<i>Never done a Conj, but do the servers act like pets? ie do you order them to do things (bash, rescue,etc). </i>

They are not quite the same. You can't order them to do things. They do them on their own accord. An angel can rescue you if it wants to. You can order your elemental to do specific things using the elem command (such as not to use area attacks or to cast fireball). The servitors follow you, with a brief lag, and cannot be left behind, even if you teleport or recall. Servitors can be aggressive towards the conjurer, so you need to have a circle up before you conjure, otherwise an angry servitor may attack and kill you. In short, servitor fighting is automatic and they do the stuff on their own. It is good to remember that angels autoattack demons, necromancers and anti-paladins.

Familiar, on the other hand, is completely manually controlled using familiar command (e.g. fam west, fam fly (some familiars can fly high in the air like air shifters), fam murder joe, fam get apple) and can move independetly of the conjurer (with the exception that command lag is shared. If the conjurer is in a snare, familiar is also immobile), with the exception of going in to cabals(familiar cannot move independently in cabals). You can see through your familiar's eyes (with >> in front to separate it from conjurer's vision) and mobs don't aggro against it, so it can be handy in exploration. Obstacles like doors can also stop familiar from entering places if it doesn't happen to have open. The familiar is obtained randomly from a set of familiars defined by your alignment. Your familiar is always the same creature every time you summon it, so you know which one you get after the first summoning. Familiar's death has the same 1/3 con penalty to you as your own death. You also take damage from familiar dying.


<i>Also, is it real hard to get empowered? Basic things, but wish to have some options in staying alive and smoking some mobs.</i>

You need to have a role that fits the religion of your choise and an interview with your patron immortal to get the empowerment. Getting the interview can sometimes be a bottleneck. What you do is have a written role, go to the shrine and pray for the Imm for an audience. There's a good chance that the Imm is not online, but you'll just have to catch the Imm when he is around and have the interview to get empowered. You can also write a note to the Imm about an appointment if you keep failing to catch your patron several times. You have automatical empowerment up to level 20 by default and should catch the Imm before hitting 20.