Get rid of Druid summoning?

[FreeTheSlaves]

Why is the DM doing any work? I have the same rule for all summoners, whether I'm running or playing:

You summon it, you play it. And you can't summon anything you don't have ready stats for.

Simple, succinct, and done.

Ditto. I don't care about what the rules allow you to do, you're not wasting our valuable gaming time with a chore that should have been done in your own time. Anyway, as a summoner I would want to know the stats intimately so as to devise the best strategy.

 

[haakon1]

You need Unearthed Arcana. I do believe there are alternate versions of the Druid in there. Or, alternately, just pick another spell for them to spontaneously cast. They can still summon nature's ally, but only as a normal spell prepared ahead of time, which brings it to a more manageable level.

Thanks. I was thinking let them spontaneously cast different spells, while still having SNA as a regular spell (it's not a bad spell, in moderation). And I will check out Unearthed Arcana -- I should have checked their first!

 

[haakon1]

I'm playing several druids in PBP/PBEMs at the moment, and any time I summon a creature, I include its stats either in the email, or in a post in the Rogues' Gallery for that game.

Doing otherwise is just impolite!

-Hyp.

Nod. That makes sense, and I know a lot of folks said stuff like this. It didn't occur to me before, because the concept of non-DM's owned the Monster Manual didn't occur to our group (though two of my players DM other campaigns).

 

[Belen]

The DM of the game I play in (as opposed to the one I run) has just banned druids. His reason is that he hates Summon Nature's Ally -- it's just too annoying to create a new monster and deal with it, when you're already running the bad guys.

I actually feel precisely the same way, and in my campaign, I've told the druid to cool it on the summoning.

So, I'm thinking this is not an isolated thing.

What do you do with druids? Did you learn to live with summoning, or change the rules?

Dude, you tell the player to buy a MM and make the darn creature themselves. I do not stat stuff out for the players.

 

[Belen]

One good thing. They are working on a companion to HeroForge called CritterForge, which should rock!

 

[Hypersmurf]

Nod. That makes sense, and I know a lot of folks said stuff like this. It didn't occur to me before, because the concept of non-DM's owned the Monster Manual didn't occur to our group (though two of my players DM other campaigns).

I cut-and-paste from the SRD, and modify for Augment Summoning or Templates.

-Hyp.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

I cut-and-paste from the SRD, and modify for Augment Summoning or Templates.

-Hyp.

I have a summoned creatures stat list, if players don't use the MM -- which all my druid players have.

 

[Romnipotent]

someone should really release a pdf with all the animals; all the celestial, fiendish, pseudonatural, celestial/fiendish pseudonatural, new monsters and the tressym... we need that back.

 

[I'm A Banana]

The problem I encountered was when a player of a druid kept summoning 1d3 dire apes, and then casting Animal Growth on them and her tiger animal companion. That meant that, on her turn in battle, she would be taking an action for herself, and then rolling as many as 13 attack and damage rolls for her minions--not to mention rolling for rending damage in some cases.

Pre-rolling is you friend. Heck, it's my friend, and I'm a DM!

 

[Hussar]

Agree with pretty much everything that's been said here.

Good grief, this is in an online game. There are online SRD's out there. Pretty spiffy ones too. And they have all the summoned creatures with templates already done for you. All you have to do is cut and paste. I'd beat my players with scented shoelaces if they didn't do this.

I have a slight advantage when it comes to die rolling by playing online. Simply create text nodes for all your die rolling needs and a turn can be done very quickly. If you have a computer at your gaming table, I would suggest doing the same thing. If not, simply do what was mentioned and pregenerate a ton of rolls and then pick randomly from the list.

Or, just for kicks, hand off the attacks to other players so they can get in on the fun too.