Everything about it seems to remove free will, and I am not comfortable with that... even in a stupid game.Part of this comes down to how you see summoning, which you either can't or won't change (both of which are perfectly fine). I find your points about free will to be interesting though. I see summoning differently, but for reasons similar to yours, I really can't stand most charms, compulsions, and mind control. I don't think Pathfinder is too bad about this, but any form of domination that can't be at least resisted (a will save) really doesn't sit well with me.
IMO, almost all spells are circumstancial tools and aren't inherently wrong, it's more about how you use them.
Is it evil to charm an villain to make him surrender instead of stabbing him to death? Yeah, sure charming him does overide his free will, but i'm pretty sure stabbing him goes against his idea of ''a good life'' and thus go againt his free will.
Or is it evil to dominate a villain's general to learn about a way to stop him?
Yeah, sure some spell are pretty evil in themselves, i think about spells that have the sole purpose of inflicting pain, but those are a small minority. Sure some spells can be a bit more dirty than others more straightfoward ones, but at the end of the day, what count is stopping the villain.
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Oooooo, situational ethics arguments! I could easily jump all over and around that fence. We get down to "do the ends justify the means" and are some things/actions inherently wrong/evil. The answers will be as numerous as there are people on this planet, and none of them can be empirically proven to be true.
Apologies to the OP, we've rather significantly derailed this thread. I believe the mechanical issue was properly addressed, and I don't have too much issue with temporary creatures being the cause of a lasting physical effect like the bridge or wall examples. Ongoing supernatural effects though dissapear with the summoned creature.
I mean as a bachelor in philosophy, it's a dance i could take part in! It's why i said ''in my opinion'' (Even though that word is kinda demeaned in philosophy, but that's a matter for another time). I won't hide my color, i mostly subscribe to the rule utilitarian school of thought.
Although i will concede that my views are not universal, and can be argued upon, i honestly have a very hard time believing that an adventurer could have a serious career while subscribing to any form of deontological ethics. Indeed i would imagine that any serious form of deontological ethic that would have trouble with infringing upon someone free will, would have trouble with using violence as well.
I won't tackle the empirical need for a proof as this is a whole other can of worms and i fear we already derailed this thread enough! :)
And i'll end this post by an apology to OP as well, as i've been a major actor in this thread derailment!
It's actually taken me a long time to accept necromancy as anything different than summoning. But they're dead, so that made it a little easier...It just doesn't sit well with me.
Totally get that. I had a player back in my college days who refused to have anything to do with conjuration or necromancy. He was deeply, personally terrified of demonic/spiritual possesion or of "becoming more open to the influence of outside entities".
He always wanted to play a wizard, always wanted to have a bonded item, always wanted his bonded item to be a staff, always wanted to have some kind of physical limitation (like being overweight or crippled) and always picked pretty much the exact same spells, feats and skills.He was constantly on the lookout for another set of robes and always carving/staining one of several staves. In real life, I mean. The robes and staves were real-life pursuits.
But then I introduced an NPC who summoned angels to have theological discussions, and offered one of his less cookie-cutter characters a few spells that summoned the spirits of his ancestors to smite his foes, grant him insight or strength, etc.
As for the moral and ethical debates within D&D and Pathfinder, I can't help but love what they did with "The Book of Exalted Deeds". Really clear-cut and definitive parameters (which is nice in a world where Good and Evil aren't just abstract concepts, but physical energies that simply, inarguably exist), but also compelling and inspiring. Sure, you may be good. You may even be a paladin. But are you EXALTED? The idea that an exalted character would refuse to tell a white lie to prevent a world-shattering catastrophe is...interesting, to say the least. Your purity is not up for bargaining; that mindset does not actually make the world a better place, though it is a tempting trap. Better to watch the world burn after you tried to do things Right than to save it after you resorted to do things Wrong.
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Wait, some people think summoning ISN'T slavery? It's coercion it best.I like that description of the wall, a lot.
To clarify... I do not believe that things like the Blindness spell removes one's eyes, and is therefor reversible once the summoned creature that caused it expires...
Don't these clowns have enough already? Planar Binding is straight up cheating, there exist multiple summon to spells beyond reach loopholes, and these pr!cks don't ever get their hands dirty anyways!!!
Screw giving them they don't already have... a spell effect like Blindness does not remove one's eyes (to go along with the wall example)... so let it be reversed with the summoned creature that caused it expires.
There is absolutely NO reason to allow their temporary puppets to have permenant interaction with this world other than, you know, literally freaking killing people!
You are writing it a bit strongly, but Summoning is slavery.
Blindness goes away when the summoned creature goes away as it is a permanent effect. Even more interesting, as it is a permanent effect it can be dispelled.
Count me for one. I absolutely do not think summoning amounts to slavery. It doesn't fit any rigorous definition of slavery. Insofar as it can be matched to any particular social institution of coerced labor, the best match is conscription.
Summoning does not involve reduction of the subject from person into chattel property (the property definition of slavery); it does not involve obliteration of the subject's kinship ties and status in society by permanent, violent domination (the so-called social death definition). It temporarily coerces the subject's labor, typically for combat purposes. Conscription is the proper word for that.
Now, conscription and slavery are two types of labor regime that both fall within the broader category of forced labor, but they are different types of forced labor, they are not identical.
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@Coriat, I think VoodistMonk's position is not about semantics. I read «slavery» above to be understood as a synecdoche, specifically the name of a given element used to refer to the whole set, here coercion.
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If you're asserting that it was just some idle rhetoric and nobody meant slavery by the word slavery, OK, but if I were to use a synecdoche like they put the city to the sword when what happened was they mistreated the populace and beat them up with saps, clubs, and whips, I'd have gone wrong. Even though the sword can stand in just fine for the [whole set] of weapons in the normal use of the phrase put to the sword, swords are killing weapons and would not be a good stand-in for the [specific subset] of nonlethal weapons that I should refer to in a situation where people were beaten but nobody was killed.
Readers might rightly criticize the phrase as misleading.
And I certainly wouldn't follow up with "wait, there are people who think saps AREN'T swords? They're weapons at best!"
So, I'm sure you can foresee the coming analogy. If you are right about the synecdochical intent, then to follow on from the point in my last post, what we've done isn't call a set (forced labor) by the name of a more rhetorically loaded subset (slavery); rather, we've called one subset of forced labor (conscription) by the name of another subset of forced labor (slavery).
Which is as muddled as calling a sap a sword because both are weapons.
Now, setting aside the above, whether or not you are right that the word slavery was merely rhetorical, it seems fair to criticize it as overwrought and misleading in this case.
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Yes, necromancy, the moral high road... you heard it here first.
We've been saying this for years...
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I like summoning but I dislike how it's done in d20. Far too powerful and far too easy. When one single spell at least doubles your action economy and grants you a ton of spells, some of which may be of higher level than the one you used to summon, things are overpowered.
Powerful? If you are a Summoner or a Wizard specialized in summoning. Not for a standard spellcaster.
The Summoner is unbalanced (and it was toned down a bit in Unchained), but it is normal for a specialist to be strong in his specialty.A good number of summoned creatures can be stopped by Protection from (alignment) if you know their alignment. The spells they can use normally are well below what a caster of that level can cast and you need to be able to speak with them to have the summoned creatures do something different than using them to fight the nearest enemy.
Sure, if you can speak with the creatures or direct them to do something different than fight they can be useful, but that requires a further expenditure of resources, be them spells or skill points.
You have an example of a Summon spell that summons a creature with spells that are higher than the spell used to Summon them?
Or you are speaking of Planar ally/Planar binding, that are Conjuration (not Summoning) spells and require to bargain with the creatures?
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Recycling is good. People are good. Recycling *people* is good! :)Yes, necromancy, the moral high road... you heard it here first.We've been saying this for years...
Let us fix that for you: "Recycling is good. People are good. Recycling *people* is best."
Really, we Necromancers just see the good in everyone. None of those needless ethical and moral dilemmas.
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Like druids and SNA? Widely considered one of their more powerful abilities, at least at low level. Plus increased action economy and bodies on the battlefield is almost always very useful. And a single spell granting you lots of spells, many not even on your list, is overly powerful almost no matter what,
Powerful? If you are a Summoner or a Wizard specialized in summoning. Not for a standard spellcaster.
There is a big difference between "one of the most powerful abilities of a class" and "a powerful ability".
And when you need to start adding qualificators like "at least at low level" to have your argument work, it means it isn't so powerful.
For normal casters, summoning spells have a casting time of 1 full round and a duration of 1 round/level. So it is problematic to pre-cast them and, if cast in combat, they eat 1 turn of actions plus the off turn part of the round and can be disrupted during the whole time.
Compare to Color spray (or several other crowd control spells) at low levels and explain why they are more powerful.
SNA almost always call animals, and you need a move action and high Handle animal to have them do something different than attacking the nearest enemy (Speak with animals doesn't allow you to direct animals, see the rules about intelligent animal companions).
Summoned animals are good between from about level 5 to level 10, unless you are summoning something really appropriate to the situation and the enemies susceptible to their special attacks.
But "good" is very different from "overpowered".
Embarrassingly enough, some of the examples I had turned out to be nothing but my imagination. Still, many creatures like Hound Archons (SM 5) get Greater Teleport at will. Self only, but still immensely useful.
Except that summoned creatures can not use their teleport abilities.
A summoned monster cannot summon or otherwise conjure another creature, nor can it use any teleportation or planar travel abilities.
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Embarrassingly enough, some of the examples I had turned out to be nothing but my imagination. Still, many creatures like Hound Archons (SM 5) get Greater Teleport at will. Self only, but still immensely useful.
Except that summoned creatures can not use their teleport abilities.
A summoned monster cannot summon or otherwise conjure another creature, nor can it use any teleportation or planar travel abilities.
And:
- the effects of non-istantaneous spells disappear when the summoning spell end;- they can't cast SLAs whose spell equivalents normally have costly components;
- if they can cast instantaneous spells with costly components you need to furnish the component;
- every part of the creature disappear when the summoning spell end, poison included. It has never been explained if that end the poisoned status of creatures poisoned by them, but I generally consider that it do so.
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Regarding the debate about the morality of (actual) Summoning spells: They do not (inherently) have the Evil subtype, and summoning spells are presented as something a good or neutral character might do. Therefore, I conclude that summoning spells are not inherently evil.
Slavery is evil (and while you could quibble about the duration, impressment is not much better).
Therefore I conclude that Summoning != slavery (or even impressment). Therefore, I further conclude that summoned creatures are volunteers. Why would any creature volunteer for that - well they (usually) get to have a fight without any personal risk, which would be appealing to some. Plus, they might genuinely want to help. Plus I assume they get payment in the form of some of the magical energy from the spell slot. Maybe not many would go for it as a percentage, but it is a big multiverse out there....
_
glass.
That is the useful mindset to have. Not just 'X is a problem!' but to actually offer a suggestion for why it's not a problem.
A) They are actually willing to do this, 'on call' by their planar bosses / gods / whatever.
B) They aren't real creatures, but assembled out of planar forces for the duration and then fading back into the planar fabric when the spell ends (or they 'die'), although, personally, I find that 'temporary creature' option kind of horrific. Does the creature know it's going to fade out of existence in 8 rounds? Yikes.
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Regarding the debate about the morality of (actual) Summoning spells: They do not (inherently) have the Evil subtype, and summoning spells are presented as something a good or neutral character might do. Therefore, I conclude that summoning spells are not inherently evil.
Slavery is evil (and while you could quibble about the duration, impressment is not much better).
Therefore I conclude that Summoning != slavery (or even impressment). Therefore, I further conclude that summoned creatures are volunteers. Why would any creature volunteer for that - well they (usually) get to have a fight without any personal risk, which would be appealing to some. Plus, they might genuinely want to help. Plus I assume they get payment in the form of some of the magical energy from the spell slot. Maybe not many would go for it as a percentage, but it is a big multiverse out there....
_
glass.That is the useful mindset to have. Not just 'X is a problem!' but to actually offer a suggestion for why it's not a problem.
A) They are actually willing to do this, 'on call' by their planar bosses / gods / whatever.
B) They aren't real creatures, but assembled out of planar forces for the duration and then fading back into the planar fabric when the spell ends (or they 'die'), although, personally, I find that 'temporary creature' option kind of horrific. Does the creature know it's going to fade out of existence in 8 rounds? Yikes.
a) My problem with the "on-call" hypothesis is that the creature doesn't know who or what it will be fighting.
If I am an LN cleric of Adabar I can call LE or LG outsiders without problems and my opponents can be of any alignment. So I can have an LG outsider fight a Good soldier of another nation for the expansionistic aims of my nation without problems for me. I am less convinced that a LG outsider that willingly accept my call will be so untroubled.b) That is one of the old versions of how the summoning spells work, creating a projection of an "ideal" version of the creature, not an actual creature. Something like a robotic version of the creature created by a computer program. But the general summoning rules in the magic chapter have changed that, as they say that the specific creature can't be called again for 24 hours if slain (but that has an effect only if you are calling a specific, named, outsider, something that Summon Monster doesn't do).
So are you summoning a shadow assembled out of magical planar forces?
Or are you yanking something from its home to do your bidding?
What about a bear summoned with SNA? Was it just waiting for a fight? Or was it getting fat eating berriers, doing bear stuff, minding its own business?
Sugar coat it however you want... MAKING something, literally anything, fight in your place feels dirty and wrong to me. Especially in a game where you, yourself, can get quite good at fighting for your d@mn self.
Whatever word you use to describe forcibly removing something from its home so it can do your job for you...
I have yet to play a character with an animal companion, because I don't like the thought of dragging some poor animal that I call a friend out into battle. Why would I do that to a pet? Sure, force multiplier. It happened throughout history. It happens today in both military and police. I still don't have to like it. This game allows me plenty of avenues to fight for myself without dragging random crap into the fight to do my share of the fighting.
Okay, I am trying to be pragmatic, just looking at what's written... looking up actual definitions of words like summon and conjur, etc... trying to be as objective as possible.
Nothing about the definitions of summoning, itself, or the act of conjuring implies slavery.
What is summoned/conjured is absolutely a real thing, though, by the sounds of it... as you cannot bring it into an environment that cannot support it.
I don't have my copy of the CRB here at work, but I don't see anything in the spell, itself, on AoN actually saying what happens when the summoned creature is killed. Or the spell expires, for that matter. Those rules must be written elsewhere.
Can someome quote relevant text showing me what happens when they die or the spell expires, please?
Type slow, I can't read fast. Lol.
"Yeah, but what about Pigpen? He's very stupid..."
-Out Cold(2001)
Edit: Found this on AoN under Spell Rules: Conjuration...
Summoning: A summoning spell instantly brings a creature or object to a place you designate. When the spell ends or is dispelled, a summoned creature is instantly sent back to where it came from, but a summoned object is not sent back unless the spell description specifically indicates this. A summoned creature also goes away if it is killed or if its hit points drop to 0 or lower, but it is not really dead. It takes 24 hours for the creature to reform, during which time it can’t be summoned again.
Ran out of time to edit my last post (again), but anyways...
I WAS WRONG.
Summoning is not slavery. I will stop comparing it as such.
The whole concept still doesn't sit right with me. I don't like it, still.
On what grounds? I am not quite sure, exactly... laziness? I don't like the little punks that have big protectors. Fight your own battles, kid.
I used to be one of those little punks in high school. Big mouth, backed up by even bigger friends. I was an @$$hole, and should have gotten my teeth pushed down my throat more times than I can count... but I didn't, because I always had someone else to fight my battles for me.
I have never forgiven myself for that BS, either. Probably one of the many wrong reasons I joined the Army. Now, none of that is anyone's fault but my own, and projecting it on to Pathfinder probably isn't fair to anyone (including myself).
Granted, my friends protected me by their own free will. They were present/near me by their own free will, as well. So there is that.
And the whole "day job" waiting for a fight argument doesn't hold up when applied to animals summoned by SNA. Not that it matters what the bear, or whatever, was doing before being summoned... they can go about that same business tomorrow (after they reform).
Hopefully that process isn't too painful or stressful. Because it probably feels every hack, slash, and arrow that sends it back whence it came. If the same creature gets summoned too many times, they may become a monster just because of repeated trauma.
"What? Where am I? Oh, not again..."
How many times can something remember dying for someone else before it decides to do something about it?
What would your character do if he/she/it was suddenly summoned to go die for someone else? Don't worry, though, you can go back to your quest tomorrow (after you die here today, fighting someone else's battle). Such is the life of an adventurer?
Is there a way for creatures to become immune to being summoned (other than being in the state of reforming from the last time)?
I don't know if we each have a destiny, or if we're all just floatin' around accidental-like on a breeze, but I, I think maybe it's all of them. Maybe it's all of them happenin' at the same time.
Forrest Gump
I think you could dimensional anchor yourself to avoid summoning. I'm not sure if that would protect you from being summoned by summon nature's ally though, since that one doesn't specify that the creature is extraplanar.
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On spells you can get via summon monster, here's a few.
SM I: via summon neutral monster & sprite, dancing lights, daze, detect evil/good and a color spray.
SM II: via summon good monster & grig, entangle & pyrotechnics; & faun, ghost sound, hideous laughter & sleep; & pseudodragon, telepathy (not actually a spell, but hey).
via summon neutral monster & atomie, dancing lights, speak with animals & reduce person.
via summon evil monster & pugwampi, prestidigitation, speak with animals, shatter plus of course their unluck aura.
SM III: without any feats a dretch does stinking cloud or a lantern archon does aid. With feats there's 101 different options for spells of 2nd level or below.
i.e. if you're using summon monster to cast other spells you're probably sacrificing a spell level (but not certainly) and you probably want to spend a feat for more options. For a spontaneous caster (espec. a non-full caster who gets full caster summoning) this may be a good deal but it's likely less useful for a prepared caster.