I'm running a game and have had a summoner using the Beta rules in the home game for coming up on 200 played hours. The APG changes one important facet of the character by not allowing him to summon and use his eidolon and his SLAs.
I'm not trying to come here and debate the reasoning behind the change or the effect that it has on the summoner. What I'm hoping to see is the builds that people are using for their summoners or ways that people are looking at building them.
I'm not looking at ways to build the eidolon, but the summoner.
I was disappointed with the lack of good feat support for the summoner and I know that my player is as well. We have both been hoping that there would be some worthwhile feats for the summoner to guide them, especially since Augment Summoning no longer seemed as worthwhile.
Thanks for any offerings of advice for my player.
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I'm running a game and have had a summoner using the Beta rules in the home game for coming up on 200 played hours. The APG changes one important facet of the character by not allowing him to summon and use his eidolon and his SLAs.
I'm not trying to come here and debate the reasoning behind the change or the effect that it has on the summoner. What I'm hoping to see is the builds that people are using for their summoners or ways that people are looking at building them.
I'm not looking at ways to build the eidolon, but the summoner.
I was disappointed with the lack of good feat support for the summoner and I know that my player is as well. We have both been hoping that there would be some worthwhile feats for the summoner to guide them, especially since Augment Summoning no longer seemed as worthwhile.
Thanks for any offerings of advice for my player.
Yeah, and the new Eidolon feat doesn't really help much either, since it takes a minute to summon an eidolon and the bonuses cease to exist after 10 minutes or so. How wonderful. A feat for 10 minutes a day, essentially. Are they serious? Whenever a play a Society Scenario, I'll just "forget" the bonus goes away after ten minutes.
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The APG changes one important facet of the character by not allowing him to summon and use his eidolon and his SLAs.
Whoa, whoa, whoa! What do you mean by that statement above? I'm so looking forward to the APG but I don't think the player of my Summoner will.
P.S. What does SLA stand for?Thanks
Reebo
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My wife's summoner acts as a backup fighter when she isn't buffing. So she uses the typical combat feats. You can build them up as either an archer or as a melee character. Keep in mind that your charisma doesn't need to be very high since you will likely not be using your SLA all the time.
I'll see if I can come up with some better suggestions when I have the book in hand.
SLA is Spell Like Ability. The summoner can either have his eidolon out, or use the class based Summon Monster abilities, not both at the same time.
Ya 0gre, the summoners that I was looking at building were going to be a bit more fight oriented than the guy made his PC. I mentioned to him that he should make sure his character has strong combat actions as well when he was designing.
I think he ended up with a 6 Str on his halfling and a 18 Cha. This was not point buy but rolled stats that he got to place.
So now I'm trying to figure out what I should do about him since the SLAs got cut down (not sure if I'm going to run with that or not) and he isn't really set up to do a whole lot.
I have him in a storyline that could involve major changes to him and am trying to decide if I should do that and allow him to go through a major tweak on the character or if I should let him lie in the bed he made.
I'm letting him redo his feats one way or another, and I guess he wouldn't make a terrible crossbow user, but just seems like he was waiting for some options that did not show up in this book sadly.
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A 6 strength? Ouch. I did see a crossbow feat floating around that allows reloading crossbows as a free action so you might be able to work a heavy crossbow build. Really though, with a 6 strength he is going to have problems just carrying all his gear. A small heavy crossbow and 10 bolts is 5 lbs., a haversack is 5 lbs, and a mithril shirt is 5 lbs which is the light load of a str 6 gnome... I guess a heavy crossbow build is out too.
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I have him in a storyline that could involve major changes to him and am trying to decide if I should do that and allow him to go through a major tweak on the character or if I should let him lie in the bed he made.
If you let someone use character options from a beta test, then you really should let them rebuild their character when the final version comes out. That's what I've been doing with my current game, which has been running since the beta release of the RPG. It's only fair to give someone a chance to change their character if you're going to change the way the rules work. Conversely, if you're willing to keep running with the beta rules until the campaign ends, I don't see any reason why that would be a bad thing either, as long as that stays true for everyone else too.
Jeremy Puckett
An interesting summoner build is that of a mounted warrior (who uses his Eidalon for a mount), Maybe take a level or 2 of fighter for added feats. Works especially well for a ranged character and a flying eidalon with Flyby Attack and Vital strike.
An interesting summoner build is that of a mounted warrior (who uses his Eidalon for a mount), Maybe take a level or 2 of fighter for added feats. Works especially well for a ranged character and a flying eidalon with Flyby Attack and Vital strike.
That's what I did with my kobold Summoner. Fighter 1 / Summoner 8.
We used feats from 3.5 as well, so ended up with:
Mounted Combat, Mounted Casting, Combat Casting, Ride-by Attack.
Didn't work too badly. Until I ran into someone who did the same thing and was better at it. LOL
Personally, with a character that entrenched already, I would let him keep playing it the way it was in the playtest. I know that is the first thing my GM is houserulling out of the APG. We had no problems with this in the playtest, and we all feel it nerfs the wrong parts of the class.
Personally, I like reach builds on a summoner. Pick up a spear, cast enlarge person on yourself, and go to town. For this build, get a decent dex and str, 14s will do, and pick up combat reflexes. If you can spare it, getting a guisarm is not a bad option.
If you let someone use character options from a beta test, then you really should let them rebuild their character when the final version comes out. That's what I've been doing with my current game, which has been running since the beta release of the RPG. It's only fair to give someone a chance to change their character if you're going to change the way the rules work. Conversely, if you're willing to keep running with the beta rules until the campaign ends, I don't see any reason why that would be a bad thing either, as long as that stays true for everyone else too.
That is one of the reasons that I am leaning towards allowing the SLAs to still be used. However, the problem that he is coming up against even with them is that he never made his character to have a strong use of his own actions.
Change within reason is one thing, but the old Living Greyhawk edition change making completely different characters is not what I am hoping to see without reason. If you play Beta rules, you do accept that changes are going to happen (on both sides of the screen). While I am in full support of him making changes, I don't know that I want him to simply sit down and reorg his stats so that he is strong enough to melee fight. I don't want my cute little summoner buddy to all of a sudden 'Hulk' out. He isn't an alchemist after all.
Also, what I am talking about is not a minor redesign of the character, but a complete overhaul. He is in a place where I can provide him the opportunity to do this. I even have a story going that involves a major change with the character. So I'm wondering if I should use that storyline and let him rebuild his character from the ground up.
Even if I keep the SLAs being usable, he is not really doing much with his main character since the feat support that we hoped to see in the APG didn't show up.
I have seen the mounted eidolon idea as well, and thought that it could work pretty well for those desiring to go that way.
And to Cainreach, we haven't had problems with the SLAs either, which is one reason that I am likely keeping them. It gives the party options and is the ability that seems to make the summoner a viable party member to me.
So far we seem to have Archer, Mounted, and Melee builds for the summoner. I think that having reach in melee is also really good for the summoner so that they can stand behind the eidolon and get the protective bonuses from it.
This is pretty much what I was seeing before, but kinda hoped that I had done it wrong.
Who likes the pit spells btw!? I thought those were funny and awesome.
Yeah, and the new Eidolon feat doesn't really help much either, since it takes a minute to summon an eidolon and the bonuses cease to exist after 10 minutes or so. How wonderful. A feat for 10 minutes a day, essentially. Are they serious? Whenever a play a Society Scenario, I'll just "forget" the bonus goes away after ten minutes.I'm running a game and have had a summoner using the Beta rules in the home game for coming up on 200 played hours. The APG changes one important facet of the character by not allowing him to summon and use his eidolon and his SLAs.
I'm not trying to come here and debate the reasoning behind the change or the effect that it has on the summoner. What I'm hoping to see is the builds that people are using for their summoners or ways that people are looking at building them.
I'm not looking at ways to build the eidolon, but the summoner.
I was disappointed with the lack of good feat support for the summoner and I know that my player is as well. We have both been hoping that there would be some worthwhile feats for the summoner to guide them, especially since Augment Summoning no longer seemed as worthwhile.
Thanks for any offerings of advice for my player.
I think the feat is odd. Right under the name? It says "You have the power to call your eidolen one additional time per day. Then the Prerequisite, then the benefit.
I think the feat ALSO lets you summon it again.
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I think the feat is odd. Right under the name? It says "You have the power to call your eidolen one additional time per day. Then the Prerequisite, then the benefit.
I think the feat ALSO lets you summon it again.
Unless your eidolon is killed you can summon an eidolon as many times per day as you'd like, it just takes a minute.
So this feat can be used multiple times per day but you have to resummon your eidolon which takes a full minute.
Edit: The flavor text clearly was written before the class change that allowed summoning multiple times/ day.
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The only suggestion I have for builds is to take the Diehard feat on both the summoner and eidolon. If the eidolon has Diehard, the Life Link hp transfer ability is actually useful. If the summoner has Diehard, Life Bond is not completely useless. Once you both have the feat, it's like sharing one big bucket of hp.
I think you can use your Summon Monster SLA and summon your eidolon with the Summon Eidolon spell at the same time. When summoned by the spell rather than the ritual, Augment Summoning should enhance the eidolon.
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The problem with using the Summon Eidolon spell is that it has a full round casting. So if you have a surprise round you are basically without your Eidolon for 2 rounds, which is a huge opportunity cost to the point that it simply doesn't make sense to consider.
Err wot? When you surprise someone else why wouldn't you already have your eidolon summoned already? The summon eidolon spell is not going to be used frequently because you will have your eidolon around almost always. This is relevant when you get woken up rudely or after you get KOed in combat and possibly if you go into a city where you think a 12' tall gibbering monster would be unpopular.
Only if you can quicken the Summon Eidolon spell does it make sense to use it together with your SLA ... which will be a very high level trick.
The SLA is primarily going to be relegated to a out-of-combat utility and (fairly minor) healing. It's not a third creature giving the summoner huge action economy anymore but it is still quite useful. It's also decent at low levels when your eidolon is much more fragile or at higher levels if your eidolon is getting pounded or gets knocked out.
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The opportunity cost of risking getting caught without your Eidolon out still makes this a bad decision most of the time. Better to use spells if you have to spring a trap with a summon or something, not your SLA.
I'd rather burn an abundant resource (summons SLAs) than more scarce ones (spells) if I can do it at relatively low risk. In particular since the "risk" is losing a full round action casting a second level spell at the beginning of combat. In particular since the summon SLA is equivalent to my highest level spell and Summon Eidolon is always second level.
In the end it's about play style. Clearly you are more cautious a player.
Only if you can quicken the Summon Eidolon spell does it make sense to use it together with your SLA ... which will be a very high level trick.
If the wording I've seen on the summon monster SLA is correct, it doesn't matter whether you've summoned your Eidolon via the 1 minute class feature ritual or through the summon Eidolon spell; you still can't use both the Eidolon and the summon monster SLA at the same time.
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If the wording I've seen on the summon monster SLA is correct, it doesn't matter whether you've summoned your Eidolon via the 1 minute class feature ritual or through the summon Eidolon spell; you still can't use both the Eidolon and the summon monster SLA at the same time.
It also says the reason you can't have them both out at the same time is that they are effectively the same power. I'd think that if you'd summoned the eidolon with the spell instead of using the power, the power would still be free for Summon Monster use.
If having an eidolon out with the Summon Eidolon spell also prevents use of the Summon Monster SLA, I can't see why anyone would choose that spell.
While this is probably symantics. The Summon Monster SLA, only disappears if the Summon Monster SLA is used again. So you could use the SLA, THEN summon your eidolon (by either method) and have both on the table at once for the duration of the SLA minus the time to summon the eidolon.
While I do not have the book yet, from everything we have heard this would not work. If ya summon the Eidolon the SLA's stop working. Just like if ya use an SLA then use it again to summon something else the first one stops and goes poof
For the record, I'm likely going to write a Summoner Guide once I get my hands on the APG. I probably won't include an in-depth Eidolon section to it right away, for two reasons:
The Summoner Guide would be modeled somewhat after Treantmonk's guides, although probably not quite as detailed and long-winded. There's enough variety in the class that I'll probably cover Melee Summoners, Ranged Summoners, and Caster Summoners. All three should be plenty viable, although the Caster Summoner will be very different from pretty much every other 2/3 or full caster in the game.
Maezer has it completely right from what is written. My group has commented on this, and I believe that is one of the basis of people saying that they can cast summon eidolon and keep their SLAs out. Unless I missed something, it is fine the way the class has been written. You can do it without the 2nd level spell, but it takes a minute of your summons time off due to the eidolon ritual.