Summon monster question: Celestial vs. Fiendish

[Dinkeldog]

1) Is it possible, per the RAW to summon, say a Celestial Wolf with a Summon Monster II spell? The book lists Celestial Riding Dog and Fiendish Wolf. Why the difference?

2) Regardless of the RAW, is there some compelling argument why some creatures are Celestial and others Fiendish?

3) Does anyone with the Planar Handbook allow the Lawful and Chaotic templates? Is there a balance reason not to?

As usual, I am not suggesting that there is a "right" or "wrong" way to do it. I'm more interested in people's opinions as to the balance issues if one allows free mixing of Celestial and Fiendish and adds in the other two templates.

 

[Thanee]

1) I don't think so. Hmm... wait, wasn't there something in the DMG or UA, where it said you could alter the summoning tables?

2) Only thing I can think of is, that the base animal appears closer to one side than the other for some reason, i.e. dog seems more friendly, wolf more mean, or something like that.

3) I do allow all alignment-based templates to be swapped for the opposite, when summoning creatures. I see the good-evil axis to be stronger than the lawful-chaotic axis, therefore I'd usually only consider these two, but no, I don't see much reason not to allow axiomatic and anarchic as well.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Pinotage]

My guess would be that it's entirely a flavor things. Wolves, snakes, rats, scorpions etc. are 'inherently' perceived as being more evil than riding dogs, bears or hippogriffs. Given the equivallency of the two templates, I'd not mind switching from one type of creature to the other, particularly if the deity of the cleric in question, for example, was one of nature.

Pinotage

 

[diaglo]

1) I don't think so. Hmm... wait, wasn't there something in the DMG or UA, where it said you could alter the summoning tables?

there is an optional rule out there... it may be in the DMG concerning summoning. there is another one about summoning specific monsters. you summon the exact same fiendish wolf or celestial dog. you know his name and so on...

 

[Li Shenron]

As usual, I am not suggesting that there is a "right" or "wrong" way to do it. I'm more interested in people's opinions as to the balance issues if one allows free mixing of Celestial and Fiendish and adds in the other two templates.

There is no balance reason AFAIK. Definitely not between the four different templates. I even easily allow a player to actually summon a base creature not included in the lists, as long as it seems about the same CR as the others.

The only risk you run when expanding SM lists, is that some zealous player may want to summon the "perfect" critter every time. Not that this is necessarily bad, but it can slow the game down a lot (it's good to require the summoner to have at least prepared the sheet for something he summons), and it may sometimes seem metagaming.

 

[Infiniti2000]

1) Is it possible, per the RAW to summon, say a Celestial Wolf with a Summon Monster II spell? The book lists Celestial Riding Dog and Fiendish Wolf. Why the difference?

No, it's not possible, but there may be an official variant somewhere. The difference is probably entirely flavor, to give Good vs Evil vs Neutral a different selection, and stacking the deck for Neutral.

2) Regardless of the RAW, is there some compelling argument why some creatures are Celestial and others Fiendish?

Not really.

3) Does anyone with the Planar Handbook allow the Lawful and Chaotic templates? Is there a balance reason not to?

You could easily develop whole new lists of monsters, probably all in the same ballpark as the existing monsters. The real power in the Summon Monster and Summon Nature's Ally spells is the flexibility. By expanding this flexibility, you greatly increase the spells' power. IMO, that might actually make the spells useable at higher levels.

 

[Three_Haligonians]

I feel the need to plug the Summon Monster Variant in Dragon #302. It's based on CR and while you only get three choices when you take the spell (they have to be outsiders, elementals or other extra-planar creatures) it allows you to add more and more to your list with time and knowledge checks.

It even covers being cautious since some creaturs have deceiving CR's for various reasons (always a plus to point out your limitations I think)

Anyway, I think it's great, I use it for my games and I'm done plugging now.

To answer your actual questions:

1)I'm pretty sure the RAW says no (and am further assured by Infiniti2000 saying the same thing).

2)I don't think the RAW has stopped many people before in situations like these - switching out templates should be fine I imagine, they seem to be assigned that way on the principal of "theme" and not rules.

3) I own the Planar's Handbook and I allow both templates - there is nothing outrageous about them (although to be fair, Axiomatic creatures will miss out on their hivemind ability unless you summon more than one but that's not to difficult).

J from Three Haligonians

 

[Bullgrit]

Have any of the designers, ever, anywhere, spoken about their reasons for making the lists as they did? There must be some reason why they didn't just say, X, Y, and Z creatures with the celestial or fiendish templates as the caster wants.

Bullgrit

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

You could easily develop whole new lists of monsters, probably all in the same ballpark as the existing monsters.

To expand, I had a DM who went through and did this. He also included the other MotP templates (Shadow, Axiomatic, etc.). Additionally, every sorceror chose a bloodline (either alignment- or elemental-related), and sorcerors were limited to summons from their particular bloodline. Wizards, upon learning a Summon Monster Y spell for the first time, could choose two bloodlines, and could relearn the spell (as if it were a new spell) to add additional bloodlines (one each), or could learn the additional bloodlines from another wizard.

It was a pretty cool variant, and almost all of the domains were fairly balanced with each other (though I think the water-related domain may have been a little weak). I think my wizard - apprentice to a great summoner, known for being able to call many creatures from at least 5 bloodlines - started with Anarchic and Aquan as my available SMI bloodlines. I eventually learned Axiomatic, as well.

 

[dcollins]

1) Is it possible, per the RAW to summon, say a Celestial Wolf with a Summon Monster II spell?

No. The list is the list.