantly occurring problem." I have never, ever, seen a bird of prey attack another bird of prey. It would be the rarest of the rare. Moreover, flying predators are rare enough that as a DM you might get away with this once in a campaign: any more than that, and you're just shutting down a legitimate use of the familiar by making the world overly hostile to it. Most normal animals live out their whole lives without being killed by a predator - those that are eaten are the exception, not the rule. This is DM Metagaming, and the familiar's owner will just stop by the wayside and resummon it. Kill it twice and the metagaming becomes embarrasing.
I am down with the idea of trained hawks etc. but why would familiars be common? Adventurers are rare. Wizards and other spellcasters are rare. This is again, DM Metagaming if it's used frequently.
If the answer to prevent a single level 1 spell being overpowered is "I will design the world and add combat encounters specifically to deal with it" then the spell is a problem.
Setting off traps, or "I wonder what this does?": See Frumpkin in Critical Role. He's used like a disposable party member to test out magical traps or runic circles or whatever. A "live test" animal, essentially.
Most familiars should be incapable of setting off any trap. Tripwires, pressure plates, collapsing floors or walls - all of these are designed to not trigger for the light weight or force that most familiars can exert. Creatures don't usually design traps so that a random rat can trigger it. On top of that, when a familiar triggers a trap it is often just gone at that point.
Note: Warlock familiars might be somewhat of an exception since they are intelligent, flying and invisible but they still might not be able to trigger a trap - they are still tiny - and that assumes that they even notice it.
But they do set off certain traps, especially if being used as a test subject. I actually specify weight limits for pressure plates (50lbs for 1 person traps, 200lbs for pits I want to catch 2 characters in). Many magical traps have no physical trigger beyond "If a living creature enters the room/passes over point X." The point here though was less about traps and more about "We don't know what this circle of runes does. In you go, Frumpkin!" Can also be applied to "Here, drink this.
Familiar intelligence is good for shutting down far-ranging familiars (they will probably just start looking for food), but they can always remember what they saw when you get them back in range. The spell ought to prevent the familiar from going too far away. I once had a very annoying player running a Half Elf Paladin use Find Steed to bring out a mastiff she couldn't ride, then basically use it as a disguised telepathic spy in a town to a range of 1 mile (as DM, unless the dog starts acting weird or tries breaking in somewhere, on a town street it should not draw any attention).
At the point where the DM is having the NPCs cast spells like Prot Evil and Good before having a conversation, this is again metagaming to stop familiars. You're now painting the following picture:
The wilderness is so full of flying predators that it's too deadly for birds of prey to fly
Everyone keeps trained animals specifically to deal with familiars
NPCs cast spells in their own homes on the off chance that a familiar that they have not detected might be present. They expend their limited spell slots seemingly at random. Do the players do this?
If you're going to these lengths then you're building the world to counteract a single level 1 spell. The thing is, spells should get used, and it's fine if players use them to do cool stuff! The main issue with Find Familiar is that it's a permanent ability advantage. Most other spells - like the Prot Good and Evil etc. you mentioned - you cast once, and get a limited duration. If NPCs are burning their spells "just in case" then this is still a massive advantage to the PCs. They should have no spell slots by the end of a day.
I couldn´t agree more. It perfectly summarizes my point: in order to keep the spell as it is, it seems that the solution chosen by the majority is to change the world. To extents I would feel quite embarrassed to use more than once, honestly (the chances of a random bird being attacked by another one on a given day are pretty close to zero, good luck using that twice, or most of the "solutions" given here for that matter, sorry if I seem too blunt).
Flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters. As a DM, just decide if you're willing to deal with flyers at all, and if not, tell people they can't have Familiars that can fly. That will pretty much solve any and all problems.
Given that Familiars aren't all that good at opening doors, few underground defensive fortifications will allow for proper mapping with a toad or such.
Even if you do allow for flight, Owls aren't all that good with doors either.
I never understood this - "flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters". Sure it can. So? Maybe as DMs we should stop building encounters where we want our PCs to follow the path exactly the way we laid it out. Or give our bad guys ranged weapons. Or actually use Earthbind. Or disrupt the concentration of the Spellcaster. I will never understand why we design things around a certain mechanic, instead of designing things regardless of the mechanic used.
Is that how you design "regardless of the mechanic used?" With a spell that appears on zero monster spell lists as printed?
If your world is wrapped in a neat bow and no part of it learns to react to their surroundings then yes, I could see how it would be much more difficult playing that way.
In the worlds I DM, Spellcasters learn spells according to their station, their ability, and according to the rules of their class and level. They don’t have cookie-cutter (mass produced) spellbooks.
And same with bad guys - they target familiars because once they discover that they exist and what they can do, they react like normal intelligent creatures would.
Flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters. As a DM, just decide if you're willing to deal with flyers at all, and if not, tell people they can't have Familiars that can fly. That will pretty much solve any and all problems.
Given that Familiars aren't all that good at opening doors, few underground defensive fortifications will allow for proper mapping with a toad or such.
Even if you do allow for flight, Owls aren't all that good with doors either.
I never understood this - "flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters". Sure it can. So? Maybe as DMs we should stop building encounters where we want our PCs to follow the path exactly the way we laid it out. Or give our bad guys ranged weapons. Or actually use Earthbind. Or disrupt the concentration of the Spellcaster. I will never understand why we design things around a certain mechanic, instead of designing things regardless of the mechanic used.
Is that how you design "regardless of the mechanic used?" With a spell that appears on zero monster spell lists as printed?
If your world is wrapped in a neat bow and no part of it learns to react to their surroundings then yes, I could see how it would be much more difficult playing that way.
In the worlds I DM, Spellcasters learn spells according to their station, their ability, and according to the rules of their class and level. They don’t have cookie-cutter (mass produced) spellbooks.
And same with bad guys - they target familiars because once they discover that they exist and what they can do, they react like normal intelligent creatures would.
I don't know what kind of campaigns you're running, but in mine, bad guys don't usually have the time to learn new spells between the first time they meet the party, and the next time. Usually there isn't a next time at all.
On rare occasions, it makes sense for a caster to have already known and prepared Earthbind. One example was some druids whose ancestral enemies were famous for riding giant birds into battle. But in general, it's a pretty niche spell and I don't feel it makes sense for many NPCs to have it.
It's also not in the same source book as Find Familiar, and now we're getting into the question of whether it's acceptable to say one thing is balanced if and only if you buy another thing.
Flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters. As a DM, just decide if you're willing to deal with flyers at all, and if not, tell people they can't have Familiars that can fly. That will pretty much solve any and all problems.
Given that Familiars aren't all that good at opening doors, few underground defensive fortifications will allow for proper mapping with a toad or such.
Even if you do allow for flight, Owls aren't all that good with doors either.
I never understood this - "flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters". Sure it can. So? Maybe as DMs we should stop building encounters where we want our PCs to follow the path exactly the way we laid it out. Or give our bad guys ranged weapons. Or actually use Earthbind. Or disrupt the concentration of the Spellcaster. I will never understand why we design things around a certain mechanic, instead of designing things regardless of the mechanic used.
Is that how you design "regardless of the mechanic used?" With a spell that appears on zero monster spell lists as printed?
If your world is wrapped in a neat bow and no part of it learns to react to their surroundings then yes, I could see how it would be much more difficult playing that way.
In the worlds I DM, Spellcasters learn spells according to their station, their ability, and according to the rules of their class and level. They don’t have cookie-cutter (mass produced) spellbooks.
And same with bad guys - they target familiars because once they discover that they exist and what they can do, they react like normal intelligent creatures would.
I don't know what kind of campaigns you're running, but in mine, bad guys don't usually have the time to learn new spells between the first time they meet the party, and the next time. Usually there isn't a next time at all.
On rare occasions, it makes sense for a caster to have already known and prepared Earthbind. One example was some druids whose ancestral enemies were famous for riding giant birds into battle. But in general, it's a pretty niche spell and I don't feel it makes sense for many NPCs to have it.
It's also not in the same source book as Find Familiar, and now we're getting into the question of whether it's acceptable to say one thing is balanced if and only if you buy another thing.
No one needs to personally encounter your adventurers to know of and/or learn about them. IRL we know of and about all kinds of people we’ll never personally meet. Fame, celebrity and infamy exist in D&D worlds unless you choose to exclude them, which seems a misguided choice at best. There is no 24 hour news cycle in D&D but there is the good, old-fashioned rumour mill. And bards. The more your party uses a certain tactic, the more likely it is that the world at large will be aware of it, the more likely NPC’s will be prepared to counter it.
Flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters. As a DM, just decide if you're willing to deal with flyers at all, and if not, tell people they can't have Familiars that can fly. That will pretty much solve any and all problems.
Given that Familiars aren't all that good at opening doors, few underground defensive fortifications will allow for proper mapping with a toad or such.
Even if you do allow for flight, Owls aren't all that good with doors either.
I never understood this - "flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters". Sure it can. So? Maybe as DMs we should stop building encounters where we want our PCs to follow the path exactly the way we laid it out. Or give our bad guys ranged weapons. Or actually use Earthbind. Or disrupt the concentration of the Spellcaster. I will never understand why we design things around a certain mechanic, instead of designing things regardless of the mechanic used.
Is that how you design "regardless of the mechanic used?" With a spell that appears on zero monster spell lists as printed?
If your world is wrapped in a neat bow and no part of it learns to react to their surroundings then yes, I could see how it would be much more difficult playing that way.
In the worlds I DM, Spellcasters learn spells according to their station, their ability, and according to the rules of their class and level. They don’t have cookie-cutter (mass produced) spellbooks.
And same with bad guys - they target familiars because once they discover that they exist and what they can do, they react like normal intelligent creatures would.
I don't know what kind of campaigns you're running, but in mine, bad guys don't usually have the time to learn new spells between the first time they meet the party, and the next time. Usually there isn't a next time at all.
On rare occasions, it makes sense for a caster to have already known and prepared Earthbind. One example was some druids whose ancestral enemies were famous for riding giant birds into battle. But in general, it's a pretty niche spell and I don't feel it makes sense for many NPCs to have it.
It's also not in the same source book as Find Familiar, and now we're getting into the question of whether it's acceptable to say one thing is balanced if and only if you buy another thing.
No one needs to personally encounter your adventurers to know of and/or learn about them. IRL we know of and about all kinds of people we’ll never personally meet. Fame, celebrity and infamy exist in D&D worlds unless you choose to exclude them, which seems a misguided choice at best. There is no 24 hour news cycle in D&D but there is the good, old-fashioned rumour mill. And bards. The more your party uses a certain tactic, the more likely it is that the world at large will be aware of it, the more likely NPC’s will be prepared to counter it.
I've never been convinced by this argument.
1. My monsters aren't listening to bards. My last campaign saw the PCs fighting giants, goblinoids, and barbarians, for the most part. Many of those guys can't even speak Common, let alone have the time or the interest to listen to wanderers. If my party is moving from one goblin camp to another and another, then sure, the goblins might send word, but actually they're moving from goblins to barbarians, and those groups have no reason to communicate. The only things they fought that had any chance of knowing about them were the two surveillance-network-running BBEGs. And this was a campaign where I added Renown rules!
2. PC experience moves faster than information. When you can reach level 5 in a week, but to reach Waterdeep takes two, well, there's a disconnect there.
3. Most fighting doesn't take place in public spaces, nor does it leave survivors. My PCs fight in dungeons. They fight in ancient ruins. On roads far from the eye of the local militia. And from none of those are any bards escaping to sell their warnings.
4. Even if there were runners, and even if the runners delivered their warnings to the right people, in time, and even if those people were inclined to listen, I just don't see someone registering the familiar as being worth mentioning.
Flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters. As a DM, just decide if you're willing to deal with flyers at all, and if not, tell people they can't have Familiars that can fly. That will pretty much solve any and all problems.
Given that Familiars aren't all that good at opening doors, few underground defensive fortifications will allow for proper mapping with a toad or such.
Even if you do allow for flight, Owls aren't all that good with doors either.
I never understood this - "flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters". Sure it can. So? Maybe as DMs we should stop building encounters where we want our PCs to follow the path exactly the way we laid it out. Or give our bad guys ranged weapons. Or actually use Earthbind. Or disrupt the concentration of the Spellcaster. I will never understand why we design things around a certain mechanic, instead of designing things regardless of the mechanic used.
Is that how you design "regardless of the mechanic used?" With a spell that appears on zero monster spell lists as printed?
If your world is wrapped in a neat bow and no part of it learns to react to their surroundings then yes, I could see how it would be much more difficult playing that way.
In the worlds I DM, Spellcasters learn spells according to their station, their ability, and according to the rules of their class and level. They don’t have cookie-cutter (mass produced) spellbooks.
And same with bad guys - they target familiars because once they discover that they exist and what they can do, they react like normal intelligent creatures would.
I don't know what kind of campaigns you're running, but in mine, bad guys don't usually have the time to learn new spells between the first time they meet the party, and the next time. Usually there isn't a next time at all.
On rare occasions, it makes sense for a caster to have already known and prepared Earthbind. One example was some druids whose ancestral enemies were famous for riding giant birds into battle. But in general, it's a pretty niche spell and I don't feel it makes sense for many NPCs to have it.
It's also not in the same source book as Find Familiar, and now we're getting into the question of whether it's acceptable to say one thing is balanced if and only if you buy another thing.
No one needs to personally encounter your adventurers to know of and/or learn about them. IRL we know of and about all kinds of people we’ll never personally meet. Fame, celebrity and infamy exist in D&D worlds unless you choose to exclude them, which seems a misguided choice at best. There is no 24 hour news cycle in D&D but there is the good, old-fashioned rumour mill. And bards. The more your party uses a certain tactic, the more likely it is that the world at large will be aware of it, the more likely NPC’s will be prepared to counter it.
I've never been convinced by this argument.
1. My monsters aren't listening to bards. My last campaign saw the PCs fighting giants, goblinoids, and barbarians, for the most part. Many of those guys can't even speak Common, let alone have the time or the interest to listen to wanderers. If my party is moving from one goblin camp to another and another, then sure, the goblins might send word, but actually they're moving from goblins to barbarians, and those groups have no reason to communicate. The only things they fought that had any chance of knowing about them were the two surveillance-network-running BBEGs. And this was a campaign where I added Renown rules!
2. PC experience moves faster than information. When you can reach level 5 in a week, but to reach Waterdeep takes two, well, there's a disconnect there.
3. Most fighting doesn't take place in public spaces, nor does it leave survivors. My PCs fight in dungeons. They fight in ancient ruins. On roads far from the eye of the local militia. And from none of those are any bards escaping to sell their warnings.
4. Even if there were runners, and even if the runners delivered their warnings to the right people, in time, and even if those people were inclined to listen, I just don't see someone registering the familiar as being worth mentioning.
News travels. Goblins, giants and barbarians might not speak to passers by and might not even speak common but they presumably talk amongst themselves. Why do we know of Hercules, Cuchulain or any number of other ancient heroes but no one should know of your heroes? We know Odin’s ravens were named Thought and Memory but your adventurers’ familiars are utterly inconsequential to every observation?
I couldn´t agree more. It perfectly summarizes my point: in order to keep the spell as it is, it seems that the solution chosen by the majority is to change the world. To extents I would feel quite embarrassed to use more than once, honestly (the chances of a random bird being attacked by another one on a given day are pretty close to zero, good luck using that twice, or most of the "solutions" given here for that matter, sorry if I seem too blunt).
I don't know. I live in a suburban area, and coyotes have killed all three of my cats over a 5 year period. And yes, I know for sure they were killed by coyotes. My wife hired a goddamned tracker with sniffer dog to find the first one (FFS, like we could afford that!) and we found her bones. The second one I saw in the mouth of the coyote, running away with her. Her neck was broken, and she was already dead. The last one, the neighbors scared off the coyote hunting pair, but he died soon after from his wounds. And that's in the suburbs. Out in the wilderness.. that's a whole other level.
Now, if we're going by "what's likely to happen if this were a movie/book" -- I agree that pets in movies/books don't get regularly attacked unless it's somehow a running gag or some other part of the story.
But in the real world, critters get eaten every day.
Or to put it another way: In a world that regularly puts apex predators in a position to eat the PCs, why are the familiars getting a pass?
Flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters. As a DM, just decide if you're willing to deal with flyers at all, and if not, tell people they can't have Familiars that can fly. That will pretty much solve any and all problems.
Given that Familiars aren't all that good at opening doors, few underground defensive fortifications will allow for proper mapping with a toad or such.
Even if you do allow for flight, Owls aren't all that good with doors either.
I never understood this - "flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters". Sure it can. So? Maybe as DMs we should stop building encounters where we want our PCs to follow the path exactly the way we laid it out. Or give our bad guys ranged weapons. Or actually use Earthbind. Or disrupt the concentration of the Spellcaster. I will never understand why we design things around a certain mechanic, instead of designing things regardless of the mechanic used.
Is that how you design "regardless of the mechanic used?" With a spell that appears on zero monster spell lists as printed?
If your world is wrapped in a neat bow and no part of it learns to react to their surroundings then yes, I could see how it would be much more difficult playing that way.
In the worlds I DM, Spellcasters learn spells according to their station, their ability, and according to the rules of their class and level. They don’t have cookie-cutter (mass produced) spellbooks.
And same with bad guys - they target familiars because once they discover that they exist and what they can do, they react like normal intelligent creatures would.
I don't know what kind of campaigns you're running, but in mine, bad guys don't usually have the time to learn new spells between the first time they meet the party, and the next time. Usually there isn't a next time at all.
On rare occasions, it makes sense for a caster to have already known and prepared Earthbind. One example was some druids whose ancestral enemies were famous for riding giant birds into battle. But in general, it's a pretty niche spell and I don't feel it makes sense for many NPCs to have it.
It's also not in the same source book as Find Familiar, and now we're getting into the question of whether it's acceptable to say one thing is balanced if and only if you buy another thing.
No one needs to personally encounter your adventurers to know of and/or learn about them. IRL we know of and about all kinds of people we’ll never personally meet. Fame, celebrity and infamy exist in D&D worlds unless you choose to exclude them, which seems a misguided choice at best. There is no 24 hour news cycle in D&D but there is the good, old-fashioned rumour mill. And bards. The more your party uses a certain tactic, the more likely it is that the world at large will be aware of it, the more likely NPC’s will be prepared to counter it.
I've never been convinced by this argument.
1. My monsters aren't listening to bards. My last campaign saw the PCs fighting giants, goblinoids, and barbarians, for the most part. Many of those guys can't even speak Common, let alone have the time or the interest to listen to wanderers. If my party is moving from one goblin camp to another and another, then sure, the goblins might send word, but actually they're moving from goblins to barbarians, and those groups have no reason to communicate. The only things they fought that had any chance of knowing about them were the two surveillance-network-running BBEGs. And this was a campaign where I added Renown rules!
2. PC experience moves faster than information. When you can reach level 5 in a week, but to reach Waterdeep takes two, well, there's a disconnect there.
3. Most fighting doesn't take place in public spaces, nor does it leave survivors. My PCs fight in dungeons. They fight in ancient ruins. On roads far from the eye of the local militia. And from none of those are any bards escaping to sell their warnings.
4. Even if there were runners, and even if the runners delivered their warnings to the right people, in time, and even if those people were inclined to listen, I just don't see someone registering the familiar as being worth mentioning.
News travels. Goblins, giants and barbarians might not speak to passers by and might not even speak common but they presumably talk amongst themselves. Why do we know of Hercules, Cuchulain or any number of other ancient heroes but no one should know of your heroes? We know Odin’s ravens were named Thought and Memory but your adventurers’ familiars are utterly inconsequential to every observation?
You've ignored what I said with point 1. Yeah, they can talk amongst themselves. That won't accomplish anything.
Your mythic characters argument is so far from the point that I'm not even sure how to engage with it. I would ask you if you truly think people in "Odin's time," who would've been inclined to fight Odin if he ever showed up at their base, all knew the names of his ravens, but there are so many elements of absolute nonsense in that question, that it almost even distracts from the fact that any answer you could give would be raw speculation. But I digress. Why would you go from the specific, comprehensible examples of individuals delivering stories, to these nonspecific examples of stories propagating seemingly of their own volition? A story can't tell itself.
Maybe a more accurate comparison would be to ask if you know how many of the soldiers who fought in X town in our real world last month were injured. If someone was going to fight those soldiers, they'd probably want to know, because they can use that information to plan, but if you were a survivor in that fight, do you know? And is it going to be a priority for you, to go and deliver that information? Who would you tell it to?
You've ignored what I said with point 1. Yeah, they can talk amongst themselves. That won't accomplish anything.
Your mythic characters argument is so far from the point that I'm not even sure how to engage with it. I would ask you if you truly think people in "Odin's time," who would've been inclined to fight Odin if he ever showed up at their base, all knew the names of his ravens, but there are so many elements of absolute nonsense in that question, that it almost even distracts from the fact that any answer you could give would be raw speculation. But I digress. Why would you go from the specific, comprehensible examples of individuals delivering stories, to these nonspecific examples of stories propagating seemingly of their own volition? A story can't tell itself.
Maybe a more accurate comparison would be to ask if you know how many of the soldiers who fought in X town in our real world last month were injured. If someone was going to fight those soldiers, they'd probably want to know, because they can use that information to plan, but if you were a survivor in that fight, do you know? And is it going to be a priority for you, to go and deliver that information? Who would you tell it to?
Well yes, if every creature your party comes into contact with are barely sentient isolationists, sure. Strange world but you are within your right to build your world any way you want.
The Norse did actually have written language, regardless of how much you may believe otherwise. So did the Greeks. However even with respect to cultures with solely verbal traditions, those cultures existed because people in them did talk with each other. There are a lot of misunderstandings about the past, particularly around the concept of 'barbarians,' who were typically labelled such either over cultures that were simply different or seen as less developed in some technological way (also, though more often than not over cultural differences).
And what part of the PHB, precisely, advises anyone, player or DM of troop strengths or casualty numbers? Why are you even mentioning such things in this context? (Although they were usually recorded nonetheless. Even 'barbarians' built cairns or other grave markers).
Are we just talking past one another here?
A. It's not my setting, it's the Storm King's Thunder module from WotC. Not sure where you're getting "barely sentient" from.
B. Did I imply the Norse didn't write? I'm not here for a history lesson. The span of time between the ancient Norse societies and today renders the comparison you were making absurd. You're trying to compare it to the span of time between one part of a D&D campaign and the next. If, at your tables, it is a common occurrence for a handful of societies to rise and fall, a few world wars to occur, between when your party uses their cool trick for the first time and when they start to face opponents who have heard of said trick; then, and only then, will this comparison make sense.
C. My use of the word "barbarians" is just to reflect what they're literally called in the module. Uthgardt barbarians don't speak Common. They speak their own language. I think it's called Bothii.
D. I was referring to your Odin example. It's not important, but if you really want to know, the "you" in that scenario is the hypothetical NPC Bard.
I don't think that "Uthgardt speak their own language (called Bothii), which has no alphabet." necessarily means "Uthgardt don't also speak Common". The Uthgardt Shaman provided in the adventure confirms, since it lists "Bothii, Common" as languages.
Other than that, no idea what you two are arguing about !
Literally herding cats lol....
But yeah after that 100 ft that cat is just going to wander to a corner and lay down.
Even within the 100 ft, it is going to take a lot of effort from the owner to try and get the cat to do anything that it doesn't want to do!
I do think one of the issues might be people playing on VTTs. On Roll20 or whatever, when you send a familiar ahead to scout, it's a whole lot easier to just show the map for the next 100 feet then it is to keep it dark and try to narrate what the wee bestie is seeing and understanding.
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
Our DM has never had a problem where my familiars have been concerned.
Never underestimate how attached a wizard or in my case a sorcerer with ritual casting gets to their familiar. I've had two and I got very attached to them. So did the party. I know many wizards use them as disposable creatures but the DM gives mine personalities so we all hate it when they die even though we know I can bring it back when I have downtime. I play my character as getting very upset when my familiar "dies."
And don't underestimate how fun role play moments with the familiar can be. I once used my owl to try to distract an innkeeper (the ranger had snuck her bear inside and we were trying to get it outside unnoticed). The innkeeper ran after the owl with a broom and killed it. At the time my party thought my owl was a real bird. My character theatrically cried and the artificer used the death get free rooms and breakfast. Then the rest of the party decided to replace my bird. I was secretly recasting Find Familiar at the time. They all trooped out to find a bird, with the NPC traveling with us suggesting we get a goose. So the party went on a "wild goose chase." My character was touched by their concern. Then before we left, the innkeeper felt so guilty that he gave the inn to us. The artificer has a running gag about creating "Best Wester" style chain of inns, so we are always on the lookout for one. It was very funny and everyone got a chance in the spotlight.
As far as outshining other party members? Our ranger has done more to mess with encounters than my owl which can only communicate at 100 ft. It does so with pictures that can't always be interpreted. Sometimes it fails its perception checks (done with the owl stats, not mine). We had to a break a high level mage out of prison. I changed my raven into a rat intending to scout ahead. No go. The prison was surrounded by an anti-magic field. The DM played my familiar as being very upset it had to take the form of a rat and when changed back into a raven it sulked. A familiar can't pick a lot or check for traps. It doesn't get sneak attack. The rogue still has opportunities to shine. Resources can be scarce and not all towns have the components that I need - or there is only enough for one casting.
Also some of it depends on the DM. Being told that your familiar sees people doesn't mean those people are good or bad. Sometimes things are hidden underground so my owl doesn't see them. If you don't specifically ask it to scout it just does its thing. Sometimes I send my familiar to its planar pocket and forget about it until a party member suggests I send it ahead.
We are doing Icewind Dale right now and the owl hasn't been able to scout much because of snow, the darkness (dark vision only helps so much) hawks in the air, an enemy's familiar. Sometimes I get lucky and the familiar sees something but that just means the party comes in prepared and the DM doesn't get a surprise round. We still end up having the encounter (mostly because we get curious and go check it out anyway).
My point is that with a little creativity familiars can be a fun way to add levity to the campaign, they don't have to take anything away from rangers or rogues and they don't have to be a headache for the DM.
You have a lot of opinions here that Familiars are overpowered, but also opinions that if anything kills a Familiar more than once then it’s DM meta gaming… and simultaneously don’t consider the cost or time to re-casting this spell… and then consider a first level spell to be rare.
I don’t think any game I’ve played has ever needed any of these things to make Familiars balanced. It’s honestly never come up in any campaign I’ve played in - if you consider a normal environment and playing by the rules, Familiars fit smoothly into the game without any balance issues.
Flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters. As a DM, just decide if you're willing to deal with flyers at all, and if not, tell people they can't have Familiars that can fly. That will pretty much solve any and all problems.
Given that Familiars aren't all that good at opening doors, few underground defensive fortifications will allow for proper mapping with a toad or such.
Even if you do allow for flight, Owls aren't all that good with doors either.
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I'd like to also add a little context about the whole 100' distance thing.
When you're looking at a map provided in an adventure, 100' can seem like a long way because it covers a large amount of the provided map.
But, 100' is actually a very short distance. For comparison:
Olympic pool is ~150' in length.
Minimum soccer field width is ~150' (minimum length is 300').
On an American football field, the distance from the goal line to the 34 yard line is 102'.
Distance from home plate to first base in a regulation baseball field is 90'.
A regulation basketball court is ~92' long.
Staying within 100' of your scouting familiar while also remaining hidden from enemy sight is not a given. It's not good enough to just be invisible. You need to be silent, too. It's close enough that even small noises would be audible.
I never understood this - "flight of any kind can trivialize some kinds of encounters". Sure it can. So? Maybe as DMs we should stop building encounters where we want our PCs to follow the path exactly the way we laid it out. Or give our bad guys ranged weapons. Or actually use Earthbind. Or disrupt the concentration of the Spellcaster. I will never understand why we design things around a certain mechanic, instead of designing things regardless of the mechanic used.
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Is that how you design "regardless of the mechanic used?" With a spell that appears on zero monster spell lists as printed?
I couldn´t agree more. It perfectly summarizes my point: in order to keep the spell as it is, it seems that the solution chosen by the majority is to change the world. To extents I would feel quite embarrassed to use more than once, honestly (the chances of a random bird being attacked by another one on a given day are pretty close to zero, good luck using that twice, or most of the "solutions" given here for that matter, sorry if I seem too blunt).
If your world is wrapped in a neat bow and no part of it learns to react to their surroundings then yes, I could see how it would be much more difficult playing that way.
In the worlds I DM, Spellcasters learn spells according to their station, their ability, and according to the rules of their class and level. They don’t have cookie-cutter (mass produced) spellbooks.
And same with bad guys - they target familiars because once they discover that they exist and what they can do, they react like normal intelligent creatures would.
I don't know what kind of campaigns you're running, but in mine, bad guys don't usually have the time to learn new spells between the first time they meet the party, and the next time. Usually there isn't a next time at all.
On rare occasions, it makes sense for a caster to have already known and prepared Earthbind. One example was some druids whose ancestral enemies were famous for riding giant birds into battle. But in general, it's a pretty niche spell and I don't feel it makes sense for many NPCs to have it.
It's also not in the same source book as Find Familiar, and now we're getting into the question of whether it's acceptable to say one thing is balanced if and only if you buy another thing.
No one needs to personally encounter your adventurers to know of and/or learn about them. IRL we know of and about all kinds of people we’ll never personally meet. Fame, celebrity and infamy exist in D&D worlds unless you choose to exclude them, which seems a misguided choice at best. There is no 24 hour news cycle in D&D but there is the good, old-fashioned rumour mill. And bards. The more your party uses a certain tactic, the more likely it is that the world at large will be aware of it, the more likely NPC’s will be prepared to counter it.
I've never been convinced by this argument.
1. My monsters aren't listening to bards. My last campaign saw the PCs fighting giants, goblinoids, and barbarians, for the most part. Many of those guys can't even speak Common, let alone have the time or the interest to listen to wanderers. If my party is moving from one goblin camp to another and another, then sure, the goblins might send word, but actually they're moving from goblins to barbarians, and those groups have no reason to communicate. The only things they fought that had any chance of knowing about them were the two surveillance-network-running BBEGs. And this was a campaign where I added Renown rules!
2. PC experience moves faster than information. When you can reach level 5 in a week, but to reach Waterdeep takes two, well, there's a disconnect there.
3. Most fighting doesn't take place in public spaces, nor does it leave survivors. My PCs fight in dungeons. They fight in ancient ruins. On roads far from the eye of the local militia. And from none of those are any bards escaping to sell their warnings.
4. Even if there were runners, and even if the runners delivered their warnings to the right people, in time, and even if those people were inclined to listen, I just don't see someone registering the familiar as being worth mentioning.
News travels. Goblins, giants and barbarians might not speak to passers by and might not even speak common but they presumably talk amongst themselves. Why do we know of Hercules, Cuchulain or any number of other ancient heroes but no one should know of your heroes? We know Odin’s ravens were named Thought and Memory but your adventurers’ familiars are utterly inconsequential to every observation?
I don't know.
I live in a suburban area, and coyotes have killed all three of my cats over a 5 year period.
And yes, I know for sure they were killed by coyotes. My wife hired a goddamned tracker with sniffer dog to find the first one (FFS, like we could afford that!) and we found her bones. The second one I saw in the mouth of the coyote, running away with her. Her neck was broken, and she was already dead. The last one, the neighbors scared off the coyote hunting pair, but he died soon after from his wounds.
And that's in the suburbs. Out in the wilderness.. that's a whole other level.
Now, if we're going by "what's likely to happen if this were a movie/book" -- I agree that pets in movies/books don't get regularly attacked unless it's somehow a running gag or some other part of the story.
But in the real world, critters get eaten every day.
Or to put it another way: In a world that regularly puts apex predators in a position to eat the PCs, why are the familiars getting a pass?
You've ignored what I said with point 1. Yeah, they can talk amongst themselves. That won't accomplish anything.
Your mythic characters argument is so far from the point that I'm not even sure how to engage with it. I would ask you if you truly think people in "Odin's time," who would've been inclined to fight Odin if he ever showed up at their base, all knew the names of his ravens, but there are so many elements of absolute nonsense in that question, that it almost even distracts from the fact that any answer you could give would be raw speculation. But I digress. Why would you go from the specific, comprehensible examples of individuals delivering stories, to these nonspecific examples of stories propagating seemingly of their own volition? A story can't tell itself.
Maybe a more accurate comparison would be to ask if you know how many of the soldiers who fought in X town in our real world last month were injured. If someone was going to fight those soldiers, they'd probably want to know, because they can use that information to plan, but if you were a survivor in that fight, do you know? And is it going to be a priority for you, to go and deliver that information? Who would you tell it to?
Are we just talking past one another here?
A. It's not my setting, it's the Storm King's Thunder module from WotC. Not sure where you're getting "barely sentient" from.
B. Did I imply the Norse didn't write? I'm not here for a history lesson. The span of time between the ancient Norse societies and today renders the comparison you were making absurd. You're trying to compare it to the span of time between one part of a D&D campaign and the next. If, at your tables, it is a common occurrence for a handful of societies to rise and fall, a few world wars to occur, between when your party uses their cool trick for the first time and when they start to face opponents who have heard of said trick; then, and only then, will this comparison make sense.
C. My use of the word "barbarians" is just to reflect what they're literally called in the module. Uthgardt barbarians don't speak Common. They speak their own language. I think it's called Bothii.
D. I was referring to your Odin example. It's not important, but if you really want to know, the "you" in that scenario is the hypothetical NPC Bard.
I don't think that "Uthgardt speak their own language (called Bothii), which has no alphabet." necessarily means "Uthgardt don't also speak Common". The Uthgardt Shaman provided in the adventure confirms, since it lists "Bothii, Common" as languages.
Other than that, no idea what you two are arguing about !
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I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.