# Flavourful Familiars ___ Use these variant rules when you want a more narrative way to handle familiars at your table. A *flavourful familiar* does away with hit points, ability scores and modifiers, challenge ratings, and actions. It favours players and DMs that want a simple, customisable familiar that uses a singular stat block. ### Changes to the Find Familiar Spell The *find familiar* spell works as normal, but the familiar uses the following changes: * The familiar uses the *flavourful familiar* stat block below, and it has the Air, Land, or Water Only speed and features as appropriate for its animal form. * The familiar has an AC and passive Perception equal to<br>9 + the caster's Proficiency Bonus (PB). ___ > ## Flavourful Familiar > *Tiny celestial, fey, or fiend (your choice), unaligned* > ___ > - **Armour Class** 9 + PB (natural armour) > - **Speed (Air Only)** 10 ft., fly 50 ft. > - **Speed (Land Only)** 40 ft., burrow or climb 10 ft. > - **Speed (Water Only)** 10 ft., swim 40 ft. > ___ > - **Skills** _______________ +PB, _______________ +PB > - **Senses** darkvision 30 ft., passive Perception 9 + PB > - **Languages** understands the languages you speak > ___ > ***Aquatic (Water Only).*** The familiar can breathe air and water, and while underwater, it has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on vibration. > > ***Flyby (Air Only).*** The familiar doesn't provoke opportunity attacks when it flies out of an enemy's reach. > > ***Keen Senses (Land Only).*** The familiar has advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight, hearing, or smell. > > ***Animal Form.*** The familiar is able to attempt any task that its animal form would be able to, with the consideration that your DM may ask for a skill check when it attempts a task with an uncertain outcome. > > ***Skill Focus.*** When summoned, the familiar becomes proficient in two skills of your choice—write them in the two blank spaces in the **Skills** section above. The familiar adds your Proficiency Bonus (PB) to any skill check it makes with skills it is proficient with, but uses a -2 modifier for all other checks and saves. > > ***Fragile Body.*** When the familiar takes any damage, it disappears, leaving behind no physical form. It reappears when you cast *find familiar* again. \columnbreak ### Running Flavourful Familiars Use common sense and logic to determine if a familiar's animal form would be able to perform a certain task or not. An owl or a raven familiar may be able to carry a coin or a staff more easily than a crab or a seahorse familiar could, but each would struggle to lift a full backpack. As always, everyone should work together to ensure that each player at the table (including the DM, because they are a player, too!) is having fun. Don't get too bogged down in rules and mechanics for these familiars—let the narrative lead. If all else fails, let the dice decide! ### Customising a Familiar or its Form As with any rules that streamline or simplify a process or an existing set of rules, this one stat block simply cannot cover every kind of animal form that a familiar could take. Work with your DM and use your common sense to find a happy middleground for your familiar's animal form. If you would like to further customise your familiar, adjust the *flavourful familiar* stat block in one of the following ways (keeping its animal form and capabilities in mind): * Trade 10 feet of one type of movement speed for 10 feet of another (such as giving it a speed of *30 ft., burrow 20 ft.*) * Give it a third skill proficiency (which will also add +PB) * Give it proficiency in one kind of saving throw * Increase the range of its darkvision from 30 ft. to 60 ft. * Give it blindsight (or even tremorsense, for familiars that prefer underground environments) instead of darkvision ### Pact of the Chain Warlocks In the situation where a Pact of the Chain Warlock wants their familiar to be able to attack, feel free to add an Attack action to the *flavourful familiar* stat block from the animal form's stat block as appropriate. ### Changes from Simple Familiars These rules are an iteration of my [Simple Familiar](https://www.reddit.com/r/DnDHomebrew/comments/klgbz5/its_time_to_run_some_familiars_without_hit_points/) rules. Taking on board the various points of feedback I received from Reddit users and other sources, I made these changes: * AC and passive Perception decreased to 9 + PB to more closely match those of existing familiar animal forms * Added darkvision to more closely match what is common for the existing familiar animal forms * Adjusted the Air, Land, and Water Only speeds to be more flavourful and specialised * Replaced the Water Only *amphibious* feature with *aquatic* to give underwater animal forms a bit of a boost * Replaced the Land Only *keen smell* feature with *keen senses* to give terrestrial animal forms a bit of a boost * Added a customisation section to guide players and DMs that want familiars with more specialised animal forms * Made various other quality-of-life additions <div class='pageNumber'>1</div> <div class='footnote'>/u/raspilicious<br>Flavourful Familiars v0.3</div>