Summoning Monsters

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

For the record, Celestial Badgers understand Common.

Any creature with an Intelligence of 3 or greater understands Common (even if it does not speak it), unless the description says otherwise.

Intelligence: A creature can speak all the languages mentioned in its description, plus one additional language per point of Intelligence bonus. Any creature with an Intelligence score of 3 or higher understands at least one language (Common, unless noted otherwise).

The celestial template gives the base creature an Int of 3, and does not specify the language the creature speaks.

Abilities: Same as the base creature, but Intelligence is at least 3

Contrast this with, say, the Nixie:

Nixies speak Aquan and Sylvan. Some also speak Common.

Accordingly, celestial badgers understand Common.

Some will argue that, really, they meant celestial badgers to understand the Celestial language, because it's the same name, right? By a similar logic, fiendish snakes would understand Fiendish - which, as you will note, does not actually exist. Therefore, this line of argument is spurious.

 

[Tiberius]

Another spell line to consider in a similar vein is the Summon Undead chain. With the errata, you can summon undead with HD equal to your level + 1, which can yield some pretty big things. Combine that with the DR of skeletons and zombies, and you have some powerful creatures to play with, if you take the time to pore through the MM and apply the appropriate templates to things in your time between games. These spells appear in Libris Mortis, among other places.

 

[farscapesg1]

Battlefield control is really where the Summoning spells pay off. Sure, there are a couple creatures (Celestial Bison for Summon Monster III), that make pretty good brutes, but the ability to place summoned creatures to aid the other members of the party is the highlight. The only problem is that making good use of summoning spells usually requires you to build the character as a summoner from the start.

Then there is always self defense. In our last session our party was attacked by wererats. Unfortunately, the rest of the party wasn't in a position to provide any protection for my character and my attacks couldn't penetrate their DR. I summoned up a fiendish ape to try to distract the wererat that was attacking me, but the ape couldn't hardly get past its DR either (max possible damage was 13 and DR is 10/silver). Yet once again, the enemy decides to ignore the large creature attacking it from behind and keeps attacking the easy-to-hit wizard So, I decided to make use of the ape's huge grapple benefits and have him grapple the wererat and just hold him away from me, letting me cast other spells to try to help out the party. It was pretty fun watching the DM try to escpage the grapple each round when the ape had a +14 grapple check. Then he would have the wererat bite the ape, which couldn't get through the DR either

 

[werk]

In specific? A Druid of mine has had fun with Summon Nature's Ally II (Dire Badger) for getting through annoying obsticles - they have a dig speed (only 10 feet, but nothing specifically prevents them from Running for 4 times that in a round, if I recall correctly, for 40 feet of digging per caster level) that is described as being able to penetrate anything short of "solid rock"; you can duplicate the effect with a Celestial Dire Badger via Summon Monster III.

...

A creature with a burrow speed can tunnel through dirt, but not through rock unless the descriptive text says otherwise. Creatures cannot charge or run while burrowing.

 

[Rackhir]

Celestial Bison is probably going to be your best "combat" summon, especially if you have augment summoning since it has 5hd. The +4 Con will bump it up 10 more HP to 47. The Fiendish Monstrous Centipede Huge will be a close second with 6 HD though it has lower attacks and HP, it does have poison (1d6 Dex) though.

4 HD is the minimum to get DR 5/magic with a celestial/fiendish/pseudonatural. You are at the level where magic weapons or the equivalent in natural attacks are rare enough that opponents will generally not be able to overcome the damage reduction. Fiendish Dire Bats, Fiendish Apes, Fiendish Monstrous Centipede - Huge (6hd). These also have enough HD to get the DR.

Creatures with a single primary attack will benefit a bit more from augment summoning. Their attack is treated as a two handed weapon for purposes of the strength damage bonus.

The Save DCs for a lot of abilities and poison are con based, which is another good reason to get Augment Summoning.

 

[Old Gumphrey]

Another spell line to consider in a similar vein is the Summon Undead chain. With the errata, you can summon undead with HD equal to your level + 1, which can yield some pretty big things. Combine that with the DR of skeletons and zombies, and you have some powerful creatures to play with, if you take the time to pore through the MM and apply the appropriate templates to things in your time between games. These spells appear in Libris Mortis, among other places.

I just checked the Libris Mortis errata and found nothing about Summon Undead spells. Where are you getting your information?

 

[farscapesg1]

Creatures with a single primary attack will benefit a bit more from augment summoning. Their attack is treated as a two handed weapon for purposes of the strength damage bonus.

Is this mentioned anywhere that I have missed? I have always just given the creatures a +2 to damage for the Augmented strength score (+4), but if this is actually spelled out in the rules then creatures with a single attack would get +3 damage instead.

Edit - nevermind I found it on page 6 of the Monster Manual. Now I have to go through and refigure my creature stats and print the darn index cards again

 

[Prism]

I just checked the Libris Mortis errata and found nothing about Summon Undead spells. Where are you getting your information?

Its in the players guide to faerun errata but for some reason this was missed from libris mortis. Without this ruling the spells as printed are very powerful compared to other summonings of the same level

 

[Jhulae]

There was also a Dragon Magazine a while back (for some reason 313 sticks in my mind, but it's probably not the right one) that had 'expanded' summoning lists for the summon spells, because honestly, the ones in the core book are kind of limited because of space.

 

[Jack Simth]

Well, it doesn't do you any good because you won't likely be able to communicate with the badger to tell it to dig anywhere (you need speak with animals or learn celestial and convince your DM that celestial badgers understand celestial). More importantly, however, realize that the badger does not leave behind a tunnel or anything, so the fact that he can dig may not have the uses you think it does.

Actually, the Dire Badge does leave a tunnel - it's in the description:

These vicious creatures tolerate no intrusions. They cannot burrow into solid rock, but can move through just about any material softer than that. A dire badger usually leaves behind a usable tunnel 5 feet in diameter when burrowing unless the material it’s moving through is very loose.

A dire badger is from 5 to 7 feet in length and can weigh up to 500 pounds.

(Emphasis added)

You recall incorrectly. A creature cannot charge or run while burrowing.

Ah well, happens.