I concur that timing is the primary issue.
In our games, two things seem to help. The first is having a list of what you can summon (and what it does). Let me give a shout-out to the very helpful Monster Summoning Cards by Purple Duck Games. I have a copy on a tablet, but they also print out onto card stock very nicely and you have hard copies to lay out in front of you if you prefer.
The other is handing the tablet or card to other players, and saying "here, you drive the elemental." This both solves the issue of "how much control do I have over my summons" and also keeps other people involved in the game (and killing things). It doesn't feel like I'm doing the killing when Mike is the one moving the mini and rolling the dice.
The downside, in my experience, are the novel or templated monsters. Anyone who summons an Evolved Good Monster from an alternate summons list damn well better have the modified stats at their fingertips.... and never do.
One way I keep things going as a DM is to limit the time I allow my players to make decisions. If my player takes more than about 20 seconds to decide what to do then I will often put them in delay. It is also important to note that you do not decide what to bring in when you start casting. You make that choice when you finish casting.
You make all pertinent decisions about a spell (range, target, area, effect, version, and so forth) when the spell comes into effect.
Provided the character in question is casting a standard summon spell, this usually gives them plenty of time to grab the stats they need while the other players are taking their turns.
One way I keep things going as a DM is to limit the time I allow my players to make decisions. If my player takes more than about 20 seconds to decide what to do then I will often put them in delay. It is also important to note that you do not decide what to bring in when you start casting. You make that choice when you finish casting.You make all pertinent decisions about a spell (range, target, area, effect, version, and so forth) when the spell comes into effect.Provided the character in question is casting a standard summon spell, this usually gives them plenty of time to grab the stats they need while the other players are taking their turns.
Yeah, but everyone who didn't just fall off the turnip truck knows that standard-action summons are the gold standard and tries very hard to get them. And they're not hard, even if you're not playing a summoner (that gets them by default).
In general we've found the Summon Monster series more effective due to useful SLA and abilities. Can also be used to make beat sticks and meat shields.
Summon Natures Ally has generally been effective for creating beat sticks and meat shields.
Despite the spells being superficially similar I think they have very different power levels.
Though SNA does have the "I summon some Cyclops and have them natural 20 their Great Axe"
I dont think they are OP , while they are quite good indeed , even more if you are a neutral caster.
With that said , the player must have the sheets of what he intends to summon ready , this spell is more of a pain because of the time it takes from the game sometimes ugh...
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I agree, the summoner's turns taking longer than the other players' turns is a potential issue, but that can be avoided if the summoning player takes steps to keep things moving.
As a player, I pre-select a short list of candidates from the longer list, and then limit myself to that short list during a session. This reduces the time spent deciding what to summon, and 2 or 3 candidates are enough to cover most situations. With a short list, it also makes it easier to have stats at the ready, whether you prefer cards, hero lab printouts, or shortcut links on your device. Having your minis or pawns ready to go ahead of time helps, too.
Limiting yourself to a handful also saves time on your subsequent turns, because it's easier to "know your monsters" when the list is short. One last thing that helps is simplifying your monster's tactics according to basic roles, like attack, flank, or interpose.
I like that tip above about letting other players drive the summoned monster(s) now and again.
Another tip I'd suggest is sorting your summoned monsters by spell. That way instead of checking each monster to find their spells, you're selecting a spell and the monster that goes with it.
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One thing to remember is that unless you can talk to the summoned creature, all it can do is fight. That having been said, quite a few of the possible summons speak Common or have telepathy. In fact my group has used them to translate before when we had some written material in one of the planar languages and no comprehend languages spell handy.
Slowdown and analysis paralysis are really the biggest issues with summons from my POV. That and the fact that many of the summons are templated animals so there's a lot of flipping around the Bestiary trying to generate stats on the fly unless you have a premade list.
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Speaking as someone who plays a Summoner, I concur on the usefulness of prewritten stat cards. I've played sessions where I had to look up monster stats on the fly AND modify them with the +4 to strength and constitution. It was embarassing.
On the other hand, when I have the stats and a decent plan when my turn comes up? I can go all out and there are some petless, summonless characters who's turns take longer than mine.
One thing to remember is that unless you can talk to the summoned creature, all it can do is fight. That having been said, quite a few of the possible summons speak Common or have telepathy.
Good point. Many of the outsiders (such as archons) have truespeech (Su), which also works. Although, like common, not in a silenced area.
Slow turns is just a player being rude. If X summons age more than you can handle then summon x-1. I've only found the master summoner regularly crosses this limit.
Idk about summoning being OP but it does make any caster with it automatically decent. This statement is based on an in game experience where a heavily unoptimized sorcerer still made the martials feel silly because her summons did more destruction than they could. The reason was pretty simple. The GM designed encountes to challenge the static talents of the martials. My ever changing summons would bypass those challenges.
I think this speaks more to the problems of martials not the spell more so than any other of these threads. I know martials like the Aegis or soulkinfe wouldn't feel silly next to sorceress summons.
In my experience summons tend to die quite quickly if the enemies pay attention to them - this takes up the enemies time and takes some pressure of fighters etc or gives them flanking and makes them better at doing their job.
I generally have low intelligence enemies attack a random target unless a particular thing just did a lot of damage to it. That means summoned monsters act as a bit of protection for melee PCs.
I think the round long casting time is an opportunity to disrupt without risking a ready action. I don't think this should happen often but a few times in a summoners career seems reasonable.
Protection from Evil/L/C/Good is a very easily accessible spell and gives some protection against summons. Bad guy has it in potion form?
If a summoner was spamming summons I would ensure at least some of the foe were diverted to managing the summons population. I would never let a character bring in more than one or two summons spells worth of creatures at any one time.
Lastly, while the player can give commands to the summons if he speaks the language, they are still NPCs. As DM i move them st the players instruction but the player rolls all the dice. I also expect the player to give commands commensurate with the creatures intelligence.
My strategy was to summon one thing then hide. So when something did attack me, I just summoned more things
The GM rarely attacked me or my summons. For reasons like this. Now don't ask me how one level 5 summon at party level 12 made all the martials feel silly. I think it was something about tar creatures stealing weapons.
Can I just say that Lantern Archons are amazing? 2d6 a round might not be that much damage, but if you got a pit and a monster with low touch AC the only thing stopping that damage is hardness or poor dice. The thing that makes summon monster so powerful is action economy. You're basically adding a turn (or multiple turns) to the PC's side, and you have several types of turns to add based on the monster(s) you bring into play.
Since there's zero penalty to having a summon die it can also be used for a lot of traps. Lords know how many celestial ponies had a bad day due to fireball traps and the like.