My 2 cents: Druids

[koolking]

Hello,

Normally I enjoy playing Druids. I got one together to play here. However...

I discovered that Summon Nature's Ally is so watered down as to become next to useless. In that spell you can only summon a creature that lasts 1 round per level. Not 1 minute per level--1 round (about 6 seconds) per level.

I can understand 1 minute per level but not 1 round per level. To me, that makes the spell so useless it becomes a wasted spell.

Am I the only one who feels this way?

I am fairly new to Pathfinder so I don't know if this issue has come up very much at all.

kk

[mardaddy]

It is more or less weak sauce, but it scales up and is meant to be only a speed bump to buy a round at low medium or high levels (unless enhanced.)

My issue with ALL summon is full round to cast. Makes you a target and brings the potential for that weak sauce speedbump to not go off in the first place, wasting the speed bump effort.

I had a druid use summon natures to bring forth a viper to go after an invisible opponent (we were unsure exactly where he was and vipers have scent to locate him), so it has its rare utility uses also. The invisible guy ended up completely combat ineffective from the 3 viper bites and poison before the viper disappeared (bad rolls.)

In a completely different game, I had a different druid cast it while in seagull wild shape to bring forth a mass of centipedes on an escaping rowboat of enemies. More poisoned.

[lemeres]

They can be useful for short term scouting. Air elementals have a fantastic flight speed, and earth elementals can earthglide past walls in underground dungeons. And those movements are in tact, even if you use a very low level spell (which means it is easy to spam at higher levels.

Not exactly subtle, but they can give you an idea of what you are facing. You will need to spend skill points to get the elemental languages though (but that shouldn't be too bad- druids stop spending points in handle animal at some point anyway once they can pass all the checks with their companions).

[Ciaran Barnes]

Gain a few levels and things will work themselves out.

[pauljathome]

Its FAR from useless, even at level 1.

In combat:
1) Its another thing for the bad guy to hit on. Using a first level spell to rob the bad guy of its attacks for a round is often a good trade off
2) Summoning it into a flanking postion can work wonders
3) Summoning it behind the enemy lines to play havoc with the enemy wizard can work wonders

Out of combat:
Trap dectecting ponies can be wonderful
Swimming dolphins can save somebodys ass

Once you have a few levels you get some scary good options. Satyr is huge. Dire tigers are quite damaging (especially if you buff them)

And then there are magic items that are insanely cheap (at higher levels). The Ring of Natural Attunement (Kami) is a game changer at high levels (the 7th level Summon Zuishin is just silly good)

And all this for the high, high cost of absolutely nothing. You get to spontaneously cast the spell so you don't even need to memorize it. You memorize other spells but still have access to it if the situation requires it.

[lemeres]

I wouldn't say it is that great at level 1 (since you could just use your own character to do that stuff)... but by level 3-4, they last long enough to actually accomplish something. 3-4 rounds covers most of a normal fight.

[Perfect Tommy]

you're a spell caster with full progression, 2 good saves, good bab progression. And while shape.

And you can spontaneously convert spells to summons. Sure, they start out weak. But mid level they give you huge options. Essentially you can prep diverse spells and know they will be useful, if only because you convert them to SNA.

[koolking]

Thank you for all your advice. Much appreciated. I got a lot of good stuff to think about. I'll give everything that all you suggested a try. I won't just try once or twice. I'll try several times and maybe I'll get used to it.

And, well...I do still think that one minute per level would make more sense.

kk

[Grandlounge]

Additionally, look for the special ability of your summons. Caster hate getting grabbed, free trip attempt are free and can be devastating if you're lucky. Your enemies may fly before you can do so reliably.

[Klorox]

@OP, welcome to Pathfinder, land of highly nerfed magic, like it or leave it.

[Zolanoteph]

Also look at augment summoning. Use the level behind version of a summon spell to summon multiple speed bumps at+4 con. They probably won't hurt things in any meaningful way but this makes for an outstanding wall.

[GeneticDrift]

Its an amazing spell even with the low duration. At low caster levels it might not be worth it though. At cl 3 or so i feel it works out to the whole combat.