rushlight said:
This is a different view of the text than I had - but I can see your viewpoint. If I concede to your view, then I believe that the calling feature of Gate would indeed be problematic at best - more likely broken. The text of the spell certainly becomes more muddled the closer you examine it. Thankfully, you took your time to explain your view, rather than make snide comments.
It seems reasonable to me to design the spell such that calling a "balor" (and getting a random balor) which you can control while calling a *particular* balor (the one named Hoho who stole the candles from the temple) results in no control (or even no balor). That allows the use of "generic" monsters in the same manner of the Summon Monster spells while preventing the use of Gate in a manner that would harm the integrity of the game.
In the end, while the way I interpreted Gate may or may not have been the way they intended - it will be the way the spell functions in my game world.
And I'm curious where those other capital-U "Unique" creatures are out there...
Tessarael already pointed this out: "Unique" is an old AD&D term that appeared under the entry for number of a particular of type of creatures, that appeared in the old AD&D stat blocks. It meant simply that that creature was the only one of its kind. For instance, Graz'zt while a demon, is the only demon of his kind. Under the number of appearing line in the old monster manuals it read "unique" or something like that.
Unique refers to a handful of adversaries who are singular (and usually very powerful) beings and functionally have their own type and technically belong to a group of 1. Demon princes, arch devils, slaad lords, the celestial hepdomad, the animal lords, Primus etc. are unique beings.
Demon, Balor is a type. All balors share traits in common. Tarnhem the Balor and Errtu the Balor are individual beings with their own goals and sometimes different capabilities but they share the same base type (Demon, Balor) and therefore are not "unique".
Demon prince is not a real category. It is a rank used to refer to a group of unique demons of similar power level. Graz'zt, Demogorgon and Orcus have nothing in common except being loosely part of the "demon race". They have trancended the normal classifications of their type and are now each "unique".
Ssendam, Ygorl, Renbuu and Chorst have trancended the categories of the slaad race. They are not red, green, blue, black, white, gray, mud or death slaad. They are now each belong to a category of 1 and are therefore "unique".
Rastlin is a human. He is a great and mighty human by virtue of his levels and perhaps templates that he may have but he is still a human and therefore not "unique".
That said, the spell has some serious clarity issues. I find it easier to deal with if you add a saving throw and SR to it and let the caster TRY to call whatever extraplanar creature of non-deific status or equivalent power level (demon princes, slaadi lords etc. which in my campaign all have at least divine rank 0) he chooses. If the spell fails, the creature is free to try to figure out who was trying to gate in and obliterate him.
Tzarevitch