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View Full Version : D&D 3.x Class Manyfold Summoner - A PrC wholly devoted to improving summoning and summonlings!



Endarire
2018-08-19, 01:51 AM
Greetings, all!

I felt especially inspired recently and made the Manyfold Summoner (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1wK_vPVE8CRAoyLYK_4g_ESU-R4U7kXgGfmB640jI3BI/edit?usp=sharing), a D&D 3.5 PrC (that could probably easily be ported to Pathfinder) that focuses on summoning. To my knowledge, no 3.x PrC that (almost) fully advanced casting focused entirely on summoning. The summon boosts were just part of a package that sometimes involved calling creatures (Malconvoker, Thaumaturgist) or doing casting stuff in general (Master Specialist, Paragnostic Apostle).

The overall goals of this PrC were thus:

-Improve summoning and summonlings without making them too strong.

-Combine and refine the official summoning abilities from 3.5.

-Add enough original content to make it worthwhile.

-Stick to theme.

-Avoid ambiguities.

I acknowledge this PrC may seem or be strong. However, it does what it does well, or at least it should. Is it better than Planar Shepherd, Incantatrix, or/and Dweomerkeeper? Almost certainly not, but such isn't the point. Is it better than the other PrCs that are at least somewhat summoning-related? Quite likely, and that's intentional, due at least in part to a general lack of purely summoning-focused PrCs.

Thankee for your consideration!

noob
2018-08-19, 07:46 AM
It still does not seems better than conjuration master specialist.
But it is hard to make a class better than free quickening on 3 conjuration spells per day.

JoshuaZ
2018-08-21, 08:51 PM
I like this a fair bit. Do you have any fluff for who this is other than I'm-Really-Good-At-Summoning? Also, I do wonder how this would interact with my own Keyholder (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?559742-Prestige-Class-Contest-Thread-IV-This-could-be-Heaven-or-Hell) which has some summoning related abilities (and has a first level ability about alignment which is very similar). Edit: The file seems cutoff or incomplete at the end?

Kyrell1978
2018-08-22, 06:49 AM
Looks good. Definitely not as crazy powerful as the pathfinder summoner but a lot of flavor.

noob
2018-08-22, 06:55 AM
Looks good. Definitely not as crazy powerful as the pathfinder summoner but a lot of flavor.

Pathfinder summoner is way weaker than this prc.
The reason people complain about pathfinder summoner is that the options it gives by default are correct options and it does not gives bad options so it have a high floor.
If you just go and spam minions it works great just like a wizard spamming summons.
If you forget about your character and only focus on the eidolon you are still better than a fighter.
But in the end you are way less powerful than a wizard taking that prc since that wizard will spam minions way faster than you will ever be able to.
The problem of the pathfinder summoner is that it is close to impossible to play it wrong unlike a wizard where you have bad spells and if you pick the bad spells(most of them being damage spells) then you are weak.
A class needs to be easy to play badly or else if you are with other people playing badly then you will overshadow them.

Kyrell1978
2018-08-22, 07:52 AM
Pathfinder summoner is way weaker than this prc.
The reason people complain about pathfinder summoner is that the options it gives by default are correct options and it does not gives bad options so it have a high floor.
I disagree. I understand that this is a full casting class and that it has that over the pathfinder summoner and that's a big deal. However, it has worse hp, worse bab, can't cast in armor, the eidolon can get more powerful than almost anything that this can summon and the summoner can spam summons without tapping into his spells per day if his eidolon goes down and his summons last like forever and a day as opposed to a round per level. If you go all the way to the capstone you get to have two of you rolling around and all of that is just the vanilla summoner there are "better" archetypes out there. I usually play a synthesist just to limit myself in action economy when I play a summoner.

noob
2018-08-22, 09:01 AM
I disagree. I understand that this is a full casting class and that it has that over the pathfinder summoner and that's a big deal. However, it has worse hp, worse bab, can't cast in armor, the eidolon can get more powerful than almost anything that this can summon and the summoner can spam summons without tapping into his spells per day if his eidolon goes down and his summons last like forever and a day as opposed to a round per level. If you go all the way to the capstone you get to have two of you rolling around and all of that is just the vanilla summoner there are "better" archetypes out there. I usually play a synthesist just to limit myself in action economy when I play a summoner.

A wizard gets craft construct one level earlier so he gets the really tough action economy earlier.(and if you really have to wait for simulacrum wizard gets it at the same level)
A wizard also gets a familiar that can cast while he is casting(familiar spell is basically quicken spell but with a lower spell adjustement).
He can also get a contingent summon and a contingent spell(allowed to stack explicitly).
Not only a wizard with this prc can channel his spell but he also can get 25% chance to not spend the spell thus allowing potentially to summon creatures nearly all day long.
You can with a single slot summon tons of creatures if you are using that prc by channeling + quantity boost and it is especially easy when you have time stop.
Oh and if you want all your summons can benefit from time stop by spending one casting of it(or of contingent action or whichever spell allows more action economy annihilation).
Or use chain lighting together with mount communal for casting 6 chain lightings at once(and repeat that on the two following rounds) if you are into blasting or use summmon swarm and cast a few thousand chain lightnings at once.
Also a summoner can not benefit of superior summoning on his sla.
hp does not matters as much when you are a wizard.
Armour does not matters either.
Also does any summoning spell depends on your bab?
A summoner have its summon only last one minute per caster level which is far from forever(and seems to only apply to his summoning power and not to his other summoning spells) and a day but if you consider it is then a manyfold summoner have his summons last a very long time too thanks to extend summoning.

Kyrell1978
2018-08-22, 12:03 PM
A wizard gets craft construct one level earlier so he gets the really tough action economy earlier.(and if you really have to wait for simulacrum wizard gets it at the same level)
A wizard also gets a familiar that can cast while he is casting(familiar spell is basically quicken spell but with a lower spell adjustement).
He can also get a contingent summon and a contingent spell(allowed to stack explicitly).
Not only a wizard with this prc can channel his spell but he also can get 25% chance to not spend the spell thus allowing potentially to summon creatures nearly all day long.
You can with a single slot summon tons of creatures if you are using that prc by channeling + quantity boost and it is especially easy when you have time stop.
Oh and if you want all your summons can benefit from time stop by spending one casting of it(or of contingent action or whichever spell allows more action economy annihilation).
Or use chain lighting together with mount communal for casting 6 chain lightings at once(and repeat that on the two following rounds) if you are into blasting or use summmon swarm and cast a few thousand chain lightnings at once.
Also a summoner can not benefit of superior summoning on his sla.
hp does not matters as much when you are a wizard.
Armour does not matters either.
Also does any summoning spell depends on your bab?
A summoner have its summon only last one minute per caster level which is far from forever(and seems to only apply to his summoning power and not to his other summoning spells) and a day but if you consider it is then a manyfold summoner have his summons last a very long time too thanks to extend summoning.
Hey man, I get it wizards are cool, but to say hp, bab, and the ability to wear armor don't matter is silly. It's hard to continue casting when that summoner dimension doors his eidolon on top of you. Then there is the fact that the summoner can actually kind of take care of himself even in melee (not an ideal option but a possibility). A 25% chance to not expend a slot is still a 75% chance that you have to (rather than the 100% chance of not expending it that the summoner gets). The summoner's creatures still stay 5 times longer than this prestige class (forever and a day was obviously hyperbole). Ultimately, it's a difference of play style, the summoner is a gish and the wizard a full caster. There are certainly ways to defeat both. Anyway, have fun and I hope your games are fantastic.

noob
2018-08-22, 12:44 PM
Hey man, I get it wizards are cool, but to say hp, bab, and the ability to wear armor don't matter is silly. It's hard to continue casting when that summoner dimension doors his eidolon on top of you. Then there is the fact that the summoner can actually kind of take care of himself even in melee (not an ideal option but a possibility). A 25% chance to not expend a slot is still a 75% chance that you have to (rather than the 100% chance of not expending it that the summoner gets). The summoner's creatures still stay 5 times longer than this prestige class (forever and a day was obviously hyperbole). Ultimately, it's a difference of play style, the summoner is a gish and the wizard a full caster. There are certainly ways to defeat both. Anyway, have fun and I hope your games are fantastic.

I agree both classes are powerful.
The main problem with summoner is that it is hard to play it inefficiently.
While it is easy to play a fighter wrong or to play an oracle badly or to play a sorcerer with bad spell selection.(I mention the two latter because if you messed up your spell selection it comes back to bite you for entire levels and the fighter is even worse since you need feat trees to be good at your job)
So due to that in the average table the summoner is more powerful than the others because there is no way to pick options that handicaps you enough for being at the same level as a fighter who picked the wrong feats and weapons and a summoner due to not being a buff/bfc class makes its power too much visible.
Furthermore by default a summoner is given as a sla the power to make a dozen of minions which can slow down gameplay if done wrong.
If everyone played their wizard or cleric or druid efficiently(I bundle all those in my mind because they all amount to more or less the same thing but with different flavour) nobody would think a summoner is overpowered.

(by the way if you think ac is really important then get mirror image: it lasts quite long and is an efficient spell for defending yourself and if you really are that much scared of attacks targetting ac you can also use obscuring mist or web as familiar spells once high level enough. meanwhile for hit points there is many sources of temporary hp easier to access when wizard such as false life and since a summoner have on average one more hit point per level with something like false life you will stay ahead for a huge part of the progression of a summoner)
(Also I forgot when my wizard missed for the last time but in fact due to using rays or simply not attacking a wizard will almost never use his bab idem for a summoner)