Demon summoner


Pathfinder First Edition General Discussion

Scarab Sages

So I'm starting a new game and was hoping to make a demon summoner or maybe something close to the warlock from World of Warcraft. I have no idea where to start other than have a bunch of charisma and planar ally + planar binding. We are starting the story at level 1 and going up to level 20 by the end. I'm mostly just wanted someone to maybe point me in the right direction because I've come up mostly empty handed for a full class that allows even imps to be summoned or controlled.

I don't really want to be full evil character so maybe a way to get around that would also be helpful.

Any and all help, no matter how small, is always helpful. Thank you for your time.

Silver Crusade Contributor

You might consider the unchained summoner class. ^_^


If Unchained isn't an option for you (I don't have the book yet myself), you can still build a pretty effective "demon" eidolon. In a campaign that my wife ran last year, the party summoner modeled his eidolon on a marilith. At 1st level, she wasn't much more than a man-sized snake with two arms to wield swords. By the end of that campaign, though, at 11th, she was cosmetically indistinguishable from the real thing, had some appropriate resistances, and was carrying around the bulk of her master's wealth in the form of 6 gladii of various materials and enchantments. But she wasn't actually a demon, so was neutral (CN?) like her master.

Regardless of class, summoning evil creatures requires evil spells, which will affect your alignment over time. (Ditto with chaos, if you're focusing on demons, or law if devils.) You'll probably be neutral at best, with an chronic need to do good deeds to try to stave off your inevitable fall.

Silver Crusade

Naoto wrote:

So I'm starting a new game and was hoping to make a demon summoner or maybe something close to the warlock from World of Warcraft. I have no idea where to start other than have a bunch of charisma and planar ally + planar binding. We are starting the story at level 1 and going up to level 20 by the end. I'm mostly just wanted someone to maybe point me in the right direction because I've come up mostly empty handed for a full class that allows even imps to be summoned or controlled.

I don't really want to be full evil character so maybe a way to get around that would also be helpful.

Any and all help, no matter how small, is always helpful. Thank you for your time.

Also the summon monster line.

As for staving off being evil, that's something you'll have to discuss with your DM. Personally I think a neutral spell caster should be able to summon evil beings without becoming evil (I mean, the demon summoning wizard who is neither good nor evil is kind of a trope), but other DMs will have varied views. If you get a math focused DM, just make sure for every demon you summon you also summon an archon.

Grand Lodge

This feat can help with filing of the evil descriptor of spells so you can summon demons with out it effecting your alignment. it does take some wrangling though.

Scarab Sages

Thank you all for the help, I'm looking into everything now. The summoner class is something I wanted to stay away from because my DM thinks it's really overpowered. He will let me play it if I want but asks that we try to stay away from it. (He also doesn't like the leadership feat, really anything that gives you more characters)

Scarab Sages

For anyone looking for something similar to me in the future, I found a 3rd party book called "Deep Magic" by Kobold press. It has an archetype for summoner called the demon binder. Its almost nothing like the summoner and has everything to do with making deals with demons and using them like your eidolon. (till you are unconscious, it kills you).

Scarab Sages

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Naoto wrote:
Thank you all for the help, I'm looking into everything now. The summoner class is something I wanted to stay away from because my DM thinks it's really overpowered. He will let me play it if I want but asks that we try to stay away from it. (He also doesn't like the leadership feat, really anything that gives you more characters)

For what it's worth, the Unchained Summoner is much less overpowered than the original version. The eidiolon is much more restricted in evolutions, and the spell list has been re-balanced to remove early access to game changing spells.


Summoner is not problematic, if you don't minmax your Eidolon too much or take the Unchained Summoner

Other things you might want to look at:

Wizard - Conjuration School, Infernal Binder subschool, later on take the True Namer Feat
Cleric - Fiendish Vessel with the right domains
Summon Evil Monster - a feat that adds a lot of Demons and similar creatures to your Summon Monster list
Diabolist - a Prestige Class specialized in Summoning Devils
Souleater - a Prestige Class that deals with Daemons and trades souls


The unchained summoner is far less broken than the original summoner in my opinion, and they are definitely most appropriate way to build a "demon summoner" that hits concept at level 1.

In addition to I3igAI's advise above, look up the Summon Guardian Spirit feat from the Monster Summoner's Handbook. It basically gives you a second eidolon (as early as 5th level) which can be one of the demons from the improved familiar list that you can summon using your SLA when you're eidolon isn't out.

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