Talk:Summon Monster (3.5e Spell)

Ratings

Dragonexx favors this article and rated it 4 of 4!

This is a great spell and it makes summon focused mages a decent concept. What's really great, is that it can be for spontaneous casters, it can be cast at a higher slot, meaning it doesn't suck for sorcerers. There is one flaw that it might encourage splatbook diving to find the perfect monster, although that's so minor that it's not even going to detract from this rating. Over all, an interesting way to spice up the campaign.

	Tarkisflux likes this article and rated it 3 of 4.
	The spell is well made, and the spell slot level scaling instead of caster level scaling is an interesting touch that works well to compress a spell chain into a single spell. The lack of summoning type restrictions make it a bit broad for my tastes, but it's still a very good replacement for summon monster, summon nature's ally, summon undead, and similar spell chains.

	Eiji-kun favors this article and rated it 4 of 4!
	I was waffling on this spell when... "the combined Challenge Rating of creatures you have summoned at once can never exceed your caster level -2 (even with multiple castings)." This is smart and earns my sweet, 100% cotton love.

	Leziad favors this article and rated it 4 of 4!
	With the new changes I think this spell is much more helpful for the would be summoner in a very high level game.

	Foxwarrior likes this article and rated it 3 of 4.
	Now that this feat scales with the slot level you cast it from, it's a neat way (if still a tiny bit too easy, maybe) to give Summoning to Sorcerers, rather than a way to summon creatures that can cast 4th level spells with a 3rd level slot.

	TheDarkWad favors this article and rated it 4 of 4!
	Now that it scales by spell slot it serves as an wonderful fix for summoning.

Why this spell is was bad

I'm not ready to put in a hate yet, but I'm close. You have wrapped up the entire creature summoning shtick (aside from edge cases) in 1 little spell, and it's not cool thematically or mechanically.

I see two issues here - the scaling and the dumpster diving. I get the desire to have spells scale with you at some rate (sort of), but the rate here is ridiculous. It crowds out any higher spell level creature summoning effects. The only things I see to even do with higher level summoning spells with this scaling are to lengthen the duration (meh, also potential leadership cheat), quicken it (also meh), increase the range (potentially interesting), or grant a higher EL per casting (hell no). And since the acceptable ones can be done with metamagic already, there's not much reason to make a new spell for them. It really needs to not scale with caster level, but at something less than that. Changing the effect to EL 1 + 1 per 2, 3, or 4 CL over 3 might be ok, maybe, but a fixed EL might be more appropriate overall.

As for the dumpster diving, there's nothing in here restricting you from summoning only [Awesome] monsters for the rest of your life. It's also thematically weird to cast the same spell to summon angels and demons and dragons and aboleths (with the same casting of the spell even). The old lists were annoying and poorly done, but if lists are out then some sort of Type restrictions might be appropriate. There's still dumpster diving going on, but you can drop the EL granted by the spell for [Awesome] types and have fewer problems.

I'd do both of these things and write up a bunch of summoning spells to replace the lines, but that's me. - Tarkisflux ^Talk 21:03, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

With the recent changes and "loves" coming in, I figure this is unlikely to be addressed and I might as well hate it already. So I've done that. - Tarkisflux ^Talk 00:14, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

I may as well expound why this earned a Love. At first I was neutral. It's a summon spell clearly designed to replace the Summon Monster chain, and in that sense it's a direct power up. While the Summon Monster chain is unimpressive barring some optimization to summoning, I am a little loathe to power spellcasters up. Even so, this has some prescience in the form of Astral Construct being the psion's one-stop-shop for Summons at any level. It's previous stats would have drawn my ire, but CR -4 and 10 minute duration is just right. What made this from "I see what you're doing, it's ok" to love is the inclusion of the above line. Summoning has the issue of simultaneously being too weak (1/2 your level? Really?) and too strong (My pokemons, let me show you ALL of them). Complete Psi tried to apply a fix to Astral Construct with terrible results, limiting them to 1 construct at one time ever (a terrible rule, I ignore it). This, however, fixes the issue of armies of high level summons with the joy of having more than one summon at a time. I gotta say, I approve strongly.

The dumper diving Tarkis brought up IS a valid point, but I don't think it's as important as he puts on. Dumpster diving is possible to a degree with the old ones, and there's only so much you can account for when it comes to splatbooks, 3rd party, homebrew, and other sources of broken monsters. While a problem, it's not one large enough to do anything to dull the appreciation for me, so it remains a love. -- Eiji-kun 01:36, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

I strongly approve of the fix and the duration, it's the scaling that replaces the entire chain and the limitless options that I object to. And those only because it's a spell. This would be fan-fraking-tastic as a starting point for a class feature on a summoner PrC / base class, but I don't like it as a thing that any wizard can grab and custom summon useful or cohort appropriate (by grabbing things with [Awesome] types) creatures. It is ridiculously broad IMO, and not a good addition to any game despite the things it fixes.

That said, I don't actually think it's bad enough to be removed from nav, just something that I would recommend against using. As such I have softened my rating slightly. - Tarkisflux ^Talk 02:56, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

Note for anyone coming in later, the above criticisms mostly no longer apply. - Tarkisflux ^Talk 17:48, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

Wonderings

Now that it has the stipulation of scaling based on spell level, the effectiveness of the spell caps out at level 17, even when cast as a 9th level spell, when it allows you to summon a CR 14 creature. Because of the way it scales, the CR of the creature(s) summoned can never exceed 14, so I'm wondering if making the total CR modifier -4 may be hampering the spell in its current format, and if a change back to the original -2 (so that way at level 20 you still get a CR 16 creature, which is more viable in my opinion) is warranted. - TG Cid 16:44, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

That would put it more in line with other level 9 spells at level 9, and probably more on the level with Planar Bindings, too. Planar Bindings aren't 1-round actions, though. --Foxwarrior 16:46, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

The level 20 comparison is probably poor, since you would also be summoning a CR 16 creature at level 17 when you get 9th level slots. And basically a CR (your level - 1) creature anytime you get a new slot. Which is better than a leadership cohort, but only for 10 minutes. So it's probably fine, but it's worth looking at over all levels and deciding if you want that behavior, not just at 20. - Tarkisflux ^Talk 16:53, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

For all levels (including level 2, which it could be changed back to since the math seems to work), with the spell level first and then the levels at which it is typically cast in parentheses as a reference:

• Level 2 (3-4): CR 2
• Level 3 (5-6): CR 4
• Level 4 (7-8): CR 6
• Level 5 (9-10): CR 8
• Level 6 (11-12): CR 10
• Level 7 (13-14): CR 12
• Level 8 (15-16): CR 14
• Level 9 (17-20): CR 16

I'll concede that the level 20 argument is a poor one, but it would be the only irregularity in that pattern of having a CR of -2. When you first gain the spell, the creature is your CR -1, and then in between it is CR -2 until you reach level 9 and can't go any higher. Which works pretty consistently with what I interpret as the big power jumps casters get at each new spell level. As Fox pointed out, it has advantages over planar binding and such and is a better cohort for a short duration. I would hope that the new scaling system will have remedied most issues with regards to it being superior to a cohort, not to mention all the anti-summon effects available to other casters at higher levels of the game. So I am in favor of it personally, given the new system. - TG Cid 17:18, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

I'm in favor of boosting it too, at least to -3. Iffy on -2, but like I said it's probably fine. - Tarkisflux ^Talk 17:43, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

You Should

You should mention you can't summon a templated creature, this could cause a lot of problem if you could. --Leziad (talk) 22:43, 25 May 2015 (UTC)

Bumb, because a zombie titan at level 7th is a not a good idea. --Leziad (talk) 01:58, 27 May 2015 (UTC)

I feel like a zombie titan would have 40 HD (doubled by zombie template from the base 20) and be considerably higher CR than CR 6. I see what you are getting at, but given that templates typically bump the CR of the creature in question I am not convinced that it is really necessary to omit them from the summoning possibilities. - TG Cid (talk) 14:18, 27 May 2015 (UTC)

Alright, what about half-minotaur everything (no increase in CR unless it gain a size cat so free power boost), a ghost creature as low as caster level 7th which is essentially invincible at that level and magic jar everything, a vampire creature as low as CR 9 with dominate monster on multiple creatures at will? The titan was an example, and still a valid CR 6 creature despite common sense, it even summoned with it equipment! (as written anyway). Thing is, while broken creature do exist adding template to the mix is a recipe for disaster and make this spell more versatile than a 2nd level shades. Heck 3 out of 4 of my example come from the SRD, just imagine if I did a little bit of digging. --Leziad (talk) 19:16, 27 May 2015 (UTC)