[3.5] Looking for a different form of Summoning

[A.A.King]

"Trapfinding can be replaced by a well placed Summon Monster I"

I'm looking for a kind of summoner where this ISN'T the case. A class or prestige class based around summoning creatures to fight or do stuff for you, but with very specific creatures. Something like Pokemon or the "Celestial Spirit Magic" from Fairy Tail. You have a limited amount of creatures you can Summon, and these are always the same but their strength increases as you gain levels. So a summoning like the Paladin Mount which gains abilities like the Paladin Mount or an Animal Companion/Wild Cohort but with more creatures and a larger focus on those creatures.

Is that clear and is there something like that?

[Chronos]

The Beastmaster is a PrC for druids that doesn't advance your wildshape or spells, but gives you a whole bunch of animal companions and makes them more powerful. Is that what you want?

[Captnq]

Is that clear and is there something like that?

Ah, No. and... No.

I think what you want is a hoard of animals that will increase in power with you and a whole bunch of Familiar pockets so you can pull them out pokemon style. Conjure Ice Beast III, I Choose You!

Check out my sig and look at the spell handbook. Take a look at the rules section on summoning creatures.

[chronomatophobe]

I don't think there's anything that specific among summoning spells, but you could always ask your DM for a fiat. Say "Hey, is it okay if I only use this spell (Summon Monster III for example) to summon a Celestial Black Bear with 3 extra HD? I'll even name them and roll HP. I only want this spell to summon this creature specifically, and I think the loss of utility makes up for the increase in power."

Frankly, since utility is the problem with summoners, that's fair. Perhaps even an extra 2 CR increase to the summoned creature is warranted, but that might be going a bit too far. Sounds like a lot of paperwork, though.

[Crake]

If you're cool with pathfinder material, the summoner class normally summons a single persistant monster that you can equip and mould into what you want. However there is an archetype in ultimate magic called broodmaster in ultimate magic which instead lets you get more weaker summons. It starts off with 2 at level 1, then you can spend evolution points (the stuff you use to customise your summon) to unlock more.

[Coidzor]

The Complete Psionics Stealth Nerf/Pseudo-nerf/Fake Nerf/whatever to Astral Constructs would put you into this range, what with only being able to summon one at a time(TWO if you work for it with a PrC capstone, IIRC), and having to spend feats in order to unlock certain premade forms which can be mildly customized from there.

As I recall, anyway.

Summoner (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/base-classes/summoner)is probably more your speed though, though it requires some backporting.

[Gadora]

Perhaps one of these methods (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/magic/summonMonsterVariants.htm) would be a place to start?

[eggynack]

The Beastmaster is a PrC for druids that doesn't advance your wildshape or spells, but gives you a whole bunch of animal companions and makes them more powerful. Is that what you want?
It actually really doesn't make them more powerful. Sure, the class adds three levels to your first animal companion, but after that you get a pile of crappy animal companions that start their progression at the level you gain them. The capstone of the class is basically an unadvanced riding dog in all of its splendor. It's not a very good class, even for an animal companion based fellow, in other words. It might be worth a one level dip (it's not, but it's better than more), but after that it's a whole pile of nothing.

[A.A.King]

Beastmaster definetly isn't what I want. The extra animal companions offered are quite useless. Summoner seems to be a nice class, The individualised Summoning seemed close to what I wanted, but still not quite the same. Maybe I should try asking around in the Homebrew section.

Thanks for the suggestions everyone.

[Werephilosopher]

The Complete Psionics Stealth Nerf/Pseudo-nerf/Fake Nerf/whatever to Astral Constructs would put you into this range, what with only being able to summon one at a time(TWO if you work for it with a PrC capstone, IIRC), and having to spend feats in order to unlock certain premade forms which can be mildly customized from there.

There's also the Personal Construct ACF from one of the Mind's Eye articles. It gives a Shaper the oppurtunity to the quicken their Astral Construct if they use the same one every time.

[A.A.King]

There's also the Personal Construct ACF from one of the Mind's Eye articles. It gives a Shaper the oppurtunity to the quicken their Astral Construct if they use the same one every time.

That sounds rather promising, could you elaborate on that please?

[Coidzor]

That sounds rather promising, could you elaborate on that please?

Mind's Eye (https://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20070411a)articles are great (https://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20040625b).

[Psyren]

Astral Construct, using only the Ectopic Forms from CPsi and modifying them to be a bit less... sucky... would pull this off. They have the level-scaling and specialized shapes that you're looking for. You could brew up a variant Shaper class built around this concept.

[A.A.King]

I never really bothered looking into Psionics, but it sounds like this is the way to go. I'll definitely give it a try.