Before I get into this, I just want to say that I love 5e. That said, there is an element of the new edition that I am not at all happy about - the summoning spells.
First off, there is a real lack of summoning options in the PHB. Wizards only get two summoning spells, conjure minor elementals and conjure elementals. The old summon monster type spells are gone, and I think that's a big disappointment. I enjoyed playing summoner type characters in 3e. It was alot of fun. Even though the summon monster spells of that edition were poorly balanced, I liked the fact that you could play a summoner starting at level 1. Now, you can't summon anything until you're 7th+ level, since the lowest level summoning spell is conjure lesser elementals - a 4th level spell. I'm also disappointed by the lack of ability to summon anything but elementals. Wizards do get animate dead, but that isn't technically summoning, and it has the stigma in the RAW of being "not a good act." I will really miss being able to summon fiends, celestials, and other creatures. Of course, they could always add spells that summon these things later, but the lack of such spells in the PHB is a disappointment.
Now, on to the bigger issue. The summoning options that they did provide are poorly designed, to put it nicely. These spells let you summon several creatures at a time. For example, the conjure minor elementals spell, when cast in an 8th level slot, can summon 24 elementals. TWENTY FOUR. That's an action economy nightmare. Who on earth wants to have to keep track of and roll attacks for 24 creatures? I certainly don't. It's not just the higher level versions where it gets obnoxious, either. Even the 4th level version of that spell lets you conjure as many as 8 elementals. Animate dead isn't much better. A wizard can get a dozen zombies from just a single casting, from what I've been told. Running around with dozens of pets may have been fun in Diablo 2, but I do not want to have to deal with such a mess in a pen and paper RPG. I really don't want to return to the days where everyone else at the table has to sit there bored while the wizard or druid takes turns for all of his pets.
FYI, you can see the conjure minor elementals spell here: http://www.actsofgeek.com/2014/08/game-the-game-5th-edition-players-handbook-preview-part-5/
This is probably the biggest disappointment about the game to me and for the same reasons. I had high hopes for summon monster spells as I felt the concentration mechanic would work well with them in curbing any action economy issues. Anything more than 2 or maybe 3 monsters on the field is too much IMO.
The purpose of the spell is for mass combat. That's why it takes a full minute to cast. It could be used to make a lot of elementalists before storming a room but 24 1/4-CR elementals sounds less useful than 3 2-CR elementals in the same 8th level slot. You don't have to conjure 24 weaker elementals and track them if you don't want to.
When the PHB comes out and I have a chance to fiddle with it some more, I'm going to look into making a Summoner tradition for Wizards. It will keep some of the Conjurer abilities (those that benefit summoning), but otherwise I'll see about giving it a buff familiar or a generic summon that gets more powerful as they call it with higher level spells.
I have no idea how summoning is going to work out in 5e, but...Yeah. The OP's discription doesn't sound too good. I'd much rather summon one elemental that kept up with my PC level-wise (and spell slots I spent on it-wise), who I could command in battle using my actions. A surrogate melee fighter/defender, pretty much. It'd be cool to make it more plastic too. Maybe allow one big summon, or up to 4 weaker summons...But, yeah. No one wants to play or DM the mess of 24 little elementals or whatever running around.
Summoning things other than just elementals would be nice too. I guess casters will need splat books badly again. More-so that martial types, it seems. Although, I hope there's just one splatbook for each class (smaller soft covers, like 2e did), or just make a decent PHB 2 with (relatively) equal amounts of new stuff for everyone. Maybe psionics should get its own book too. I didn't like how 4e just put it in PHB 3, along with non-psionic classes, hybrid rules, yet more feats, and yet more magic items.
I loved my 3e summoner as well, and was super disappointed that I couldn't remotely make him in 3e. The lack of summoning spells is a blow against 5e.
I am disappointed to hear this.
I wholeheartly agree with the OP. Summoner is probably my favorite wizard tradition that have played at 2e and 3e. As it is conjurer is really underwhelming.
Before we start going on an anti-summoner rant...
I want to see the details of the Chain Warlock and the Conjurer before we start making those calls. I also want to take a good look at druid / ranger pet masters. I want to take a good long look at the spells.
Why? Both the Chain Warlock and Conjurer start off with a nice summon spell at low levels. Find Familiar. I know that the Binder can give up their attack action to let their familiar attack once or twice a turn. I'm going to assume that the Conjurer allows the same.
This alone sets off a very strong Summoner vibe - a summoned spiritual being fighting for you. That alone is critical. I'm sure the familiar is going to be leveling up as well, and going to be something only specific subclasses will get to mess around with in combat (binders, conjurers, beast masters).
After that? Well, summoned monsters, in the past, were notable for breaking action economy. So, I'm sure that there are balances in place that I want to see as well before we start going off and freaking out. I'm going to want to take a look at those spells and how they work with subclass features. I'm personally interested in a warlock familiar running around with an Armor of Agathys on, hugging everything, meanwhile the binder will be hasted and casting eldritch bolts from a distance, giving both pet and owner combat turns.
A lot of this stuff is 1) not necessarily immediately obvious to the eye, and 2) possibly altered from whatever you remember of 3e to curbtail caster dominance, and yes, summoning monsters was part of the problem.
Actually, from what I have read over on the enworld forums by the guy who got an early copy of the PHB:
- Wizard familiars are normal CR 1/4 animals; you can deliver touch spells through them but they cannot otherwise attack; you can share senses.
- Chainlocks gain improved combat-capable familiars such as imps and pseudodragons.
From what little I know, it appears the Chainlock has stolen the summoner shtick from the conjurer. I will confirm this information later today once I have had a chance to read my PHB.
Mephi1234 wrote:
I was not awed by the description of the chainlock at enworld (although there sure seems to be a lot of love for the bladelock on the thread), but that might change when I get the PHB.
As for summoning 8 (or 24) elementals, I would prefer to summon a swarm of them instead (thematically similar, but bookkeeping easier). The only reason I can think of summoning 8 or 24 1/4 CR elementals is to light a corridor with fire elementals. I also thought on the enworld thread they mentioned summon woodland creatures or something like that, so instead of there being generic summoning spells (I-IX), you focus on summoning one type of critter per spell. That's easier on the bookkeeping and supports more focused character concepts.
I feel like spells that summon 6 or more creatures under your control at a time should be special-case spells intended for mass combat while there should also be versions that summon 1 or 2 stronger versions for use in common party-sized fights. A 10th level wizards summoning one 10th level earth elemental that can be controlled through concentration and the wizard's Action is much more managable that 12 weak creatures that need micromanaging.
I remember when 4e came out and there were a number of classes and options that people felt were missing, including a summoner. I guess this is another time where we'll have to wait for splat book spells for the wiz or a new summoner subclass.
Mechagamera wrote:
seti wrote:
Mephi1234 wrote:
Personally, i miss the instinctive summons from 4e.
Spend an action to control it, or it does it's own thing. And it's own thing depending on the monsters.
Some monsters where firendly and would attack the nearest enemy.
Some where wild and would attack the nearest anything.
Some monsters where hostile and would attack the party if not controled.
It really gave them flavor. You really needed to be careful not to get stunned when you summoned a balrog.
Kalani wrote:
yusakuasano wrote:
mellored wrote:
Mephi1234 wrote:
Mephi1234 wrote:
Yeah. Summons are tough to balance under the action economy, but concentration I think really makes it work. I've been working on a tweaked version of 4e, and think I found a good way to handle summons that use their own actions - each summon spell is sustain minor (you need to use your swift/minor/bonus action to keep it going) and requires concentration, but the creature can act independantly. As for how much damage it does, for the generic offensive summon I looked at damage spells at that level and had the summon match that output over about 4 rounds of combat. This means that for short fights, a fiery burst might be better, but over a long period of time the summon would do more, which feels right to me - don't bring a summon to a 2 round fight, but they will excell at a slugfest. Also, as I have it, you technically can have 2 summons active, but it means the wizard can only move OR attack, not both, so is generally stationary. That should be a valid drawback if they're trying to keep concentration up lol.
mellored wrote:
WOW! I'm really surprised by this. Looks like I'll have to add another page of house rules. I thought they kept summoning out of the playtests because they were still working on them. Now it's clear they never even bothered to work on the problem of summoning. This is a rather tradgic development for those wanting to play summoners. Obviously, the designers became stuck trying to overbalance the game in adoration of the action economy.
The summoning spells have been redesigned as conjuration spells. Druids can cast Animal Friendship as a level 1 spell (technically enchantment). At level 3 they can cast Conjure Animals. They have two fourth level spells in Conjure Minor Elementals and Conjure Woodland Beings. As a fifth level spell they can Conjure Elementals. Finally at 6th level they cast Conjure Fey. Wizards get the same two spells for elementals, plus two undead creation spells. It looks like druids are the main summoner style of class in 5e unless you are into Necromancy. A druid has to reach level 5 and cast level 3 spells before the conjuration/summoning can really begin.
Just some initial thoughts after reading the comments here and quickly glancing through the PHB. Some of the concerns seem unfounded, as there are a lot of creatures that can be brought into play here, up to a max of 32 beasts for a level 9 casting of Conjure Animals., and 24 creatures at level 8 for Minor Elementals and Woodland Beings. I never played a summoner type of PC in previous editions so I can't compare them very well. But having lots of stuff under your control looks like a viable option in 5e.
[edit1]
Conjurers (Wiz) get Durable Summons at level 14, giving conjured summons 30 temp HP. They use the term "summon" a lot in this specialty school. Based on the text, I would go so far as to say 5e Conjurers and Summoners are synonymous
Necromancers (Wiz) get Undead Thralls at level 6, and increase undead HP maximums by their Wiz level and gain the Wizard's Prof Bonus to weapon damage rolls.
I didn't see anything unique to druids in regards to buffing summons/conjured creatures, but I've not read their entry thoroughly yet.
[edit2]
I forgot to mention Clerics can Conjure Celestials as a level 7 spell. Combined with Animate Dead and Create Undead, they also can serve as a creature controller type.
Ashrym wrote:
dmgorgon wrote:
mellored wrote:
Huh, well Druids get conjure animals which is a 1 action spell so it kind of fits the summon monster model. Druids also get tsunami and storm of vengeance while wizards get nothing on the mass destruction side. Probably because wizards aren't supposed to be good at attack spells. 
Ahglock wrote:
As I stated earlier, I would check the Conjure Minor Elementals spell during my PHB readthrough.
The spell gives you an option for the type of elemental summoned:
- 1x CR 2 elemental
- 2x CR 1 elementals
- 4x CR 1/2 elementals
- 8x CR 1/4 elementals
Casting the spell in higher slots doubles (or triples) the number of elementals summoned. This is not a combat spell, given that it takes a full minute to cast. Summoning a small swarm (8) 1/4 CR elementals seems reasonable for the skirmish-level fighting that players do, especially if they are used to distract enemies, draw fire, scout, or the like. I see no reason to summon 24 of them using an 8th level spell slot unless you are planning on deploying them on a battlefield using the mass battle rules.
Ashrym wrote:
Ahglock wrote:
Ahglock wrote:
GhostStepper wrote:
GhostStepper wrote:
Ahglock wrote:
While I'm not as upset about the current state of things as the OP, I will say that pet casting - both monster summoning and undead animation - is an area of the game I would very much like to see expanded on in future supplemental content, including more spells aimed at summoning/creating/controlling individual creatures that skale in quality instead of quantity, aimed at regular scale games rather that piles of stuff for mass battles. Which, for the record, I also like, and very much appreciate that mass battle stuff is incorporated into the core rules of 5th, even if I remain skeptical of the implementation.
For my own part, what I would most like to see is a lesser 'animate dead' variant capable of animating zombie/skeleton animals, partly as a combat option, but mostly for non-combat utility uses (skeletal steeds for the party to ride, zombie birds with which to scout when combined with some sort of 'share senses with target undead' type spell, etc).
Ahglock wrote:
This was a huge dropped ball, how disappointing!
I was extremely excited to open my copy of the PHB today. Then, "What..? Where are the summoning spells?"
What a major blow to the edition. I'm enthusiastic about the simplicity of the game, the similarity to older additions...
But they left out the summoning spells! I play summoning characters!
I guess I have to go back to Pathfinder.
Disappointed.
Just skimming, but If you aren't happy with the amount of summoning, I'm assuming you are trying to be a conjuror wizard or druid or something. Regardless, there's no lack of summoning spells that I can see. If you have problems with lack of spells on a spell list, simply house rule that these are on whatever classes spell list you are trying to play. So yeah, there's quite a few.
Conjure Animals
Conjure Celestial
Conjure Elemental
Conjure Fey
Congure Minor Elemental
Conjure Woodland Beings
Create undead
Find Familiar
Find Steed
Guardian of faith
Insect Plague
M. Faithful Hound
Planar Ally
Raise Dead
Spirit Guardians
Evenglarexi wrote:
Evenglarexi wrote:
Brock_Landers wrote:
I agree. The dev's have a missed opportunity in the Conjure Lesser Fiend and Conjure Fiend spells - both of which would be ideal for Wizard (conjurers) and Warlocks. I expect a Conjure Fiends type spell to be in the DMG (due to its extreme evil connotations), or in a future sourcebook. Its too good an opportunity to pass up.
Outside of Fiends and Elementals - Wizards are not "traditionally" capable of summoning other creatures (when looking at the wealth of literary source material on the subject). A Celestial badger just doesn't scream "wizard" to me, which is an example of the kinds of things found on the SM1 spell lists.
Wizards and Warlocks should be summoning things like Nightmares, Hell Hounds, towering Elementals, Fiends from the lower pits, ghostly apparitions, and the like. In 1E, 2E, and 4E there were wizard summoners, but they did not call mundane creatures from the upper and lower planes like they did in 3.X. Even at lower levels, they summoned Imps, Quasits, and Mephits (minor elementals) to do their bidding.
I do agree however, that the Conjure Lesser Elemental spell should have been a 2nd level spell with reduced effect however. Something to the effect of the following:
- You summon a small elemental creature such as a mephit, or minor elemental. This elemental can have a CR no greater than 1/2. Alternatively, you can summon 2 CR 1/4 elementals instead. These elementals must be of the same type.
- At higher levels: When cast in a 3rd level spell slot, you can summon a CR 1 Elemental, 2 CR 1/2 elementals or 4 CR 1/4 elementals instead. When cast in a 5th - 8th level slot, the spell functions as listed in the PHB.
A similar Conjure lesser Fiend spell should likewise exist with similar effects. Conjure Fiend, Conjure Lesser Fiends, Conjure heavenly being, and Conjure lesser angel should all be on the clerics list, while only the Fiends/Elementals should be on the wizards list.
Gate is also capable of "true" summoning (pulling a creature from its current location through the portal).
FallingIcicle wrote:
I guess my first question would be: "What is it that you would like to be able to do that you can't?"
And then my second question would be: "Have you talked to your DM about it?"
Granted... some things, like changing Summon Celestial into Summon Fiend, may require extensive changes (by which I mean, changing one word), but for the most part I can't think of much that a "Summoner" would want to do that it can't, provided you have an accomodating DM who will let you swap a couple of spells on your list. I can't imagine many DMs who would protest if approached by a player asking to limit themselves strictly to Conjuration spells in exchange for the ability to add a couple of additional summon options to their lists. Maybe those DMs exist. And probably for organized play purposes, you'd have to stick to the rules, but I think in most cases you'd be fine.
Overall, I think summoning is pretty solid in this edition. Or at least the base rules are. The spells themselves are well written and clear, with a lot of variation as far as what you can summon. And it's easy enough to tweak it from there. That's not to say that I don't expect a strictly "summoner specific" class to be released sometime in the near future. That's absolutely a thing that will happen. But for now, it's an easy fix.
Remember: This is D&D. Where the rules are only suggestions, and the spell lists don't mean anything. ;)
I hope they come up with more summon spells in future supplements, though.
My biggest gripe is no Gate spell for the Warlock. Hello, chain warlock wants to summon stuff!
yusakuasano wrote:
Kalani wrote:
I'll conceed some of those spells may not be what you want for summoning but...man I try and suggest something and then everyone dismisses it. If you don't want the other conjure spells on your list for summoning, then you are going to have to make your own house ruled spells. Other than that there's no reason for this topic to really exist except for the sole point of complaining. So make your own and share it with us, change the spells known on whatever summoning class you want, or just let the topic die because there's literally nothing else that can possibly be done at the moment. If you want wizards to really hear your problem email them or send a tweet at mike mearls. That's all the advice I can possibly give.
Melwick wrote:
This is the biggest dissapointment, specially since one of my players and I love summoning classes.
It's kinda angering to see how WOTC has been neglecting how cool Summoning-based characters can be; games such as Pathfinder let you be a Summoner who's different from the Wizard, also, it has better options when summoning and the class is CENTERED arround that concept, it also has it's own customizable summon starting Level 1.
Another thing I dislike is that WOTC seem to think Summoners are some sort of heartless wizard that uses monsters as expendable resources since well, that's how rules threat them and even class flavors tell you most of times monsters hate you and wanan break free, whereas the Pathfinder Summoner establishes a bond with his monsters and specially his eidolon (his customizable one) to the point they share alignment, can communicate with telepathy, he gives his life willingly for his master and even fuses with him; the Eidolon at it's core is like a brother or a father, he's like family to the summoner.
So in this edition we not only have a HARDER to manage summoning spell, but it also adds to the whoel tasteless "I'm a heartless minion master" background WOTC has been mantaining.
Or..... maybe they just haven't gotten around to making the summoner classes and spells yet? They weren't in core book 4e either.
Mephi1234 wrote:
Aldath wrote:
Evenglarexi wrote:
Evenglarexi wrote:
You also have to keep in mind, the Pathfinder Summoner class was not in the core book either.... It came from the Advanced Players Guide. It is unfair to compare Core (PHB only) Dnd against the totality of another game system... The pathfinder core book is equally lacking in a dedicated summoner class. Do not compare an apple (PHB) against a fruit basket (Core + Splatbooks). The apple will always come up short.
I expect a dedicated summoner class (or subclass) in a future sourcebook. This is a given.
I expect to see additional monk weapons in a future sourcebook, if not a dedicated sohei/kensai subclass.
I expect to see new spells, feats, and subclasses for a variety of archetypes.
I expect to see the occasional new base class, but only if the concept requires new rules/features, can support multiple subclass archetypes, can distinguish itself alongside other classes, and would not be better off as a subclass.
Some people seem to expect that because something is absent from the PHB, it will neverappear in the game. The game has only been out for 4 days people. How about we wait a good year (maybe two) before we start complaining about the lack of options in the game....
Or better yet, how about we compare the options available in the 5E PHB against its predecessors... The 1E/2E PHB had far fewer classes, and each class had far less customizability, or depth. The 3.X PHB had 1 less class (no Warlock), but the baked-in customizability was lacking. All fighters had identical class features (only differentiated by feat choice, which was lacking in the PHB) - while the 5E Champion, Battle Master, and Eldritch Knights are completely different beasts, despite each being layered on top of the fighter chassis. In 4E, there were even fewer classes than in 3.X, however each class was broader in scope, and had a multitude of customization options.
The 5E subclass has much in common with the 2E Class Kits and Players Option system, and act like baked in substitution levels, and prestige classes (3.X), or paragon paths (4E) - most of which were nonexistant in the core rules (outside a handful of prcs in the 3.X DMG).
All this complaining about a lack of options only reveals how ungrateful and spoilt the gaming community has become.... We seem to expect to have several years worth of expansion material baked into the core product, without additional cost or development time.... and that it must all be balanced to the nth degree, and be (almost) 100% error free.
Kalani wrote:
Ashrym wrote:
Mephi1234 wrote:
My PHB won't be delivered by Amazon for a few days. But in 3.0/3/5/PF, Summoning and Animating are some of the most broken mechanics in the game.
"Open ended" spells like Summon Whatever #, Animate Dead, and Polymorph were notoriously broken. If a creature on any list available to you had a spell or special ability, then you gained access to that special ability. Summons and Animated creatures give you another meat shield to stand in front of you (or surround you). When fighting individual enemies (like a single boss enemy) they could surround them, basically locking down their movement. Each Summoned or Animated creature had its own actions, and thus anyone who Summoned or Animated a creature gained a huge action advantage. In addtion to being crazy unbalanced, it could also be intesensely time consuming. Fighter takes 1 turn, Dread Necromancer's and his minions take 20. And those issues are just the tip of the iceberg.
It's bad enough that full casters get 100+ options that will be added to with almost every splat books. They shouldn't also get automatic win buttons.
Mephi1234 wrote:
Person_Man wrote:
Aldath wrote:
Mephi1234 wrote:
FallingIcicle wrote:
Mephi1234 wrote:
You have to remember, Complete Mage was one of the last splatbooks to come out for 3.X, towards the very end of its print run. A throwaway line in a late-print run splatbook is not something to get torn up about.... Especially when you consider that there was a 3-4 year gap (approximately) between Complete Arcane and Complete Mage, and few people complained about the lack of celestial patrons during that time period.
As I said previously today - don't compare apples (PHB-only) with a fruitbasket (Entire print run). The apple will always come up short. The book has been out 4 days..... 4 days! We don't even have 2/3 of the core rules yet, let alone any splatbooks, dragon articles, etc.
Sheesh. Give the dev's a break would ya. Not everything will be in the core rules. The more obscure corner-case examples (such as celestial warlocks) almost always show up in later products.... Not the core rules.
I think 5E captures the "core" essence of the Warlock nicely. Future products will expand on this with new otherworldly patrons (eg. celestial), pacts, invocations and spells - and may even introduce new subclass mechanics and substitution levels down the road.
It is not always an anwer to say run it past your DM when many people may only play adventure league modules at cons like myself. For adventure league, you are limited to what is in the rulebook. I too bought the book on friday and was looking forward to creating a summoner and sadly found out, it is not there. I could care less about Druids, I want a Conjuring Wizard! Then started looking at the high level spells and got more frustrated. Very frustrating. Seeing this thread was enlightening that I was not the only one that felt that way.
Is there any spell that lets wizards summon non-elemental, non-fiendish, non-celestial, magical beasts? Like summoning fey or griffins or something?
Kalani wrote:
FallingIcicle wrote:
FallingIcicle wrote:
Melwick wrote:
"Is there any spell that lets wizards summon non-elemental, non-fiendish, non-celestial, magical beasts? Like summoning fey or griffins or something?"
"Conjure animals, level 3. Conjure fey, level 6. Conjure Woodland Being, level 4. Gate, level 9."
Wizards only get one of those four, "Gate".
DemoMonkey wrote:
Ashrym wrote:
Another thing I noticed is that conjure animals and conjure woodland beings have a 1 action casting time. All of the other conjure creature spells take 1 minute. So druids get to summon creatures mid battle, but wizards don't. 