Help me with Summoning for the Iron Kingdoms

[Skade]

I have been running a campaign in the Iron Kingdoms for some time now, and finally got my copy of the character primer, where I learned that the Iron Kingdoms are isolated for one reason or another from the planes, and t-hus, summoning spells should not work as they do in a standard DnD setting. (For that matter, neither do Plane Shift and the like). Unfortunatly one of my players is Summoner, and so this has some obvious effects. Normally I would simply ignore the setting info, keep the character as is and move on, but the player would like to be more in keeping with the published info. So we started to come up with alternative means.

What I have in mind is making a summoning spell that will call forth a specific creature from the same plane. What I have in mind is creating a summoning circle in a secure location, set around a cell or cage, that houses a trained animal, or even a wild one. When te spell is cast the creature housed in that cage is instantly transported to the caster and is under similar restrictions as the normal summoning spell. What this does however is allow the caster to equip the creature, if possible. So maybe they have a trained ape (she really wanted to use the war ape I have from Chainmail) with armored, spiked greaves, rather than simply an ape. That would now be possible.

What level spell should this be? The Summon spells are more or less Spell Level = HD. This would not really be true here. Or should it be? Its really more akin to a teleport spell than a summoning spell in tnat respect. I want it to be able to transport whatever is in that circle.

Thoughts?

 

[whatisitgoodfor]

That sounds rather a lot like the Summon Nature's Ally chain of spells. Taking an existing critter from the active plane and transporting it to your location for the duration of the spell.

One of the WotC sourcebooks (T&B IIRC) mentioned the possibility of allowing characters to have set NPC outsiders that are summoned by the SM# spells.

The book mentioned allowing the players to do everything from roll up the stats for their planar bond-mates to even allowing the PC to provide superior equipment for the outsider (assuming that the PC has some method of planar travel available to them, since anything the summoned critter picks up while summoned gets left behind when the spell ends).


Keeping that in mind, I would just go ahead and let the normal SM# spells apply to the critters that the character can train. However, making up for the fact that no wacky planar travel is required to outfit the animals, I would force the PC to research a spell that would allow the monster to bring its equipment along for the ride.

[ps. Don't make the PC research Summon Monster and Equipment for each of the nine levels of the spell, just researching it for level 3 should be more than enough of a discouragement.]

Just some thoughts.