I am looking for the official word on this....

Can ALL familiars and animal companions speak? What about shifters in forms that wouldn't normally speak?

For instance... pixies, imps, sure... I see how they can talk.

Wolves? Badgers?

Thanks!

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Animal companions can't, no.

Out of familiars, only certain ones would be able (the more 'magical' ones, along with the Raven which can speak common, once it becomes a familiar afaik) The ones that can't, to my knowledge are; Bat, Panther and Hellhound. (although the latter can understand infernal, if not speak)

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Signature by Maryn! <3 I am also seen as DM Snuffles.

Skeleton can talk too, if Awakened. I've seen a talking rat and it was hands down the best familiar I've ever seen. So though not all creatures can speak by default, all familiars share the same bond with the master (which pretty much beats talking), and there's always a way to awaken your pet.

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Wouldn't 'awaken' allow any animal/normally not speaking creature to , in fact, speak?

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Isys ~ Daughter of Earth and Life
Ronnie ~ Without darkness, one cannot full appreciate the light
[MIA]Walker ~ Priestess of the Helping Hand

Yes. This doesen't mean it's a good idea, however.

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How exactly would "Awaken" allow a creature that physically cannot form words, then be able to form words and thus speak? I can see an Awakened badger suddenly able to discern more from the wisdom increase, but since language is tied to intelligence, which is not increased with awaken...

I've always understood that the ability to speak a particular language requires the physical ability to speak, thus animals cannot speak. I have however come across a badger that was able to convey quite clearly its intent to gnaw off my leg on more than one occasion.

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Thine taste in horrid footwear not withstanding, I did not say that thou were in fact an idiot, I merely implied that such things were self evident.

-Krrja

I'm not sure if Awaken does allow them to speak in PnP, but in Amia the spell doesn't to my knowledge.

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Signature by Maryn! <3 I am also seen as DM Snuffles.

While I am of the opinion that talking animals are not the classiest of fantasy tropes, I don't really understand why it should be something we need to police. Amia offers players an avenue to realize their, erm, fantasy fantasies. If they include a dark, handsome wizard with a witty black cat, I won't begrudge them that.

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The same way a corpse walks and eats your face. It's called magic.

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Awaken (the NWN spell) is not the same as the PnP spell. It does not allow the animal to speak.

The PnP spell would need to be requested and as a general rule over the last years te DM staff forbid both animal speech of companions and the like AND speaking in animal shape as a druid or shifter. The later is a special feat in PnP and not selectable on amia.

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LOL! <3 Vinny

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Isys ~ Daughter of Earth and Life
Ronnie ~ Without darkness, one cannot full appreciate the light
[MIA]Walker ~ Priestess of the Helping Hand

Mephits, Imps, and Eyeballs are all sentient, speech-capable creatures as well (even without being familiars). Fire mephits, for instance, know Ignan as their default tongue, and eyeballs know the tongue of Beholders and also Common. Obviously an Imp speaks... uh... Infernal and Common, assuming it's a devil and not a demon (which speaks Abyssal and Common)

The abyssal imp equivalent is called quasite. [/nitpick] ^^

In general, I go by "does it plausibly have vocal chords" if I don't actually know, though. It's a good rule of thumb for me. I don't mind a talking cat or such, however. It's far from unheard of and , if not unreasonable for a shifter or druid in animal form to make the necessary modifications to their anatomy to be speech capable, not unreasonable for similar transmutations to allow the same for awakened animals. In other words, it's very easy to explain in character, given how magic works and what's already possible with it in DnD.

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GSID: Piranha, Borntokill, Free Beer, Bad Luck Inc.
Player of: Nothing atm. Busy elsewhere.

Grell: I would like to hire the Kossuth maid service. Do you do waste disposal? I've a list of homes you could visit

Thissum. The PnP Awaken in a different spell entirely. The PnP Awakening takes 24 hours to cast and after that it has no duration, it lasts until the animal dies or the spell is Dispelled. Awakening gives the animal the following; 3d6 Intelligence, +1d3 Charisma, and +2 HD. Its type becomes magical beast (augmented animal). An awakened tree or animal can speak one language that you know, plus one additional language that you know per point of Intelligence bonus (if any).

However, here follows the bummer;
An awakened animal can’t serve as an animal companion, familiar, or special mount.

In one PnP campaign a friend of mine has a talking Awakened wolf but it's not an animal companion, it's simply a wolf she befriended and then awakened. The wolf is basically an NPC cohort. With a habbit of shocking unknown people by suddenly blurting out "We live in harsh times, my friend."... <.<'

Anyway, back to topic at hand; Talking animals. You can always take a look at the Intelligence scores of the animals. Animal that has higher than 2 Intelligence is basically concidered a Magical Beast, which then could no longer serve as an Animal Companion for Druids and Rangers, because it's... not exactly animal anymore, not in the proper sense. The Raven familiar CAN learn Common, but it seems to be a special case as it's the only one that even in PnP rulebooks has a special mention it can learn a language. The other Familiars, well, the non-animal ones could probably at least understand and some even talk languages. But talking panthers? No. Hellhound? Doesn't speak, but understands Infernal. (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Hell_Hound)

As far as that talking Donkey goes, get it outta ma face before I cast Hold Monster followed by Creeping Doom oni t >:O

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In-Game: guano

Where did this come from? I assume you are speculating on this, I could find nothing that indicates an animal with higher than 2 INT is considered a Magical Beast. All I could find was that animals have a 1 - 2 INT, and that Magical Beasts can have an Intelligence greater than 2. Animals do not have supernatural abilities like most Magical Beasts do.

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As far as speech capability goes, most animals that can be domesticated or coerced/bribed with animal empathy have some form of learning capacity. This includes the ability to learn what certain sound combinations or words mean. They may not be capable of speech themselves, but I would find it very odd if a dog or cat, for example, were unable to understand commands it had been actively trained for. The conclusion from this is that even with INT 1-2 on some animals, if they can be trained or communicated with via druidic tongues or the appropriate skill, they possess the potential to have and learn a rudimentary vocabulary.

Should just said animals then be given the means to communicate somehow, it is possible they may be able to. If only to say things like "fetch! Food! Walkies!" etc.

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GSID: Piranha, Borntokill, Free Beer, Bad Luck Inc.
Player of: Nothing atm. Busy elsewhere.

Grell: I would like to hire the Kossuth maid service. Do you do waste disposal? I've a list of homes you could visit

Steve the Monkey in Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, you mean?

Haha, yeah, I was thinking of two things. What Ruce mentioned (Steeeeeeeeve) and also, "SQUIRREL!"

Sure, they can talk. Why not.

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No offense to all of you who responded... but... I asked for an "official" answer... not opinions.... seems the DM's that answered said in a nutshell, if they can normally talk, they can talk, if not, they can't. Except ravens as familiars, they can talk. Got it... thanks!

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Whatever DMs tell you, though, if it's not posted in the Rules forum, in your journal or on the Entry pillars, it is not a rule. You could not, for example, demand that every new player search all our forums for the keywords "familiar" and "speaking", find this discussion, recognize which poster was at the time a DM (if they no longer are, there's no tag on the post), before role-playing with their speaking panther. If that was really the case, we would have no choice but to punish new and old players equally for it. And it's certainly not something worth making a new rule about.

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Combined assumption of various sources.

This part discussing intelligence says;
"An animal has an Intelligence score of 1 or 2. A creature of humanlike intelligence has a score of at least 3."
http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Intelligence

Wikipedia entry about animals(As unreliable as it is, but I couldn't find where I originally read it) says;
"Under the rules of D&D, animal type creatures do not have an Intelligence score higher than 2. When a designer makes a change to an animal creature that increases its Intelligence or grants it additional abilities, the designer is encouraged to also change the creature's type, usually from animal to magical beast."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creature_t ... 26_Dragons)#Animal

Same Wiki entry about Magical Beasts says;
"A magical beast is similar to an animal in many ways, but usually has a higher intelligence, and possesses supernatural or extraordinary abilities."

And while searching the info, the SRD Database listing Traits of Animal subtybe says;
"Intelligence score of 1 or 2 (no creature with an Intelligence score of 3 or higher can be an animal)."
It also says;
"An animal is a living, nonhuman creature, usually a vertebrate with no magical abilities and no innate capacity for language or culture."
http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Animal

Of course there are exceptions like Ravens, but even with Ravens it's only listed in the article about Familiars that a Familiar raven can learn common. Standard, free-born, no-magical-connection ravens don't have such entry.

I hope this answers to your question.

Oh and to clarify to those who looked for an "official answer", and possibly missed it, this seemed like one to me.

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In-Game: guano

No official answer since it isn't a rule written down friend.

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Gotcha.... was just wondering how we did this since I didn't recall seeing a ruling anywhere....

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In canon, yes, awakened creatures and plants speak vocally. (Although nobody is casting "awaken" on any skeletons since skeletons are not a valid target for that spell, nor are you likely to find a skeleton-friendly druid...) Awakened organisms cannot serve as companions, familiars, or special mounts however. But given such creatures are given to happily assist the caster anyways, it's literally meaningless semantics in mechanical terms.

Familiars are more complex. A normal familiar is an animal, out of which, only ravens can speak vocal common with anyone (and this is a supernatural ability). However, all familiars can speak with their master vocally from wiz/sorc lvl 5 onward (and only their master). However, given NWN's handling of familiars, it's obvious our familiars are all "improved" as the feat "improved familiar." This feat doesn't change the aspects of familiar speech at all though, but merely states if a new familiar option is chosen that can normally speak (like an imp), it can speak just fine. Although it's a bit absurd in my mind to think a mephit or imp knows how to speak any native Faerunian tongue, as there's zero reasonable way for that to happen. Again, skeletons would fall under this rule and given no vocal chords and the fact improved familiar grants zero supernatural ability to communicate, they would remain mute. A skeleton, non-raven animal, or other normally non-verbal familiars would require some extra, permanent investiture of supernatural ability for speech.

Naturally, Amia is Amia and will do what it will for its own needs, but I must say that seemingly denying a valuable in-canon RP tool for druids to have their companions speak simply because you cannot reconcile awaken being different from the feat natural spell is kind of like seeing one ant in your kitchen and burning your house down in response.

I do think these rules are somewhat important, mostly because they serve the balancing of such things with RP ability as a weight. You chose a socially acceptable creature as a familiar as a cat? Well, the trade-off is it can't speak. You want a nifty, tanky skeleton that can manipulate things with opposable thumbs? Get ready for vocal awkwardness in social situations as its drawback. On the other hand, you can't really shrug off imps, mephits, dragons, eyeballs and the like as something they aren't with a heavy cloak or socially normal. The bonus for that being speech.

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Rashad the Azure, Zakharan Merchant-lord Most Fair and Master of the Desert Wind
Loremaster Tukson Devers, Oghmanyte Wrestler of Knowledge and Child of the Passive Voice

(No tells for Rashad while I'm playing other characters please.)

What about companions to rangers/druids of Lurue the queen of magical/talking beasts?

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That'd make it a Magical Beast. Animal companions are... well... Animals.

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In-Game: guano

I thought she imparted the companions of her followers with that ability, I may have been mistaken.

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There's your official answer.
Animals do not speak, there are a very few that can, in certain situations, but it's extremely rare. Lurue does not grant speech to animals.

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Apart from what MightNMagic said about familiars being able to speak with the master at level 5 (and in NWN, the master being able to literally possess the familiar to speak through it), you could also just cast Tongues on the familiar or give it a Pearl of Speech. Both of these would work for an animal companion too, though a druid does not have as easy access to Tongues and I'm not sure what their Int score is. 3 Int is enough to understand Common, IIRC.

The NWN Awaken is, indeed, not applicable here, but the PnP spell is available and I think MNM made a good point that has been overlooked: an Awakened animal is friendly and will serve the caster anyway. That it's not counted as your animal companion (or familiar or special mount) does not mean it won't act in an equivalent capacity but rather that it the game rules don't treat it as taking that slot (which you could then fill with another animal to have two buddies). If anything, it is an expansion rather than a restriction of its use. At least I cannot see anything in the spell description that indicates an Awakened animal you were already on friendly terms with before would not follow you in the future, too.

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