Summons Discussion

[Legacy_henesua]

               I have adjusted Summons for Arnheim (nw_s0_summon). I'd like to get some feedback on what I am doing so far.

Some background: My goal is to encourage team play. This is a low magic setting, and so my thought is that magic-users need to be scaled back in power, which I have tried to offset by making them more interesting.

Summon 1 - 9
Duration (minutes) =  5+(CasterLevel*2)-(SpellLevel*2)
Metamagic Extend doubles this number
After the above is finished, if Duration is less than 10, then it is set at 10 (+1 for metamagic extend)

This means that lower level summons last longer than higher level summons. A 20th level mage casting a Level 1 summons, has a summons for 43 minutes of game play. A 1st-3rd level mage has the same creature for 10 minutes of game play. That 20th level mage  likewise gets a Level 9 summons for 27 minutes.

By way of comparison, a standard server set up enables a summons of any level to last for 24 hours (48 minutes of game play).

I have also diversified the kind of summons different spell casters summon, religion and alignment also plays a role. I have not nearly finished this yet as it is a great deal of work, but here are the low level examples which I am gradually tweaking over the course of play:

Evil Clerics of The Faith (good or evil only)
Dretch - HP24, AC14, AB1 d4 clawsx2, +1 5DR,  10 SR, imm. fire, poison, mind spells, DR20 acid, cold
Imp - HP32, AC18, AB6 d4+poison, Bolt: fire, +1 5DR,  10 SR, imm. fire, poison, mind spells, DR20 acid, cold, regen2, invisibility
Hell Hound - HP54, AC20, AB9 d8+2, fire breath, 
+1 5DR, imm. fire, (not turnable as it is a magical beast)

Good Clerics of The Faith
Lesser Lantern Archon - HP8, AC16, searinglight (d8), +1 5DR, 12 SR, imm. electricity, Aura: Menace
Lesser Hound Archon -  HP54, AC19, AB8 d4+2, d8+2, +1 5DR, 16 SR, imm elec, paralysis, Aura: Menace

Druids, Rangers (of Nature), Clerics (of Bear God)
Standard animal summons

Arcane Casters, and Divine (w/ elemental/arcane god/religion)
Beast Man - HP24, AC17, - 1DR (armor), AB6 d8+3 spear, power attack, cleave, imp initiative, blind fight) [/list]
               
               

               

                     Modifié par henesua, 20 juin 2012 - 12:15 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_WebShaman]

               Magic-users need to be scaled back in power?

CoDs need to be scaled back in power!  MUs can be dealt with using other methods...like AMZ (anti-magic zones), etc.

The best Summons changes that I have experienced are those that allow for the Caster to determine from a "list" of Summonable creatures - and to be able to set them (for quick casts, etc).

This allows for more flexibility as the "normal" summons, IMHO.

Why would you wish to make weaker Summons?  No-one will really use them - they will opt out for other spells that deliver more "bang for the buck" - even the Summons in vanilla NWN I tend to avoid like the plague as a MU - however, a Cleric with the Animal domain gets improved Summons, so that is probably the only worthwhile "summons" type strategy.  Note that at higher levels, it peters out into unusability because the Summons do not scale with level.  And the Epic Summons suxx0rs.

Just my $.02 on the subject of Summons.

Now, allow for multiple Summons...yeah!  That begins to make more sense!
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_henesua]

               The summons here are actually stronger. Its the duration that got scaled back. And yes, in a low magic setting, magic users are by far the most powerful class.

This means that MU's can not solo so easily.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par henesua, 21 juin 2012 - 02:10 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Rolo Kipp]

               <buffing the archmage badge on his chest...>

My opinion, of course, can be considered a bit biased. None-the-less, I'm really liking how you are scaling the duration... longer for higher level caster, shorter for higher level summons. Elegant.

I agree with WS that being able to choose *what* you summon has always been my idea of how summons work (for some classes. Others, particularly totemic or spirit casters would be tied to animal families).

In regards to soloing, I personally feel pure MUs shouldn't be able to solo easily. It's a tradeoff for their phenomenal cosmic power at higher levels. But against that, I find it is sometimes more *fun* to just jump in a game and play without worrying about character development <you feelin' ok, boss>
Er, yes. I like what H is doing. I like how he's really encouraging team play. I love the *depth* the's building into his PCs advancement. I love his unique setting. But Arnheim isn't a drop in and bang-around type of world. <unless you're skeaver...>
Er, yes. But he dies. I hate that.

On the subject of soloing MUs, Rolo, though a roquish wizard multiclass, was significantly easier to solo through the OC, even with the quixotic choice of a raven familiar <hey!>
-sorry- than the other classes I ran. And I relied on summons extensively.

<...that he just minted>
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_henesua]

               Good, I wanted feedback on the duration, but how about some criticism of the mechanics of it. The mechanics must have flaws. I want to hear about those.

I also wanted to hear about the balance of powers of the summons I offered as examples above.

But before getting to all that, YES, I agree with both of you that the ability to chose which summons you call would be cool. I don't want to do that with the standard summon spells. Not yet anyway. I've already got too much work cut out for me here. For the specialty summoning spells however  (planar allies, create undead etc...) I do have plans for that. Those spells always sucked, and yet should be much more interesting.

So.. Duration? How can I improve on what I have done? I essentially keep the duration similar at each spell level. You only get about a 2 minute increase in duration at each spell level for spell levels 4 - 9. And the duration is between 25% and 50% of what is a typical duration on most servers. I would think that 10 minutes - 20 minutes is enough time to have a summons up in the party before an encounter. And possibly use that summons in a few encounters if it doesn't get killed. Most likely however I think 1 summons = 1 encounter useful + 1 encounter killed since I am trying to specialize them.

In terms of diversifying the summons, given standard animal summons as a baseline - they are easily hit, have no defenses, but decent hit points, and do decent physical damage if they can hit - I figured I could add some variations:
- deep spell casters yet little if any combat ability. (spells can be damaging to opponents and/or improve party defenses via healing or beneficial auras)
- low hit points but good defenses (could be AC, could be DR, could be SR, or a combination of a few)
- utility/watchdog (very high perception skill, ability to dispel invis, great search for finding secret doors)

and so on. The idea is to create different niches by varying these kinds of abilities.

Aesthetics will also change with the summoner and the source of the summoner's power. Gnomes for example are more likely to summon earth elementals. Arcane spells typically summon monstrous humanoids and elementals and magical beasts. Divine spells tend to summon outsiders related to the religion. Vermin goddess has vermin. Druids summon plants and animals. Etc...
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_WebShaman]

               Ok.

MUs do not rely on Summons to be powerful (see Melee Mage for why).  MUs can solo just fine without Summons.

Nerfing Melee Mages is basically impossible without changing a ton of spells, and that results in a cascade of imbalance that basically tears D&D style play apart - see Thain for details.  You will end up having to edit and change every type of weapon spell, defensive spell, etc AND their durations, effects, etc...

Bleh.

This leaves CoDs (already by far the most powerful of classes) even more supreme at the top.

With your Summons changes, have you taken into account the Animal Domain influence on them?  Often, one will take a class of Cleric with Animal Domain just to get this influence (if one is going the Summons route, which I personally find underpowered in comparison to the Melee Mage for solo play, especially at higher levels).

Such a Summons for a CoD, on the other hand, just makes for more "cheese" IMHO.

About the only "real" good use for Summons was invented by Kail as fodder for Dispel Magic tossing critters...wands of Summoning used to deplete the DMs, before wading in and smacking the now hapless foe...have you taken that into account?

Seriously, as a pure Mage player AND the original creator of the Melee Mage and PW buster supreme, I can tell you that nuking the Summons spell will NOT make MUs "less solo-able"...it will only result in the MU replacing those Summons spells with other, more-bang-for-the-buck type of spells.  Perhaps one will use Scrolls, instead (I probably would, to save spell slots), and perhaps a Wand of Summoning (especially if the Summons are now more powerful, but limited in duration, I would look at ways to "move" the weight of the Summons to some other medium to save spell slots).

This is how the mind of a PGer (as most in an RP style setting would label such behavior, I think) works.  How to get the most bang out of each and every asset, and how to convert supposed nerfs into advantages.

But changing the duration times, I don't really think will have any impact at all on soloing with MUs.

Nope.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Empyre65]

               I figured out that MUs are Magic Users, but what are CoDs?
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_WebShaman]

               Clerics or Druids.  Thus CoDs.

Often referred to as CoDzillas...due to the sheer power of these classes totally dominating the game.  NWN goes even further, not really restricting the Domains that Clerics can combine from.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_henesua]

               FYI... CoD and Wiz Sor are all included in my mind as spell casters. They have all been addressed in Arnheim as overpowered classes in a low magic setting.

edit - just realized that Shaman is going off the old school meaning of the term "magic-user" being "wizard". Sorry, I should have said Spell Casters.

Can't get into it much deeper than that right now, will try to pick up this thread later.

*goes back to work*
               
               

               

                     Modifié par henesua, 22 juin 2012 - 08:44 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_SHOVA]

               In my mind, the casters have two balance issues when it comes to summons. First there are the spell summons, which can be changed to limited time, rather than default Bio settings. Easy enough to do. The second, and harder to fix is the familiar/animal companion. These are made even more problematic when they do not un-summon on rest, so the caster can bring them back if they did without a thought.

To fix this, I added a line of code to the rest event to un-summon them. removing the free for all.
I also added Tony Ks AI, which implements fear into the Familiar, it may run away.
Then to top it off, if it is killed I added a half level XP hit to the caster.
I am sure that some might hate those changes, I for one like them.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_henesua]

               I made a ton of changes to familiars and spirit animals too. But that is a separate discussion.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_WhiZard]

               

SHOVA wrote...
To fix this, I added a line of code to the rest event to un-summon them. removing the free for all.
I also added Tony Ks AI, which implements fear into the Familiar, it may run away.
Then to top it off, if it is killed I added a half level XP hit to the caster.
I am sure that some might hate those changes, I for one like them.

Many characters don't use familiars at all (except maybe the pixie for locks of plot doors/placeables) simply because of the XP drain.  I personally mostly use the familiar to spawn more creatures and then immediately unsummon it before fighting so that I get XP as if the familiar was not in the party but a spawn level as if the familiar was part of the party. 

While some might hate your changes, probably a lot of people would never notice them.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par WhiZard, 24 juin 2012 - 01:22 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_MrZork]

               The unsummoning  of familiars would add annoyance to playing wizards (my favorite class) at lower levels. Particularly notable is that Tony K's AI allows a player to give some equipment to a familiar, which is a nice touch (and I think adds realism), but that equipment is lost entirely if the familiar is unsummoned (as opposed to killed, which leaves a remains with the familiar's inventory). Of course, it's possible to modify the AI to have the familiar drop all of its equipment each time it is unsummoned, but even having to pick up the dropped equipment and then have the familiar reequip it after every rest will quickly get tedious.

Of course, because of time constraints, I don't do much party play and tend to spend my time soloing, so someone like me isn't the focus of the present discussion, which is fine. However, I would like to note that while summons can make it easier to solo, they also increase the possibilities for party play by effectively turning a small party into a larger one. In other words, summons (typically) serve as extra "tank" characters in a party - surely, not as good as another PC tanking, but often adequate for the job. But, nerfing them (especially by shortening durations) means that getting together a viable party can be harder if not enough players can be found to tank. As an example, right now (without nerfed summons), if I log in with my wizard character and then team up with someone playing a rogue, we can have some fun even if it's a slow day on the server and we don't find another player for the party. The extra associates help make that possible, even at low levels, because they last long enough and are effective enough to serve as tanks and are even worth buffing and healing, in some circumstances.

Anyway, I certainly understand the desire to encourage party play, but I figured someone should at least mention that nerfing summons (particularly familiars and companions) can have the opposite effect, depending on the situation.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_henesua]

               Familiars (since they were brought up):
Zork, I've handled familiars and summons completely differently. I don't force unsummons. I've made HPs and Death persistent, and allow the Druid/Ranger, Wizard/Sorc to summon/unsummon their pet at will any number of times per day. But dead pets can not be summoned. There are ways to deal with this that I won't get into here.

Familiars are also not meat shields but very small and fragile animals that can go places a wizard can't: house cat, mouse, bird (crow-like), bat. Special movement is implemented (climb, fly, swim, slip through tight spaces and under doors) which these creatures can take advantage of. The main ability that all have is to mark a location that the wizard/sorc can use as a spell target. And I have introduced spells in both the Scry family as well as Teleportation so marking hard to get locations is very useful.

Summons discussion:
I'm not getting useful feedback here. I've already made the big choices with regards to summons, and they are working roughly to meet my goals based on game play. I had hoped to hear some more as to how to adjust what I am doing to improve it.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_WebShaman]

               Kind of hard to post improvements to a system, when one is not properly informed of how the system works and what sort of environment it is being used in.

We know that you plan on shortening the duration, and increasing the power of the summons..somewhat.  We know that you have stated it is low magic.

But everytime we offer our experiences (and in some of these cases, at least, that means literally years of PW play, creation, staff work, etc) and opinions, you seem to shrug them off (or not really address them) and add that "it is being worked on" or "I won't get into here".

It really seems to me that you have already made up your mind.  Which is fine, really.

But why then ask for feedback (and you state that ours is not useful, and I rather suspect that you are not getting that useful feedback because we just do not have enough useful information to give it here)?

You seem to be (don't take this wrong here) in the focus of a Staff member/PW Creator/Etc - and that normally means...you don't really want any feedback that is in any way contrary or runs against what you are thinking, planning, and creating.  It would involve way too much work to undo all that you have done up to this point and start off on a tangent, I think.

So, to make it short - build what you want.  

I personally would hartily suggest (as I did before) that instead of nerfing summons, to expand instead on the list of summonable creatures, allowing Casters to choose from a list of different creatures with varying abilities, etc.  This aids RPing immensely, and makes the Summons spells much more interesting than just a "tank" or another HP sink...

I know of PWs that have done this, and have had a very high level of success and approval from the PB (playerbase) WITHOUT unbalancing party play.