How do you handle Roleplaying Familiars?

[Darksidebro]

Hey all, so for an upcoming game a player mentioned they want to have a friendship with their familiar. My group still follows the old rule of "Your familiar shares all your knowledge"

But my question is, how do you guys handle Roleplaying? I can see a few ways to handle it:

-Let the player announce what their familiar does and says (I'm not a huge fan of this)

-Take control of the Familiar's speech and actions as if it was an NPC.

-Let the player decide what the familiar does, but the DM may interject with Speaking and Actions as they see fit.

I'm sure there are other options I'm not considering, how do you guys play it?

[NinjaLemur247]

Hey all, so for an upcoming game a player mentioned they want to have a friendship with their familiar. My group still follows the old rule of "Your familiar shares all your knowledge"

But my question is, how do you guys handle Roleplaying? I can see a few ways to handle it:

-Let the player announce what their familiar does and says (I'm not a huge fan of this)

-Take control of the Familiar's speech and actions as if it was an NPC.

-Let the player decide what the familiar does, but the DM may interject with Speaking and Actions as they see fit.

I'm sure there are other options I'm not considering, how do you guys play it?

We always treat the Familair as NPC and the DM control him. Your familar should follow that orders you give it but if it's intelligent familiar he may do so very creatively

Now occasionally if it's funny I have done the voice my IMP familiar to deliver some comica or saying. My imp's name is Fritz BTW LOL

[gfishfunk]

The way we do it is have the Player roleplay the familiar, with the DM (or other players) inserting amusing things. This works well for us because no one is a jerk.

If you are looking for deep roleplaying and want to use the familiar for that purpose, then the DM should play the thing. At the outset, they should define the relationship. Too many DMs want everyone to be slightly antagonistic to make it interesting, and that can sour the roleplay.

[Antilles123]

Hey all, so for an upcoming game a player mentioned they want to have a friendship with their familiar. My group still follows the old rule of "Your familiar shares all your knowledge"

But my question is, how do you guys handle Roleplaying? I can see a few ways to handle it:

-Let the player announce what their familiar does and says (I'm not a huge fan of this)

-Take control of the Familiar's speech and actions as if it was an NPC.

-Let the player decide what the familiar does, but the DM may interject with Speaking and Actions as they see fit.

I'm sure there are other options I'm not considering, how do you guys play it?

Familiar is an NPC for us. We have a pseudodragon at the moment with our wizard, that we picked up during some adventure. Our DM makes kangaroo-like sounds and tilts his head like a confused dog to say roleplay it (it can't speak, but can understand).

Most of the time we forget it's even there. And then someone says, what's happened with the pseudodragon (usually after a fireball lands on us).

[Addaran]

Since the player want to have a relation and RP it between the familiar and his character, definitively control it as the DM. Doesn't work so well to try being to person at once and talking with yourself...