Summoning items?

[SangoProduction]

OK, so yesterday I watched Death Battle's introduction for Natsu in the upcoming death battle. Intrigued me so I decided to watch it. I must say, having each episode be 10-15 minutes instead of ~25 minutes because of my HTML5 Speed Controller makes it much more palatable.

Anyway. So, one of the main characters is a summoner, except, instead of how it is in 3.5, they have specific items (gate keys) for summoning singular creatures. Honestly, it kind of reminds me of Pokemon in several ways. Regardless, it seems like an interesting idea.

Does 3.5 have similar style items, other than scrolls or wands (or other plain old "just cast the spell" items)?

[Matrota]

I wanna say there is a rule where if you know a creature's true name you can speak it and instantly summon them to your side. Most calling effects don't work on unique creatures, instead randomly choosing a creature you call based solely off of race/class specifications you give when casting the spell.

To replicate the gate keys, the spell refuge is the closest thing you're gonna get. It affects an item that is given to someone else at the casting of the spell (in this case a key), and when the command word is spoken and the key is broken, it summons the possessor of the key to the person who summoned it's home, or within 10 feet of the summoner. This would mean the creatures you "call" would need to be able to cast refuge, which is a 9th level spell. They'd also need to cast it every time after they're summoned, as the key is now broken and the spell is used up. It may be easier to give your creatures a magic item with plane shift/greater teleport and use sending to contact them when you need their aid

[Venger]

I wanna say there is a rule where if you know a creature's true name you can speak it and instantly summon them to your side. Most calling effects don't work on unique creatures, instead randomly choosing a creature you call based solely off of race/class specifications you give when casting the spell.

unless your target is a level 20 truenamer, that's not a real rule. even if he is, you need a lot of ranks in truespeak and a whole lot of time and money.

as far as the mechanical effects, what is it you're trying to do, exactly? if you want to be a pokemon trainer, you can just fluff your summon spells that way, or if you need it backed up by mechanics, you can always take spell thematics (where the example is literally "having your summoned monsters appear out of thrown spheres)

[Uncle Pine]

There's an optional summoning rule somewhere in a DMG sidebar that allows you to "key" your summoning spells to specific individual creatures, so that every time you cast that spell you only summon those instead of a random specimen of any of the options of that level of the summon monster spell. Even though this allows you to equip said creatures because you always summon those, it's a big downgrade from the versatility of the original spells.

Smoky Confinement (CM 117) allows you to store touched creatures in tiny receptacles worth at least 100 gp for future use.

Dragon #280 has the Token Familiar feat that turns your familiar into a pokeball-sized figurine. Coupled with one or several instances of Extra Familiar (described in the same issue) you can have a whole slew of "golden keys" in which you can store your familiars.

Mixing Flesh to Stone, Stone to Flesh, PAO and Shrink Item can lead you to the similar results using core-only material, but it's less efficient (not to mention risky, if you're using Stone to Flesh).