#10718 It should not be possible to summon more than one familiar

HaHaCharade

[Windows] Find Familiar VERY Bugged When Cast by Two Wizards in Same Party

- Did multiple tests with my party which contains a Gnome Fighter/Illusionist (Neutral Good) and a Human Mage (Lawful Neutral).

- Both mages must cast spell simultaneously (pause game and both give command to cast) for each to summon a familiar. Otherwise it'll say "Familiar has already been summoned" when the second mage attempts it.

- Using the above "trick", the Lawful Neutral mage creates a Ferret. The Gnome creates a Pseudo Dragon.

- Suddenly, both familiars now only respond to the Gnome -- even the one that he did not cast. The other mage is forever ignored, even after reloads.

- When picking up the Ferret to put it into his backpack (which again the Gnome shouldn't be able to even do), it turns into a Rabbit once in inventory.

Notes:
Operating System: Windows 7 Professional 64-bit (6.1, Build 7601) Service Pack 1
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 CPU X 990 @ 3.47GHz (12 CPUs), ~3.5GHz
Memory: 12278MB RAM
DirectX Version: DirectX 11
Dual AMD Radeon HD 6900 Series Graphics Card

moody_mage

It's an engine bug in all the games, not just IWD specific.

http://forum.baldursgate.com/discussion/34276/known-5775-multiplayer-familiar-issue

HaHaCharade

Weird. Hopefully its still planning to be fixed. Seems to affect more than multilayer -- This was just me creating and playing party by myself.

HaHaCharade

I wonder if there's a "quick fix" to reassign a familiar to a different mage... maybe using EE Keeper or something similar. I haven't had much luck as of yet.

Gate70

(comment removed as not correct)
Thanks

Avenger_teambg

You cannot have 2 familiars, there is only one familiar summoner in a game. So you cannot assign the 2 familiars to two different people.

HaHaCharade

Avenger_teambg said:

You cannot have 2 familiars, there is only one familiar summoner in a game. So you cannot assign the 2 familiars to two different people.

Not sure I understand (sorry). You *can* have 2 familiars if 2 mages both cast the spell at the same time - they are just bugged and only respond to the one caster. Are you saying that by design, the EE games should only allow for one familiar for one mage to be summoned, regardless of number of mages in a party?

macomeau

@HaHaCharade‌ Correct.

HaHaCharade

@macomeau

Blah. That's lame considering there's no real precedent for one-familiar parties in pen and paper AD&D. I'm curious, was this a limitation in the original BG2? And is it just due to system limitations? If so, I'd maybe note it in the spell description that only one can be in play for a party, regardless of the number of mages.

Gate70

The original BG2 restricted familiars to the protagonist only.
& I believe the IWD scroll has "Note: Only one party member may have a familiar."
Thanks

HaHaCharade

Gate70 said:

The original BG2 restricted familiars to the protagonist only.
& I believe the IWD scroll has "Note: Only one party member may have a familiar."
Thanks

I see the note now. Thanks!

Redrake

Sounds to me that from this point of view, IWD EE is IWD Baldurized EE. Why not fix this issue?

HaHaCharade

Redrake said:

Sounds to me that from this point of view, IWD EE is IWD Baldurized EE. Why not fix this issue?

I tend to agree, however if its just not worth the effort involved I can understand that as well. Still, when I summoned two by casting the spell at the same time, they behaved perfectly except for them responding to only one mage instead of two. Given that I wouldn't think it would be a huge fix, but then again what do I know?