Summons while being on another plane?

[Zappo]

Suppose that you are on an outer plane and cast a Summon monster V. Or a Summon natural ally. What are your options?

I think that it would add to a plane's flavor is there were specialized SM/SNA lists. But how should these lists be? Suppose the caster of a summon monster is on a lower plane - my first instinct would be to add heaps of fiendish creatures, more evil outsiders, and drop all celestials. However, on a second thought, that doesn't really make sense. The spell is supposed to get extraplanar creatures, so on (say) Baator it should pick up anything except a Baatezu. What would you do?

And what about SNA spells? They are supposed to summon a "natural" creature, but on another plane the definition of "natural" could be very different. Could a SNA cast on the plane of water come up with a fire elemental? Probably not. If cast on an upper plane, on the other hand, it is reasonable that it will summon a celestial animal instead of a normal one...

Has anyone thought about this?

 

[jerichothebard]

That's one way of looking at it...

The other is that they are spellcasters who trained with the Prime Material version of the spell, so that they will continue to summon creatures that are normal to their frame of reference. In other words, the spells will continue to function as written, rather than having to adjust the list every time they plane-hop.




Not nearly as interesting, or, frankly, as logical, but a whole lot less work.


jtb