How do you play Summon spells?

[RigaMortus2]

When you cast Summon Monster, Summon Nature's Ally or Summon Undead (for Dread Necromancers), how do you actually play them, or control them? In the cast of Summon Monster, it states that if you can communicate with them, you can direct them, but if you can't, then what? Do they just attack the nearest enemy? Do they know friend from foe?

What about in the case of Summon Undead? How does a Dread Necromancer communicate with his summoned undead? Is there a certain feat or language they need to know? Or are they simply able to automatically tell their summoned undead (via the spell) what to do, where to go, who to attack, and how to attack them?

 

[Hypersmurf]

From the Summon Monster text:
"It appears where you designate and acts immediately, on your turn. It attacks your opponents to the best of its ability. If you can communicate with the creature, you can direct it not to attack, to attack particular enemies, or to perform other actions."

If you Summon a monster and don't tell it otherwise, it will attack your opponents. Only if you tell it to do something else will it do something else.

-Hyp.

 

[Jack Simth]

Well, I usually let the player make rolls for the summon; and the player knows who to attack (usually) so.....

When there's no language in common, they can do all the tricks listed under the handle animal skill; directing the critter is a free action, no roll required.

 

[RigaMortus2]

From the Summon Monster text:
"It appears where you designate and acts immediately, on your turn. It attacks your opponents to the best of its ability. If you can communicate with the creature, you can direct it not to attack, to attack particular enemies, or to perform other actions."

If you Summon a monster and don't tell it otherwise, it will attack your opponents. Only if you tell it to do something else will it do something else.

-Hyp.

Right. My question was a little more involved then that... Who decides what enemy it attacks, the player or the DM? And in the case of Summon Undead, what do you need in order to communicate to them? Or can you just automatically tell undead what to do?

 

[Mouseferatu]

While it may stretch the RAW a bit, I just have the player control the creature(s) he's summoned. It's frankly too much work for the DM to have to worry about in most encounters.

 

[Legildur]

As a player of a druid who relies heavily on summoning, I try to play the animals to type - ie dire wolves tend to flank opponents, rhinos charge nearest opponent etc. I resist calls from fellow players who try to encourage me to move animals in a more tactical manner. I haven't yet been in a position where I've had to consider using the Handle Animal skill to get them to do something. Usually they don't last that long...... unless animal growthed!

 

[Hypersmurf]

Right. My question was a little more involved then that... Who decides what enemy it attacks, the player or the DM?

Without direction from the character, I'd go with an answer along the lines of Legildur's. Generally, they'll attack the nearest opponent to where they're summoned, I'd assume.

And in the case of Summon Undead, what do you need in order to communicate to them? Or can you just automatically tell undead what to do?

I don't have the spell text handy. Undead with an Int of 3 or higher will generally understand Common, of course.

As for nonintelligent undead, from the MM description of Skeletons:
Skeletons are the animated bones of the dead, mindless automatons that obey the orders of their evil masters.

A skeleton is seldom garbed in anything more than the rotting remnants of any clothing or armor it was wearing when slain. A skeleton does only what it is ordered to do. It can draw no conclusions of its own and takes no initiative. Because of this limitation, its instructions must always be simple. A skeleton attacks until destroyed.

Based on that, I'd assume skeletons understand the orders of their evil masters.

-Hyp.

 

[frankthedm]

My interpretation of how summoned monsters work.

When a critter is summoned, you give it a mental image of who your opponents are or you can declare all except you are opponents. It then goes for the closest opponent unless given orders it can understand [finger pointing doesn’t count unless the summon chooses to do so.] The summoned creature's morality determines what happens to those who are not your foes on the subjects of AoOs and area affect placement.

A bit of house rules that I really like…

Commanding creatures to do things that would violate their ethos can cause them to turn on you. If you want something…questionable done, an evil summon may be the safer choice. Now if you might want to take someone alive, good critters are more likely not to kill the helpless.

 

[shilsen]

A bit of house rules that I really like…

Commanding creatures to do things that would violate their ethos can cause them to turn on you. If you want something…questionable done, an evil summon may be the safer choice. Now if you might want to take someone alive, good critters are more likely not to kill the helpless.

I haven't got that far, but I've had a summoned creatures express their unhappiness at certain tasks while being constrained to perform them by virtue of having been summoned. For example, I had an evil cleric summon a hound archon to attack the PCs. The hound archon kept apologizing to the PCs throughout the fight (though it fought to the best of is ability) and thanked them with its last breath when killed.

 

[TheGogmagog]

As for nonintelligent undead, from the MM description of Skeletons:
Skeletons are the animated bones of the dead, mindless automatons that obey the orders of their evil masters.
.... A skeleton attacks until destroyed.

Based on that, I'd assume skeletons understand the orders of their evil masters.

-Hyp.

So neutral or good wizards who decide to summon undead are out of luck. The summons won't obey thier orders, but will attack until destroyed. Depending on the wording of the summon undead, it might be attack your opponents, or it might be attack randomly.

To the OP: I've always seen it up to the summoner to decide who it attacks, and whether it performs tactics it's familiar with like trip for the dire wolves. I can't recall a situation where a monster was ordered to do something beyond it's normal tactics like inch around into a flanking position, grapple or trip. The only time I have seen players do that is when it's in thier tactics section.

IMHO Technically, the DM could question who the summons attacks if there are more than one logical target (two adjacent or it needs to move to a new target). I'm not sure I would worry about it. But if a player asks a bear to inch around into flanking, trip, or dance around in a tu-tu, He'd probably better have some way to communicate his wishes.