I noticed several things regarding shadow familiars. First of all, although the familiar's abilities can be trained, the earned points are not persistent: That is to say, if the minion dies, the newly summoned one will be fresh stock without any of the training the previous gained. (I'm not even sure if that's a feature, but in an OOC discussion, the majority of players agreed that each cast is a new familiar, and hence it does not maintain prior knowledge. I would still like persistent skills on familiars though.) The second is that the familiar does not improve it's base abilities as the sorcerer raises his sorcery.
In the ability description, it says that the familiar's "power and abilities will grow as the sorcerer's own powers grow."
A shadow familiar is a nether-being, spawned from a facet of the summoner's own soul. As such, it is utterly loyal and cooperative with the sorcerer who summoned it. To a novice, the shadow familiar will be of little use other than a status symbol, but its power and abilities will grow as the sorcerer's own powers grow.
(Summon a shadow familiar. The familiar will initially have some minor use in combat, attacking anything hostile to its master. If the familiar's body is destroyed, it can be re-summoned.)
Although I've doubled my sorcery skill from 100 to 200, which should technically be a significant improvement, my summoned familiar maintains his same skill levels of 150 perception, 200 dodge, 50 melee that he had when he was summoned at 100.
I feel that as the summoner's sorcery skill increases, the minion should also have higher skills and abilities when freshly summoned.
Familiar skills improve as summoner improves
Familiar skills improve as summoner improves
Last edited by Lun on Sat Jul 14, 2012 5:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.
I have nothing productive to say, therefore, I must be heard!
Shadow familiars aren't meant to be heavy combat/persistant-skill minions. Instead, you use them for further abilities later on, such as Familiar Message, Minor Animation, and Possession. It's intended that their skills reset on each summoning.
They'll likely get more utility abilities as sorcery increases, in the same vein as Familiar Message, but don't expect a familiar on its own to be a scaling powerful combat minion.
They'll likely get more utility abilities as sorcery increases, in the same vein as Familiar Message, but don't expect a familiar on its own to be a scaling powerful combat minion.
The lore compels me!