Beneficial bug with Spugnoir's familiar

Since I reinstalled ToE, with the latest and very cool NC patch, I have made 3 parties already. This party is my latest, and focuses on metamagic - thanks to Xavier's research now I know what & what not to do.
Those 2 earlier parties were a bit of a try-out, and I noticed that quite some fights in the moathouse were made a lot tougher. So finally, I found a use for the NPC's.

So, there I was, cleaning out the moathouse. Backed up with Elmo, Furnok & Spugnoir, we cleaned out that den of evil. Spuggy did not participate in the Lareth battle, I kept him as a back-up for whe exiting the moathouse - NG parties can expect to be ambushed

For a bit of extra zing (and Furnok being "tragically" killed), I let Spuggy summon a familiar: a cat. I let it roam free, so it could act in battle too. I did not really care whatever happened to those 3 anyhow- they were meant as distractions- so my heroes could live long and prosper.

The fight went really well, Spuggy charmed a bowmen brigand, his cat was even greater... It has 3 attacks!!! Killed a gnoll almost all by himself Anyhow, I hate to let good XP go to aste, so when battle was over, I shot the charmed brigand. Spuggy nor Elmo liked that very much, and took it up for the brigand...but not the cat. He stayed under my controll, and nibbled a fair bit of life off of Elmo. Anyhow, we won the battle, looted the corpses and went off to drink to our victory in the Welcome Wench. And then, when we safely arrived, the weird thing happened:



The cat had gained it's first adventurer level!
I'm now a proud owner of a cat with 1 lvl of Barbarian, which has gotten the full 12HP for its first level
I think I'm going to doubleclass it as a Barbarian/Rogue. Be prepared my enemies, be prepared!!! :cool2:

 

Wow. I never summon familiars because I thought they were just stuff you carry in your pack. Thanks for that info.

 

That is amazing!

Does the cat still keep it's cattish-properties (small size, extra attacks, etc)?

I would love to read/see a campaign about the cat's adventures...

 

A barbarian cat! Freak'n YES!

Does he howl when he rushes into battle? Does his hair stand up when he rages?

Can you still pet him? Did you name him?

 

A quick try-out battle...



Yes, still small, yes, still 3 attacks.

No, no howling, petting or hairs rising up. It uses the Jackal/wolf/dog sounds... it even looks more like a small wolf, to be honest.

 

Ahhh, so it's a Wolf Cat!

Are you sure it's not just a wolf disguised as a cat?

There is a rumor of a feline/canine bending faddish group of wolves. :twitch:

 

I think ShiningTed was the first to reduce the jackal/wolf down and call it a cat - pretty sure he used them as spawners in the KOTB Demo. I suspect cat familiars may therefore be a Co8 invention, maybe this is why they level up? I wonder if any other familiars do this as well...

 

Druid!? That means the cat can cast! :yikes:

(Summon Companion: Bear - Wild Shape: ...?)

 

How can it cast if it can't talk? Unless it uses silent spell for all of it's spells. Doesn't that add a level or two to each spell so designated though?

 

Well, whaddayaknow... I'm more of a carefull player as I think I am. Apparently, I saved after that oh-so-important fight, so yes, I have here the results for a druidic cat:



A familiar is an intelligent animal, and I would say that being good in the feline language works just as well as any other language for purposes of spellcasting
He also can summon an animal compagnon.
That's about as far as I wanted to go testing with the druidic cat, but as you can see, it's totally valid.

 

Mother of God.

Can we say a Chaotic Evil Halfling Ranger named Belkar Bitterleaf and his intrepid animal companion, Scruffy!?!

 

Maybe the Ranger is the Human Companion...

Of course cats can talk. Otherwise how could they communicate with us, their servants?

 

Sorry, but you have it wrong. Cats are food for my dogs.

 

I have a 180 lb dog and he is scared to death of one of our cats, but he loves the other one.

 

Well, knowing what Spuggy's cat can do, I would also become scared of cats
For the record, he's got now 2 lvls of Barbarian & 1 level of Rogue.
What I did notice is that there's not that many feats that will work. Gave him Dodge, and I will see if it can benefit from Weapon finesse, as that will probably become its next feat.
While that cat isn't so dangerous when there's no buffs on him, it becomes a whole other story as soon as Magic Fang, the bardic song and the rage kick in. And if it's flanking, well... Let's just say, you would not be surprised when you would hear a voice suddenly say "SUPER COMBOOOOO!!!". Being able to place 3 sneak attacks in full offense is nice - it has killed already quite some orcs, wolves, dire wolves & a warg. Goblins & kobolds too, but they don't count :cool2:

edit: backtracked a tiny bit, as it turned out that weapon finesse works, plus my cat gained more hp with the try-out level-up. Excellent