Which summoner class is better?

[Gun Dragon]

Which summoner class is better? The unchained or or normal summoner?
Which one is more fun and more wanted at the table?

[LazarX]

1. Define better? If you mean scene stealing and powermongering, the normal summoner is definitely better. In fact, it's so much better at scene stealing, and encounter wrecking, that many GM's, including Paizo itself, are banning it from their tables.

2. This kind of answers the question of which is more wanted.

[Conall O'Kanis]

The Normal summoner is 'Better' if by better you mean more powerful. The spells are available earlier, and the Eidolon is more flexible.

I find the Unchained one more fun however, because someone who enjoys the lore and nature of Outsiders will feel more like he's calling on.

A Summoner calling an Inevitable Eidolon is alot more possible in the Unchained variant

[EpicFail]

Part of summoning optimization involves meta preparation like color-coded dice, note cards or other retrievable hard copy* data, and approaching your turn with a militantly mindful desire to be as quick as possible. I've seen this issue both ways, and it's not pretty when the unprepared or even partially prepared wallow through their turn at the table.

That said, I'm in the dark on Unchained Summoner. Is there a link to it somewhere??

*One had better be an absolute wizard if one fumbles thru their tablet or smart phone for the info on their critters. I've only seen this done badly and it's painful.

[Taenia]

The original summoner allowed you to build your Eidolon exactly like you wanted, this led to some great Eidolon and a lot of overpowered Eidolons. This difference came about from the ability to take either a balanced approach or just funneling all your evolutions into offense and defense.

For example my favorite Eidolon I have ever saw was a Pirate Captain whose Eidolon was a medium sized pirate ship complete with crew. All the abilities were based around actions of the crew as if they were actually a pirate ship.

Another was the Eidolon Butler, lots of skills/abilities at blending in and serving his 'master', plus a little combat ability.

I have seen the 6 armed pouncing armored quadruped that would get buffed and rip apart encounters.

The new one is less flexible, but provides a more well rounded, accurate version of some creature from the planes. It prevents individuals from throwing all the points into offense and creating an eidolon more powerful than its intended level.

[Fruian Thistlefoot]

The Unchained summoner Brought the Original into check. The original summoner was extremely powerful. Eidolon's power got scaled back to be more on par with animal companions. Before you could easily build a pouncer level 1 and demolish most encounters. And the spell list of having 8th level spells hidden in 6th level spells was pretty powerful all while getting a better and more obedient fighter than the fighter PC class. I would say the dang Eidolon would out class many poorly built PCs.

I have only played the original Summoner and will be honest that the unSummoner did lower their power across the board. Spells and Eidolon both took a power cut. But it is still viable and a strong choice looking it over.

I would still play the new Unchained Summoner. But if you're given the choice to pick between the two, And you favor power, you should always pick Original summoner and Evolutions. If you prefer flavor you might like the new Eidolon system.

[Cheapy]

The unchained one is better designed, and will be allowed at more tables, so it has that going for it.

[cnetarian]

EpicFail wrote:

Part of summoning optimization involves meta preparation like color-coded dice, note cards or other retrievable hard copy* data, and approaching your turn with a militantly mindful desire to be as quick as possible. I've seen this issue both ways, and it's not pretty when the unprepared or even partially prepared wallow through their turn at the table.

That said, I'm in the dark on Unchained Summoner. Is there a link to it somewhere??

*One had better be an absolute wizard if one fumbles thru their tablet or smart phone for the info on their critters. I've only seen this done badly and it's painful.

The SRD site has the rules for the class.

[cnetarian]

Also I have no idea how the unchained summoner plays but the original was far too good to be used for anything but an NPC boss. Ran a few of them and they tended to dominate with an eidolon able to match or surpass martials at fighting with the summoner able to do most of the battlefield controlling while also acting as party face.

[FLite]

Defensively unchained eidolons are more powerful, as they can get defenses APG eidolons cannot get. For example, an unchained elemental is immune to sleep and paralysis from level 1, inevitables get a bunch of +4s to various saves and immunity to non lethal and fatigue / exhaustion starting at level 4. and so on.