Advice for a Summoner or Oracle character

[Vyranos]

Hey there. I've just gotten the Advanced Player's Guide, and two classes struck me with interest: the Oracle and the Summoner. But what makes a good Oracle/Summoner?

[Angra Mainyu]

Both classes can do a lot of different things. The hard part is focusing them on a couple. Some people like to focus them on doing one thing extremely well, but this can lead to situations where they cant do anything at all. So I think its something to avoid. Having one concept as a primary idea is good, just keep a secondary one that you can do well and you should be ok.

Summoners tend to be build improperly because they take very careful reading of the complete section. Most players forget that if it doesnt specifically say you can take an evolution multiple times, you can only take it once. Reach is also misread and applied to multiple attacks. It only does a single attack.

Im a huge fan of the oracle. The big down side to them is they get a limited spell list like a sorcerer. So, picking spells takes a lot of care. I recommend picking ones that are either versitile or ones that you would want to cast multiple times in a day. The rest can be scrolls that you carry around.

[Wind Chime]

For evolution's pounce and quadruped are best and really like claws they have the second best evolution efficiency in the game 2 claws attack for 3 evolution points and they can rend.

[Wasum]

Its not like there are only a billion threads about both of these classes, there are also a couple of guides in the sticky-guide-thread.

Dont get me wrong, I dont mean to be rude, really, but just using the search of these boards once before posting a question (especially one that has without any doubts been dealt with before as both classes are several years old) would give you all the answers your looking for way faster and there would be less pointless threads on these boards.

Please dont take it as offense, but this is such a superficial question - you really would have found something within 2 seconds of trying.

Wasum

[Chris P. Bacon]

The Nature mystery offers a revelation that allows you to learn Summon Nature's Ally spells, and you already have Summon Monster spells on your list; that makes you potentially a pretty versatile caster (it also gives near-by animals a big buff to their saves).

The trouble is your limited number of spells known, which forces you to consider how much you want to, or can afford to specialize in summoning. Summoning is generally a pretty versatile path, particularly when you can summon things that cast their own spells, but it's something to think about. At least as a spontaneous caster you can eventually swap out some of your lower-level spells if/when you feel they've become obsolete.

[Mystically Inclined]

What makes a good Oracle or Summoner? *Thinks about it*

Okay. First you should read the Oracle and Summoner guides. The Summoner guide in particular is the most comprehensive class guide I've ever seen. I'd also strongly recommend reading Treantmonk's God Wizard Guide if you haven't, because he lays out the different areas of magic that a magic user can focus on. It's great reading for classes like the Summoner and Oracle, because they have limited spell selection and shouldn't be trying to do everything. Actually, it's pretty much required reading for the Summoner in particular. Treantmonk actually explains the point of summoning, which is very helpful.

The first step is to realize that both of these classes tend to focus on at most two 'types' of magic. (And by that I mean blasting, buffing, debuffing, or battlefield control.) The Summoner does it because he has a VERY limited spell selection. He's primarily casting to support his other abilities. The Oracle does it because she's good at it.

With an Oracle, you have a very limited spell selection. This is rounded out by your revelation abilities, your curse, and getting the heal/harm spell line on the side. You can opt to play a generalist caster, but there is little benefit to doing so as an Oracle when the Cleric can do it so much easier. Instead. use your revelations and curse(s) to be really good at one thing, while picking enough spells to be okay at something else. You might have enough room for a smattering of 'other,' but you'll have to be careful or risk losing depth in your primary or secondary focus.

Mechanically, there is absolutely nothing I can say about the Summoner that is not covered in the guide. So instead I'll give a some points the guide won't mention:

This gets long:

-The Summoner is not for the feint of heart. It's an incredibly complicated class all on its own, and it allows access to several different things that themselves take a lot of experience to use effectively. A Summoner's Eidolon can either be a skill monkey or a front-line battler, while the Summoner himself can cast and summon. So a Summoner's player needs to be experienced with the most effective use of spells, the summon monster list and which monsters are effective both inside AND outside of battle (break out those monster manuals!), the grapple/combat maneuver rules, and have a pretty good idea of what skills are going to be required. On top of all that, the Eidolon rules are a complicated subset all on their own. It is incredibly easy to build an overpowered Eidolon because you didn't read the rules right and included abilities that shouldn't be there. There are over two pages of FAQ/errata concerning the Summoner alone- more than any other class.

-The Summoner has the potential to do a lot of things. That doesn't mean that it can do a lot of things at once. There is not a single role on the team that the summoner cannot build himself to fulfill, but don't try to do everything.

-The biggest problem with the class (outside of its headachy ruleset) are the complications it can create between the players. You're essentially building a character that can do two or three jobs at once. If any of those jobs are already being filled by another character, then you're competing with the character at its specialty. The party fighter (or party skill monkey) gets kind of frustrated when his dedicated build gets matched or outshone by someone else's class feature. That player looks at your character and thinks "he can do just about everything I can, while also being the party face, magical support, AND summoning creatures as a backup schtick. Why is my character in this party again?" So I recommend that any potential Summoner players keep this in mind and build their character to perform roles that nobody else is trying to fill.

-GM's don't like Summoners very much.

In summary: when you play an Oracle, it is important that you know what you want to do with her. Don't play a Summoner until you're really experienced and are willing to not step on everyone's toes.

Hope this helps!