What's the point of a mage summoner when clerics can do the same ?

[Choranzanus]

3ed nonsense

I have never understood how monster summoning made it into cleric spell list. It just seems totally wrong.

 

[Plane Sailing]

Psions can't get the spell like abilities that a normal caster can. In terms of pure combat nastiness, Astral Construct and Nature's Ally outdo the normal summons, but being able to get outsiders with decent spell like powers adds alot of versatility.

It certainly did in 3.0, but if you compare the 3.0 summoning lists with the 3.5 summoning lists there are whole rafts of spell casting summoned creatures which have disappeared from your options

 

[amethal]

Clerics have alignment restrictions. My good wizard can summon demons and fiendish servants if need be. My good dwarven buddy the fighter/cleric can't.

As far as I can tell, clerics in Eberron don't have alignment restrictions.

And clerics with the Dragon Below domain get Augment Summoning as a granted power.

I really want to play a cultist of the Dragon Below with the DB domain and the Madness domain. I think it would be a lot of fun. (And yes, I do know it is called the Madness domain because you'd have to be mad to take it )

 

[Brother MacLaren]

Once again you summed up pretty nicely what I tried to express: Here why I don't like clerics: They are no fantasy archetype.

Aside from EGG's concept of them as Templar-type figures... they work really well as evil demon-worshipping cultists. Or any "wizard" that calls on specific supernatural beings -- the "wizard" in Conan the Barbarian, for example.