RPG Superstar 2013 Top 32
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A summoner can summon his eidolon in a ritual that takes 1 minute to perform. When summoned in this way, the eidolon hit points are unchanged from the last time it was summoned. The only exception to this is if the eidolon was slain, in which case it returns with half its normal hit points. The eidolon does not heal naturally. The eidolon remains until dismissed by the summoner (a standard action). If the eidolon is sent back to its home plane due to death, it cannot be summoned again until the following day. The eidolon cannot be sent back to its home plane by means of dispel magic, but spells such as dismissal and banishment work normally. If the summoner is unconscious, asleep, or killed, his eidolon is immediately banished.
I think it's pretty much common knowledge that the summoner's biggest contribution to a party is the power of his eidolon. The class is heavily focused on the use, abuse, and manipulation of this "super familiar." That's all fine and good. Cool. We get that.
Note the bolded text, though. If the summoner is killed, yeah, I can understand that the link is broken and the eidolon goes bye-bye. But unconscious or asleep? With a single 1st-level spell (sleep), a spellcaster can drop the summoner, banish his eidolon, and even if a party member wakes the summoner back up the very next round, it's a one minute ritual to bring the eidolon back. That's not going to happen in combat.
Plus this eliminates the possibility of the summoner using his eidolon as a "watchdog" while camping. Why is that so bad? The eidolon SHOULD be able to shoulder a burden like this for the party, especially since it could be evolved with all kinds of advanced senses in order to be really good at that kind of thing!
And yes, I'm aware that playing an elf or half-elf makes you immune to magical sleep and avoids the first part of this issue, but I'm arguing that the summoner's eidolon should not be that easy to just "do away with" in the first place. Yes, the Summoner class has a high Will save, but Wisdom isn't a prime stat for them, so they're unlikely to have "untouchable" saving throws like a cleric or paladin. I am of the opinion that the bolded text quoted above should be reduced to simply "if the summoner is killed" and leave it at that. This would also allow a summoner reduced below 0 HP to get "saved" by his eidolon, and that's just nifty, IMO.
(bump) I appreciate your posting of the rule you're discussing and your well written argument.
Personally, I don't have problem with the Eidolon disappearing when the summoner sleeps. My guess is that it was specifically targeted at not letting the Eidolon stand watch every night. Your suggestion would be a reasonable house rule for any GM who doesn't like to bother too much with watch rotations, sleep interruptions, etc.
(bump) I appreciate your posting of the rule you're discussing and your well written argument.
Personally, I don't have problem with the Eidolon disappearing when the summoner sleeps. My guess is that it was specifically targeted at not letting the Eidolon stand watch every night. Your suggestion would be a reasonable house rule for any GM who doesn't like to bother too much with watch rotations, sleep interruptions, etc.
Agree, seemed like a valid balancing point to me. I would find a permanent supernatural guard dog a bit of a problem. The eidolon seems to be a supernatural manifestation of the summoners conscious mind, when that portion of the summoner's mind goes offline, so does the eidolon, makes sense to me and makes for a pretty good balance point that the summoner would want to compensate for like any other low will class.
And what you would think about houserulling that Eidolon becomes dazed when Summoner falls unconscious or asleep and disappears after Summoner remains unconscious or sleep for 1 minute (or some other specific amount of time). This would prevent permanent watchdog problem and yet prevent sleep early in battle from reducing Summoner's effectivnes for the rest of the fight.
Hmm, I just imagined new Summoner feat:
Eidolon's Burden
Prerequisites: Eidolon class feature.
Benefits: Twice per day, as an immediate action Summoner may save oneself from gaining dazed, paralyzed, sleeping, staggered, stunned or unconscious condition by redirecting it to his Eidolon as long as Eidolon remains within 100 feet. Eidolon suffers the redirected condition, even if it wasn't viable target for the original effect. This ability cannot be used to transfer condition that Eidolon already has.
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There are a ton of small nerfs made to the summoner for balancing reasons, something forum trolls don't realize. The Eidolon is going to be horrible defensively (bad ac unless you severely reduce offense, bad hp, fewer magic items since shared, must stay within 100 feet, etc). The summoner himself is the weakest defensive class in the game since he must share magic items and is a caster. Finally, summoners are ZAD, not MAD or SAD. A 20-point roll is barely better than a 12 point roll since only a small charisma is useful and you are going to blow the first 1-2 rounds casting before using a crappy weapon attack if any (useless at higher levels).
I have lost the Eidolon in about 1 in 3 scenarios (good luck lasting a single round vs a Remorhaz), but overall it is still balanced due to front-loading the offense. Access to spells like haste and the summon SLA makes him still useful without the Eidolon (albeit much less so).
It may be hard to see the balancing until you get a full round attack on low AC enemies, or if you build the Eidolon to be far weaker (such as a Serpentine or to a lesser extent Quad base).
Summoners and sheep...
A naturally sleeping Fighter can't wear his full plate armor without penalties (unless he have Endurance as a feat) and the naturally sleeping Summoner lose his eidolon: it sounds fair to me.
A naturally sleeping Fighter can't wear his full plate armor without penalties (unless he have Endurance as a feat) and the naturally sleeping Summoner lose his eidolon: it sounds fair to me.
Except when in combat Fighter is affected by sleep effect his heavy plate does not fall off. Once he gets up his armor is still on him. On the other hand Summoner loses his Eidolon and has to spend one minute summoning it again.
Also, another feat that occured to me:
Lingering Eidolon
Prerequisites: Eidolon class feature.
Benefits: Eidolon may remain active for a limited time while its master is sleeping or unconsciouss. This ability can be used for a total of 1 round per class level each day.
A naturally sleeping Fighter can't wear his full plate armor without penalties (unless he have Endurance as a feat) and the naturally sleeping Summoner lose his eidolon: it sounds fair to me.Except when in combat Fighter is affected by sleep effect his heavy plate does not fall off. Once he gets up his armor is still on him. On the other hand Summoner loses his Eidolon and has to spend one minute summoning it again.
Also, another feat that occured to me:
Lingering Eidolon
Prerequisites: Eidolon class feature.
Benefits: Eidolon may remain active for a limited time while its master is sleeping or unconsciouss. This ability can be used for a total of 1 round per class level each day.
Yep, but don't forget that a typical Fighter is more likely to fail is Will saving throw than a typical Summoner.
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Except when in combat Fighter is affected by sleep effect his heavy plate does not fall off. Once he gets up his armor is still on him. On the other hand Summoner loses his Eidolon and has to spend one minute summoning it again.
Erm, or he could just take Summon Eidolon as a second level spell, it's a fairly nice to have spell regardless since it's the only way to use your SLA and eidolon at the same time. If you don't want to use the spell slot it's a 400gp/ incident 'fix' for scrolls. It's a relatively uncommon problem in combat.
As for overnighting, it's only a problem when the summoner is asleep and there is an attack on the party. How often this is an issue depends on the group but the solution is still the same and still not too onerous.
Edit: Just a personal note here, I GMed a summoner for 7 levels and have a 4th level PFS summoner I'm playing and the sleep issue almost never comes up. I'm not suggesting it's never going to be an issue, but it has certainly not proven crippling in our group. A far more annoying and common problem is when the eidolon hits negative hit points but isn't dead. Then you have to either heal it or spend an action to dismiss it so you can use your summon ability.
RE: Eidolons and hit points
Slight threadjack, but I'm interested in hearing some compromises that would let an Eidolon heal naturally.
It's kind of silly that an Eidolon can be pulled to pieces by rabid dire wolves, and 24 hours later it can be summoned at half hp. Meanwhile, an Eidolon who ends a long day at 1 hp can be summoned years later and still be at 1 hit point. It might even be more efficient for the wounded Eidolon to bite its own head off so that it can actually heal itself. I'm also curious, do conditions stay on an Eidolon (especially the dying condition) while it's not summoned?
The standard action dismissal is an odd one too, can't the Eidolon show itself out?
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RE: Eidolons and hit points
Slight threadjack, but I'm interested in hearing some compromises that would let an Eidolon heal naturally.
It's kind of silly that an Eidolon can be pulled to pieces by rabid dire wolves, and 24 hours later it can be summoned at half hp. Meanwhile, an Eidolon who ends a long day at 1 hp can be summoned years later and still be at 1 hit point. It might even be more efficient for the wounded Eidolon to bite its own head off so that it can actually heal itself. I'm also curious, do conditions stay on an Eidolon (especially the dying condition) while it's not summoned?
The standard action dismissal is an odd one too, can't the Eidolon show itself out?
Well clearly you don't dismiss your eidolon with one HP, you have him lie still so you can CdG him.
The whole not healing naturally thing is a little weird.
How about these Alternate Eidolon Healing Rules:
- When the summoner rests: an Eidolon with zero or greater hp regains half of its max hp, a dead Eidolon's hp is set to half of its max hp.
- All conditions (other than dead) on an Eidolon end when it is dismissed for any reason (maybe this already is supposed to happen, idk).
- Eidolons dismissed while at negative hit points are killed.
- An Eidolon at less than half of its max hp summoned with the Summon Eidolon spell regains hp until it is at half of its max, but the amount of hp regained this way is lost when the spell ends.
Now there's a benefit to the Eidolon being dismissed while the party sleeps, the Eidolon can heal without being killed by its own summoner, and the weird situation of negative hp Eidolons and conditions is wrapped up.
Balance wise, healing while alive makes the Eidolon more powerful. This is balanced by automatically dying if dismissed while at negative hp, and dying again if summoned via spell while dead and not healed enough to counter the loss of the temp hp when the spell ends.