Quote from The_Ace_of_Rogues >>

Quote from AEDorsay >>

Quote from The_Ace_of_Rogues >>

Quote from AEDorsay >>

I love the new conjure ones.

I have a class that is essentially all about bringing in spirits of the world to the aid of the caster, and they are perfect for it!

 

As a concept, summoning generic spirits or whatever to produce an effect isn't bad, but as a substitution for being able to call up specific creatures, it's just god-awful.

Multi-summoning tends to just kill session progress yes, but that just means we cut out those options and leave the higher level single summon ones be. I've seen people claim the list is too daunting, but it's really not. Demons in their appropriate range are less than a whole 20 entry page when I searched them here, devils slightly higher, and both with a lot of duplicate entries. Fey and Elementals are about the same size, and we all know how few Celestial options there are. In contrast, Beasts in the CR 1-3 range clock in at over 40 entries here, and they're clearly comfortable having Moon Druids sift through those to pick their known forms. It's literally maybe an hour's homework for a player to sort through the entries and earmark a handful of summon options. This is the Information Age, for crying out loud. You can bookmark or print out the pages for quick reference; heck, you can link the block to your character sheet on D&DB. Yes, it might be more bookkeeping than some people care to deal with, but it is not nearly such an onerous and impossible task that it's unrealistic to expect players or DMs to put a bit of legwork in.

 
agreed on it not being all that hard, but I will channel my inner lead D&D architect for 5e and utter “pain points” and “player feedback” and…

 

Respectfully, reciting buzzwords without context doesn't give me much to respond to. And, as I said, clearly flipping through blocks isn't such a deal-breaking pain-point since they stuck with it for Wildshape and as I just highlighted, a 9th level Druid is looking at about twice as a many entries as the maximum possible for a Conjure spell.

 
well, I mean, I did say that *I* agreed, and then I tossed out the buzzwords that they have ben letting drip from every sentence with the predictive regularity of spin preparation.

That said, I did choose the ones most likely to be used to address your point: it does indeed take effort to look up them all (and if all you have access to is the basic rules (a valid consideration), then that's a much smaller list) and yes, the DDB system is able to just drop them into the character sheet...

But they are also doing the whole VTT with an Unreal Engine at the same time (and that means it helps to limit such things, model wise) and so they chose an effective way to do it to solve multiple concerns and needs (players being collectively lazy en masse, VTT design needs, load on DDB, speed of play, adherence to corporate Lore models, etc).

I still agree with you -- you doubtless recall that I have little to know use for a VTT and have strong reasons for being upset with DDB -- but that is why they are offering us a chance at feedback.

I like it -- but note how I spoke to a specific circumstance in my atypical game.

As far as the "critters one can summon" thing, I do agree with a list. I provide one, and I have it limited to "normal animals" (including the mini and maxi size versions oof each -- nothing gets a chuckle like a herd of 2 foot tall elephants crossing a road being chased by a giant gander that stops and decides the party is a problem as well).

Another of the Dms maes a personal call each time it is used (and a couple of our players use these)  and says it is really distracting and deeply annoying, especially for his dungeon crawl style stuff -- it shreds speed of play in a player group that prizes speed of combat.

Did anyone else notice that the warlock does not get any of the conjure spells? I thought they used to have a few.

Quote from Aquilontune >>

Did anyone else notice that the warlock does not get any of the conjure spells? I thought they used to have a few.

 
Originally they had Conjure Fey.

Tasha's gives them several of the Summoning Spells, but Warlocks didn't have any of the Conjure X spells except the Conjure Fey in the PHB.

Warlocks also got Conjure Elementals via an Invocation, and got the Demon and Devil ones from Xanathars.

Literally anything that turns off the "I summon eight pixies and command them to Polymorph us all into T-Rexes!" or the "I summon eight wolves and use eight Pack Tactics-boosted attacks to knock everything in a five mile radius prone and choke the battlefield" tom****ery is a godsend.  Yes, I know good DMs put their foots down on that garbage, but not every DM is a good DM, and players are entirely too fond of occasionally slipping into Meme Knucklehead territory when given the chance.  The "I know it's a dumb stupid idea everybody memes on, but I've never gotten to do it, and I wanna actually do it just once...!" dealie.

Summoning spells are always going to be extremely dicey in 5e.  This edition is so incredibly sensitive to any shifts in action economy that granting the players the ability to throw even one extra body at problems is a bigger shift in CR-esque calculations than almost any magic item or Ohh-Pee feat could be.  The Tasha's summons are wildly popular, yes, but also widely held by more experienced players/DMs to be dramatically overpowered.  You are not going to be allowed to keep spells that provide even more action economy advantage than the Tasha's spells.

That said?  I quite like the thematic divergence between "Summon' producing a physical entity with a stat block and 'Conjure' producing a spectral entity with no stat block that instead offers more ephemeral bonuses.  I think it's a good, solid piece of design, intuitive and easy.  Are these specific spells 100% bang-on correct?  Who knows, haven't absorbed it all yet.  But I'm totally down on the idea.  The old Conjure spells were some of the worst, most poorly designed and DM headache-prone spells in D&D.  There is no good reason to keep them in trhe new books, especially since they'll still exist in the old books for poor players to make their DMs cry with.

Quote from Aquilontune >>

Did anyone else notice that the warlock does not get any of the conjure spells? I thought they used to have a few.

Warlocks could conjure:
Demons (Summon Lesser Demons, Summon Greater Demon)
Devils (Infernal Calling)
Animal/Fey (Conjure Fey)
Undead (Create Undead, Danse Macabre)

They did not get the druid-conjuration spells because thematically warlocks are not druids.

Quote from Pantagruel666 >>

The reality is... people who play conjurers want to be petmasters, and giving them damaging zones isn't what they want. Just make all the conjuring spells summon a single creature, and add Conjure Swarm (which summons... a single creature with the Swarm type) to cover what used to be done by summoning 8 mooks.

 For combat purposes sure. But what everyone is missing is the non-combat fun you could have with the old conjuration spells which is just completely obliterated here. e.g. Summoning horses for your party to ride to chase after a bad guy who is trying to escape, summoning a bunch of dolphins to pull a ship, summoning a flock of birds to carry the party up to a tower. Druid was fun because of it's utility, now... I don't know.. I just don't see why I would play a druid rather than a Wizard or a Cleric. If I want to play a utility caster I'll choose Wizard, if I want to play a support caster I'll choose cleric. What is special about Druid now?

People keep acting like the old books and everything in them are going to instantly vanish from the face of Creation when the new books drop.  The terrible Conjure Whatever spells that players have been using to make their DMs cry for nine years now will still be available in the old books.  Which will still be available.

I get that people like the 2014 druid and its attendant Conjure spells in order to get up to edge case jankery with Beast stat blocks, but c'mon.  Does nobody else see how enormously that constrains Wizards' design space?  They're not allowed to release any Beast-type stat block that can do anything interesting because then druids will summon eight of them, turn into a ninth, and proceed to break games.  At least with arcane-spell gamebreakers the DM can ban or modify the spell; it's a whole lot harder to ban the existence of animals from a game of D&D.

Quote from Yurei1453 >>

I get that people like the 2014 druid and its attendant Conjure spells in order to get up to edge case jankery with Beast stat blocks, but c'mon.  Does nobody else see how enormously that constrains Wizards' design space?  They're not allowed to release any Beast-type stat block that can do anything interesting because then druids will summon eight of them, turn into a ninth, and proceed to break games.  At least with arcane-spell gamebreakers the DM can ban or modify the spell; it's a whole lot harder to ban the existence of animals from a game of D&D.

No that is 100% nonsense. There are spells for conjuring Celestials, Demons, Devils, Elementals, and Fey from the monster manual with a much broader range of CR than Conjure Animals but that has not stopped WotC from publishing new celestials, demons, devils, elementals, and fey. The thing that is stopping WotC from publishing beasts with cool powers is that they have decided that anything with even a drop of magical-ness about it is a Monstrosity not a Beast. It has absolutely nothing to do with game balance. There are half a dozen monstrosities that are in no way more powerful than the Basic Rules beasts but are classes as Monstrosities because they are fantastical creatures - e.g. Hippocamps, Griffins, Hippogriffs. And there are a handful of beast with cool powers - like Spiders with their Web, Giant Constrictor Snakes with their grapple + restrain, Frogs with Swallow, Owls with Flyby, several with the ability to poison.

I don't know who came up with this argument but it is utterly invented, and assumes WAY more forethought and planning on behalf of WotC than there is evidence for.

Quote from Agilemind>>

For combat purposes sure. But what everyone is missing is the non-combat fun you could have with the old conjuration spells which is just completely obliterated here. e.g. Summoning horses for your party to ride to chase after a bad guy who is trying to escape, summoning a bunch of dolphins to pull a ship, summoning a flock of birds to carry the party up to a tower. Druid was fun because of it's utility, now... I don't know.. I just don't see why I would play a druid rather than a Wizard or a Cleric. If I want to play a utility caster I'll choose Wizard, if I want to play a support caster I'll choose cleric. What is special about Druid now?

I completely agree that being able to summon a whole bunch of woodland creatures etc. is too iconic to be rendered down into a pretty boring single effect; while players could try to argue with their DM for some of the old things you could do with this to wreak havoc/be a nice druid actually and help out or whatever, it shouldn't be necessary to do that.

I like Pantagruel666's suggestion of the "large swarm" for simplicity, and I could definitely see the value of having a generic swarm profile handy for speed (and for dealing with the player asking for things you'd like to allow but don't really have a profile for).

I do wonder if the Dungeon Master's Guide or Monster Manual could do with better guidance or a template for quickly converting a group of monsters into a swarm of the same type; it won't work perfectly for everything of course but I've done this myself for some bigger encounters I've wanted to run. For example I had a party of six 13th-level adventurers on a nautical one-shot and I wanted a cool boarding action fight, but I'd still be running it to this day if I'd actually put 30+ pirates on the enemy ship, especially since individually they weren't that threatening. Instead I did five big "swarms" which I was able to "heal" as reinforcements came up from belowdecks. Made the fight way easier to run, so we could focus on the coolest parts.

Formalising something along those lines, and having sample "swarm" monsters handy could help a lot with all forms of round bloat including things like necormancer players, or just running big enemy groups in general. For example animate dead could reference a "swarm of zombies" profile for if you animate five or more and need to speed things up. There are definitely ways to help the DM cope rather than just slapping down player options that can be perfectly fun in the right hands.

While I get the differences in details, to me, all the summon and conjure spells still seem far too similar. There's a distinct lack of imagination and willingness to make them markedly different from each other; if anything, the new conjure versions in UA 8 feel even closer to the summon spells in Tasha's. To me, at least.

To me it seems obvious that they just wanted to get rid of the Conjure X spells in favor of the Summon X spells, but I believe they promised at some point that all the old, iconic spells would still be available with the same name and at the same level (but not necessarily the same effects), so they are twisting themselves in knots to essentially do this. The fact that most of these spells were overly powerful and overly complicated in combat makes me glad that they are going to be gone. All of the problems that Yurei has noted (with the usual bit of hyperbole) are true, and I don't even think "wall of meat" was mentioned. The out-of-combat uses that have been mentioned are certainly creative, but they just make the spells even more overpowered, when they can be used to solve even more problems. Other creative solutions will be found by intelligent players and the game will still be fun (or even more fun) because one character isn't gifted with a spell that solves such a ridiculous range of problems.

The solution to the "i need my folks to have an ability to summon a half dozen horses" is to homebrew a spell that creates a half dozen horses. OR just use the 2014 versions alongside the 2024 versions.

The spells are similar. That's a feature, not a bug, to me.

Really for summoning mounts they just need to mash up Phantom Steed with Conjure Animals so you can summon a set of Riding Horses without occupying your Concentration slot.

Honestly we don’t need the conjure spells since the summon spells cover their primary intent. The only reason to keep them is tradition. If we must keep conjure spells I would make them all no concentration instantaneous spells.

Conjure Animals  
Casting Time: Action
Range: 60 feet
Components: V, S
Duration: Instantaneous 

You summon nature spirits that take the form of a Large swarm of animals in an unoccupied space that you can see within range. The swarm vanishes at the start of your next turn, and you choose the animal form of the spirits such as wolves, serpents, or birds. The swarm can immediately move up to 30ft and it can occupy other creature’s space. Any creature other than you that starts or ends it’s turn in a space occupied by the swarm must make a Dex saving throw or it takes 3d10 piercing or slashing damage (your choice) on a fail and half damage on a success. The space occupied by the swarm counts as difficult terrain to any creature other than you. 

Conjure Celestial    
Casting Time: Action
Range: 90 feet
Components: V, S
Duration: Instantaneous 

You summon the protective presence of a Celestial spirit, which manifests in an unoccupied space that you can see within range as an angelic being bearing a Sword, a Shield or a Staff you choose which one when you cast the spell.

Sword bearer- Swings it’s sword creating a 60ft cone of Radiant energy extending from itself. Any creature in the cone must make a Con save or take 7d10 Radiant damage on a fail and half damage on a success. The spirit immediately vanishes after. 
Shield Bearer- Hovers resolute emitting a protective aura. Creatures of your choice that remain within 10ft of the spirit gain a bonus to their AC and saving throws equal to you Spellcasting modifier. The Shield Bearer vanishes at the start of your next turn.  
Staff Bearer- Points the staff at one creature you choose within the spells range and that creature regains 8d12 hp

And other big instantaneous spells like these. This would give some separation between the conjure and summon spells. (I made these up as a reference, I didn’t take the time to balance them)

Just as a final complaint here. I have yet to see WotC nerf either Animate Dead nor Animate Objects which have all the same (if not  more) problems as the Conjure spells. But those are Wizard spells so I guess no-touch-y because wizards deserve fun creative thematic spells.

Quote from Ain_Undos >>

Honestly we don’t need the conjure spells since the summon spells cover their primary intent. The only reason to keep them is tradition. If we must keep conjure spells I would make them all no concentration instantaneous spells. 

Yes, we do need the Conjure spells, because there's a large difference between summmoning a generic entity that makes a few standard attacks and summoning some flavor of Hag, a Coatl, Hollyphant, one of the interesting Elemental variants, an Abashi, or any of the other fun options out there. You might be content with generic summons, but please don't try to speak for everyone that the ability to summon specific creatures with specific powers was just a meaningless ribbon. That's the entire appeal of the Conjure spells, and it's something Summon is wholly incapable of capturing.

Ain_undos,

That's pretty much my thought, as well. And when one messes with spells, one risks much.

Concentration is a different kind of mechanic in my house rules, and since I use a spell point system and custom classes, I am always more interested in the way spells work, since I try to leave them alone to a certain extent (but definitely not entirely). These all work well for me, and solve a couple problems that I have in terms of the nature and fabric of the worldsetting itself having to do with the whole challenge of summoning things. 

I like them because they fit much better with the way my game world works. SImple as that. But I can also see how those who have done entire builds around commanding a small army of animals are going to be upset. I may not care, mind you, but I can see and sympathize.

These spells will absolutely be something "cool" -- the unreal engine can take this kind of thing and do some impressive stuff with it. So while I think a few folks will complain now, I also think that it will turn out that these become some of the most popular spells in the game.

Quote from Agilemind >>

Just as a final complaint here. I have yet to see WotC nerf either Animate Dead nor Animate Objects which have all the same (if not  more) problems as the Conjure spells. But those are Wizard spells so I guess no-touch-y because wizards deserve fun creative thematic spells.

To be fair, Animate Dead doesn't drop 8 creatures on the field at once at base level.