The obvious solution to cursed equipment is surely that the Eidolon does not shake off the cursed item, it stays with the beastie and is still there when it returns.No matter how you handle cursed equipment, it makes the Eidolon the perfect "detect curse" spell.
"We just found these new items... Summoner, give them to your pet and make sure it uses them next combat. When we camp for the night, dismiss it and resummon it tomorrow. If the items aren't 'stuck' on it, then they aren't cursed!"
But this would be a good way to stop the obvious way to get money since cursed items don't detect as such (normally).
"Okay Summoner, we know this sword is cursed because your Eidolon can't get rid of it. Dismiss your Eidolon and carry the sword into town. We'll sell it to a mark, leave town, and then you can resummon your Eidolon. Rinse and repeat as needed."
So this sentient intelligent being with its own personality going to accept this?
So this sentient intelligent being with its own personality going to accept this?The obvious solution to cursed equipment is surely that the Eidolon does not shake off the cursed item, it stays with the beastie and is still there when it returns.No matter how you handle cursed equipment, it makes the Eidolon the perfect "detect curse" spell.
"We just found these new items... Summoner, give them to your pet and make sure it uses them next combat. When we camp for the night, dismiss it and resummon it tomorrow. If the items aren't 'stuck' on it, then they aren't cursed!"
But this would be a good way to stop the obvious way to get money since cursed items don't detect as such (normally).
"Okay Summoner, we know this sword is cursed because your Eidolon can't get rid of it. Dismiss your Eidolon and carry the sword into town. We'll sell it to a mark, leave town, and then you can resummon your Eidolon. Rinse and repeat as needed."
That is completely up to the Summoners player.
The Eidolon is the characters primary class ability after all.
So this sentient intelligent being with its own personality going to accept this?The obvious solution to cursed equipment is surely that the Eidolon does not shake off the cursed item, it stays with the beastie and is still there when it returns.No matter how you handle cursed equipment, it makes the Eidolon the perfect "detect curse" spell.
"We just found these new items... Summoner, give them to your pet and make sure it uses them next combat. When we camp for the night, dismiss it and resummon it tomorrow. If the items aren't 'stuck' on it, then they aren't cursed!"
But this would be a good way to stop the obvious way to get money since cursed items don't detect as such (normally).
"Okay Summoner, we know this sword is cursed because your Eidolon can't get rid of it. Dismiss your Eidolon and carry the sword into town. We'll sell it to a mark, leave town, and then you can resummon your Eidolon. Rinse and repeat as needed."
That is completely up to the Summoners player.
The Eidolon is the characters primary class ability after all.
The point I'm trying to make is that the Eidolon isn't some kind of dumb-a$$ but a sentient being with its own personality. The Summoner can tell it what to do but it doesn't have to like it. The Eidolon might not be able to act directly to harm the Summoner but other PCs, if I was DMing, would be fair game. And if you start throwing the alignment issue about, a good Summoner just wouldn't allow that to happen and an evil or neutral one *might*. The neutral or evil Eidolon would take umbridge and react.
I wouldn't. It may have a personality, but I would treat it as other summoned creatures. It does bends to the summoners will. It will do as the summoner says to the best of its ability. Not only that but will serve the summoner to the best of its ability. That means not screwing things...
Your choice, your game.
Hey there all,
I have been going through a great deal of playtest feedback and speculation over the past few days. It has become obvious to me that there needs to be a few adjustments made to the summoner for balance reasons. Although I would not say that these changes are final, from this point onward, they are part of the class for playtesting purposes (this includes the Pathfinder Society Organized Play). I need to implement these changes to get a bit more productive feedback, since the issue seems to be skewing results a bit too heavily.
Feel free to post comments and feedback concerning this rules change in this thread, but leave other issued out of this discussion please.
Jason Bulmahn
Lead Designer
Paizo Publishing
Eidolons are limited in the amount of gear and equipment they can use. Their forms tend to shift over time, making certain types of gear impossible to use properly. Eidolons with the proper training and the limbs (arms) evolution can wield weapons. They suffer the normal penalties for wielding more than one weapon, regardless of the number of arms they possess. Eidolons cannot wear armor, due to their shifting form, but those that take the proper feat can use a shield. Eidolons can use some magic items. Each eidolon can wear up to two rings, if it has the limbs (arms) evolution. Each eidolon can wear a single magic item in the following slots: eyes, head, neck, and shoulders. An eidolon with the limbs (arms) evolution or the tentacle evolution can drink potions.Any magic items possessed by the eidolon fall to the ground when the eidolon is sent back to its home plane, regardless of the reason. If this includes cursed items, the items immediately return to the eidolon when it is summoned again.
In addition to the above language, the following changes are made to the summoner.- Delete the sentence from the Summon Monster I class feature that reads: He can cast this spell as a...
I take the middle ground on this one. I think that limiting the summoner to one use of the Summon Monster power at a time is a smart move, and I think that the eidolon probably didn't need the armor. However, if we're going to limit the summon monster to one use I think that the minute/level duration would probably be a better idea. They can still cast summon monster normally, so their not really being limited too heavily, just forced to make choices.
I feel like the nerf to the summon monster X SLA is overboard. It smacks of the senseless and imbalanced nerf to Astral Constructs for the psion class. This nerf makes no sense in context of the wizard, cleric, and ESPECIALLY druid, all of whom can still spam as many SM-Xs onto the field of battle as they want, so I feel like the summoner should have the same capability, only better.
Take, for example, the Dread Necromancer class. That class can have as many skeletal beasts as it wants on the field, decked out in as much magical swag as you can put on 'em.
So I see this as kind of a knee-jerk reaction to people noticing what lots of summons on the field can do, here. Remember that AoE spells and AoE save or sucks can be just as deadly as multiple summons, if not more so.
Now the changes to the Eidolon, those were utterly justified, so go nuts.
Here's the thing, though. The summon monster ability of the Summoner scales with level. With the current fix, if the summoner wants to summon, say, 7 monsters into combat, he can blow a class feature, then cast actual spell(s). This expenditure of resources ensures that he can still summon, in total, more monsters than the wizard sans scrolls, but getting more than one on the field will require some of his more valuable resource(s) to be expended.
Undead minions were worthless in 3.5. They were always underleveled, and by the time you could create nasties like mummies and vampires, everything has a huge fort save and will kill them in one round. Sure, you can use a massive amount of them, but the cost in GP is horrendous for high-level monsters and low-levels creatures require a lot of work to recreate.
Very true of the Druid, though. In my experience, though, most monsters from that list aside from the massive swarms of dire weasels are a bit weaker than the summon monster creatures. Maybe the better word is less diverse. Summon monster creatures have many more abilities and specialties than your summoned badger, even though he has the barbarian's class feature. Plus, the druid still has to blow all his high-level spells to be that powerful... and it's a full casting progression class. The summoner gets better guys, but can summon less at once. Summon monster scrolls are something I see all my summoners carrying around whether they want to or not. Maybe if they automatically gained knowledge of the Summon Monster spells with each new casting level, then it would be a bit more fair.
I do think that the single monster from the SLA should have an extended duration though. I mean, it does absolutely no harm. You can't have more from this ability than this one out at once, and on top of that, it's always going to be a weaker monster than the best you can summon at low level, and it's no replacement for a Planar Ally spell.
I feel like the nerf to the summon monster X SLA is overboard. It smacks of the senseless and imbalanced nerf to Astral Constructs for the psion class. This nerf makes no sense in context of the wizard, cleric, and ESPECIALLY druid, all of whom can still spam as many SM-Xs onto the field of battle as they want, so I feel like the summoner should have the same capability, only better.
Take, for example, the Dread Necromancer class. That class can have as many skeletal beasts as it wants on the field, decked out in as much magical swag as you can put on 'em.
So I see this as kind of a knee-jerk reaction to people noticing what lots of summons on the field can do, here. Remember that AoE spells and AoE save or sucks can be just as deadly as multiple summons, if not more so.
Now the changes to the Eidolon, those were utterly justified, so go nuts.
The problem with "ONLY Better" is that it becomes Too Much. Comparisons to a WOTC unbalanced splat book PrC are a poor defense. Fact is yes the Summoner has a particular niche, but the niche is the Eidolon. My suggestion does not remove Summon Monster from the Summoner's toolkit as it's still there from the base class ability. It does bring up a serious question which needs to be addressed. How much summoning per day do we want ANY character to do even if Summoning is it's "Schtick", arguably it's not... the real schtick for the Summoner is "Pokemon Master".
Yes it is a reaction to what lots of summons on the field can do. The deadliness is not just the issue, it's the monopolisation of combat time by one player who's got the majority of pieces on the field.
Removing the Summon Spells from the class lists solves the following problems.
1. The broken progression from Summon Monster 1-9. The class ability has these available in the same progression rate a Wizard would with the spontaneous flexibility of a sorcerer. A Summoner of 16 charisma would have the ability available 6 x day. Add perhaps a feat to...
It sounds more like you just don't like summoning in general? A conjurer can crank out an enormous amount of summoned monsters and also throw down gems like solid fog, grease, and many others for battlefield control.
Comparisons to a WOTC unbalanced splat book PrC are a poor defense.
<Snip long rambling rant>
It doesn't help your argument when you clearly are making snap judgements with no basis in reality.
Dread Necromancer isn't a prestige class. It's a base class. If you didn't even know that much, it's quite likely you don't even know enough about the class to judge whether it's unbalanced or not.
Also I would like to point out that a Summoner could make a staff with Summon monster level 9 in it as a sixth level spell (and have it be the highest level spell in the staff), then hand it to say the cleric or wizard to have them recharge it with one of their sixth level spell slots, instead of a ninth level spell slot.
Also Wands of:
Overland Flight
Summon Monster 5
Wall of Stone
Teleport
and third level wands of:
Stone Skin
Summon Monster 4
Invisibility, Greater
Second leevl wands of:
Haste
I know some of this sort of stuff is already available due to the ranger and paladin it isn't to quite the same extent.
The summoner getting the spell like ability to summon monster makes sense to me -- getting it with extend duration works -- even limiting how many at one time works to me as well.
BUT to limit the SLA and then not the spell list, especially with the amount of issues a summoner with the craft wand, or craft staff feats can bring to the table, means the Spell List could definitely use some going over IMO.
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Comparisons to a WOTC unbalanced splat book PrC are a poor defense.<Snip long rambling rant>
It doesn't help your argument when you clearly are making snap judgements with no basis in reality.
Dread Necromancer isn't a prestige class. It's a base class. If you didn't even know that much, it's quite likely you don't even know enough about the class to judge whether it's unbalanced or not.
While I don't normally agree with Zurai, I have to agree here dude.
Dread Necromancer is the Beguiler of the Necromancy school. As he levels up he becomes more and more Liche Like. Before you shoot off about a class, do your homework, to prevent foot in mouth syndrome.
And before Zurai points it out, yes I don't follow my own advice, no matter HOW sound it is.
I will be honest, as a GM, the thought of an NPC summoner dropping multiple summon monsters on a party worried me more than player problems. The question was, "why won't an NPC that was meant to die NOT do this?" Yes that is metagaming, but the question is still valid.
The idea of a prepared boss villan placing multiple long duration summoned monsters against a party is a concern IMO. Given the right conditions, the PCS could quickly face overwhelming numbers. Even if the encounter did not result in a TPK, the summoned creatures do not provide XP. This could result in extra resouces being spent for no reward, and that screws the players.
In any case, this particular concern may have been fixed with just the return to a full round casting time and duration (putting the summoner on par with other spellcasters) and not stopping the multiple summons, but I am not sure.
If previously covered, my apologies in advance.
Please remember than most summoned monsters are very easily halted by the 1st level protection from (alignment) spells, which stop most summoned monsters cold at the lower levels, since the vast majority of them have nothing other than natural weapons(page 328, PRPG Core Rules). Since dispel magic is a 3rd level spell, a 'war of attrition' is not in the conjurer/summoner's best interest. The availability of such a simple, absolute defense easily mitigates IMO the concerns about the summoner's ability regarding summoning the more dangerous monsters, since it is VERY easy to deal with most dangerous of them. Whether or not player characters have this available to them is another matter.
The creatures that can get around the protection from (alignment) spells are (by summon monster spell level):
- Summon Monster I: none
- Summon Monster II: small elemental
- Summon Monster III: lantern archon - presumably only because its natural attacks are rays - if they are stopped by the protection spells in question, then there are no creatures of this spell level that have any significant ability to bypass the defense.
- Summon Monster IV: medium elemental; hell hounds are nearly useless - only their minor breath weapon avoids the protection; hound archons, spear-wielding - hoping they do not run against a magic circle against (alignment) - and mephits
- Summon Monster V: babau demons, spear wielding; bearded devils, glaive wielding; bralani azata (which are great - bow, scimitar, SLAs - great critter to summon); large elemental; kytons, chain-wielding; salamanders, spear-wielding and xills packing bows and stabbity death
- Summon Monster VI: huge elementals; erinyes, bow, sword and unholy blight; invisible stalkers; lillend azata (summoned bard with extra goodies, who cares if the snake-angel-woman can attack?)
- Summon Monster VII: greater elemental and vrock (the vrock cannot melee, but it can merrily dance around spewing spores, wrecking havoc with telekinesis, bestow heroism and enough of them can initiate the dance of ruin)
- Summon Monster VIII: elder elemental
- Summon Monster IX: breaks the rule as it were, since the entire roster has plenty of SLAs to make a summoner happy.
Was just mulling over this alternate class ability for the summoner :
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Multiple Eidelons
Not all summoners form a bond with one eidelon, some form bonds with multiple eidelons over the course of their life.
Benefit : Rather than just one eidelon, you may form bonds with multiple eidelons. The maximum number of eidelon's you may make a connection with is equal to 1 plus 1 additional eidelon per five full class levels. For example, a level 3 summoner only has one eidelon. A level 5 summoner has 2 eidelons, a level 10 three, and a level 20 has 5 eidelons.
A summoner can only have one eidelon summoned at a time. He may summon no more than one eidelon per day. If an eidelon returns to his home realm due to having taken too much hp damage, that eidelon may not be summoned for 24 hours (other eidelon's who have not 'died' can, however).
Each eidelon is built separately using the same number of evolution points (as listed for the summoner's level).
A summoner can change any or all his eidelon's forms whenever he would normally be able to. The only exception is that the spell transmogrify only affects one eidelon at a time (the one currently summoned).
Replacement : A summoner who takes this alternate class feature does not receive his Summon Spell Like Ability.
Normal : A summoner can only have one eidelon, ever, and he normally has a Summon Monster spell like ability.
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I think this is a nice alternate ability, is not too overpowered, and gives a more 'Final Fantasy' summoner feel.
P.S. The plural of eidolon should probably be "eidolons" or "eidola," not "eidolon's" ... Or is it "eidoli"? "Eidolae"? Does anyone here speak Greek?
I'm siding towards "eidola", or "Eidolae", if one is keeping the regional 'flavor' of the word. It would seem that the determining factor is whether the Eidolon is considered an augmented summon-- (thereby counting as less of a "person") "eodola", or something representative of a greater concept above that of a person-- "Eidolae". As we all know, grammatic patterns tend to be somewhat varied when the concept conveyed is intended to be something greater.
My assortment of small change about all this:
Cursed items: Huh? They fall off, and then they fall back on again? No. Just no. That's a rule for rule's sake, and I really hate those. Don't do this. This might seriously ruin the book for me.
Eidolon armour: I'm not sure about this. The changeable form is very Protean, but what about lawful summoners? They'd hate that. I think there needs to be some solution that is not just a game rule but still fixes the problem. Would it make sense to have eidolons with armour bonuses?
Special summons: Is this class the Summoner or the Eidolon Companion? Come on! Give the guy his nice summons back. Do away with the arbitrary limit (this one really has to go. Why should those summons be worse than normal summons???). Maybe get rid of the extra duration, too. But at least let him have his summon casting time. Thaumaturges got that already, and they get a full, 9th-level spell list.
Give them the fast summoning as an extra class feature even, so they can use it with their normal summon monster spells. They're summoners!
I'm siding towards "eidola", or "Eidolae", if one is keeping the regional 'flavor' of the word.
I was kidding. The word "eidolon" is Greek; the plural in that language is "eidola." In English, one could make a case for "eidolons." Use of the apostrophe in making a plural, however, is incorrect in ANY language.
A lot of folks didn't really like my comparison of the Summoner to the Dread Necromancer, with the thought that the DN is suboptimal. That's fine- I'm just pointing out that they have way, wayyyyy more dudes on the table (even if they suck) than the summoner does.
But sure, let's really compare him to two classes: the druid, who can salad-shoot out as many summons as they have slots, and the sorcerer, who can do the same if they take Summon Monster X in every possible spell known slot.
It's not silly to want to tone down the number of summons on the table at one time- it IS however silly to do such a nerfing unless the entire game, including every other class, is similarly nerfed. After all, if you do this to the Summoner, I'll just go back to my Abyssal Sorcerer, who has all of these capabilities, and only lacks the eido-pet.
From another perspective, you should look at how individually strong these summons from the SM X list are. Most of the time they can't hit diddly squat (bad to-hit bonuses), and can only inflict significant damage in significant numbers. And since the enemy has the option of side-stepping all of these mooks and just sinking savage fangs into the Summoner's jugular...
...I just don't get the hue and cry.
So, in any event, if you were asking my opinion (which many of you weren't =) I would say that you should relegate limitation of summons at a time to a house rule. Some groups will be okay with multi-summoning, and others will be less patient. It's perfect house-rule territory.
As others have said, if you need to get rid of the min/lvl and standard action summoning to bring the class in-line with other similar classes, that's fair.
Alright, having read through the thread, I feel that things may be getting "off track" to the concept of the class, because of a couple people doing some rule gymnastics to show the EXTREME end of a purpose.
What is a Summoner?
I have always interpreted the class as a spellcaster that focused more on the 'metamagichanics' of how the Summon Monster/Nature's Ally/Construct worked. Was it a connection forged? A gate opened? A divine linking? A soul investiture? To that extent, they chose to set their direction of study into exploring the answers to that question. If a "yank and pull" produced this effect, what about if instead of a "yank and pull", one offered a "call and a treat"? If these creatures came from there what if one reached over here and did this?
As knowledge was gained, so improved the casting, oftentimes by simple "feel" alone, until that -- taking the ultimate chance-- perhaps the lure of a fragment of soul (whether offered, sold, or promised) They reached somewhere where they found the Eidolon?
Now, the rather "fluid" explanation for the form, is somewhat plausible to me, in that the Eidolon may be molded (whether consciously or not) by the summoner's will/intent/subconscious desires, until the form is perfected and then transferred(?) onto the summoner themselves, finally realizing *(or being unable to manage the effect until..) that if the magical connection is a two way street, a bit of energy or investiture in this manner will produce the Greater Aspect/Twin Eidolon effect. That makes the Eidolon's form on the Material Plane a result of the will/intent/subconscious desires of the summoner.
The potential extremes should not come back to bite the class in the form of ability removal to prevent those potential extremes, in my opinion, but I was always one that focused more on the "idea" and "concept" of the character over the possibilities that the mechanics would allow... *shrug* I recognize that exploitation has to be limited, but should that not be a more a function of the GM and homeruling, than the class wording itself? I always thought the classes were presentations and frameworks for a concept or idea, with "wiggle room" for somewhat more.. "esoteric" concepts to still fit.
Ah well, I'm losing my focus, so I hope I conveyed the majority of what I wanted to say above.. If not, and if the discussion diverges a bit for me to remember any other points I missed, I'll post again. I do hope I've made points that some can agree with and support, however. I have a tendency to state the coverings of things, expecting people to look under sometimes.
I was kidding. The word "eidolon" is Greek; the plural in that language is "eidola." In English, one could make a case for "eidolons." Use of the apostrophe in making a plural, however, is incorrect in ANY language.
Agreed. I just thought the "ae" was a rather poetic way of implying the idea of a greater concept. *bright grin/blush* I'm a fan.
*polite bow*
--The forest for the eyes
My suggestion on the armor issue is this:
Replace "Natural Armor" in the Eidolon statistics with "Armor." Nat Armor and Armor, mechanically, have almost no differences, except for one main one: They don't stack with each other. By replacing instances of Nat Armor with Armor it would force the summoner to choose between equipping it with armor or not, and note that, up until the highest levels, level appropriate Full Plate would still be better AC than the nat armor.
Keep the Evolution as Improved Natural Armor, so that it stacks with anything. So a level 20 Summoner's Eidolon would have a max of +24 AC from Armor and Evolutions, whether he wore armor or not... But when the Full Plate is no longer useful at high levels, the Eidolon can instead go around wearing +1 Heavy Fortification Adamantine armor, relying on the AC bonus it gets inherently and being able to use armor for special armor abilities.
This does have the unfortunate benefit of making the Eidolon immune to the Mage Armor spell, though, but I'm not sure how important that is.
----------------------------------------------------
As for the Cursed Item issue, let's take it to the other extreme...
An Eidolon that has Cursed Equipment cannot be dismissed because it's stuck to the equipment. If your Eidolon would die while wearing cursed equipment, you are left with a cursed item attached to a semi-amorphous corpse. The Eidolon may not be dismissed until the equipment is removed (via a Remove Curse spell or similar method), at which point, if its HP is below 0-Con, it is automatically dismissed as normal.
It sounds more like you just don't like summoning in general? A conjurer can crank out an enormous amount of summoned monsters and also throw down gems like solid fog, grease, and many others for battlefield control.It's more like "Too much of anything is too much" period. Summon happy characters tend to be major monopolizers of DM and game time and this character withnot only craploads of summon spells that they can spontaneously cast, they've got a whole bushel of SLA summons they can whip out as well. And we're not even talking about Eidolon abuse yet.
Yeah but that's like saying "DANG those Evokers, they can blast WAY TOO MUCH"... a fireball can end an entire encounter in a turn, and they can throw four at the level they get access to it with a reasonable spellcasting stat. (slot, bonus slot, bonded item, attribute slot), Sure it's faster then a summon spell but it's just as negative in terms of fun for anyone else.
Summons can certainly take a long time which is why you initiate a turn time limit for the Summoner and require them to have the stat block on hand. It's managable, yes it CAN get out of hand but so can a dual wielding ranger at high levels (with all the miscelaneous buffs from this and that, spells, etc...) someone can take just as long if not longer working out the math on 6-8 attacks.
Suggestion:
Eidolon and Cursed Items:
When an Eidolon is desummoned either by the action of the Summoner or through its death, any cursed items on its person are transferred, curse intact, to the summoner. Summoners so cursed can be rid of the curse via normal methods.
This prevents using the Eidolon as a curse detector in any useful fashion (since it just sticks the master with the curse). Sure, you know its cursed if the sword suddenly flies over and sticks to (in?) the hip of the summoner- but now he's stuck trying to get the curse removed.
Much easier to identify it, probably.
-S
To those who are complaining about the 1 at a time limit. This only applies to the SLA. The summoner is still free to spam summons with his spell slots just like every other spell caster. The SLA with usage limit makes him just enough better at summoning than other casters to separate him from the others, but not enough to make him a pain at the table. I do think that a longer duration of some kind, and later being able to use it as a standard action, would be helpful for the SLA though. Neither of these would really be that game breaking while reinforcing the flavor of the class. It provides a good balance for those who would prefer to deemphasize the role their eidolon plays. I also believe that summoners should automatically get the summon spells as bonus spells to balance the limit on the SLA; that way they truly can spam summons if they want and still have all their limited known spell slots available for something else.
Suggestion:
Eidolon and Cursed Items:
When an Eidolon is desummoned either by the action of the Summoner or through its death, any cursed items on its person are transferred, curse intact, to the summoner. Summoners so cursed can be rid of the curse via normal methods.
This prevents using the Eidolon as a curse detector in any useful fashion (since it just sticks the master with the curse). Sure, you know its cursed if the sword suddenly flies over and sticks to (in?) the hip of the summoner- but now he's stuck trying to get the curse removed.
Much easier to identify it, probably.
-S
Nice. I can just see the players face... certainly does discourage using the eidolon as a "curse tester" :D
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I'm for leaving the minute duration and standard casting time in. With the one at a time for the SLA novaing prevented. If they want to explain this limit while most summonings have none then say that the summoner is able to communicate with his SLA monsters fully and the conection is taxing. This could also allow real tactical use without handle animal pushing. I also agree with a poster above that the summon monster spells should be bonus spells. This would let someone still do some heavy summoning if they want but cost some spell resources. Really the amount of summoning done at your table should be set by the GM. This is an advanced players guide class and not for everyone.
For the "cursed object" issue... why don't all magical items (or normal items for that matter) stick with the Eidolon when it dies or is dismissed? Is there a reason that the "cursed items" really need a seperate cause? If the character spends the money to equip their Eidolon, why have to carry around the equipment when it isn't available? This also gives the added benefit that if the character gives their Eidolon a magical item with the intent of helping it in one battle, and the Eidolon is taken down, that item is unavailable until it can be summoned again...
For the summoning... Limiting it to one SLA at a time is fine... but as others have mentioned, please bring back the extended duration and reduced casting time... This is the "Summoner" after all :)
1. Eidolons as originally written could achieve high ACs. Compare this to animal companions and the only real culprit I see is the natural armor evolution.. remove that and avoid having to deal with the clunky armor fix/explanation.
Actually, there are three culprits here.
1) +4 natural armor baseline over the course of 20 levels. ACs get +12 natural armor over their progression, while Eidolons get +16.
2) The natural armor evolutions. Obvious.
3) The ability to wield a shield. Only ape animal companions can wield shields, and they're not terribly useful for anything else, while any Eidolon can sprout arms.
So, yes, the ability to wear armor is something in common. However, removing the ability to wear armor as a temporary stop-gap testing measure lowers their maximum AC by 14, which is basically the same as removing #1 and #2 in the list above at the same time but with fewer words and less potential confusion to testers.
So, yes, the ability to wear armor is something in common. However, removing the ability to wear armor as a temporary stop-gap testing measure lowers their maximum AC by 14, which is basically the same as removing #1 and #2 in the list above at the same time but with fewer words and less potential confusion to testers.That makes it bad design.
Better would simply decide relatively where an Eidolon's AC should be in comparison to an animal companion and adjust the natural armor from there.
I think simply removing the natural armor evolution would solve the problem. It certainly is the culprit here. Beyond that tweaking the natural armor progression should suffice.
-James
Would you please read all of what I wrote? I even italicized it for you in the original post!
The changes mentioned in this thread are temporary and are intended to level the playing field out so that testing can be done that doesn't get derailed by those two issues.
We won't see the final version of the changes until the book is released in August. Right now, removing the ability to wear armor had the same actual effect as equalizing natural armor to animal companions with the least amount of explanation. That's all that's required for a playtest.
If previously covered, my apologies in advance.
Please remember than most summoned monsters are very easily halted by the 1st level protection from (alignment) spells, which stop most summoned monsters cold at the lower levels, since the vast majority of them have nothing other than natural weapons(page 328, PRPG Core Rules). Since dispel magic is a 3rd level spell, a 'war of attrition' is not in the conjurer/summoner's best interest. The availability of such a simple, absolute defense easily mitigates IMO the concerns about the summoner's ability regarding summoning the more dangerous monsters, since it is VERY easy to deal with most dangerous of them. Whether or not player characters have this available to them is another matter.
Dispel magic is of limited use, since it affects only one target, you need greater dispel magic to affect an area. The proection from alignment spells, while useful, fail if you attack the summoned monster, force the barrier, or it fails to overcome SR.
Honestly, the problem is that an NPC summoner opponent could nova his most powerful summons under the original rules. While not exactly identical, the effect was very similar to the complaints used by some of the Paizo staff against psion opponents. The suggested changes offset that. Not having as chance to playtest it, I am not sure if my original concerns are valid or not, or if these changes went to far.
I personally would love to see some of the playtest use the classes as opponents against the standard PC classes, just to see if there is a problem that needs to be addressed from that end. Hopefully after the Christmas Holidays I will have a chance to playtest some of the classes and see for myself.
Would you please read all of what I wrote? I even italicized it for you in the original post!
The changes mentioned in this thread are temporary and are intended to level the playing field out so that testing can be done that doesn't get derailed by those two issues.
We won't see the final version of the changes until the book is released in August. Right now, removing the ability to wear armor had the same actual effect as equalizing natural armor to animal companions with the least amount of explanation. That's all that's required for a playtest.
It doesn't do that at all.
The eidolons spend evolution points on AC and don't invest in armor.
I'm sorry but simply 'remove the evolution that adds to natural armor' is frankly even easier to write. In fact even 'refer to the druid animal companion chart' for advancement in natural armor would not be hard to write.
So while I did read what you wrote, I'm sorry but I did not accept what you said there.
Imho for a playtest you should attempt to represent the final version, so as to well test it out and if it is as you are portraying it to be then it doesn't do that.
-James
A couple of comments here:
1) Removing the natural armor bonus means you HAVE to invest in wearing real armor to have any viable AC. For flavor reasons some players will want to go that route. The natural armor bonus can be created as metallic, thicker skin, etc.; while armor is armor. Have no problem just removing armor proficiency from the list for an easier mechanic. If you look at the shield ally and greater shield ally abilities the eidolon I believe is geared to be more of a protector so having the ability to have a good AC is needed. Although I agree wearing armor, plus all of the natural armor capabilities is too much. I would rather see wearing armor go away than the natural armor. Of course, you load up on AC through the roof and you have little left for any offesive abilities, or other miscellaneous features.
2) Also, forcing the eidolon to have same rules and progressions as the Druid animal companion is wrong. I believe the focus here is that the eidolon should be a stronger "companion" than the druid's animal companion. Otherwise, how do you make up the balance between the druid's wild shape ability, summon nature's ally, and 9th level spell progression. If the eidolon is no better than a druid's animal companion, why in the world would you play a summoner when you play a druid with more power and a companion that is just as good.
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Nice. I can just see the players face... certainly does discourage using the eidolon as a "curse tester" :DSuggestion:
Eidolon and Cursed Items:
When an Eidolon is desummoned either by the action of the Summoner or through its death, any cursed items on its person are transferred, curse intact, to the summoner. Summoners so cursed can be rid of the curse via normal methods.
This prevents using the Eidolon as a curse detector in any useful fashion (since it just sticks the master with the curse). Sure, you know its cursed if the sword suddenly flies over and sticks to (in?) the hip of the summoner- but now he's stuck trying to get the curse removed.
Much easier to identify it, probably.
-S
+1. It fits in with the "sharing a soul" thing as well.
If previously covered, my apologies in advance.
Please remember than most summoned monsters are very easily halted by the 1st level protection from (alignment) spells, which stop most summoned monsters cold at the lower levels, since the vast majority of them have nothing other than natural weapons(page 328, PRPG Core Rules). Since dispel magic is a 3rd level spell, a 'war of attrition' is not in the conjurer/summoner's best interest. The availability of such a simple, absolute defense easily mitigates IMO the concerns about the summoner's ability regarding summoning the more dangerous monsters, since it is VERY easy to deal with most dangerous of them. Whether or not player characters have this available to them is another matter.
Dispel magic is of limited use, since it affects only one target, you need greater dispel magic to affect an area. The proection from alignment spells, while useful, fail if you attack the summoned monster, force the barrier, or it fails to overcome SR.
Honestly, the problem is that an NPC summoner opponent could nova his most powerful summons under the original rules. While not exactly identical, the effect was very similar to the complaints used by some of the Paizo staff against psion opponents. The suggested changes offset that. Not having as chance to playtest it, I am not sure if my original concerns are valid or not, or if these changes went to far.
I personally would love to see some of the playtest use the classes as opponents against the standard PC classes, just to see if there is a problem that needs to be addressed from that end. Hopefully after the Christmas Holidays I will have a chance to playtest some of the classes and see for myself.
I agree, a summoner or two as BBEGs would be great for playtesting.
Sadly, I believe that the playtest window will close at the end of December?
EDIT: Ah, end of January. That will give me a crack at some playtesting the new classes as BBEG replacements in CoT.
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A couple of comments here:
1) Removing the natural armor bonus means you HAVE to invest in wearing real armor to have any viable AC. For flavor reasons some players will want to go that route. The natural armor bonus can be created as metallic, thicker skin, etc.; while armor is armor. Have no problem just removing armor proficiency from the list for an easier mechanic. If you look at the shield ally and greater shield ally abilities the eidolon I believe is geared to be more of a protector so having the ability to have a good AC is needed. Although I agree wearing armor, plus all of the natural armor capabilities is too much. I would rather see wearing armor go away than the natural armor. Of course, you load up on AC through the roof and you have little left for any offesive abilities, or other miscellaneous features.
Shield Ally works great for mounted combat.
Oh look, the Summoner's Eidolon has an AC of 55 at 20th level... just like the fighter and paladin(possible when smiting, though it is possible otherwise).
2) Also, forcing the eidolon to have same rules and progressions as the Druid animal companion is wrong. I believe the focus here is that the eidolon should be a stronger "companion" than the druid's animal companion. Otherwise, how do you make up the balance between the druid's wild shape ability, summon nature's ally, and 9th level spell progression. If the eidolon is no better than a druid's animal companion, why in the world would you play a summoner when you play a druid with more power and a companion that is just as good.
Total agreement. You did forget one more advantage that druids have over Summoners. A druid can cast spells while wildshaped if they have the Natural Spell feat, but I have read nothing that says a Summoner can do the same when he merges with his Eidolon or becomes one. Druids FTW!
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Any magic items possessed by the eidolon fall to the ground when the eidolon is sent back to its home plane, regardless of the reason. If this includes cursed items, the items immediately return to the eidolon when it is summoned again.
Anyone else notice the Eidolon gets to keep non-magical gear for some reason?
hmm. non magical gear.
*eidolon wraps tentacles around huge statue*
*eidolon gets desummoned*
*summoner goes to town*
*summoner summons Eidolon*
*viola, town gets a new statue*
-S