Can I Summon a Banished Creature?


Rules Questions


Here is the scenario.

My high level PCs are on a different plane from their home plane when the bad guy casts Banishment. The druid's animal companion fails the save, and I rule that it is banished back to their home plane.

Can the druid now Summon back his Animal Companion? Under the Rule of Yes, I would say, this sounds reasonable, though I would limit it with the spell duration.

Can you Summon a specific creature?

I'm curious, would this work under the RAW?


What spell is the druid going to use to accomplish this?


Java Man wrote:
What spell is the druid going to use to accomplish this?

That is a good question. I would assume an appropriately leveled Summon spell. Summon Nature's Ally? I would have to gauge the level based on comparable creatures in the lists.

I've now read that if you Summon a Specific creature, you can only summon it once every 24 hours. That is a good limiter.


The animal companion does not appear on any summon list for Summon Nature's Ally, only basic bestiary creatures do.


Pathfinder Maps, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

A summoner with an eidolon has a spell for bringing his eidolon back early, but for anyone else I think you have only the options that you would have if a fellow PC got banished that way. You would need to either go back to your home plane to get him or somehow open a Gate and invite him to come through -- and I don't recall druids having spells that would accomplish either of those things. On the other hand, your party did somehow get to another plane, so you probably do have some sort of options.

Failing that, are there any suitable replacement animals available on your current plane?


Java Man wrote:
The animal companion does not appear on any summon list for Summon Nature's Ally, only basic bestiary creatures do.

I can see your point here. The gate option also is completely viable, but I like the idea that the Druid presented. I'm inclined to allow it to happen but thank you for the RAW.

I like the idea of the 24 hour limiter on summoning a specifically named creature (which is why I'm inclined to allow this in the first place).


Sounds like a viable and non-disruptive house rule to go with.


I'll second the idea of a 24 hour timer as a good idea and add two bits of support. First if an extraplanar creature is effected by Holy Word (or its alternate alignment variants) and banished by the caster it can't return for at least 24 hours per the spell description. Second if a Druid releases or has to replace their Animal Companion it requires a ceremony requiring 24 hours of uninterrupted prayer to do so.


Pathfinder Maps, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

An obvious idea might be to have the druid perform the ritual to summon a new animal companion and let you know if he wants to get the same animal companion back. It is up to you to decide whether that ritual is powerful enough to bring that animal from another plane to the druid.


David knott 242 wrote:

An obvious idea might be to have the druid perform the ritual to summon a new animal companion and let you know if he wants to get the same animal companion back. It is up to you to decide whether that ritual is powerful enough to bring that animal from another plane to the druid.

Hmm.

Quote:
If a druid releases her companion from service, she may gain a new one by performing a ceremony requiring 24 uninterrupted hours of prayer in the environment where the new companion typically lives.

But since we're already well into house rule territory, sure, why not?


Summonings standardly create a generic creature of the specified type and race.

When you get specific on names, personalities, etc, then that is gaming history and the realm of fiction and home games.
Thus the home game GM has to balance this idea with its assumed relationships and expectation of utility of familiarity against the chaos of the generic. How does it enhance play and the story.
We're back to summoning 'Asmodaeus' and getting an infernal self-immolating tyrannosaurus polymorphed into a Chihuahua... only 2 rounds till the dispel magic goes off...


I look at it this way, his animal companion was banished. There is no immediate way to get back to their home plane and retrieve the animal. So, since it is his, and there is a bond, and the druid is 16th level, I'm okay with him taking a high level spell slot to get his animal companion back, for the duration of the spell, once every 24 hours. There is the danger of Dispel Magic, other protections against summoning, etc to consider, but overall, I don't see this as a game breaker.

Now the second it was abused.... then it wouldn't just plain wouldn't work.

Summoning named demons, devils, and gods is another matter altogether. I would think it very, very foolish to tamper with these beings and draw their attention. My players know better then to screw around with that type of thing. (I once had a devil torment a stupid PC at EVERY SINGLE moment it would be even a slight inconvenienced to him. This went down as an epic story still told today. Set the boundaries fellow DMs and you never will have any issues.)


In that situation, the usual means after ruling out planar travel is to simply use the ritual attract a new setting-appropriate animal companion for the duration. You can always get the old one back later, assuming it doesn't get killed or something.

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