D&D 5E (2014) How should summon spells be factored in the encounter math?

[Quartz]

However, summon spells do not fit this mold at all. First of all, how do we measure the fact that you summon an entirely new creature to your side, with its own stack of Hit Points and a consistent damage per round?

I forget the issue number (and indeed the actual adventure) but in one of the issues of Dungeon Magazine there was an adventure for 3E which prominently featured a summoner and I recall it being explicitly noted that no extra XP was to be given for the summoned creatures - they were contained within the XP for the summoner.

 

[Horwath]

Yes, it is broken, but not as a 3rd lvl spell. An avg of 3 enemies on a fireball is good to calculate, so it deals 69,3 avg damage ((28 x 0,65 + 14 x 0,35) x 3). At 3rd lvl, summon fey deals 8,45 (13 x 0,65) per round, so its like 8 rounds to be equal. Considering that its still 1 more creature at your side, that has hit points, i would say its balanced compared to fireball at 3rd lvl. The problem is the upcast, that just DOUBLES the damage of summons on even levels (like 4th). So it becomes 18,2 damage per round, way better than any normal fighter at 9th level (without considering limited resourses). Summon spells at even levels make martials feel dumb, its ridiculous.

never used a fireball unless it's 5+ and the "boss" MUST be in the AoE, otherwise it's almost a waste of a slot.

now, one thing that has to be calculated in, is that all summons(except some subclass exceptions) are Concentration based.

that means it prevents having some other spells that can control the battlefield better.
it also means that you can lose all that with taking 1 point of damage.
Wand of magic missile anyone? best Conc breaker in the game for cost. Just use 3 charges for 5 checks at DC10.

as for it's own HPs, well that is a bane and a boon at the same time,
it's good when you need to soak some AoO or some traps, but anyone with half a brain will avoid damaging the spell and go for the caster or someone else. but, if enemy has cheap source of damage and all others are out of harms way, then it's just an added dispel mechanic for everyone to use against it.

as for spell levels of the spell, it should be counted round-up for numbers of attacks, so that you can make 1st, 3rd and 5th level Summon X spells, and have incentive later to use 9th level slot on a Summon X, every DM would be very happy with 9th level slots being used on Summon X.

When you thing about it, every DM is more than happy when casters use their spell slots for damage spells.

#buff all damage spells.

also, upcasting of most damage spells is compete rubbish.

 

[Silam]

I guess if you wanted a fully calibrated encounter XP calculator, it should be based not on who the enemies are but what do they do?

If you catch a level 20 Champion at the end of their rope who has epically dispatched one thousand orcs single handedly, has 1 HP left, and none of their expendable powers available, and you slay them, you did not really defeat a level 20 Fighter. At best, you stepped on an armored rat, but not much more. But D&D does not take into account how worn down enemies are.

If, on the other hand, that Fighter actually has a figurine of wondrous power and uses it to summon some full health beast, you may suddenly have a more difficult fight on your hands. But D&D doesn’t take magic items into account in the CR of an enemy (that I know of, at least?)

But even beyond that… forget about the figurine… what if the Champion wins initiative and lays 4 attacks on your sorry behind, and scores 4 crits (it is a Champion afterall), they may actually represent a much more difficult fight than you would expect from a 1 HP foe with no expendable powers left. But D&D does not take into account how lucky foes have been in their attempts to destroy you.

So a fully calibrated XP calculation system may need to rely on more nuanced factors than who the enemy is and instead take into account things like the total and/or max spell slot levels they expended, the amount of HPs they lost before falling, etc.

All of that could be quite easy on a VTT, but that would be a nightmare for an analog pen and paper game.

So we accept that the encounter math is inherently quite imprecise, and relies on several assumptions:

1. Enemies start fresh and get ground down to 0 HPs.

2. Enemies usually have zero magic items or occasionally have just 1. Maybe 2-3 for a final boss. Most magic items are weak. They are therefore, on average, negligible.

3. Enemies fight moderately smartly: they’ll have their expendable abilities available and use them, but probably will not gang up on one PC at a time.

4. Crits and other luck factors smooth out over time given enough fights so no point in giving a bit more XP here and a bit less later, it should all even out in the end.