Help me ponder on summons!
Skatan
Member, Moderator Posts: 5,352
Hello!
I like to ponder on different builds, more than actually playing the game. After reaching HLA's with a cleric recently and starting to sommuning devas, it go me thinking, what is the absolute maximum number of summons one character can have at the same time?
I know there are a couple of you out there who knows pretty much anything and everything about this game, so instead of me doing my own research (I'm not lazy, I just have too few gaming hours nowadays to try out everything myself!) I'd thought I would ask in here.
My initial thoughts are that a C/I should be able to summon a shitload of critters, as well as, HLA summons. He/She could then also buff them up and send them forth and just stand back and watch the chaos. Is the C/I the best summoner or will ie a druid be better?
Also, when thinking about this I came up with a quite absurd CHARNAME concept, the "blademaster"; a guy who summons swords to do his bidding. We got Ras, the dancing sword. We got Spectral Brand's dancing blade. We got mordenkainen's swords of course. What is the maximum number of 'dancing' swords one can have at one time? If it's a cleric/thief with UAI, then I guess once could use blade barrier as well for even more blades in the air. I've never taken a cleric/thief up to HLA's though, so not sure if that'll work.
Edit: I wrote this in a hurry, dunno what the hell I was thinking when I wrote the last part about a cleric/thief; they obviously can't summon mordenkainen's :P
Cheers!
/Skat.
I like to ponder on different builds, more than actually playing the game. After reaching HLA's with a cleric recently and starting to sommuning devas, it go me thinking, what is the absolute maximum number of summons one character can have at the same time?
I know there are a couple of you out there who knows pretty much anything and everything about this game, so instead of me doing my own research (I'm not lazy, I just have too few gaming hours nowadays to try out everything myself!) I'd thought I would ask in here.
My initial thoughts are that a C/I should be able to summon a shitload of critters, as well as, HLA summons. He/She could then also buff them up and send them forth and just stand back and watch the chaos. Is the C/I the best summoner or will ie a druid be better?
Also, when thinking about this I came up with a quite absurd CHARNAME concept, the "blademaster"; a guy who summons swords to do his bidding. We got Ras, the dancing sword. We got Spectral Brand's dancing blade. We got mordenkainen's swords of course. What is the maximum number of 'dancing' swords one can have at one time? If it's a cleric/thief with UAI, then I guess once could use blade barrier as well for even more blades in the air. I've never taken a cleric/thief up to HLA's though, so not sure if that'll work.
Edit: I wrote this in a hurry, dunno what the hell I was thinking when I wrote the last part about a cleric/thief; they obviously can't summon mordenkainen's :P
Cheers!
/Skat.
Post edited by Skatan on
2
Comments
That's even more than a maximum per character, the whole party can't have more than 5 summons active at anytime (unless you play on an old, non-updated version of BG2) The best summoner is the Sorcerer.
He can renew the killed summons much more often than any other character, and not being multiclassed give him access to high level summons earlier. The only time a class can do better than a Sorcerer is during the short time where a simple Cleric can summon three Skeleton Warriors at once, but the Sorcerer doesn't have yet access to Mordenkanein's Sword This is not an absurd idea.
It's actualy even my 3rd character on my "I want to do a playthrough with that someday"... just after my "Children of Fire" and my "Pinky and the Brain" current playthroughs
I'm unsure if the Dancing Blade counts toward the 5 summons limit... but the main idea of my character is to start the fights like that:
- Chain Contingency > On enemy sighted > Mordenkanein's Sword x3
- Simulacrum
- Dancing Blade x2 (one from the original, one from the Simulacrum)
- Switch on Firetooth +3, sending even more blades in the air
You have to plan a bit a counter against Death Spell however, as it is the only true bane of Mordenkanein's Swords
Edit: Wow, I'm really not at my best today, haha! You literally just wrote this above "
I'm unsure if the Dancing Blade counts toward the 5 summons limit... but the main idea of my character is to start the fights like that:" :PThe problem is: Bows sucks in BG2
The lack of bonus coming from the strength make bows gimped compared to any throwing weapon. A basic companion with the Gesen Bow will shoot for 3-4 damage per arrow, while someone with Firetooth +3 will easily strike at 14-15 per hit
Even the Archer kit does not change this, since a Kensai using throwing weapons will still utterly crush the Archer in term of damage, and the Kensai can dual to a mage, while an Archer cannot.
That character of "Archer" as also a dual-wield ability... but considering BG2 battlesystem, what is the point to summon Mordenkanein's Swords if it is to go to the melee after that and expose yourself?
Those summons are marvels if you let them tank, and hammer the oppoenent from distance after that.
SSSSSSSSSSOOOOO currently, the most interesting plan I got about a "blademaster", like you call it, is a Wizard Slayer 13/Mage.
Why Wizard Slayer?
The only thing that can destroy Mordenkanein's Swords are spellcasters. But a spellcaster have a lot of trouble to cast anything when a Wizard Slayer spam throwing daggers at him, which creates a kind of combo between the caster and his summons
As for how to use em.....
It's kinda... fight dependant... or if you are solo or your class and party makeup... ect...
In shadows of amn. ..
Cernd or jahira fire elementals
Edwin aerie nalia 1x invisible stalker and 1x nishruu
Viconia and anomen i think can pull it...fire up the Ariel servant (air elemental)
Depending on CHARNAME Class you can do any of the above or deva/fallen deva, or just charge in with gww.
You can also get Kithix and zerk horn early which do count towards your summon max of 5 so don't go too crazy.
Heck throw a pit fiend via gate in ahead of ya to have fun.
Tbh though MOST of the fights are going to nuke your summons off the hop with a death spell or be so short that by the time you get everything Summoned the fight is over.. Plus you are going to be able to just power through them without the summons.
has a Remove Summoning Cap component.
But this is Skatan who asked how to remove this limit, so my case in irrelevant.
Having played heavily with summons in my wild magic playthrough, I'll however say that there is absolutly no true use to remove this limit, @Skatan
Summoning have diminishing returns: the more you bring on the battlefield, the more they hinder each other moves, and opportunities to attack... By the time you kill an opponent summoning an infinite amount of summons, you will have killed it three times just summoning a few to serve as a barrier, and attack the said opponent from your safe position far behind them.
Also, if you waste a lot of spells making unefficient summoning, and get hit by a Death Spell, you could find yourself in trouble due to a shortage of summoning spells of the right level after that.
Summoning weaklings as a replacement will do no good by ToB.
So... honestly, I won't ever bother to remove this limit at your place.
You get the skellies earlier and you will have more spell slots for them.
Efreets are useful summons, as well. They do nice melee damage, can stall enemies by turning gasous form and has some nice fire spells to devastate opponents. Efreet bottle is one of the best items that is used regularly even deep into ToB.
One drow ambush in the main area of Underdark gave me quite a headache, thanks to scs the drows were super annoying. Decimated my under-equipped, under leveled party. So I gated in a cacofiend or two off-screen, by using reckless dweomer, and they wasted all of their potent spells and hps to fight them off. Made the fight quite easier for me.
If you consider the spell level and accessibility of summons in the game, Skeleton Warriors are easily superior to Mordenkainens, and probably the best summon in the game, which is why people mention it so often.
Knowing that a summoner mage needs no companion at all... 2 companions is truly a crowd
There's genies, cacofiends, stalkers, monsters, spiders and a plethora of other summons. Personally I never use any summons except skellies and HLA's! Sure, I've used the wand of monster summoning, but practically never gated in anything. One exception though, I use summoned nymphs alot on druids.
Discounting those, I enjoy Spiders and Nymphs most I think. Both are weak, as opposed to skeletons and mordenkainens who have their resistances as their best stat, but they're tactically useful. Spiders are great against casters, Phase can poison them and Sword has 5 APR, so either are a pain in the ass against stoneskin. Nymphs on the other hand have several auto-cast CCs which they use efficiently, as well as a mass-heal.
Spiders and Nymphs are best used in a conjunction with skeletons though. It's like the holy trinity of RPGs. Skeletons are tanks, spiders are damage dealers, nympths are supports/healers.
Truth to be told, I havn't been using summons too much outside of them though. Most of the other summons suffer from having way better summons close to their level. "Gate" demons, for example, are complete trash compared to any HLA summons, and Wyverns, Genis, Cacofiends and Stalkers are all level 6-7 spells, meaning they have to compete with Mordenkainens, which they really can't.
My current LoB run might change that though, since I'm trying out all the summons to test their newgained strength. For a guy who usually plays with fairly few summons outsides of Planetars, it's definitely fun to be forced into a new playstyle. All summons counts towards that 5 max limit yes, including the ones from items.
Simulacrums, however, doesn't, since they're "illusions" and not "summons". I think the same is true for all other illusionary beings such as Misleads and Projected Images. I can't say for sure though, Simulacrums are the only ones I have tested myself in the current EE build of the game.
Now, I have wrote 3 playthrough that you can check if you don't believe me, in which, for each one, I rushed the chapter 2 only doing the minimal amount of content in it (most often, just the Planar Sphere), and each time, I got the level 7 spells before even entering the Underdark... that leaves me:
- all the chapters 5, 6, 7
- almost all the sidequests
- all the companion subquests
- all WK
- all TOB
... to do with the level 7 spells at my disposal
Is it truly 50% of BG2 for you? For me, it's 70 if not 80%
However, what we were discussing was your original statement; "I don't know why people are so obsessed about skeleton warriors. Mordenkanein's Swords are vastly superior."
We're talking about "people." Not you. Not a solo sorcer running BG2 only. Because believe it or not, that is not how a majority of playthroughs looks like. Most people doesn't play solo sorcerers in BG2 only exclusively, if much at all. Many people might have done it once or twice, but it's definitely not such a common occurance that it by any stretch of the imagination can be assumed to be the standard.
Now, in most playthroughs, people have access to Skeleton Warriors for a much bigger portion of the game than Mordenkainens. And they are both really strong, borderlining OP summons considering their resistance and tanking capabilities. But because people use them a whole lot more, skeleton warriors come quicker to people's mind when discussing the strongest summon.
So basically, the answer to your question, why people are obsessed with skeleton warriors over mordenkaninen, is: "Because they don't play solo sorcs in BG2 only."
I think we can put this discussion to rest with this, yes? It was a very unecessary topic anyway. I was mostly curious as to how you came up with that 20-80 split, but I've gotten my answer, and I'm pretty sure you've gotten your answer as well.
i.e. for this thread, the default context is BG2.
The thread author is for all other matter the one who decide the context, this is that person's needs/concerns/questions which are the causes of the appearance the topic. He can at any moment add a precision about that context, like if the topic extends outside the default context, or if the topic narrows on specific cases he had in mind but forgot to mention first.
The other writers should not try to assume they can extend the topic, because they are not into the mind of the thread author, and thus, could lead the discussion to become hairwire if they do.
The author has given a precision about what he has in mind, that was a "blademaster". Perhaps he want also to persue the talk about other kind of summoners, but he is the one to tell... not you.
The author has given no precision about the fact he wanted the discussion extend to BG1. Perhaps he want also to talk about it, but once again, he is the one to tell... not you.
Still, with that said, I think there were quite alot of interresting replies.