Welcome one and all, to Ekko's Exotic Elementals Emporium! Here at E4, we boast a tremendous selection of familiars and companions for arcanists of all varieties. So, if you need a talking skull, a canny magpie, or a handy homunculus, you've come to the right place! Our trained experts will even help you pick out a companion that best complements your magic and personality. To simplify your browsing, they have devised this rating system:
Sky Blue names indicate some of the rarest and most valuable familiars we have. If you want a top-notch familiar, this is a good place to shop. Blue names denote good choices. They're worth looking at, because if you can't find what you're looking for in sky blue, odds are blue will have it. Black labels are pretty standard material. They can shine in niches, but are generally overshadowed by the shades of blue. Purple tags are generally sub-par. A very specialized arcanist might be able to use one, but most discerning mages will pass them by. Red names are to be avoided. We sell them only for those who are just in it for looks and not function. I guarantee you, there's a better choice out there.
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Now, step this way and follow me to the display cases!
**NOTE: All Arcane Power familiars are heroic tier familiars.**
Bat: If you're going into a cave, dealing with drow, or simply need to know if someone's sneaking up on you, you want a bat. Their blindsight lets them notice and warn you of hidden or invisible foes and obstacles, which is a great benefit by itself. Better yet, their Active Benefit lets you negate concealment for your attacks, making you the bane of lurkers everywhere. An excellent choice. Book Imp: A book imp can be helpful if you need a sneaky familiar, because it can turn invisible, but it can't stray more than a hundred feet from you. It gives fire resistance, but other, more useful, familiars do too. I recommend passing on the imp - there are much better familiars that fill its roles. Bound Demon: Unlike it's imp cousin, the bound demon is pretty handy, if only for its active benefit, which gives you a fair amount of temporary hit points when you hit a bloodied foe. The demon is slow though, so getting it near your enemy can be difficult. Cat: Cats are very sneaky, and have absolutely no range limit, so they make good spies. Unfortunately, there is currently no way that you can communicate with or direct a cat when you aren't near it, so this use is limited. They let you reduce falling damage even if you're not trained in Acrobatics, which is nice, but not nice enough to give these creature a better rating. Crafter Homunculus: If you took Alchemist instead of Ritual Caster, a crafter homunculus is pretty helpful, because that -1 to defenses is always very handy. They're completely useless if you don't create and use alchemical items often, and if you only use them occasionally, you should look at other options that are more generally useful. Alchemical items aren't that great anyways, so this has even more limited use. Dragonling: Dragon familiars are highly prized, and for good reason. They give a nice bonus to your healing surge value, which would make them worthwhile by itself. Even better, you can use a close blast from your dragonling's square instead of yours, making this a great choice for close-range arcanists like Hexhammers, Valor bards, and sorcerers. Falcon: Falcons don't look like much at first glance - a 40-square range limit isn't impressive, and using a falcon to make a ranged attack is merely OK. A second look reveals that it gives you a handy +2 to all defenses against OAs, meaning that if you need to make ranged attacks in melee range, a falcon is a wonderful choice. If you just need to move around a lot, they're still a good pick. They also make great scouts, because they can fly out of normal arrow range while taking an aerial look around. Owl: Owls are scouts, and they are unique amongst the scout familiars because of how they work. As a standard action, and at-will, you can see through the owl's eyes for a round, but it only works for noticing creatures, not attacking. If you want to know what's around a corner, or get a look over a wall, they're useful, but the randomness of their Perception bonus makes other scouts more reliable. Rat: A rat familiar is basically a pocket rogue. It gives you a +2 bonus to Stealth and has it's own +5 on top of it, and it can make Thievery checks with a +2 bonus. A very good choice if you want to pick locks or steal things without needing training. Its versatility makes it a great Thievery-using familiar, as marmosets and magpies can only use one portion of the skill each, although they are better at their roles than the rat is. Raven: Ravens are really cool familiars. Unfortunately, that's about it. Their skill bonus is very situational, and their active feature simply lets them talk. Great for RP, but not for mechanics. Serpent: Serpents are good if you need to be mobile. They let you ignore some difficult terrain while shifting, and can stop enemies from making OAs. There isn't much else, so you might want to look at a falcon, which also helps you avoid OAs, but is overall more useful. Spider: The spider is, interestingly, better for cold mages than poison mages. All enemies take a -1 penalty to saves against slow or immobilize effects, even if your spider is in passive mode, and in active mode, it can drag objects as a minor action. Helpful, but you have better options than your familiar for giving save penalties.
Arcane Eye: The arcane eye lets you make one ranged attack per encounter from its space, which also ignores concealment. A falcon is probably a better choice, as the +2 vs OAs is much better than the +2 to Scrying rituals. Badger: If you spend a lot of time bloodied (either by choice or not), you want a badger. An untyped +1/tier bonus to damage while bloodied is very handy indeed. As an extra bonus, you can sacrifice your badger to reduce damage you take by your Con modifier, which comes in nice to keep you alive if being bloodied all the time becomes a problem. Canine Construct: The canine construct is a great defensive familiar. It gives you resist melee and ranged 1/tier while your adjacent to the construct. That's about it, but it's a great feature. Disembodied Hand: A lot of people have heard about our hand familiar and its higher-tier cousins, and for good reasons. It lets you draw or stow an item as a free action, which is always useful and, for some builds, essential. It can, as an added bonus, do anything a floating hand should be able to do, like open doors and make Thievery checks. Fire Lizard: This is a handy familiar if you're a fire sorcerer or going to fight a lot of fire creatures. It beats out the book imp for fire resistance, because it adds an extra 2 resistance while you're bloodied, as well as more useful skill bonuses. Lightning Lizard: This lizard is a fire lizard, but for lightning. Same stuff here. Ooze: The ooze is basically an "acid lizard," but instead of being immune to acid, it can squeeze through 1/2 inch gaps. Pretty basic, but helpful if you cast acid spells a lot. Parrot: A parrot is basically a raven, but with more useful skill bonuses. Still not worth taking apart from RP reasons. Rootling: The rootling gives you forestwalk, which is nice, but there's not much else here. It's sneaky and can climb, but can't *do* anything with those movement options. Pass on this. Scout Homunculus: A scout homunculus is a cat with less useful passive benefits, but is better at hiding. It has all the same problems, so it's not useful right now. Skull: The only notable bonus here is the +2 bonus to one attack roll with an arcane fear power per encounter. It's nice, but it requires the slow-moving skull to be adjacent to the target, which might be hard to manage. Toad: Toads give you a flat +2 to your healing surge value. This is better than the dragonling's bonus for all of Heroic tier, and better in epic and paragon if you ever spend more than one healing surge at a time. It also can give an ally some bonus healing when they spend a surge. If you want extra healing with some offense, take a dragonling, but take a toad if you don't need to move a close blast power (for example, if you're a bard). Weasel: The weasel is very sneaky and very hard to hit with OAs. Unfortunately, there's not much that a weasel can do in active mode, so those benefits are moot. It can scout, but it lacks any major benefit over other scouts like the owl.
""Familiars by Artifice" Heroic Tier Familiars"Show
Bantam Fastieth: One of the best mobility familiars around. This little raptor gives you a constant +1 boost to speed if you run or jump, and if it's adjacent to you when active, you get a +2 boost to speed. Even better, whenever you use a move action, it gets to move too, so you can always have that +2 speed boost. It doesn't let you avoid OAs for that movement, but it's still a good choice. Bloodthorn Vine Barb: The Vine Barb gives you forestwalk, which is situationally useful, but it's main feature is the 3/tier temporary hit points you can get when you hit a foe adjacent to the Vine Barb once per encounter. It's less than the 1d8/tier from the Bound Demon, but doesn't require a bloodied foe. They're closely matched, but I prefer the Demon. Clockwork Scorpion: The Scorpion is a handy familiar for everyone because of its tremorsense, which prevents any non-flying enemies from sneaking up on you. The main feature, though, lets you store a poison or alchemical oil in the Scorpion and use it when someone attacks an enemy adjacent to the Scorpion. This has situational usefulness - it's either useless or wonderful, depending on how much your party crafts or finds alchemical items. Lastly, the +2 bonus to grab checks isn't much use to an arcane character, but a garrote rogue might want to MC into an arcane class to pick it up for the handy boost. A good choice, maybe a great one depending on your campaign. Dragonmark Reflection: If you want to churn out alchemical items, this may be the best choice of a familiar. It lets you craft items 1 level higher than usual. If you're an artificer, that makes a total of 3 extra levels, and you'll want to be an artificer, because its active ability increases the amount of healing or temporary hitpoints your healing infusions do. Not much use to anyone else, though. Floating Weapon: The floating weapon is nice for a swordmage or other melee combatant - it lets you shift 1 square whenever you hit an enemy next to the weapon. It's also harder to destroy because of its +2 bonus to all defenses. A solid choice. Gadfly: The gadfly is only useful for summoners, and is then outclassed by the Summoner Homunculus and Tome Caddy. It simply gives your summoned allies a +2 bonus to opportunity attacks, which is nice, but not enough to compete with the other choices. Magpie: The magpie is one of the three thievery specialists, giving you a +2 bonus to Theivery, as well as being able to make slight of hand and pick pockets itself with an extra +2 bonus. If you need to filch something from an enemy, the magpie is a good choice, but the rat outshines it with versatility. Marmoset: The marmoset is like the magpie, but for disabling traps and picking locks. It doesn't give you +2 Thievery, but it can use thieve's tools to get back to a +4. The marmoset is better for the Theivery checks it can make than the rat, but it isn't as stealthy or versatile. If you only need to pick locks or break traps, the marmoset passes the rat. Octopus: The octopus is interesting. It can't stay active for more than a round on dry land, but it lets you hold your breath for 6 minutes if your underwater. If you're running an aquatic campaign, this is a good choice, otherwise, skip it. Saddle Squire: The Saddle Squire is designed to work alongside a mounted character, giving your mount +1 speed and letting you mount or dismount as a minor action while the Squire is in active mode. Interestingly, you don't need to be near the mount, just the squire. Not much general use, but a Vadalis Griffonmaster might not mind the MC for it. Soarwood Wings: If you have a way to fly, the Soarwood wings let you fly an extra square. It also can fly a character 6 squares once per encounter. It's wonderful if you have a fly speed, but if you don't, or can't rely on having one, skip it. Summoner Homunculus: One of three familiars for summoners, but the gadfly isn't useful. This homunculus certainly is, giving your summons a +1 bonus to all defenses and to attack rolls if their adjacent to your familiar. An excellent choice if you need to summon things, but compare it to the Tome Caddy. Tome Caddy: The tome caddy gives you free proficiency in tomes, if you don't have it. Because wizards are the only arcane class that can summon, this isn't that useful unless you MCed from Invoker for a summoner's tome. The big draw here, though is the extra damage that your summoned creatures deal, which, when added to a Summoner's Tome and Tome of Binding makes your summons very dangerous. Lastly, the Tome Caddy lets you use a tome without needing to hold it, meaning you can wield two other implements, or an implement and a shield or weapon, and still be able to use your tome. I prefer it over the summoner homunculus, but they're very evenly matched. Warforged Faceplate: A very strange familiar. It gives you a nice bonus to saves against ongoing damage, but its main function only works while you're asleep. The faceplate will stay awake for you, letting you notice enemies or other events while you sleep. Not terribly useful, but very flavorful.
Air Mephit: The perfect companion for a storm sorcerer - it boosts your resistances to both thunder and lightning damage. Better yet, if you need the mephit to be in active mode (although there isn't much it can do in it), you can make it invisible for a round as a minor action. If you took a Lightning Lizard in heroic, you want an Air Mephit in paragon. Arcane Wisp: The arcane wisp and dimensional pet fill similar roles - both add a square to your teleport distance. The arcane wisp's active benefit allows it to teleport away from an attack, which is nice if you need to have it in active mode. However, the dimensional pet is a better choice unless you really need +2 Stealth. Beholderkin: The beholderkin is an interesting familiar - its only purpose is to make one attack per encounter. If you find that you often need to pick off a minion that you can't catch in an area attack, the beholderkin is just what you need. Otherwise, the 1d10 damage/encounter just isn't worth your familiar. Blackspawn Darkling: The blackspawn darkling is a stealthy, element-based familiar. It gives or boosts your acid resistance, which is handy for certain sorcerers or campaigns. It also has a +5 bonus to stealth, making it a relatively versatile familiar. Acid sorcerers want a blackspawn, but there are better stealth familiars if you don't need the resistance. Bluespawn Nimblespark: The bluespawn is an OK familiar, but just outclassed by the air mephit. It gives you lightning resistance, instead of both lightning and thunder. Its active benefit seems nice (2d6 damage if the bluespawn is hit with an attack), but because it only has 1 hit point, that means the familiar is destroyed, so its use is limited at best. If you take the Enlarge Familiar feat, you could milk some more out of this, though. Earth Mephit: This is pretty handy, especially for a dwarf, as it reduces forced movement on you by 1 square. A dwarf arcanist, especially a hexhammer or other melee character, can use this to prevent most forced movement as very little will push, pull, or slide more than 2 squares. The active benefit is also very good, creating a temporary roadblock once per encounter. Fire Mephit: Interestingly, you probably will want a fire lizard over a fire mephit. The lizard's resistance increases while you're bloodied, but the mephit's doesn't. As the mephit's active benefit is simply becoming a torch, there's not much reason to take it. Grayspawn Shortfang: The grayspawn is much like the blackspawn, though it trades being stealthy for boosting your Arcana check, which is nice if you want to go into the Sage of Ages destiny. The grayspawn has a +2 bonus to defenses, as well. They're evenly matched, so the choice is yours - but once again, only acid sorcerers need apply. Greenspawn Banespike: Poison resistance is always nice, but the greenspawn is worth much more than just that. The greenspawn's active benefit gives you a second Bluff-for-combat-advantage attempt per encounter, which is very nice indeed, especially as its just a minor action. It even gives you a +2 bonus to Bluff checks to help. A great choice for anyone who enjoys combat advantage. Ice Mephit: As a cold-resistance boosting familiar, the ice mephit contends with the whitespawn in paragon tier. The mephit's active benefit lets you create a 3x3 area of difficult terrain once per encounter, which is a nice control booster. Cold sorcerers will probably prefer the mephit over the whitespawn, because the whitespawn tends to be sacrificed midway through the encounter. Rakshasa Claw: The rakshasa claw is the upgrade to the disembodied hand, and it comes with a handy boost to Arcana checks. If you had a disembodied hand in heroic, you want a rakshasa claw in paragon and epic. Redspawn Spitfire: The redspawn is basically a fire lizard that trades bonus resistance while bloodied for +2 defenses while active. Unfortunately, the redspawn doesn't really give you a reason to keep it in active mode often, so you'll want the heroic-tier lizard. Stone Fowl: A baby cockatrice - it's cute and functional. Sort of. It has a poison resistance, and can give you a +5 bonus to saving throws to shake off slow, immobilize, or petrify effects once per encounter, which are both handy, but not really worth your familiar slot. Whitespawn Snowstepper: Another cold-based familiar, but you'll probably lose the resistance and free icewalk during the encounter, because of the active benefit. It can sacrifice itself to reduce the damage from one attack by 5 + your Con modifier, or 10 + your Con modifier if it's cold damage. It's basically an improved badger without the damage boost while bloodied. A good choice.
""Familiars by Artifice" Paragon Tier Familiars"Show
Ambush Vine Shoot: A very unique, and very control-oriented familiar. It lets you move an extra square whenever you swim or climb, but the real draw is the -2 penalty to saving throws against immobilized and restrained that it imposes on all adjacent foes. Interestingly, a frost mage might value this plant more than anyone else. Crawling Clot: Superbly flavorful, the crawling clot is of limited use. It gives you a standard bonus to necrotic damage that increases when bloodied, but arcane characters don't have much special use for necrotic resistance. The active benefit lets you or an ally spend a healing surge when they're hit with an attack if you sacrifice the clot. The catch? It only works once per day, so you're better off with another familiar. Dimensional Pet: The dimensional pet boosts your teleport distances by 1 square, but what makes it better than the similar Arcane Wisp is its active benefit, which can interrupt and prevent an enemy's teleport. A great familiar for teleporting builds. Living Infusion: The living infusion is only useful if you're an artificer, so anyone else need not apply. For an artificer, this is a wonderful familiar to boost your healing power. Whenever you use your healing infusion on an ally adjacent to the living infusion, all allies adjacent to the target regain 1d6 (2d6 at epic) hit points for free. It's like they distilled a shaman and bottled it for your artificer! Minor Foulspawn: The minor foulspawn gives you a +2 bonus to saving throws against fear effects, which is nice. More importantly, it lets you add 1d10 (2d10 at epic tier) extra psychic damage to one arcane attack per encounter if the target is adjacent the foulspawn, which also lets you apply Psychic Lock to a non-psychic power. Smith's Hammer: Another damage-reducing familiar, the smith's hammer gives you a +2 bonus to the defense the triggering attack targets instead of directly reducing the damage. It still destroys itself, but it can completely negate the damage or completely fail to do anything. An artificer will want this over a badger or whitespawn, and possibly even over a canine construct because the hammer gives you a bonus use of Arcane Empowerment per day. Tinker Feyling:An artificer-specific familiar that lets you use Arcane Empowerment from the familiar's square instead of yours. Because Arcane Empowerment is really only useful as a method to recharge a item's daily power, you're not going to get a lot of use out of this. If you want an AE-boosting familiar, you should look at a Smith's Hammer instead.
Blazing Skull: The blazing skull is finally an upgrade to the ever-wonderful fire lizard. It's resistance still doesn't increase while bloodied, but it's active benefit more than makes up for that - it gives you a +2 bonus to a fire or fear attack made against a creature adjacent to the skull. Plus, it gives you an Arcana boost and a 20-square light effect if you want it. Fire sorcerers want this, as do a lot of tieflings. Chaos Shard: The chaos shard gives you a +2 bonus to Arcana checks (always a benefit to a Sage of Ages), as well as a +2 bonus to saves against the debilitation dominated condition. Even better, it lets you add an extra target to a close or area attack, even if it isn't in the area. That's helpful, especially when you make an attack that only targets one creature in a close burst. Gibbering Pet: The randomly selected languages and skill bonuses are unreliable, but the gibbering pet is a powerful close and area attack deterrent. If you let the pet hover in your square, all area or close effects aimed at you include it in the attack, and force it to take a -2 penalty against all targets. Like most epic material, it's very powerful. Shadow Incarnate: The shadow incarnate gives you darkvision, lets you basically cast from its square once per encounter, and can give you concealment just by being in your square (it makes the square lightly obscured). A good choice for everyone, especially in a stealthy, drow-based, or Underdark-based campaign.
Lingering Nightmare: A psychic-resistance boosting familiar that has darkvision to warn you of approaching foes. Also, whenever you hit an enemy adjacent to the nightmare with a fear attack, you roll a d4 and apply one of 4 handy benefits. If your character specializes in fear powers, this is probably the best choice there is for you. Silver Lamp: It's a torch that lets you deal some extra damage to demons. Pass it up.
Challenge: When ~ comes into play, all opponents may put a Legendary creature card with the same or smaller converted mana cost as ~ into play without paying its mana cost.
Challenge: When ~ comes into play, all opponents may put a Legendary creature card with the same or smaller converted mana cost as ~ into play without paying its mana cost.
Challenge: When ~ comes into play, all opponents may put a Legendary creature card with the same or smaller converted mana cost as ~ into play without paying its mana cost.
Challenge: When ~ comes into play, all opponents may put a Legendary creature card with the same or smaller converted mana cost as ~ into play without paying its mana cost.
Book Imps can raise the fire resistance for a sorcerer, thus giving them more elemental penetration. The fact they can turn invisible at will and with Spellseer familiar can grant a +1 to hit all the time, make them an excellent choice.
Book Imps are also one of two AP familiars that grant +2 to Arcana. Important for those mid-epic Sage of Ages types who are looking to maximize their amazing utility power. Also handy for showing off around other casters.
And really, for tieflings, is there a more flavorful choice?
Dragonlings combo extremely well with the Hermetic Saboteur PP, allowing you to remote-drop up to two Close Blasts per encounter.
Challenge: When ~ comes into play, all opponents may put a Legendary creature card with the same or smaller converted mana cost as ~ into play without paying its mana cost.
...and, for the book imp, invisibility+fly is significantly better than pretty much any sort of stealth bonus. They're invisible as long as you concentrate, regardless of how far they are, and they don't set off tremorsense because they're not touching the ground. There are basically no monsters in heroic who can detect them, and relatively few in paragon. You send him out flying, let him scout, come back and tell you what's going on. Then you make strategic decisions based on knowing who the enemy is before the enemy knows you're there. It's really quite potent - and it doesn't require making stealth checks.
so... when are you actually going to put the colors *in*?
...and, for the book imp, invisibility+fly is significantly better than pretty much any sort of stealth bonus. They're invisible as long as you concentrate, regardless of how far they are, and they don't set off tremorsense because they're not touching the ground. There are basically no monsters in heroic who can detect them, and relatively few in paragon. You send him out flying, let him scout, come back and tell you what's going on. Then you make strategic decisions based on knowing who the enemy is before the enemy knows you're there. It's really quite potent - and it doesn't require making stealth checks.
so... when are you actually going to put the colors *in*?
Invisibility does not equal stealth. Just because something is invisible doesn't mean it's silent. I imagine the sound of flapping wings would draw someone's attention and they would start looking around for the sound. At the very least, they would be expecting someone or something to show up eventually.
Also, the bat familiar has blindsense, so if you are scouting and an enemy NPC inside is an arcane class with a bat familiar (in a cave? Oh, the irony!), the invisible book imp is going to be spotted fairly quickly.
