Okay, first of all I'd like to say that this isn't a flame thread. As a matter of fact I think the summoner class was beautifully written and I commend the design team for thinking outside the box with it. I just want to share my experience with others and see if other Pathfinder players had the same problems I did.
I rolled an elven summoner and I only got the thing to level two, but even that early in the game I saw a problem. I took the bipedal form and gave the thing 4 evolution points for proficiency in martial weapons and a feat for light armor use, so my eidelon was attacking with a claw and a longsword at around +5/+5 (without buffs)and had at least 19 AC at level two. Overall my character and his summon seemed on par with the barbarian in terms of power level, considering I could heal the eidelon and with rapid shot I had a total of four attacks between two guys versus the barbarian's one. If I really had to go toe to toe with that barbarian, I don't know if I could've won. I didn't feel overpowered as I feared I would.
So what was the problem???
I felt like I was hogging the spotlight. Not only did I get two turns while everyone else got one (typical of casters who summon) but I really felt like I had two characters to role play. The barbarian had a distinct personality whereas I felt like I had to struggle to breathe life into two entities. It was a role playing nightmare!!! Has anyone else been in this situation?
The most obvious error to me is the fact your eidolons was wearing armor. Eidolons can't wear armor of any kind - it interferes with their connection to their summoner.
The most obvious error to me is the fact your eidolons was wearing armor. Eidolons can't wear armor of any kind - it interferes with their connection to their summoner.
oops :(
Don't worry about it. That rule is buried somewhere in the Eidolon section I think. Easy to miss.
The second error I see was your bonus to attack. When using a natural attack and a manufactured weapon as part of the full attack, the natural weapon becomes a "secondary" natural weapon. Which means it takes a -5 to it's attack roll and only gets half your Str mod to damage.
... I felt like I was hogging the spotlight. Not only did I get two turns while everyone else got one (typical of casters who summon) but I really felt like I had two characters to role play. The barbarian had a distinct personality whereas I felt like I had to struggle to breathe life into two entities. It was a role playing nightmare!!! Has anyone else been in this situation?
I haven't played the summoner yet, but I've been considering it.
However, I have felt like a stealing the game from everyone else when my wizard went wild with summon spells. I had as many as 5 different summons in play plus the wizard. Even with everything written down and planned ahead of time, I was still taking most of the table time. Course I was pretty much out of spells after that.
Also, I wouldn't feel like I had to 'breath life' into the eidolon. I would just consider it an extension of myself. At least not until it has higher intelligence.
Thank you for that helpful and informative post, Mergy.
One point to keep in mind is that the balancing factors on the class don't kick in until 4th level or so, when your eidolon finally fails to gain a hit die. Until that point, your eidolon matches the party fighter in everything but AC.
A master summoner is superior to an ordinary summoner at 1st level, but as he gains levels his eidolon falls behind in usefulness. Since I have never played that archetype, I am not sure when that point occurs.
The summoner himself becomes less personally useful in combat as you gain levels as well. While that level 0 Acid Splash can matter a lot at 1st level, by 5th level it is hardly worth bothering with. By that point you can almost think of your eidolon as being your player character with his own pet buffing spellcaster.
Re: Having to roleplayx2 = This is one of the many reasons I am in love with the Synthesist.
As far as normal summoners go, I tend to make my Eidolons very reserved and quiet unless adressed directly, kind of like you might expect a big bodyguard to be "I am payed to protect you, not to converse" type of thing (except not paid)... talking or other things like that are just distractions from paying attention to his surroundings and watching over his charge.....
But there are lots of different ways of going about it though.
I have found the Master Summoner can hog the spotlight in terms of the "getting two turns when everyone else gets one" area. Case in point, one of my players' master summoners managed to get 32 turns per round a few sessions ago, and that was by using just over half of her daily summons at once. She could have gotten over 60 had she used them all (and rolled well).
Regular summoner eidolons also prove superpowered at early levels. The other summoner (yes, there are two) had an eidolon who completely overshadowed the rest of the party for the first few levels. The barbarian has since caught up however and her role has changed from being the team powerhouse to the team striker.
So... Oddly enough I think the summoner looks kind of like a reverse wizard. Starts off superpowered and then the others catch up after five or six levels.
One point to keep in mind is that the balancing factors on the class don't kick in until 4th level or so, when your eidolon finally fails to gain a hit die. Until that point, your eidolon matches the party fighter in everything but AC.
A master summoner is superior to an ordinary summoner at 1st level, but as he gains levels his eidolon falls behind in usefulness. Since I have never played that archetype, I am not sure when that point occurs.
The summoner himself becomes less personally useful in combat as you gain levels as well. While that level 0 Acid Splash can matter a lot at 1st level, by 5th level it is hardly worth bothering with. By that point you can almost think of your eidolon as being your player character with his own pet buffing spellcaster.
The master summoner is about the summons, not the eidolon. It seems to be considered one of the top 3+ powered characters in the game.
The normal summoner is more than a buffer. His spell list rocks and you can build him to fight if you so desire. He doesn't need a high CHA.
In summary, Summoners rock (except the one that gets a lot of eidolons, he kinda sucks).
One reason I don't play my druid as a summoner is because I felt like she was hogging the spotlight. For a while she would wildshape into cat form, her companion was also a cat and she'd summon cats into the fight. On occasion my "turn" was as many as six different animals, most of which had "pounce" and could roll up to five attacks.
I went back to bow for the druid and battlefield control and buffing primarily because I felt like some rounds half of the PC time was spent on my creatures.
Oh, plus between her, her animal companion and four summoned cats... sometimes there wasn't much left at the end of her attacks...
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1- Why aren't you guys giving command if your summons to your fellow players?
I find that if I summon a bunch of stuff I hand the stats over to other players and command the summon to "Follow that guy's commands". The other players at the table get the satisfaction and spotlight time.
2- RP difficulties:
It helps if you focus on a strong theme or concept. I'm currently playing a summoner in Legacy of Fire. My Eidolon is a djinni with GREAT FLAAAAMING EYEBROWS. The summoner is an erudite merchant who found the genie's lamp. You are rolling up two characters but just because there is two characters doesn't mean both always have something to say.
Basically as a Summoner I took buffing spells that help the whole party, I enlarge the Paladin before my Eidolon. I deliberately didn't overpower my eidolon's attacks and took some skill and utility evolutions to fit the djinni flavor. If you share the spotlight around and deliberately make "team-player friendly" choices the summoner is much more satisfying.
I play in other campaigns and if a summoning type player suddenly handed me a sheet and said "here, play this crocodile" I don't necessarily think that would be perceived by me as "getting time in the spotlight."
It's worth discussing outside of the game to see how the players react. I know that at least half of the players in my druid's group would not have any desire to play a summoned animal or monster. I suspect that only one of my other players would be willing to take that on.
They should just write at the top of the Summoner class:
"Attention potential summoners: Just because you can do something..."
You said it Mergy!
I played a conjurationist wizard with augment summons from first to about seventeenth level. Even though I only ever had one summon spell active at a time, had everything stated out, and even usually summoned the same creature (celestial ape) it still took as much time as two or three of the other players turns. I feel like the whole summoner class is going to take up far too much table time, no matter how organized the player. Get some one who isn't prepared, or just a little unaware of other players getting bored, and you have a perfect storm for player frustration.
I really would like to see some advice from Paizo about handling summons efficiently, alternate summoning (such as summoning the same creature each time the spell is cast), and just some general advice that says - don't hog the spotlight.
One of my players rolled a halfling summoner, and, yeah, he's pretty powerful. Quadruped, bite and claws both jumped up, wing attack. Yeah, he's bad ass.
Him and the halfling fighter are definitely the meatshields of the party. I don't find him to be too powerful, though. These two characters are up to 5th level and even with all the eidolon's attacks (and the summoner's lucerne hammer) he still doesn't dish out the damage like the fighter does. Well, I should qualify that: he takes down mooks like no one's business, but up against a level-equivalent foe he hits way less. Also, the eidolon is usually the first one taken out by monsters and baddies. So, at least in my game, he doesn't hog the spotlight. We might not be very good Pathfinder players, however.
What I don't like about the eidolon, though, is its high Intelligence and its ability to speak. My game has six players when everyone shows up and I'm afraid I have largely neglected adequately role-playing the eidolon.
When I played my summoner I rarely felt like I was hogging the spotlight. Though, it helps that the other players were also playing generally overpowered classes (a wizard and a paladin). I also made sure to roll things out as quickly as I could.
Plus, (I've said this over and over again) standard summoners have major problems at high levels because you and your eidolon can't both be wearing a cloak of resistance. My quad eidolon failed about 80% of the will saves he had to roll in our high level game. It really hurts, especially when he gets banished for a day by a blasphemy spell.
I have never looked at the class for this exact reason. experienced it with a Druid summoner in 3.5, by 7th level the player and everyone else agreed it was detracting from the game to have one player controlling multiple entities during combats and he stopped summoning.
Even if you don't dominate combat with a heap of rolls or with your power you are still playing multiple things, having extra goes etc.
If you have say only 3 players and one is super organized it might work but even then you end up with 1 player playing half the party and the other 2 playing the other half between them. Perhaps if you had a small player group and one played a summoner and the others had a cohort or offsides it would work?
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I honestly took care of the problem with an eidilon that "growls" and doesn't speak to people; solves a lot. As to player and eidilon, it's not that much; usually I just "cast haste" or some other buff-type spell, and have everything to prepare.
So in combat I am 90% eidilon, out I am 99% summoner, with the occasional mention of the large creature behind me "growling". Others simply have the eidilon generally communicate with the summoner, I haven't seen anyone interact AS the Eidilon; that would get complicated. Go with the "strong silent type".
They really are pretty fun (high cha characters with good stories), though they are abusively overpowered.
The GM told me not to summon more than two things at once, and I still felt bad bogging down play: two eagles is another six attacks to roll and a check to hover each.
It's sort of like having another DM turn.
I made an attempt at fixing the master summoner at least. And I do plan on changing the base summoner a bit to get rid of that wonderfully easy-to-marginalize-the-rest Eidolon.
As it is now, it's far too easy to break the game with a summoner. There's no trick to it. It's literally "pick the most obvious evolutions" and "use the SLA."
Honestly if you play it right, the summon can actually be more of an roleplayer then your actual character. I made a master/servant relationship between my Eidolon/Summoner, respectfully. Servents don't speak....
They should just write at the top of the Summoner class:
"Attention potential summoners: Just because you can do something..."
This.
This is a mind frame is see in a lot of gamers who jump into PF, and some RPG players as well. A lot of players only see DPR no matter what kind of battle it is. my players have the same issue, except one. Many players seem to forget that in PF the battles are ALREADY stacked in the players favor.
i constantly run into the situation of " your party has come to a door, there is light emanating from underneath and you hear muffled voices what do you do? Players all talking at once, i cast bless, i cast haste, i caste bull strength, i summon monster 2.... OK OK you guys cast your first spells but the voices beyond seem unaware of your actions.. players, now i cast divine might, i'm going to cast..um...hold on.. i caste...flaming weapon!, im going to use my wand of invisibility. player X, Can i just open the door we don't even know what is beyond. PLAYER Y, wait let me cast ONE more spell... Player Z, well if he's going to cast another spell i am too!"
eventually the door gets opened and the monsters get turned into mist in 2-3 rounds. Not a big deal but since they were the first monsters they came across in the dungeon they were just mooks and would have died in 2-3 round regardless. after the battle it's a dash to the next monsters before some buffs run out. 3 battles later all there best spells are gone except one player who played smart but everyone else insists on leaving and resting.
In a Normal game most GM aren't out to destroy players EVERY single battle and players are suppose to overcome a combination of easy and moderate battles and culminating to a hard or epic battle with the BBEG. But players have this mind frame it seems like behind every door is the toughest encounter they will ever face. I also see a lot were if players aren't at full health there not moving on in the adventure, so the healer quickly burns his spells quicker than anyone.
while i don't feel this is exactly wrong. It does take away from realism and the challenge of adversity. It also makes magic feel more like a commodity to be exploited than a rare mystical force. Sometimes players need to just chill and enjoy PLAYING the game than seeing how much DPR they can dish out every single battle. Adventure is a journey in itself. sometimes a challenging adventure is the challenge and restraint you bring upon yourself. Just because you can sometimes put the game in easy mode doesn't mean it's always fun to do so, or more productive in the long run.
The most memorable session i ever ran the party made a pact that day. they decided to be conservative and try to go as far and as long as they could without resting. They made it through TEN encounters and almost half an adventure path book in ONE session by using magic only when they REALLY needed it.
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While I agree, it is NOT good for a system when you are having to tell people to self-nerf to keep in balance. The "fixes" would be:
*Have pre-ratioed maximum evolution points spent on "combat" evolutions. Now people that wanted to be all-out combat could take movement forms and such that have some combat application, but cannot just get the biggest attacks
*AC scaled up far too fast. That natural armor bonus flies up.
*Synthasist - They failed to continue to correct what they fixed for Druids / polymorphs. You do synths as a modifier to physical stats; letting you maximize mental and still end up insanely physical is what made 3.5 Druids so bad, and this takes it to a new level
*Didn't they figure out for the master summoner in playtest of the original summoner that letting them spam while keeping the summons at mins / lvl was a bad idea? How did this guy get through?
My issue is I love the summoner, flavor-wise, but even if you're careful they are abusive (even without eidilons they out-bard the bards as buffer affectionados).
I'll put it this way. If the summoner is stealing the spotlight then it is highly likely that your group doesn't have a 2 handed weapon fighter.
I enjoyed my time as a summoner, but I frequently found that when we hit ~level 3 I was consistently out shined by full casters and full fighters.
When you add to it that the eidolon can not heal ability damage naturally you find yourself in a world of hurt until someone can cast restoration.
If your DM nerfs the Summoner things get worse. Here are some examples of nerfs imposed on me. (These are the nerfs regardless of what the rules actually were.)
Augment Summoning doesn't apply to any summoned creatures summoned by a SLA.
The feat Improved Natural attack can't be applied to the eidolon as it is a monster manual feat.
Permanency can not be cast on the eidolon because the monster is a transitory dimension hopper.
Ability damage stays with the eidolon if you re-summon it because ability damage is permanent.
There were more but I'll stop here. The eidolon has the potential to be a show stopper, but when the total attack bonus of the fighter becomes 5 greater than the attack bonus of the Summoner you will find that the summoner can't do much other than buff during the summoner's turn, and the eidolon is simply a tank that can't heal himself, with lower attack bonuses, lower armor, lower HP, lower saves, and more attacks than an equipped fighter of equal level (Most of which will miss due to the attack bonus difference).
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The GM told me not to summon more than two things at once, and I still felt bad bogging down play: two eagles is another six attacks to roll and a check to hover each.If you have an Android or IOS device you might want to consider the Summoner application. Makes life tons easier for any class that uses the summon monster spell family.
It had nothing to do with my being unprepared. I had the bestiary stat-block edited for being summoned as celestial on my tablet. The issue was rolling 6 more attacks than any other player on top of my own crossbow shot or spell.
Personally, if I GM for a summoner at PFS who isn't well-prepared enough to have a bestiary or a print-off with his summoned creature's stats, he can play a different character instead, or a pre-made, or just not summon anything.
The other problem with summoners is it is easy to make things that break immersion in the game world for example a wookie eidolon that is bipedal and claw claw bite.
Because the imagination of a person in a world filled with giant flying reptiles, bears with fire-breathing snakes for tails, and fey that look like tiny centaurs with grasshopper lower bodies instead of equine ones can't think up a Bigfoot?
:)
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I'll put it this way. If the summoner is stealing the spotlight then it is highly likely that your group doesn't have a 2 handed weapon fighter.
Sure.
2 handed weapon fighter: “Whack!!!”
Summoner: OK, I move here, then cast this spell. Meanwhile my eidolon moves here, and does six attacks, let’s see now, roll, roll, roll, roll, roll, roll. ……
“Spotlight” is NOT about who does the most damage. It’s about who gets the most table time- and is effective with it. Summoners, as they get to run at least two characters all the time, are notorious spotlight hogs.
I find the the burden of playing 2 parts with Summoner can be solved by have the GM play the personality of the Edilon for you but you control it's actions. I would never require this as GM but if it's not something you are interested in role playing like that then talk the GM.
I never found Edilons to be over powered if you follow the rules and have a balanced group of players when it comes to skill in the game and optimization or lack of that. If you have highly optimized summoner in group of concept based unoptimized character you will come off as over powered. But this true of any party.