Summoner

[Goose]

Hi all, ive been really itching to play a summoner type, and I was curious as to what some of you think is essential to be a good summoner. I was looking at the Malconvoker or the Master Specialist as a Conjurer maybe. Ive yet to really see anybody play a conjurer and was curious if any of you have and how well it worked.

Im sorry if im being vague, just kinda want some general advice please. Thank you

 

[moritheil]

Im sorry if im being vague, just kinda want some general advice please. Thank you

First off, it's important to define what sort of summoner/conjurer you want to be. If you just like having armies of underlings around, necromancy and calling spells are what you're really looking for, not summoning, since summoned monsters only stick around for a short while. That said, these are your basic options:

Sorcerer (surprisingly good for calling, since the planar binding spells require high charisma)
Cleric (allows you to heal/buff as well as summon. Arguably the most powerful.)
Conjurer (I strongly recommend the Rapid Summoning variant, without which casting a summoning spell takes 1 turn)
Druid (spontaneously convert spells into Summon Nature's Ally . . . not so hot if you know that all you want to do is summon anyway, but it gives flexibility)
Artificer (allows you to buff and nuke as well as summon, but requires lots of prep time. With sufficient preparation, more powerful than even a cleric.)

In terms of prestige classes, the aforementioned Malconvoker is worth looking at, but so are these:
Thaumaturgist (bonuses to what you summon)
Nar Demonbinder (the calling diagram is helpful)
Master of Shrouds (summon undead)
True Necromancer (desecrate aura works to boost summon undead)
Moonspeaker (bonuses to summoning for shifter druids)

Surprisingly, most of the BoVD/BoED prestige classes are not actually that great for summoning high-powered monsters, at least AFAIK. There's also an Abyssal Heritor feat in FF that allows you to summon a demon once per day of up to half of your class levels in CR. At low levels that means cannon fodder; at high levels you can get something useful like a succubus or vrock. Of course, you have to be evil to really make use of that.

 

[Shayuri]

Mori kinda mentioned this, but I wanted to append a bit more detail.

Best conjurer I've seen is a Conjurer specialist using the variant class abilities in Unearted Arcana. You basically trade in wizard generalist spiffs, like the familiar, your Scribe Scroll and bonus feats, and free 2 spells per level to gain other, more Conjurer-related spiffs, like the ability to cast summons as standard actions (this is a HUGE improvement), the ability to summon buffer versions of monsters (that stacks with Augmented Summons, and makes your critters much more competitive at high levels), and the ability to spontaneously cast Summoning spells.

Good stuff. And since Unearthed Arcana is now in the SRD, it's all there for the lookin' and usin'.

 

[moritheil]

Good summary of the conjurer. I personally think the jury is out regarding how equitable the trade for your bonus feats is, but then, my builds tend to be feat-starved.

I wholeheartedly recommend trading your familiar in, though. That nets you Rapid Summoning, which gets around the single biggest headache of casting summons in combat.

(Right now, Shayuri's party is about to smack down a summoner NPC in my campaign, so I guess you could say it's weighing on my mind. )

 

[theemrys]

In my game the player of the wizard did the rapid summoning variant and it has made for a fun character. They got the augmented summoning feat and at 4th level went Master Specialist (from complete mage). Also, there are a few really interesting summoning feats in the complete mage worth looking at. I don't remember names offhand, but the one my player uses is the one that makes a noxious cloud within 1 square of where the summoned creatures are. VERY handing for stopping archers and spell casters by taking out line of sight, even if they're out of range for the summoning.

 

[Lopke_Quasath]

My current character is a summoner, and like theemrys's player he is:

Conjurer 3 / Master Specialist (Conjuring) 3

Variants: Unearthed Arcana trade-in Familiar for Rapid Summoning, and trade Wizard Bonus Feats for Summoning boosts (Of course, I only got the 1st level trade-off Scribe Scroll for Augmented Summoning, but it was for the flavor. You need Spell Focus: Conjuring anyway as a pre-req for Master Specialist).

I also have the "Focused Specialist" variant from Complete Mage (pg.34). It trades in 1 regular spell slot per level for 2 bonus spells from your favored school. This means that at least 3 spells each level must be from your school. Which is fine when you cast Summon Monster all the time (You also have to choose another prohibited school, for a total of 3 schools. Mine are: Enchantment, Illusion, and Necromancy)

I can't wait to make it (eventually) to 10th level in Master Specialist, when the special Conjuring esoterica makes all Conjurating spells that have 1 standard action casting time into swift actions (including Summon spells, thanks to Rapid Summoning!). Friggin sweet!

Complete Mage is a good book to have for the feat options as well (including the Reserve Feat "Summon Elemental")

It's a very fun character option, with lots of versatility. Enjoy!

 

[Deset Gled]

Hi all, ive been really itching to play a summoner type, and I was curious as to what some of you think is essential to be a good summoner.

To be a good summoner, there are a lot of things you need to worry about besides just the character build. You need to spend a significant amount of time making sure that you don't bring a grinding halt to combat every time you summon something.

First, make sure you have pre-written sheets or cards with full stats on everything you plan to summon, with stats written up with and without all buffs you may use. Pulling out the MM every combat will get old fast. Also, make sure that you understand all abilities and limitations of the monsters you plan to summon. Most importantly, make sure you have reviewed your collection of pets with the DM before the game starts, so you're on the same page.

Second, make sure that the things you summon work with the warriors of the group. Don't try to steal their thunder. Place your pets in ways that give your team a tactical advantage rather than just causing damage (let the meat shields make the big kills). Whenever possible, position them to give flanking bonuses. Use them to protect the arcanists so the meat shields don't have to. Don't worry about having your pets killed, they'll be back again the next encounter anyway.

Over time, you'll probably find that summoners would better if you focus on synergy rather than pure power.

 

[roguerouge]

I really think that druid is the way to go, especially if you are starting out at first level. They get much, much better creatures. The wolf at first level, the hippogriff and dire bat and elementals at third, etc. Conjurers get creatures with special abilities, eventually, but they're behind the druid who specializes in conjurations, IMHO. It's like if you want to specialize in undead: you COULD be a necromancer, but it's still much easier (and usually better) to do it just by being a cleric.

 

[jcfiala]

I was playing a Conjurer in a 3.5 campaign recently, and I have to generally agree with folks: If you go with Wizard, you want to talk your GM into allowing the Rapid Summoning ability, and you want to have the stats for the various monsters ready - I ended up using a binder to keep them in. You're also going to want the Augmented Summoning ability as well.

If Frostburn is allowed, there's a summoning feat in there that brings in monsters with the cold subtype added, which gives them something like an additional 1d6 cold damage with each hit - see if you can get that as well.

Unfortunately when I was playing Complete Mage hadn't come out yet, but I'd got with the Master Specialist from there as well if you can.

 

[Rackhir]

Alienist is a decent PrC for summoners with one hidden drawback. The True Strike that the summons gain from the template is extremely helpful since it pretty much guarentees at least one hit for the summoned creature. The drawback is that as the class is written, you can't summon anything that isn't fiendish/celestial (since that template is replaced by the pseudonatural template).

This can hurt especially at higher levels where elementals are among your best summons.

Another note, the Pseudonatural template DOES change the type of creature so that "Animal Growth" an extremely powerful enhancement for summoned animals does not work on them since it only affects animals.

My DM lets me summon non-templated creatures as normal with no template. Some people feel that allowing the caster to add the pseudonatural template to the non-templated creatures is too powerful. I don't really think so since the true strike is the only thing from the template that really makes much of a difference and that's only for one attack.

Druids are potentially extremely powerful summoners. Summon Nature's Ally (SNA) creatures are generally obtained a full level earlier than with SM spells. This is especially good, since generally the optimal choice for summoning is to get 1d3 creatures from the next level down. So that Druids can essentially get a d3 of a monster vs a single monster for a Wiz/Cleric. This is on top of full spell casting, decent HD, wildshape and the ability to substitue SNA spells.

The only drawback to druids is the lack of a rapid summoning option which makes a HUGE difference to the viability of a summoner.