1 hour ago, TheLonelySandPerson said:

Compared to, say, a druid summoning animals, the skills available to FF summons are extremely broad. I'm shying away from this concept mostly because it seems like it again turns the summoner into a multitool who always has a summon on tap that can do almost anything at least as well as anyone else on the team. This is why I'm eager to shuffle true summoning off into a limit break -- even if it outshines another player, it's only once per session. 

But in FF, the summoners have this versatility, haven't they?

Anyway, you can think in something like "once per session" to make the team think seriously about who they'll summon and when.

And about the power, if you believe that something like a Rival could work better, go on. Just create the summs like you think and in game it should work like a summoning speed bringing to the scene a new NPC to help the party. If you think an extra "character" is giving too much power to the group, just remember that Geneys is very abstract, narrative and cinematic, which means, you can add new minions or rivals easily or add something more dramatic, like another summon to fight against the party's summon, things like this.

On 7/26/2018 at 12:29 AM, Bellyon said:

But in FF, the summoners have this versatility, haven't they?

Only sort of. Again, the actions available to a summon are limited by the options on the menu. Genesys has a much broader menu to pick from.

6 hours ago, TheLonelySandPerson said:

Only sort of. Again, the actions available to a summon are limited by the options on the menu. Genesys has a much broader menu to pick from.

Would that perhaps suggest the Genesys menu should therefore be limited in some way?

Okay, I've been mulling over all these suggestions, and I think I've got a system I like. Try to find anything here that seems too powerful.

1. The summoner casts a summoning spell with difficulty based on who they're summoning. This automatically includes the Summon Ally effect. The summon's Wound Threshold is increased by the net successes on the check. (Do you think that's too strong?)
2. The summoner may call orders or let the summon act according to its nature. However, it won't use magic if they don't order it to.
3. Each summon has a rival-class stat block which they use for non-magic actions.
4. For magic actions, the summon has a list of what they can do. The spell is built normally, but may have limitations or bonus effects like an implement. The summoner pays the strain and rolls the spell with their Summoning skill, but their implements don't count. If the spell succeeds, they add their choice of SS, AA, or SA to the results. (This is what their strain-per-turn is buying.)
   • Example: Ifrit is an easy, low-level summon, so his spell effects are pretty limited -- just Attack (Fire) and Augment.
5. The summoner can spend a story point to go "off menu" as long as it's thematically appropriate.
6. When the summoner uses the Concentrate maneuver, they take 1 strain.
7. When the summoning spell expires (assuming the summon was not destroyed by damage), the summon performs its ultimate magic before departing.
   • This is generally the effect you'd get in games that lack true summoning -- Ifrit uses Hellfire, Carbuncle uses Ruby Light, etc.

Why not doing it like it's done in FF14 ? It's more Ifrit the carbuncle, Titan the carbuncle, Garuda the carbuncle that are summoned.

10 minutes ago, WolfRider said:

Why not doing it like it's done in FF14 ? It's more Ifrit the carbuncle, Titan the carbuncle, Garuda the carbuncle that are summoned.

I'm not terribly familiar with FFXIV. How would that change things?

I mean, aside from summoning teeny, unimpressive versions of each monster.

2 hours ago, TheLonelySandPerson said:

I'm not terribly familiar with FFXIV. How would that change things?

I mean, aside from summoning teeny, unimpressive versions of each monster.

It would work more or less as I described in my second post, which means it works much the same as the Conjure spell does RAW.

I really like this idea, i wonder if the biggest restriction on the power of the various summons wouldn't just be their availability. You mention it potentially turning a summoner into someone who can take any action, but shouldn't that fall to the GM by simply restricting (for story reasons presumably) the ability to acquire new summons? Make getting a new summon a major story event, something that the group works towards, and it's less of a concern just how much a summoner with access to all summons could do, since they won't have access to them all.

If you don't want to limit the number of them available in the campaign world so your summoner can just pick up new ones easily, then maybe restrict the number they can have "equipped" at a time. Maybe 1/2 INT (or whatever stat you decide governs summoning) summons can be equipped at a time, only one can be manifest at a time and each one gives access to a limited number of spells. Changing out your loadout is a non-trivial thing, maybe taking an hour to attune to a new spirit or however you want to describe it, that way the summoner isn't just a multi-tool, they need to plan for different eventualities at the start of the day and can't just swap to whichever summon is ideal for a given situation (assuming the situation is time sensitive).

I'll admit, I'm leaning more on things like FF6 where you could only have one ESPer equipped at a time or the FF7 Materia system where you had a limited number of slots, but that feels like an alright restriction to me.