Summon Monster Training?

[Berk]

Well since formians have a hive mind and since when you summon one you take it away from the hive mentality that it would fight just like any other single minded creature. The way that creature fights itself. It is completely different going up against something that can only think for itself, and something that thinks for itself and has hundreds and even thousands of others thinking for it at the same time.

Personally I say the players have wasted a month of prescious time that they could have used studying the formians in other ways like from a sage or library. A lot less labor intensive for the PC's and you could prolly find out more in a month through a sage and a library then fighting the same type of creature over and over.

I mean low level adventurers spend months fighting orcs and kobolds and goblins. Do they ever get a bonus for doing this?

And if you want to use dwarves get a bonus against certain creatures. Well that is because they spent generations fighting these type of monsters and it was part of evolution to adept to fighting these monsters to survive. 1 month shouldn't come anywhere near close to several thousands of years of evolution. Just so you know dwarves only get a +1 to hit against those certain creatures.

 

[Pooka]

Well, I think the idea isn´t that bad, but its true, you will never ever get a bonus for orcs even if you killed hundreds before ...

I think I would tip them like it was said before. Giving them a little bit of insight in the combat tactics shouldn´t be that bad. Maybe you can just take one PC that just has watched the dayly spectacle, because this one could learn more by watching than the ones that were actually fighting...

You can also just say (if you want to justify giving no bonus) that their behavior on open battleground is just different to the situation when they have to protect their offspring and their queen ... more savage or whatever ...

You have to choose what is the better way for you.
You have now many different ideas about that ... if you can´t decide just take a d20 and let the die decide


Good luck!

 

[Clay_More]

You guys make alot of excellent points. I think any numerical advantages will be too high, so ill just give them "small" pointers about Formian fighting style (though, not anything about how they fight when theyre in a big pack & hive). Once again, the Hivemind of Enworld proves its value

 

[WattsHumphrey]

I would personally have to disagree with most of the comments here and go with a circumstance bonuses for the party. Circumstance bonuses are placed in the system (IMHO) for the sake of being convenient and easy to throw around.

1) Make the party specify the conditions under which they wish to train (let the enemies set up a base first... let the enemies ambush them... let them fight in battles where they see one another coming... let the party surprise the enemies).

2) Whenever these circumstances come up in the actual attack, give the fighter a small circumstance bonus to attack roles. Give the wizard a small bonus to int checks about the race and their possible tactics. Give the ranger a small bonus to Wilderness Lore checks made to track the buggers (and perhaps the same bonus as the fighter to hit).

3) Realize that these bonuses will not apply to any that are being more directly controlled by the hive mind. I'd probably let the party think they're continuing to get the bonuses, and then just mentally remove the bonuses before determining who hits and who does not. That way, the party will have to figure out that they aren't getting use out of their tactics in certain situations.

As far as the permanency of these bonuses, I'd let the party know that they are only temporary. The students are cramming for the real test and will forget it all when it ceases to be useful. Presumably a ranger's favored enemy is something the ranger fights on a regular basis and thinks about regularly as well. The party in question is only concerned with one application of these skills and will therefore lose the bonuses.

If the party wishes to employ these same tactics against other creatures, I'd say to let them. The main problem I'd see with it, though, is that the more intelligent the creature, the more difficult it will be to accurately predict all their possible tactics. If they try to train against a human they'll have to realize that environment, alignment, intelligence level, motivation, and class will allow for a TON more variation than the specific application that the party currently is currently researching. If they wish to train against wild animals (int 3 or less, probably) then I'd assume that the tactics would be pretty universally applicable.

Anything more complicated is a judgement call, but that's how I'd rule it.