[SixOfSpades]

I agree wholeheartedly, the Familiars suck. The game should just admit that they're nothing more than a way to sneak in 12 extra hitpoints, and darn near useless for anything else. The Cat makes a good scout, and a free casting of Invisibility 10' Radius never hurts, but in all other matters, the Familiars are garbage. And whose bright idea was it to give the only Familiar with a decent Pick Pockets score to the Lawful Neutral alignment?!?

The game really needs a Familiars mod. I wish I had the coding capability, but all I can do is design. If I Had It My Way:
1) PCs of any class can use Find Familiar scrolls, although only Mages & Bards can learn the spell.
2) When you cast the spell, the game looks at your class, alignment and level(s) to determine which Familiars you get to choose from (depending on those stats, 2 to 6 Familiars will be open to you).
3) Different Familiars do different things: Some make good substitute Thieves, some cast useful spells, some are decent fighters. Not all Familiars can fit in your Backpack, though.
4) If your Familiar dies, you do not permanently lose a point of CON. Instead, you take a substantial penalty to your EXP, with the amount varying with the level of your Familiar.