Are fiend summoning wizards a thing of the past now?

[Natan Linggod 327]

At least for those of less than 11th level.
From what I can find, the only way to have a wizard to do the iconic 'Summoned Fiend' thing is to use the Planar Binding ritual which limits it to level 11 or higher.

Is there another way that I've missed somewhere??

[Eltacolibre]

Summon fiend is a 5th level spell. Wizards can cast summon fiend at level 9.

[Natan Linggod 327]

Eltacolibre wrote:

Summon fiend is a 5th level spell. Wizards can cast summon fiend at level 9.

That's a Divine spell though. Clerics , and some Sorcerers, can cast it but not Wizards.

[Eltacolibre]

Natan Linggod 327 wrote:

Eltacolibre wrote:

Summon fiend is a 5th level spell. Wizards can cast summon fiend at level 9.

That's a Divine spell though. Clerics , and some Sorcerers, can cast it but not Wizards.

Ah, I see what you mean. I guess, it makes sense that all the summoning of outsiders went on the divine side.

Wizards can only summon fiend with the ritual indeed, planar binding and that's pretty much it.

At least from what I know.

[Deadmanwalking]

Yep, Wizards cannot summon fiends to fight for them casually any more. That's better thematically, IMO. Planar Binding covers all of a Wizard's on-theme fiend summoning needs.

[Some Kind of Chymist]

I missread the title as "are fiends summoning wizards a thing of the past now" and was intrigued as to when that was option.

[Unicore]

Splitting up the summon creature spells by type seems a lot more like creating a future niche for the summoner than trying to remove a classic trope from the game. Conjurer's will still have plenty of creatures around, but it seems like the Chelaxian "deal with the devil" style arcane caster is not on the table, yet.

[Diego Hopkins]

Some Kind of Chymist wrote:

I missread the title as "are fiends summoning wizards a thing of the past now" and was intrigued as to when that was option.

Fiends summoning wizards seems like a really good plot hook.

[Natan Linggod 327]

Diego Hopkins wrote:

Some Kind of Chymist wrote:

I missread the title as "are fiends summoning wizards a thing of the past now" and was intrigued as to when that was option.

Fiends summoning wizards seems like a really good plot hook.

I have used that in a one shot game I ran. Well, summoned the entire party actually but still.

Back on topic, guess I'll have to homebrew some spells for my morally dodgy wizards at lower levels.

[Squiggit]

Deadmanwalking wrote:

That's better thematically, IMO.

Is it? Wizards trying to control demons seems really archetypal and classic fantasy to me. Kinda bummed to see it relegated to such a high level concept.

[Mechalibur]

I mean Acadamae in Korvosa is pretty much centered around young wizards learning how to summon devils. It wouldn't surprise me if we eventually get a wizard feat that lets you add Summon Whatever to your spell list.

[Dansome]

Just a matter of time.

[Rysky]

Squiggit wrote:

Deadmanwalking wrote:

That's better thematically, IMO.

Is it? Wizards trying to control demons seems really archetypal and classic fantasy to me. Kinda bummed to see it relegated to such a high level concept.

”Trying to control” is what Planar Binding’s always been about.

The Summon Monster line was just “summon a killbot for a few minutes”.

[The Raven Black]

Imp was good for the "summon a spy drone" too :-D

I hope PF2 got rid of the "Wizard has to be True Neutral because it is the best alignment for Summoning."

[Xenocrat]

For what it's worth, summoning right now looks pretty weak past 7th level (4th spell level) and gets worse the more you level. Someday we may see a feat that bumps the level cap of your summoning spell by 1 (but alas not 2) to close this gap, but probably not and definitely not for a long time.

[cavernshark]

It doesn't really solve your problem for wizards, but if you just wanted the arcane list and summon fiend, an arcane bloodline sorcerer (Imperial or Draconic) could pick up Crossblooded Evolution sorcerer feat at 8 to get a single spell from the divine list and then convert that spell known to Summon Fiend once you got 5th level spells. Arcane sorcerers also have the Arcane Evolution feat at 4th level, which gives your sorcerer a spellbook. If you really wanted to double-down, pick up a familiar at level 2 and claim you're a graduate student with a Familiar Thesis in the works.

[Siro]

Xenocrat wrote:

For what it's worth, summoning right now looks pretty weak past 7th level (4th spell level) and gets worse the more you level. Someday we may see a feat that bumps the level cap of your summoning spell by 1 (but alas not 2) to close this gap, but probably not and definitely not for a long time.

The other thing is a slight lack of creatures to summon (which seems to affect the higher levels a bit more.), leading to a lack of versatility for the spell (was a major part of the ‘Summon Monster’ power in PF1, as you were more likely to summon a creature more ideal to the situation.) However this problem should be a relatively short lived, as each new beastairy should have more creatures to summon, making the Summon spells more powerful as time goes on.

[Glimturen Runekeeper]

Also a Human Wizard with he adapted magic line of feats can get access to a limited number of cross tradion spell spells. Allowing them to take Summon Fiend.

[Shisumo]

It's also entirely possible that we will see a lower-level, more limited-scope ritual for, for example, imp or quasit summoning purposes in some future supplement.

[MerlinCross]

I'm more interested in how this works with plot. But this is also running with old info.

Does a summon still take an action from the summoner to do anything? If so, how does one portray the evil court mage that has a few Fiends summoned to do evil plots? If he has enough summoned by RAW he shouldn't be able to do anything and just stand in place. Or just be locked in his room all day.

That said, Planar Binding might still be around?

[Natan Linggod 327]

Rysky wrote:

Trying to control” is what Planar Binding’s always been about.

The Summon Monster line was just “summon a killbot for a few minutes”.

"Summon killbot" is still a thing, it's just that now they're animals rather than fiendish animals. So this change hasn't done a thing other than remove some player character concepts.

And it screws the lore for Cheliax pretty hard.

Glimturen Runekeeper wrote:

Also a Human Wizard with he adapted magic line of feats can get access to a limited number of cross tradion spell spells. Allowing them to take Summon Fiend.

Nice, looks like this will be my starting point for my homebrew.

[Rysky]

Natan Linggod 327 wrote:

Rysky wrote:

Trying to control” is what Planar Binding’s always been about.

The Summon Monster line was just “summon a killbot for a few minutes”.

"Summon killbot" is still a thing, it's just that now they're animals rather than fiendish animals. So this change hasn't done a thing other than remove some player character concepts.

I didn't say it wasn't a thing anymore.

Natan Linggod 327 wrote:

And it screws the lore for Cheliax pretty hard.

It doesn't in the slightest. There's still Planar Binding which is what the Lore has looked like, summon killbot pretty much wasn't.

And we can definitely look forward to NPC Arcane Diabolists I'd wager, as well as an Archetype down the line.

[Rysky]

MerlinCross wrote:

I'm more interested in how this works with plot. But this is also running with old info.

Does a summon still take an action from the summoner to do anything? If so, how does one portray the evil court mage that has a few Fiends summoned to do evil plots? If he has enough summoned by RAW he shouldn't be able to do anything and just stand in place. Or just be locked in his room all day.

That said, Planar Binding might still be around?

Planar Binding is still a thing and answers your question, Fiends get bound with a specific task.

Summon X isn't for tasks, they're quick killbots or scouts.

[Some Kind of Chymist]

Also worth noting that; just because a rules element does not yet exist does not mean any aspect of lore has been retconned; plenty of parts of lore existed in PF1 before any rules supported them. Diabolist will almost certainly return as an archetype or class archetype as will other things that support the lore Cheliax and other significant regions. Gunslingers don't exist yet but that doesn't mean that Alkenstar blinked out of existence.

[Natan Linggod 327]

WE'll have to agree to disagree on the lore effect then.

Hopefully whatever archtype/feat/thingummy they come up with to give wizards back a basic ability will be worth the wait.

[Saleem Halabi]

If you need an NPC that summons devils, just give him the ability to do so. NPCs are not bound by PC rules. Just because a 1st level PC wizard cant summon a quasit doesn't mean that a 1st level NPC wizard can't.

Class rules are largely for PCs. NPC stat blocks just have the abilities that they need to have. You don't have to justify it beyond that. Remember, the rules are designed to tell a fun and engaging story, not act as a physics engine.

[Squiggit]

Rysky wrote:

Planar Binding is still a thing and answers your question, Fiends get bound with a specific task.

The problem with planar binding is it's a fairly high level archetype. Someone who wants to play a diabolist wizard (which is a pretty classic fantasy archetype) is going to have to wait more than half the life of many campaigns before they can even start it.

That kinda sucks. Summon Killbot might have been less engaging from a roleplay standpoint, but at least it was thematic.

[Natan Linggod 327]

Saleem Halabi wrote:

If you need an NPC that summons devils, just give him the ability to do so. NPCs are not bound by PC rules. Just because a 1st level PC wizard cant summon a quasit doesn't mean that a 1st level NPC wizard can't.

Class rules are largely for PCs. NPC stat blocks just have the abilities that they need to have. You don't have to justify it beyond that. Remember, the rules are designed to tell a fun and engaging story, not act as a physics engine.

"fun and engaging" are generally not the words I get to hear when I tell my players they can't do something (for no justifiable reason) that they clearly saw an npc doing. :P

While I can, and do, give my npcs whatever they need, I much prefer having the rules for things. Just my style of DMing. ymmv.

[Deadmanwalking]

Thus far, literally no NPC of a PC Class (or close equivalent) and Ancestry has any abilities that a PC could not.

That may change at some point, but for the moment, complaining about something that has yet to happen and may never seems a tad premature.

[Glimturen Runekeeper]

"Also a Human Wizard with he adapted magic line of feats can get access to a limited number of cross tradion spell spells. Allowing them to take Summon Fiend."

Opps I made a sleight mistake. I rechecked the human background and saw that I had misrembered the feat. The Adaptive Adept feast that I was referring to earlier only swaps up to a 1st level spell that can not be heightened. So no grabbing summon fiend that way.

[Natan Linggod 327]

Deadmanwalking wrote:

Thus far, literally no NPC of a PC Class (or close equivalent) and Ancestry has any abilities that a PC could not.

That may change at some point, but for the moment, complaining about something that has yet to happen and may never seems a tad premature.

With my lunatic players, anticipating edge cases coming up in game has become a bit of a habit for me. :D

[Saleem Halabi]

Natan Linggod 327 wrote:

"fun and engaging" are generally not the words I get to hear when I tell my players they can't do something (for no justifiable reason) that they clearly saw an npc doing. :P

But that is the core of a class based system. If you have a party consisting of a Fighter, Rogue, Wizard and Cleric, and you have an NPC that casts a 9th level primal spell, that is literally something your PCs can NEVER do. Once they picked their classes at 1st level, they were locked out of that option forever.

Similarly, an NPC wizard can just go become a lich. A story process completely undefined by the rules. Your PCs can never do that.

Or they can craft an elaborate dungeon full of all the traps and hazards found in the players hand book. Your PCs can never do that.

Sure, you might say "But as the GM I can adjudicate those situations and provide an avenue for my PCs to do it."

Yeah, you could do that with fiend summoning as well, but neither that, nor any of the options I presented above, many of which are standard fantasy adventure tropes, can be done by PCs according to the rules.