Summon Monster death

[Mike Miller]

If a monster has a retaliatory ability upon taking damage or death, would that ability work if it was a Summon Monster creature and the attack "killed" it?

[Hiro Quester]

Nothing in the rules specifically says where summoned creatures come from. Neither does it say what happens on their death.

The common assumption is that on death they magically dissipate back to whatever source they were pulled from. But that isn't specifically mentioned in the rules.

Most assume that you cannot summon a Monster or Nature's Ally, and then keep the monster's skin when it's dead. But the rule isn't written to say that there would or would not be a corpse that lasted at least as long as the summoning spell's duration.

Perhaps you could summon a unicorn, and if it were killed, cut off its horn and use it as an imrovised weapon, for at least as long as the summoning spell's duration.

So if you can summon a creature that had instantaneous effects, like say, a Balor's exploding on death, I would say it's fair that the creature at least sticks around long enough to have such an effect. This is one of the abilities that gives the summoner a reason to use that summons.

But if the creature typically had a longer-term effect, e.g. remained to haunt its killer or the location of its death, or left behind items after its death, I would say that these effects or items could only last as long as the summoning spell's duration.

[Jack_Simth]

Nothing in the rules specifically says where summoned creatures come from. Neither does it say what happens on their death.

The common assumption is that on death they magically dissipate back to whatever source they were pulled from. But that isn't specifically mentioned in the rules. Check the Summoning Subschool (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicOverview/spellDescriptions.htm#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. It is not really dead. It takes 24 hours for the creature to reform, during which time it can’t be summoned again.

When the spell that summoned a creature ends and the creature disappears, all the spells it has cast expire. A summoned creature cannot use any innate summoning abilities it may have, and it refuses to cast any spells that would cost it XP, or to use any spell-like abilities that would cost XP if they were spells. (Emphasis and emphasis added)

Where exactly it comes from isn't specified, but it goes back whence it came (Bolded) when the spell goes away, and if killed, it's explicitly OK 24 hours later (underlined section).

Note, however, that death's all that's explicitly undone. If you cast Mount to get a pony (a medium animal), Use Polymorph Any Object to turn it into a female human (because you need to get into the slave markets, and merchandise helps with that), nothing says the PaO is undone when the pony goes back. But PaO on a Medium Mammal (animal) will be Permanent. Which means someone, somewhere, just had their pony replaced by a freshly-minted girl when the Mount spell runs out.

Other notes:
A Summoned creature that goes boom on death may or may not explode when unsummoned via violence. It depends on how far below 0 it's pushed by that last attack. If it goes from positive to -10 or less? Boom (it died, even though it wasbn't really slain). If it ends the spell in the 0 to -9 range? No boom, just unsummoned (it's at 0 or less, so it goes away, ,but it never dies in the process).