Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Rocket your D&D 5E and Level Up: Advanced 5E games into space! Alpha Star Magazine Is Launching... Right Now!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Elder-Basilisk" data-source="post: 1774739" data-attributes="member: 3146">I'm surprised that you're selling Astral Constructs so short Scion. They offer a good deal of the customizability of summoned monsters as long as you're not looking for magical flexibility and they do it with a lot less loss of combat power. Detecting invisible creatures is about the only combat-useful ability that summons have from the beginning but Constructs don't get until Construct VII. As spell multipliers, summoned monsters can sometimes be good.I'm also surprised that you're overselling monsters like the collossal fiendish spider by so much. Against the fighter in the example, the fiendish spider only hits on a roll of 19--and given that he's the particular 20th level fighter that he is, he'll get an AoO for the improved grab and get to add about thirty points to his grapple check--putting him some 9 or 10 points ahead of the spider's grapple check. Its reach is the only thing likely to keep it alive long enough to take a second action. Summoned monsters can be pretty good but there aren't any of them that can hope to stand up to an equivalent level fighter for long--except the Summon Monster III critters at 5th level.When it comes to feats, however, I think you miss the boat by a mile. Augment Summoning is not a poor feat by any stretch of the imagination. Augment Summoning, for instance, might well be enough to give the head to head Elder Earth Elemental vs. Astral Construct IX matchup to the elemental. It would probably also knock the Construct's offensive superiority down a peg or two.As for the list:Available to Summon Monster spells earlier and better reaches are available. Still, not as dramatic an advantage as you seem to be making it out to be. Very few creatures with excessive reach have Combat Reflexes and nearly just as few have a decent dex.2) SR (all summon monsters have it)</blockquote>But few have enough to be worth mentioning. A celestial Bison has SR 10. A bralani Eladrin has SR 16. Etc. In most of these cases, level appropriate opponents will have to roll no more than a 4 to overcome their SR. Occasionally, it will be worthwhile. . .  but only very occasionally.Astral Constructs are actually better here since they can receive commands telepathicallly and that cannot be overheard and is not blocked by silence, etc.As to language, it's my understanding that the base language for celestial creatures is celestial and for fiendish creatures is fiendish. It may be that an overly literal reading of the core rules implies otherwise but, at a minimum, that's a reasonable understanding of the descriptions of where fiendish and celestial creatures come from.Other than summoning outsiders for a chat or advice, I don't see the physical skills of creatures as being very significant. Spot and Listen generally just do a worse job at what the monsters can already do with Scent. (It's not as though you summon a monster to guard you through the night). Climb is impressive but I'm pretty sure that flying is better 99% of the time. Etc.This is definitely a weakness for Astral Constructs. On the other hand, as constructs, they're flat out immune to an awful lot of spells. That's worth something right there.This is somewhat misleading. Summoned monsters get more specials at once but generally only one or two will be useful and the creatures that have them are otherwise subpar. An Astral Construct, OTOH, can be given a lot of really useful specials (especially once you hit Astral Construct IV). And they don't lose a whole lot of their beatstick abilities by getting them. One of the unfortunate things about Summon Monster spells is that, if you want to get something to kill the troll, you need to get something that will barely use up the troll's full attack. On the other hand, an Astral Construct IV with energized attacks can stand up to the troll for a few rounds AND kill it.[/QUOTE]

Verification