Questions about the Summoner & its Eidolon


Rules Questions


I love the Summoner class, the amount of fun that can be had with the pair can turn anyone into anything from a pokemon trainer, to a dragon rider. That being said, after looking over some of the fun combinations I could make, I came up with a few questions about the rules.

1) After giving the Eidolon the ability to burrow, can he breathe while burrowed, or does he need to come up above the ground every now and then for air, and if so how long can he remain under ground before needing breath?

2) Can a burrowed Eidolon with the Bite, Grab, and Pull evolutions pull a creature (of appropriate size smaller) under the ground with an appropriate combat maneuver check?

3) Is there a way to add ranged attacks to my eidolon (aside from spells, weapon proficiencies, breath weapons), if not would it be an issue if my eidolon were to evolve to gain a single 30 ft ranged attack?

4) If my Eidolon has flight, can he hover, or can he only hover if I invest in the extra flight?

5) Is there a way to give my eidolon multiple attacks outside of additional appendages? To clarify: Say I had a bipedal Eidolon whom I'm trying to turn into a follower/squire like character. However he only gets 1 attack/round with his chosen weapon, is there a way to change this, or would this be a house rule by DM discretion?


1) Since the eidolon doesn't leave a tunnel behind, I would say he does need to hold his breath while underground. Use the normal rules for suffocation.

2) Not sure, this is one for your GM.

3) Evolve arms, and give it some splash weapons to throw. You can't stack several reach evolutions, because reach can be evolved only once.

4) He can hover, just like anyone else, by making a DC 15 Fly check. He must do so whether he has basic or magic flight, though magic flight increases his maneuverability, which in turn increases his bonus to Fly.

5) The same way PCs get additional attacks: wait for his BAB to increase, or take appropriate feats. The eidolon's BAB doesn't grant extra natural attacks, but it does grant iterative attacks with manufactured weapons.


1: There are no rules for how burrowing actually works in Pathfinder. I've always run it so that creatures with a burrow speed can survive indefinitely while underground, which would also extend to burrowing eidolons.

2: I would say no. The burrowing doesn't leave a tunnel behind, so there's no room to place the pulled/grabbed creature. It's really a judgment call, though.

3-5: see Zahmahkibo's responses.


I appreciate the response, the first question is rather tricky, I think I'll just ask the GM how he prefers it, but since I'm playing PFS with this character, I just wanted to know if there was an official "Yes/No" before asking.

Also for clarification there are 2 separate builds I'm working on. The first is, as I stated, a purple worm build. The second was an idea I had when I heard about obscure eidolon builds. The second build is a fighter jet and would start out as a small serpent, later on it would gain fly, magic missile, ranged attacks (if the DM allowed it). Of course the range wouldn't be amazing, but later on you could give it mount and fly your fighter jet. Tell me that's not cool.

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