The Hidden Forest

Hi all, first want to say i love THF. Now, onto my specific problem. I have asked in /ooc if any other wizards are having this problem but doesn't seem to be. This is my problem: I have had "hit or miss" on getting any familiars to cast. Minor familiar spell usually works, but anything higher, including aa familiars imporved and allegiant usually don't work - i get this message "spell did not take hold". I first thought it was maybe a conjuration skill being too low but beefed that up was no change. I was told that the aa familiars should not be dependent on any conjuration skill to use with a hot button. I also make sure I have no buffs on me at all - nothing - and still does not work. Every once in a while one of the spells or aa familiars will cast but not with any regularity. And sometimes if i do get one to cast, be it spell or an aa familiar it will poof for no reason and then will not recast. So its not like they have never worked, sometimes they do but not usually. I have tried a complete reinstall and always update spell files and the thf installer. Why is this bugged for me? I have spent alot of aa points for the familiars and they basically mostly never work. I wanted to get the higher flame aa familiar which costs 15 pts but don't want to waste points if this will not work either. If my files were corrupted how come it casts sometimes? Sometimes i will have the familiar icon in my buff box ui, then the actual familiar will poof and the pet box will disappear with no pet showing. Any help would be greatly appreciated at this point. My wizard is Urrch. Thank you for taking the time to read this and I hope this can get fixed soon. Stymee

The "spell did not take hold" message indicates a buff stacking problem. Try casting your familiar when you don't have any buffs on. Check out this recent post for some discussion on the topic:

viewtopic.php?f=35&t=7315

He mentioned in his original post, he has tried with no buffs on.

Lumps is correct though, that particular error message indicates a stacking issue.
Check your song buff window - depending on your UI setup, it may be closed without you realizing it. This would be to confirm you don't have any short duration buffs active. There a couple auras that could potentially cause issue, as well as bard songs - the ones that affect mana pool, mana regen, and spell crits or damage primarily.

Also, once in a great while, the game will have a minor glitch and drop the icon from buff window, but fail to drop the buff. This is quite rare though.

It may seem a little rough, but the best way to be SURE you don't have any buffs on of any sort, is to go get dead. If you are still getting that error message when you try to summon a familiar before casting or receiving any other buffs after a good funeral, you have an issue that will require a new install or GM assistance. If you do an install, make sure to copy your UI files and INI files to another folder so you won't need to totally rebuild all your hotkeys and UI setups.

Pretty sure they don't work with aura of the warlock I have the same issue