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View Full Version : Reserve Feats and Summon Nature's Ally



Jack_Simth
2008-03-16, 03:42 PM
The Reserve line of feats require that you have a spell meeting a particular set of criteria available to cast in order to make use of the specific feat - e.g., Fiery Burst requires a Fire spell of level 2 or higher, Dimensional Reach requires a Conjouration(Summoning) spell of level 3 or higher, , Aquatic Breath requires a 3rd level or higher Water spell, Born Aloft requires a 5th level or higher Air spell, and so on.

Well, a Druid who isn't out of spells of a particular level always has a Summon Nature's Ally spell of that level available to cast through the Druidic Spontaneous Summoning class feature.

Summon Nature's Ally III and higher has this sentence:
"When you use a summoning spell to summon an air, chaotic, earth, evil, fire, good, lawful, or water creature, it is a spell of that type." - and Summon Nature's Ally gains the ability to Summon Elementals at SNA II.

Suppose, for a minute, I have a Druid with the Aquatic Breath (requires Water spell, 3rd+), Dimensional Jaunt (requires Conjuration(Teleportation) 4th+), Dimensional Reach (requires Conjuration(Summoning) 3rd+), and Born Aloft, but the only spell he has left for today is Tree Stride (Conjouration(Teleportation), Druid-5), can he invoke all his currently listed Reserve Feats (Water spell of 3rd+? Currently capable of casting Summon Nature's Ally V (Large Water elemental) - Water spell, check; Conjuration(Teleportation) - Tree Stride, Check; Air Spell? Summon Nature's Ally V (Large Air Elemental) - Air spell, check; Conjouration(Summoning)? Summon Nature's Ally V - check; and so on) - can he actually make use of the primary function of all of his reserve feats?

LibraryOgre
2008-03-16, 03:50 PM
Yep. Spontaneous casters do very well with reserve feats.

However, this does raise an interesting question. If I have a spontaneous caster with Elemental Substitution metamagic, does he count as having spells of that force for every level he has an appropriate spell to be modified by it?

Frosty
2008-03-16, 03:56 PM
This is debatale. Some DMs don't count this type of spontaneous casting as qualifying for reserve feats. Some DMs do.

Kurald Galain
2008-03-16, 04:44 PM
By RAW, this is not actually allowed. The wording for reserve feats says that, "a spellcaster who prepares spells each day ... must have an appropriate spell prepared and not yet cast that day". A druid is a prepared caster. Being able to drop a prepared spell to cast a SNA, is not the same as having a SNA prepared.

The_Snark
2008-03-16, 04:47 PM
There's a passage in the description of reserve feats that addresses part of this:

"Spells that do not have a descriptor until cast (such as the summon monster spells) can't be used to gain the primary benefit of a reserve feat."

So Summon Monster and Summon Nature's Ally can't be used to gain the benefit of Fiery Burst, Aquatic Breath, Born Aloft, and the like, whether or not they're prepared or spontaneous.

As for whether you can use spontaneous casting like cleric healing and druid summoning... debatable. Strictly by the rules, you're a prepared spellcaster and have to have the spell prepared, but most places in the rules simply say that you need an appropriate spell available to cast. I would lean towards the latter interpretation, myself.

Chronos
2008-03-16, 06:32 PM
There's a passage in the description of reserve feats that addresses part of this:

"Spells that do not have a descriptor until cast (such as the summon monster spells) can't be used to gain the primary benefit of a reserve feat."Hmm, if you take this extremely literally, then you'd never be able to use Dimensional Reach or Summon Elemental at all, since it doesn't specify that it doesn't work for feats requiring a particular descriptor.

Kurald Galain
2008-03-16, 06:34 PM
Hmm, if you take this extremely literally, then you'd never be able to use Dimensional Reach or Summon Elemental at all, since it doesn't specify that it doesn't work for feats requiring a particular descriptor.

Huh? They would work with spells that always have a descriptor (e.g. fireball = always a fire spell), but not with spells that sometimes have a descriptor (e.g. SNA = only a fire spell if you summon a fire creature).

Chosen_of_Vecna
2008-03-16, 06:59 PM
Huh? They would work with spells that always have a descriptor (e.g. fireball = always a fire spell), but not with spells that sometimes have a descriptor (e.g. SNA = only a fire spell if you summon a fire creature).

But it says, Spells which don't have a descriptor until cast cannot be used. Not that they cannot be used to gain descriptors the gain on casting, just cannot be used.

Jack_Simth
2008-03-16, 07:41 PM
But it says, Spells which don't have a descriptor until cast cannot be used. Not that they cannot be used to gain descriptors the gain on casting, just cannot be used.
Nah; Mount, Summon Swarm, Summon Instrument, Storm of Vengence, Secret Chest, Instant Summons, Insect Plague, Creeping Doom, and (curiously) Summon Nature's Ally I and II are all Conjuration(Summoning) spells without variable descriptors.

Chosen_of_Vecna
2008-03-16, 08:07 PM
Nah; Mount, Summon Swarm, Summon Instrument, Storm of Vengence, Secret Chest, Instant Summons, Insect Plague, Creeping Doom, and (curiously) Summon Nature's Ally I and II are all Conjuration(Summoning) spells without variable descriptors.

I wasn't asserting that Dimensional X would never be usable, I was just pointing out Chronos's logic to Kurald, because I think he missed it. Maybe I was wrong, but then oh well, Kurald will know that and it won't be an issue.

Roderick_BR
2008-03-17, 09:53 AM
But it says, Spells which don't have a descriptor until cast cannot be used. Not that they cannot be used to gain descriptors the gain on casting, just cannot be used.
Take it this way: The spell is considered a certain type only after casting... but after casting, it doesn't work for reserve feats anymore.
Yes, it affects a lot of spells. Summon spells may be tricky to use.

Chosen_of_Vecna
2008-03-17, 09:59 AM
Take it this way: The spell is considered a certain type only after casting... but after casting, it doesn't work for reserve feats anymore.
Yes, it affects a lot of spells. Summon spells may be tricky to use.

But if you use a Summon Spell to power your Elemental Feat, and then later cast that spell with a descriptor, then you could have never used that spell to power the feat, thus retroactively altering the universe and self imploding D&D.

The point is that the wording of that passage is very poor, and should have been thought over more.