D&D 5e Powergamer's Tactics Room Deep Dive Series: Advanced Familiar Tactics

[Bilbron]

Familiars abound, but few use them to their maximum advantage. Join us for this deep, DEEP dive into how to get the most out of your closest companion and ally!

Not gonna lie, this is the deepest analysis of this fundamental spell available online and is a MUST WATCH for all DMs and players.

25:30

https://youtu.be/gwqPPsAQIIQ

[Ir0ns0ul]

I really liked the video and the content. Once again, great advices. It’s clear Adelina is having a lot of fun with that, hahah.

I love when I see kids having a great time with their parents with things like TTRPG, D&D and etc.

Worth mentioning that Abjurers can effectively protect their Familiars, specially when your Owl is spitting fire all over the battlefield.

[Bilbron]

I really liked the video and the content. Once again, great advices. It’s clear Adelina is having a lot of fun with that, hahah.

I love when I see kids having a great time with their parents with things like TTRPG, D&D and etc.

Worth mentioning that Abjurers can effectively protect their Familiars, specially when your Owl is spitting fire all over the battlefield.

Nice defense that I hadn't thought of! Not really enamored of the Abjurer and never played with one, but that would be a darned good use of Arcane Ward.

[Greywander]

Good video, I'm a big fan Pact of the Chain, so I'm looking forward to seeing you expand on some of the things a chainlock can pull off.

A couple minor nitpicks:

• You say familiars don't need to sleep (when you talk about them guarding during the night). I don't believe this is true; they have the same biological needs as whatever form they take, so you'd need to give your familiar a form that doesn't require sleep for this to be true. And IIRC, even the chainlock familiars all still require sleep (as well as air, food, and drink).
• This one is DM dependent, but the optional rule for potion miscibility makes it a bad idea to binge on potions. I don't have the rules in front of me, but IIRC the gist is that if you drink two potions within a certain time frame, then they'll mix together in your stomach and cause an unpredictable effect. You could negate one of the potions, enhance one of the potions, make one of the effects permanent, or explode.
• A lot of the things you suggest do seem like they might require hands. Since I've looked into creating playable animal characters, my own rule of thumb is that creatures without hands can by default use whatever anatomy they have to approximate a single hand, allowing you to use items and tools and such. But that's for a PC beast, where that kind of utility is required in order to be an effective PC. This one is highly DM dependent. You do allude to this, but I feel you might be overestimating how permissive a DM might be.
• Magic item attunement is something that raises a lot of questions. From what I've heard, the rules for AL say that your familiar uses your own attunement slots if it attunes to magic items. Non-AL tables are free to rule differently, and I don't see anything in the PHB that says that a familiar uses your own slots, so YMMV, but it's something to be aware of.

There was one more possible use I thought of during the video. When you were talking about perceiving through your familiar's senses and how you couldn't cast a spell because they'd both take an action and your perception through your familiar would wear off, a way this could be circumvented is with the Quickened Spell metamagic. Use your action to see through your familiar, then quicken a spell to cast it using your familiar's senses to target. This could get especially effective on a chainlock with unlimited range on their familiar. Oh, and you can pick up the metamagic without needing to dip into sorcerer now (though a sorcerer dip is still a better way to do it, since you'd only get one quickened spell per long rest otherwise).

On the subject of abjurers, they make a good "default wizard subclass". It doesn't really pigeonhole you into any particular niche (in the way that, say, an evoker forces you into blasting), and the features it gives you are guarantied to come in handy regularly. If someone is ever unsure which wizard subclass to play, abjurers are a decent choice.

[sophontteks]

Good video, I'm a big fan Pact of the Chain, so I'm looking forward to seeing you expand on some of the things a chainlock can pull off.

A couple minor nitpicks:
[LIST][*]You say familiars don't need to sleep (when you talk about them guarding during the night). I don't believe this is true; they have the same biological needs as whatever form they take, so you'd need to give your familiar a form that doesn't require sleep for this to be true. And IIRC, even the chainlock familiars all still require sleep (as well as air, food, and drink).

Fiends and fey do not sleep. Familiars are all celestials, fey, or fiends. I guess you could rule that one inside a beast may have to, but imps and sprites definitely do not sleep.

[Bilbron]

Good video, I'm a big fan Pact of the Chain, so I'm looking forward to seeing you expand on some of the things a chainlock can pull off.

A couple minor nitpicks:

• You say familiars don't need to sleep (when you talk about them guarding during the night). I don't believe this is true; they have the same biological needs as whatever form they take, so you'd need to give your familiar a form that doesn't require sleep for this to be true. And IIRC, even the chainlock familiars all still require sleep (as well as air, food, and drink).
• This one is DM dependent, but the optional rule for potion miscibility makes it a bad idea to binge on potions. I don't have the rules in front of me, but IIRC the gist is that if you drink two potions within a certain time frame, then they'll mix together in your stomach and cause an unpredictable effect. You could negate one of the potions, enhance one of the potions, make one of the effects permanent, or explode.
• A lot of the things you suggest do seem like they might require hands. Since I've looked into creating playable animal characters, my own rule of thumb is that creatures without hands can by default use whatever anatomy they have to approximate a single hand, allowing you to use items and tools and such. But that's for a PC beast, where that kind of utility is required in order to be an effective PC. This one is highly DM dependent. You do allude to this, but I feel you might be overestimating how permissive a DM might be.
• Magic item attunement is something that raises a lot of questions. From what I've heard, the rules for AL say that your familiar uses your own attunement slots if it attunes to magic items. Non-AL tables are free to rule differently, and I don't see anything in the PHB that says that a familiar uses your own slots, so YMMV, but it's something to be aware of.

There was one more possible use I thought of during the video. When you were talking about perceiving through your familiar's senses and how you couldn't cast a spell because they'd both take an action and your perception through your familiar would wear off, a way this could be circumvented is with the Quickened Spell metamagic. Use your action to see through your familiar, then quicken a spell to cast it using your familiar's senses to target. This could get especially effective on a chainlock with unlimited range on their familiar. Oh, and you can pick up the metamagic without needing to dip into sorcerer now (though a sorcerer dip is still a better way to do it, since you'd only get one quickened spell per long rest otherwise).

On the subject of abjurers, they make a good "default wizard subclass". It doesn't really pigeonhole you into any particular niche (in the way that, say, an evoker forces you into blasting), and the features it gives you are guarantied to come in handy regularly. If someone is ever unsure which wizard subclass to play, abjurers are a decent choice.

Thanks!

I suppose you could rule that they need sleep, I just assumed so since they are spirits and that's how it's run in my campaign. Still one more body for the rotation!

That's a pretty lame ruling from a punative DM, IMO, but even so RAW it only happens so long as you're "under the effects" of a potion then drink another. It seems to me that one could still drink a Potion of Healing every round with no trouble, but this would certainly put some limits on the tactic.

The hands thing is controversial, I know. I'd try to convince the DM as per my examples in the video, especially in regards to the birds, as they have pretty fine motor abilities with their claws (see any video about nesting). If not, I'd go with Flying Monkey for hands. If he balks at even that, then I'd just do the same things with a Tiny Servant (already roll with 10x of these and keep 5x in reserve in my backpack most times, so they can apply potions and such as well. And since a DM knows that I'd bypass his attempts at a nerf with superior tactics/cleverness and that he'd have to go to ridiculous lengths to deny me, I trust he'd be reasonable. I don't tend to play with unreasonable DMs, personally.

Regarding attunement, AL rules is a deviation from RAW, for which I supplied support from a Sage Advice ruling. I also watched the Dungeon Dudes video on familiars where they say they'd rule similarly for sake of "balance", so I can see that it's ruled this way at least sometimes. Personally such heavy handed rules alterations (not interpretations, just outright changes to screw me) just piss me off, and as a response I will stop holding back, because guess what, I can break any game but I usually don't because I'm a cool dude who wants everyone to have fun. But if a DM screws with me, I open up the tool kit a little. For example, my DM recently nerfed Misty Step (can't break Evard's Black Tentacles) so I just told him "fine, but I'm gonna start memorizing and using Rope Trick, which I hadn't been using out of respect for the game because I think it's OP, but if that's how you wanna play with me..."

Love the Quicken idea... definitely getting Metamagic Adept at my next feat.

I think Abjurers are all right, and I agree that it's a decent "starter and no research" subdomain, but even as a defensive-oriented player, I don't much like their suite of powers as a whole. But I guess that's true for all of them except for Chronurgist (I hate half the Divination and War powers, Illusion sucks until high levels that no one ever plays, Scribe wizards have blasting abilities and I already have Invoke Duplicity so useless to me even though Manifest Mind is pretty sweet, and while I love all 4 Enchanter powers the ubiquitous immunity/resistance to Charm takes the steam out of that subdomain. I will say Conjuration is sneaky good because Minor Conjuration can create total cover at will)

[Greywander]

Fiends and fey do not sleep. Familiars are all celestials, fey, or fiends. I guess you could rule that one inside a beast may have to, but imps and sprites definitely do not sleep.

Citation needed. Is it possible you might be thinking of an older edition? IIRC, in 3.x each creature type had its own set of traits that then applied to any creature with that type. In 5e, this doesn't exist. Instead, traits are given to each individual creature in their stat block. For example, you'd think most undead would be immune to poison and exhaustion and not require air, food, drink, or sleep. And most don't. But zombies aren't immune to exhaustion, and neither are vampires. In fact, vampires aren't immune or even resistant to poison, and they only don't require air; they still need food, drink, and sleep!

In 5e, creature type, by itself, does absolutely nothing. Nothing happens if you are X, Y, or Z creature type. You don't get any new traits, you don't get any bonuses or penalties, nothing. Now, what does change is how certain abilities (spells, class features, magic items, etc.) interact with you. However, there's nothing about being, say, a fiend or undead that makes Detect Evil and Good interact with you different, by which I mean this isn't a trait of the creature type itself, but rather, it is a property of the spell that causes it to interact differently. There's nothing about being undead that makes you susceptible to detection magic, rather, the spell is simply designed to detect undead.

The point is that it's a mistake to assume that creatures of the same type have or share a certain trait. If they have that trait, it will be written into their stat block. Let's look at your assertion that fiends don't require sleep. Please direct your eyes to page 54 of the Monster Manual, and look at the Shadow Demon entry. Specifically, the "Shadowy Nature" trait. Shadow demons don't require air, food, drink, or sleep. Shadow demons, specifically, are exempt from these. Now look at all the other demon types. Flip over to the devils while you're at it. Notice that none of them have a similar trait exempting them from the requirements for air, food, drink, and/or sleep. (The same is true for the sprite, by the way.)

Is it possible this was an oversight? Maybe, but I don't think so. Given that they gave the shadow demon a trait to exempt them from those needs, it seems to have been done on purpose. You are, of course, free to run it differently at your table if you are the DM, but by default, all creatures (including celestials, fey, and fiends) require air, food, drink, and sleep, unless they have a trait in their stat block that says otherwise.

This might seem nitpicky or rules-lawyery, this is important for this reason: If a player comes to their DM with something they read on the internet, it generally works out a lot better if the DM has to respond with, "well that's what the rules say, but at my table we do it differently," rather than, "what? no, that's not in the rules, where did you even get that idea?" It's fine to inform a player about common but non-RAW rulings, but it's important to be up front that they aren't RAW, and that they need to check in with their DM before assuming that it will be run that way. If you were to pick a rule at random, then the overwhelming majority of the time a given table will be running that rule as written in the book, so it's better to start with the assumption of using RAW, then offer non-RAW options as possible alternatives pending DM approval. If that table is already using houserules, then the onus is on the player asking for help to inform the internet about those houserules.

Thanks!

I suppose you could rule that they need sleep, I just assumed so since they are spirits and that's how it's run in my campaign. Still one more body for the rotation!

See my above reply to sophontteks. Nothing in the Find Familiar spell description says they don't need sleep. They use the stats of whatever form you give them, which could potentially include an ability that says they don't require air, food, drink, or sleep. None of the currently available familiar options have such an ability, that I'm aware of. If they did, it would be part of their stat block and would thus apply. Again, by default, assume that a creature requires these basic biological needs unless their stat block says otherwise. And again, you can run it differently at your table, but if you're giving out player advice, it's easier to start with assuming RAW and then offering non-RAW alternatives if they can get DM approval.

And yes, I realize that these traits are often found in the creature's description, and not in their literal stat block. However, the intent seems to be the same, either way.

But yeah, they can take their turn standing watch, and in any case most tables will probably handwave a familiar's biological needs unless you're in a survival situation.

That's a pretty lame ruling from a punative DM, IMO, but even so RAW it only happens so long as you're "under the effects" of a potion then drink another. It seems to me that one could still drink a Potion of Healing every round with no trouble, but this would certainly put some limits on the tactic.

Lame, or awesome. No one is going to complain if you accidentally make a Potion of Giant Strength permanent, or if the BBEG spontaneously combusts after downing one too many potions. There's a reason this is an optional rule, not everyone will want to play it this way. But optional rules like these can make games more interesting. It's more just one of those things that you should be aware of; it's worth checking in with your DM before downing that second potion, just to avoid any fun surprises.

If you are using potion miscibility, then Mage Hand is your friend. Mix potions from outside the blast radius, and if it doesn't explode, you can drink it to see if you got something good. IIRC, it's a 1 in 100 chance to get a permanent effect, though, so you'll need to mix a lot of potions to get some permanent buffs.

The hands thing is controversial, I know...

Yeah, again it's one of those "ask your DM before you just assume" type of things. If you're lucky, they'll allow it (but might have enemies also make use of it, so beware), but it seems a safer option to assume it won't be allowed (this way you're either pleasantly surprised or get exactly what you expected). It's not fun to find out mid-game that a key part of your build/playstyle isn't going to work the way you thought.

As far as I'm aware, there is no RAW regarding creatures without hands doing tasks that normally require hands. This one is entirely DM fiat. Which is probably why it's controversial; no matter how your DM rules, either way it's a houserule with no support from RAW.

Regarding attunement, AL rules is a deviation from RAW, for which I supplied support from a Sage Advice ruling...

I agree with you that it is incredibly frustrating when a DM just nerfs something for no reason because it feels "too strong". I've heard a horror story or two about rogues and paladins that weren't allows to Sneak Attack or Smite because their DMs thought it was OP.

I do feel like this is a little different, though. It's not like the ability for your familiar to attune to magic items is written into your class features. It's one of those things where someone had a sudden epiphany of "hey, what's stopping my familiar from attuning to magic items?" And actually, I feel like that's something that WotC didn't think of either. At the end of the day, I feel like the real question is if it makes the game more or less enjoyable for the rest of the table. Is the wizard/chainlock outshining everyone else because of their pimped out familiar? If so, you might consider using the AL ruling. But as written, nothing seems to stop a familiar from attuning to magic items.

Now the real question is, what's stopping your familiar from gaining class levels?

Love the Quicken idea... definitely getting Metamagic Adept at my next feat.

I really wish they were explicit on which spells required line of effect. A lot of spells specify when they require line of sight, but it's not always clear if you can cast the spell through solid objects (I believe anything that uses an attack roll is line of effect, since it would be affected by cover). I'm sure there are some pretty killer combos, though. Being able to send your familiar in under the door and then cast a spell through the wall could be extremely effective. It's unfortunate that the feat only lets you do it once per long rest, though.

I think Abjurers are all right, and I agree that it's a decent "starter and no research" subdomain, but even as a defensive-oriented player, I don't much like their suite of powers as a whole. But I guess that's true for all of them except for Chronurgist (I hate half the Divination and War powers, Illusion sucks until high levels that no one ever plays, Scribe wizards have blasting abilities and I already have Invoke Duplicity so useless to me even though Manifest Mind is pretty sweet, and while I love all 4 Enchanter powers the ubiquitous immunity/resistance to Charm takes the steam out of that subdomain. I will say Conjuration is sneaky good because Minor Conjuration can create total cover at will)

Fortunately, the wizard chassis is extremely solid, and you could still be a fully functional character even without a subclass. The spells you learn/prepare probably have a greater effect on you than your subclass does. I also really like Minor Conjuration, but I'm not super interested in playing a summoner. I did play a conjurer in a one shot recently, but only because our levels were low enough that I didn't have any of the summon-boosting features.

Where the abjurer really shines is as an anti-mage. Their advantage on saves vs. spells and resistance to spell damage make them very strong in duels with another caster. But the thing is that an enemy mage can be a danger not just to you, but to your whole party. This is where the buff to Dispel Magic and Counterspell comes into play. Not only are you much more resilient against spells, but you can remove all of an enemy mage's buffs, and then just deny them from casting any more spells. It's true that mages tend to be rare, depending on the setting/campaign/module, but a competently run mage can really wreck the party. So if you're not fighting a lot of mages, then abjurer probably seems a bit lackluster.

Something like an evoker might be "more useful", in the sense that you would actually use your subclass features more often; my personal feeling is just that there's almost always a more effective spell you could be casting other than a blast spell. The exception would be if you're dealing with a horde of mooks, in which case a good AoE to clear them out will help your party more than any of your control spells.

I think Divination is alright. It's another good "default subclass" if someone doesn't know what to play. Portent is a good ability. If I had a criticism for this subclass, it would be that it's a bit dry. It's mechanically strong but not as interesting. It doesn't let you do much that you couldn't do before, it just makes you better at doing things you could already do (abjurer is kind of the same, I suppose). Features like Minor Conjuration or Illusory Reality are more interesting to me.

Anyway, I'm not going to go through every wizard subclass, there are too many! And that risks derailing the thread, as well.

[Bilbron]

1. [Potion Mixing] Lame, or awesome.

2. As far as I'm aware, there is no RAW regarding creatures without hands doing tasks that normally require hands. This one is entirely DM fiat. Which is probably why it's controversial; no matter how your DM rules, either way it's a houserule with no support from RAW.

3. I do feel like this is a little different, though. It's not like the ability for your familiar to attune to magic items is written into your class features. It's one of those things where someone had a sudden epiphany of "hey, what's stopping my familiar from attuning to magic items?" And actually, I feel like that's something that WotC didn't think of either.

4. I really wish they were explicit on which spells required line of effect. A lot of spells specify when they require line of sight, but it's not always clear if you can cast the spell through solid objects (I believe anything that uses an attack roll is line of effect, since it would be affected by cover). I'm sure there are some pretty killer combos, though. Being able to send your familiar in under the door and then cast a spell through the wall could be extremely effective. It's unfortunate that the feat only lets you do it once per long rest, though.

5. my personal feeling is just that there's almost always a more effective spell you could be casting other than a blast spell.

6. I think Divination is alright. It's another good "default subclass" if someone doesn't know what to play. Portent is a good ability. If I had a criticism for this subclass, it would be that it's a bit dry. It's mechanically strong but not as interesting. It doesn't let you do much that you couldn't do before, it just makes you better at doing things you could already do (abjurer is kind of the same, I suppose). Features like Minor Conjuration or Illusory Reality are more interesting to me.

1. Honestly, it seems like powergaming is enabled more with that variant rule, with the permanency thing and such nuanced tactics as you described. Either way, I'll adapt and make the ruling work to my advantage.

2. The RAW are always as follows: "the creature can use an action/bonus action/reaction to do X"; and "familiars are creatures that can perform any action except the Attack action." So, as I see it, RAW your familiar can do any action that does X, and deviation from this is homebrew. People tend to forget that this is a game with simplified rules, and not real life, and can thus be prone to overthinking.

3. Yet they support the interpretation in the Sage Advice ruling I put on the screen during the video, and AL rules are IMO clearly a deviation from RAW and RAI. In any case, I personally don't have anything attuned to my familiar (I have to attune to the Spell Gem which my familiar uses, though of course once I fill it I reattune to a different combat item), because the DM hasn't given me anything I can reasonably attune to him. Which reminds me that a DM who complains about this sort of thing has really just shot himself in his own foot.

4. I think it's very clear that the RAW prohibit all spell effects without line of effect, except teleportation (hence the name).

5. 100% agreed... I hate blasts and think they are so low ROI and high opportunity cost, considering damage is easily generated with totally renewable resources (as per my Offense video: https://youtu.be/SjBpQ8KUhuw).

6. Also 100% agreed... Diviner seemed so boring with all the oomph occuring right at 2nd level and never getting any better. Chronurgy is obviously the best now, but for 2nd I still lean Enchanter considering all 20 levels.

[MaxWilson]

I really wish they were explicit on which spells required line of effect. A lot of spells specify when they require line of sight, but it's not always clear if you can cast the spell through solid objects (I believe anything that uses an attack roll is line of effect, since it would be affected by cover). I'm sure there are some pretty killer combos, though. Being able to send your familiar in under the door and then cast a spell through the wall could be extremely effective. It's unfortunate that the feat only lets you do it once per long rest, though.

You could always acquire Beast Sense (there are several ways) so you could see without expending an action. Or just learn Clairvoyance.

However, I think that only helps with Touch spells, because those explicitly are enabled by your familiar. Any other spells are blocked by total cover (cannot be cast through solid objects) according to the Spellcasting rules in the PHB.

Where the abjurer really shines is as an anti-mage. Their advantage on saves vs. spells and resistance to spell damage make them very strong in duels with another caster. But the thing is that an enemy mage can be a danger not just to you, but to your whole party. This is where the buff to Dispel Magic and Counterspell comes into play. Not only are you much more resilient against spells, but you can remove all of an enemy mage's buffs, and then just deny them from casting any more spells. It's true that mages tend to be rare, depending on the setting/campaign/module, but a competently run mage can really wreck the party. So if you're not fighting a lot of mages, then abjurer probably seems a bit lackluster.

IME Counterspell tends to be more spell-slot-limited and reaction-limited than ability-check limited. I.e. the Abjuror has no particular advantage at Counterspelling. Dispel Magic, slightly moreso, but only after 10th level. It's about as impactful as a Bardic Inspiration die.

In other words, I disagree that Abjurors are remarkably good at anti-magery. You'll have to make the same hard choices as any other mage about whether to Counterspell this Lightning Bolt from a Spirit Naga, or save the spell slot for later and just heal the damage; whether to upcast Counterspell VI against a Mummy Lord's Hold Person VI, or use a regular Counterspell VI and pray that it works (lest the Mummy Lord auto-crit you into oblivion); whether to Counterspell or Shield or Absorb Elements when fighting mixed foes.

Abjurors sink an awful lot of their subclass power into Arcane Ward, and IMO Arcane Ward is not great. Twilight Clerics make it look even worse (because Twilight clerics are as broken as Shepherd Druids). I'd rather be an illusionist trying to use Seeming to make those mages and Spirit Nages and Mummy Lords cast the wrong spells against the party because we're all disguised as Eladrin (fey) or skeleton mages (undead) or vampires (also undead) or star spawns (aberrations) or whatever type of monster the enemy happens to be (the Mummy Lord's own mummies attacking it). Failing that, be a Necromancer and just hammer things flat with a metric ton of skeleton archers, or an Enchanter or Diviner with a bunch of minions. Not a fan of abjurors.

I think Divination is alright. It's another good "default subclass" if someone doesn't know what to play. Portent is a good ability. If I had a criticism for this subclass, it would be that it's a bit dry. It's mechanically strong but not as interesting. It doesn't let you do much that you couldn't do before, it just makes you better at doing things you could already do (abjurer is kind of the same, I suppose). Features like Minor Conjuration or Illusory Reality are more interesting to me.

The best way I know of to use a Diviner is Wish (Planar Binding) during combat with a big scary elemental/fiend/fey (without legendary resistance, or after Legendary Resistance is depleted). Portent ensures that the Wish won't be wasted, and also effectively negates Magic Resistance (advantage is irrelevant if you are just going to override the die roll). Now that Marilith or Red Abishai is fighting for you instead of against you. If you don't have a low Portent die today, obviously don't use this combo.

Enchanters can do the equivalent by capturing the fiend with Hypnotic Gaze and holding it hypnotized until someone can Planar Bind it.