In the game, spells allow players to summon creatures such as animals, celestial, minor elementals, and woodland beings. Some spells require the spellcaster to play a specific summoning class, which can be frustrating for some players. The Druid class is a Swiss-Army Knife of a class, with 3rd-level spells allowing access to powerful powerhouses like call lightning, conjure animals, sleet storm, summon fey, and tidal wave.
Druids can use an identical spell called Animal Summoning I, introduced in Supplement 3: Eldritch Wizardry. They have excellent summon spells from Tasha and fizzban (beast, fey elemental, and dragon). There are three Druid spells that work: conjure animals (3rd level), conjure woodland beings (4th level), and conjure fey (6th level).
The idea with summon spells is that the player chooses the creature within that creature, and the DM chooses the creature within that creature. Dispel Magic is another option, targeting the magical effect of “Conjure Animals”. Druids do magical damage, tons of hit points, and keep other characters safe as the animals are up front.
In summary, the Druid class offers a unique way to summon creatures, with 3rd-level spells offering powerful abilities and a range of powerful spells. Players can control steeds, sidekicks, pets, or summoned creatures on the D and D battlefield, but their 3rd-level spell options have potential for game breaking potential.
📹 How to use conjure animals fast! – D&D 5E Basic guide to Conjure animals
I wrote the script for this video right after Swift Quiver video actually. I know its super late but I was super busy. Sorry. Treantmonk’s …
What spell allows Druids to turn into animals?
Wild Shape is a powerful ability that allows Druids to transform into animals, gaining benefits based on their choice. This versatile ability benefits Druids both in and out of combat, but is among the most complex class features in the game. As a Druid, they can soar with eagles, dig with moles, and run free through the forest as part of a pack of wolves. They can also turn into a fly on the wall to eavesdrop on clandestine conversations or find dungeon keys to break their party out of jail. Wild Shape is one of D and D’s most potent abilities, and this guide has been refreshed with improved formatting and tips on how to maximize its benefits.
Can Druids summon familiars?
The Druid Familiar is a summoned character that follows players at their speed and can be summoned by Druids of level 200 or higher using the Summon Druid Familiar spell. It provides no shared exp between the summon and its summoner, unlike a normal Summon Creature spell. The summoner follows players at their speed, goes up and down stairs and holes, and lasts 15 minutes with a 30 minute cooldown. It can also go to a Protection Zone. If the summoner logs out, it disappears, stopping the timer countdown and reappearing when logged in again.
The Druid Familiar is useful for low-level Druids as a free blocker and damage boost. However, due to its timer/cooldown mechanic, it cannot have 100 uptime, so it’s important to be cautious when it disappears. It’s not recommended to use it when hunting with a Knight, as it challenges creatures away from them, reducing their damage output.
Can Druids talk to animals without spell?
Druids are capable of communicating with wild-shaped animals through the use of specific spells and magical items. This ability is also possessed by bards, rangers, and forest gnomes.
Can I have a pet as a druid?
Druids don’t have animal companions due to concerns about action economy and game balance. While a druid can befriend an animal using sidekick rules, they would be treated as a separate party member for game balance calculations. A 2nd-level druid feature allows summoning a spirit that assumes an animal form, casting the Find Familiar spell without material components. This makes the familiar a fey instead of a beast, and disappears after a number of hours equal to half the druid level. This feature is useful for enhancing the druid’s abilities and ensuring a balanced game.
Can you summon animals in D&D?
The summoning of fey spirits manifests as beasts that materialize within unoccupied spaces within the designated range. One may select one beast with a challenge rating of 2 or lower, two beasts with a challenge rating of 1 or lower, four beasts with a challenge rating of 1/2 or lower, or eight beasts with a challenge rating of 1/4 or lower. Each beast is removed from play when it reaches 0 hit points or when the spell concludes.
Did druids have familiars?
Druids are unable to gain familiars or companions; however, they are capable of interacting with and charming plants and animals through the use of various spells. Additionally, they possess the capacity to cast spells that facilitate the temporary manifestation of woodland creatures. It should be noted, however, that JavaScript may be disabled or blocked by an extension, and that not all browsers support cookies.
Is A druid Vegan?
Druids are not vegetarian or vegan, and it is essential to choose between the meat and vegan sides of the Druidic force. Regular druids are likely omnivorous or vegetarian, while fighting druids may be omnivorous or vegetarian. They may be heavy on locally sources or hunted foods, but not strictly vegetarian. Shadow druids, due to their bond with plant life, are almost entirely carnivorous and likely man-eaters. It is crucial to choose wisely between the meat and vegan sides of the Druidic force to maintain a healthy lifestyle.
What is the druid connection to animals?
Druidry is a spiritual tradition that emphasizes the importance of each creature offering gifts of inner knowledge, vitality, and healing. Animals are not just objects for our use, but they also provide us with the energy or healing potential of each animal. These gifts can be experienced through telepathic connections with pets, which have been proven to prolong life and promote good health.
In Druidry, each animal carries a unique kind of “medicine” or energy, which can be received by Druids through their interaction with the animal in the Otherworld, a mysterious realm sometimes called the Spiritworld. This realm contains various environments and beings, and part of the training of Druidry lies in developing the ability to consciously travel within this world.
The story of the Well of Segais from Ireland tells of King Cormac losing his wife and children to a mysterious warrior who spirits them away to the Otherworld. The well is surrounded by nine hazel trees, and five large salmon swim in its deep waters, feeding on the hazelnuts. The wise drink from each of the five streams and the central pool, representing the essence of Druidry as a sensuous spirituality that seeks wisdom and nourishment from the still center of Spirit deep within and through each of our five senses.
The salmon is the most sacred creature in the Druid tradition, known as the Oldest Animal. The fish is a central symbol within a spiritual tradition, appearing in Irish and Welsh legend, Vedas, Hinduism, Buddhism, Babylonian and Sumerian mythology, and Christian tradition. The fish and fisherman were both intimately related symbolically from the earliest days, with the first Avatar of Vishnu the Creator being a fish, the Buddha and Jesus being referred to as fishermen, and the Fisher King being the central figure in the grail legend.
When Druids today seek the Salmon of Wisdom, they are connecting not only to the tradition of ancient Druids but also to an understanding deeply rooted in the collective awareness of all humanity.
What is the best animal to conjure in D&D?
The text provides a detailed account of a diverse array of animals, including brown bears, tigers, and a polar bear. The text indicates that the browser may not support cookies or that JavaScript may be disabled or blocked by an extension.
Can druids summon spirits?
You can summon Spirit Wolves, Dire Wolves, or a Grizzly, but you cannot summon more than one at a time. When summoning a Spirit Wolf, your Dire Wolves or Grizzly will disappear, so you should use Spirit Wolves until Dire Wolves are available. Once Grizzly is available, you must decide whether to use Grizzly or Dire Wolves. Grizzly does more damage but can only be one, while Dire Wolves do less damage but can be up to three to attract monsters’ attention. Spirit Wolf adds attack and defense to Wolves, Dire Wolves, and Grizzly pets, while Dire Wolf adds hitpoints and damage. Vines follow you and can be attacked and die.
Can a druid summon animals?
The spell “Conjure Animals / Animal Summoning I” is a cleric spell introduced in Supplement I: Greyhawk and can be used by anti-clerics or druids. It is Level 6 for clerics and 4 for druids, with a duration of 10 turns and a range of 3″. The caster conjures one large animal, three medium-sized animals, or six smaller animals, and the animals obey the caster. This spell was introduced in Dragon Magazine 1 and is now part of the Illusionist spell list.
📹 5 Tricks All Good DRUIDS Know
Druids are one of my favourite classes in Dungeons and Dragons! They’re also probably the most complicated, let’s talk about …
I write this before this article come out, I’m fully aware what the Sage Advice Compendium says (RAI) and I left it out for this article. I will bring it up in my Advanced guide to Conjure animals if that ever comes out. media.wizards.com/2015/downloads/dnd/SA_Compendium_1.02.pdf Here it is, to find what I’m talking about then just Ctrl f and look for “Conjure”. It reads: “The design intent for options like these is that the spell caster chooses one of them, and then the DM decides what creatures appear that fit the chosen option.” This is an annoying design intent. Straight up horrible. If we apply this to other spells, like polymorph, it would be dumb. No one plays like that. Also, it’s just quicker to let players pick, instead of having the DM pick. Keep in mind: If we go by straight rules as intended, Revivify and many other spells just wouldn’t work at all. youtube.com/watch?v=jKglAJCKF9k So I choose to ignore this RAI because its stupid and annoying for both the player and the DM.
As a DM I have a house rule that animal companions and conjured animals share the same initiative as the player that summoned them, and the player gets to choose who goes first. It helped speed up the ranger’s decision making b/c he had one large turn per turn rather than multiple small turns per turn
Ah, yes. I have to use a google spreadsheet to keep track of my summons. I am so prepared, I could complete the animal’s turn faster than martials. My allies can deal SO much damage per a round, so I fully dedicated Conjure Animals to utility and control. About the flesh wall, do keep in mind constrictor snake is a great choice for control. Huge creatures can move through medium creatures and the triggered AOP can restrain them on hit. AOE counters Conjure Animals CR 1/4 if the fireball manages to hit the animals and your allies before they act. Be sure to separate them. Also, you need to consider using higher CR creatures if you plan on body blocking while the enemy has powerful AOE. CR 1-2 should be able to take a fireball if you’re a lvl 6 Shep Druid. Shepherd Druids are so strong. I am target number one in the majority of enemy encounters because it becomes very difficult to kill my allies. Summons or conjure animals in this case is capable of soaking soooo much damage, which greatly increases my party’s survivability. One time I used a giant eagle to swoop down to snatch a downed party member and flew them to safety.
The problem with grappling with conjured animals is that RAW it doesn’t work for the vast majority of animals. A grapple is made “using at least one free hand”, and everything other than hands that can grapple is stated specifically in the rules that it can like the loxodon’s trunk or the giant octopus’s tentacles. It depends heavily on your dm’s discretion, they may let something like cows grapple by biting, they may let bears bear hug to grapple, and they may not even let apes who do have hands grapple at all. It’s very clear that the designers only thought of the grapple attack as a player only action, and any other creature they intended to be able to grapple have it stated explicitly in their stat blocks.
Oh, wow – That grapple to force-move an ally is a life-saving move! Man, Conjure Animals+Grapple can add a lot of extra movement to the battlefield. Super useful, thank you for this hidden gem! That art by Tamlin is SUPER awesome and adorable, btw! Bonus tip: Combine Conjure Animal Grapple movements with a Fighter Arcane Archer’s Grasping Arrow for a ton of extra possible damage. 2d6 extra damage on *each turn* (not each round, each turn(!)) the Grasped target moves more than 1 foot.
So, when I can expect summoning, I sit down with the full list of summon options and make out cards for them (usually, this happens when PCs are leveling up). That way, all possible future prep is done. Player casts spell, DM hands them stat card – easy peasy. Also, it hasn’t happened, but ambushing me with improved options will just be a hard “no” until we sit down and make cards (unless it’s a scroll or something that we just got). I will not stop the game to prep around one player’s action.
One note that might be important for some groups: That list of example beasts at 3:12 is NOT part of the spell description! That list was generously added by D&DBeyond because without it the spell becomes an absolute nightmare to run. Especially if you follow Sage Advice. I’ve never had a problem with the balance of Conjure Animals. It’s always been the difficulty of running it at the table. That’s the whole reason the Tasha Summon spells were created. Yes, if you play online it becomes significantly easier, but not everyone does that and the game is not designed around it. I have similar complaints about Wild Shape, but I think I’ve rambled enough already.
So fun combo idea thingy, Conjure 4 Apes with your Action and use Magic Stone with your Bonus Action Now hand 3 of the Apes Magic Stones and make them throw em as a ranged spell attack (that uses your wisdom for both accuracy and dmg) The 4th Ape uses his turn to scout and collect 3 move pebbles for next turn Congrats now you have more or less the same dpr as someone with an extra attack, a hand crossbow and the crossbow expert feat, except after the first turn of setup you get an additional action to do anything you want while they use every resource every round
i just changed the spell to this: You summon fey spirits that take the form of beasts and appear in unoccupied spaces that you can see within range. Choose one of the following options for what appears: One beast of challenge rating 2 or lower, Damage die = D12 Two beasts of challenge rating 1 or lower, Damage die = D8 Four beasts of challenge rating 1/2 or lower, Damage die = D6 Eight beasts of challenge rating 1/4 or lower, Damage die = D4 Each beast is also considered fey, and it disappears when it drops to 0 hit points or when the spell ends. The summoned creatures are friendly to you and your companions. They obey any verbal commands that you issue to them (no action required by you). If you don’t issue any commands to them, they defend themselves from hostile creatures, but otherwise take no actions. The summoned creature shares your turn and works differently in combat. while in combat with this spell active: At the end of your turn you designate one or more creatures that are within 5 feet on one or more of your summoned creatures. That creature must succeed on a dexterity saving throw or take 1 die piercing damage per summoned creature within 5 feet of it, taking half damage on a successful save. Each summoned creature can only contribute with die per round. The die is determined from challenge rating. Can some math guy tell me if its better or worse damage statistically? and what do you guys think of this idea?
i love it when a famous D&D YouTuber talks about things i have been saying since the release of 5e, i have been chanting the toa of squeeze rules for a long time now haha, also love the idea of giving other players control of the animals, really sparks player team work and thank you for reinforcement of telling everyone what you plan to do, hate when players want to keep secrets then expect me the DM and the other players to act like we don’t need to improve
3:48 This is a blessed image, even it personally wouldn’t be at my table. Conjure Animals is such a strange spell. the CR system is notoriously poor when it comes to determining power, and the DM counters to it are more or less things a newer, less prepared, or polite Gm doesn’t have prepared (Traps, harsh terrain, ambushes before main fights, ect). The Sage Advice addendum is there to balance this spell’s mechanical power (Huge action economy/damage advantage without the high spellcasting mod Web, Fireball, and Hypnotic Patterns need) with chaos. Weather the prep and consequences of this chaos are worth the obvious domination aspects of his spell is up to each GM. Frankly if you wanted to counter this spell (And most other “Crazy” D&D combos) Magic missile on the caster of Conjure Animals is an easy free way to do damage and make a caster do 3(+) DC10 Con saves. you can give quite literally anything a wand of magic missile and they can also break so no need to worry if the party gets their hands on them for a while. Web DM long ago talked about this spell and posited that if you wanted a specific animal, it’d be interesting if you had to go recruit them. they deemed being able to pick out what animals you summoned to be “Tresure” and that you’d need to treat your animals well, similar to a familiar. This allows the GM to make an adventure hook or plot point out of the spell and also Streamline the Conjure Animal possess for those who use the spell habitually. This is how I use the spell in my games.
i always tell my DM im picking Conjure Animal and always picking wolves. i have the stat block and use the average damage instead of rolling damage. boom time saved. i don’t even use them all to attack in combat. i summoned 8 wolves attaked with 4. used 2 to stand guard over fallen NPC’s to keep them safe and the last 2 wolves to block the exit to keep the enemy from escaping the room. boom tactics
Love the article. Playing Circle of the Shepherd and I always pick the animals but my DM and I had conversations in advance about which animals were and weren’t appropriate. We selected the ones we wanted to use and I have sheets with the stats and HP trackers for each type of animal I can use in my binder. We play at a table with minis. Mini bases are painted in solid colors. I have dice in each of those colors. We keep all the animals on a single initiative and I roll attacks for all animal at once using the color coded dice to make sure we know which roll is for which animal. And then all damage is rolled at once using the color coded dice to speed resolution. If we’re trying to save even more time I’ll group the animals into pairs and roll once per pair to cut down on the number of rolls to resolve. We use the same system for Conjure Woodland Beings and it works well to keep things moving.
Question on Beast Selections: Our Druid used it for the first time recently, and decided he wanted 1 Dire Wolf and 1 Brown Bear. My DM ruled that was fine and he didn’t need to summon all the same type. That’s not how most tables do it I guess, but RAW is there a reason you can’t do 8 different beasts of 1/4 or lower? Obviously it would make running combat a nightmare, but other than that is there a reason you can’t?
The only reason I say DMs choose the creature is because of the in world lore implications. Why would the druid who lived in the frozen wastelands their whole life summon a giant constrictor snake? Doesn’t really make sense, so they can’t summon creatures they haven’t seen (a list of which the DM should provide as they are the world manager)
You don’t need a die roller, roll multiple D20 (1 per creature) and then let the dm tell you the target number or you go from top to bottom. After the AC is known you pick up all the die that are not hitting and tell them how many hit and the average damage. Same system as has been done for decades using D6 and Warhammer. No excuse to let pets and conjures to slow down combat!
If you want control, wild beyond the witchlight added giant snails, cr 1/4 22 hp and 11 ac, but they can enter their shell for an additional 4 AC for 15, at level 5 this is an excellent meme control creature since you can barricade a single enemy with decent AC high ho creatures blocking them in a single space
It should only take a few seconds to move the tokens to their new location. Then you roll all attacks at once, then roll all damage together (possibly rolling separately for each target). It honestly shouldn’t take any longer than another player’s turn, and the animals don’t have nearly as many options to choose from, so it should be much faster. Conjure Animals is such a good spell, I think it runs some serious competition against Fireball for best 3rd level spell. It would be a shame not to use it because it bogs the game down too much, because it doesn’t need to.
I usually just tell my players “please don’t conjure 64 rats in the middle of combat” and then they don’t, because we’re adults who have mutual respect for one another. Like I promise I won’t design an encounter where having 16 giant lizards is necessary. I’m glad you brought up communication, because if it’s a bad time for the GM, then you’re playing the game wrong.
1) Love the idea of letting other players take on the roll of Animals X, Y, Z to help get everyone a little extra rolling not on their turn. 2) I don’t think I’d ever have a player say “no” to playing another creature, especially when they can go mega chaotic and do whatever with it without fear of KO 3) That viewer art chef’s kiss on that one. That looked fantastic. 4) Conjure animals turns the encounter difficulty down a notch in most cases (Hard ► Medium). Want to understand more and why, look up Sly Flourish’s deadly encounter thresholds.
I DM on roll20 and use lots of macros and tables. Players call the spell macro and it uses the table to inform which creature is sumoned. Creatures roll after the player initiative so we have less rolls. Players can only uses creatures previously made for summoning. All creatures act and attack at same time. Is realy quick to use.
I have some rules as a DM for summoned allies: summoning more than 1 creature their initiative is either at the same initiative as you (right after your turn unless specified in the spell) or at the bottom of the round. They share initiative and take the same action (if you’re fast you can do a couple different actions). I let my players choose the creatures but urge them to go with the fewer in number as not to slow down the game too much. Some players want to summon tons of creatures which is fine but asking this at the beginning let’s them know that time is my concern
I’m fascinating by your ability to be the devil’s advocate for so broken spell against literally all humanity, by coming up with a point where people think that this spell is bad, with the feeling that people don’t understand the obvious things At the same time, completely misunderstanding the obvious things about offline gaming, saying that the spell doesn’t actually take much time because YOU CAN USE THE MACROS, and showing a article where Treatmonk literally didn’t roll a single real die, nor got up from the table to place 16 velociraptors, and even then spent x3 more time than Kelly before it, with rolling real dice on webcam
Conjure animal and conjure woodland beings are super op…. I love druids and have played them for 2 years… I cut the numbers of creatures in half just to bring it in balance of the rest of the group…. and still I normaly do the most damage. I’m competing with fireball spammers but I’m single target. ( and still at half the creatures)
Much much longer to do these things in person (clicking 8 times or rolling a macro takes much longer than rolling 8d20s and adding the modifiers, then determining which hit, then rolling damage) plus most people in my group wouldn’t be able to run this in a time effective manner. I couldn’t, and I wouldn’t pick this spell because it’s both hyper-optimized and annoying to other players. The more things you summon, the more you have to do on a turn, the more engaging the combat is for you, right? Everyone else at the table has a worse experience sitting around for 3 extra minutes as you figure all of these things out.
I think a lot of the hate for Conjure X is a result of things like the Conjure Fey/Polymorph combo, where a player summons 8 sprites and has them polymorph the whole party into T-rexes, which I personally think shouldn’t work like that, but that’s a rant for another time. That said, in my experience, a lot of players also struggle to micromanage even a single other creature in combat, nevermind eight of them. Typically, familiars might as well disappear into the pocket dimension as soon as initiative is rolled, and this whole article is about the groans Conjure X spells draw because they’re likely at least doubling the size of the combat. Even pact of the chain warlocks and BM rangers commonly think of their companions as just a beatstick instead of any of the other million things being able to use certain actions remotely and often at improved economy can do for you. I did make an observation when I was playing a necromancer a while back. The way animate dead is written, it seems to me like you can use your bonus action to command either all of your creatures, or a portion of your creatures, but not two portions of your creatures. To illustrate what I mean, Let’s say you’ve got four zombies. You can command them to swarm an enemy, or you can command some of them to attack an enemy, but you can’t command two of them to attack one enemy and two of them to attack a different enemy. Now, Conjure X isn’t worded like this; in fact, its wording seems to be the exact opposite, where since it doesn’t take an action, you could theoretically give all 24 of your creatures an individual order, but I feel like that’s starting to push “Talking is a free action” a little too far.
If you suspect the enemy is immune or resistant to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage from non magical attacks, giant poisonous snake does poison damage. They get an easy con save to take half, but half is better than nothing. And since the snake has +6 to hit, they’ll make enough con saves that some of them will fail. A lot of enemies are also immune or resistant to poison, so this is definitely niche, but good to have in pocket. Werewolves do not resist poison. If my math is right, summoning 8 giant poisonous snakes has 44.1 dpr vs werewolves (42 if you always take average poison damage).
I think the fact that you had to make this article telling everyone to specifically prepare for one spell at third level is representative that the spell is clearly problematic. No other third level spell requires this amount of prep and the fact that it comes at fifth level, a point where new dms and new players tend to get to (in other words people who wouldn’t know to watch out for this spell), and so dramatically fucks with the action economy. I mean like it if you want but this spell is atrociously designed imo, you wouldn’t have to tell your dm you’re taking most level 3 spells but this is an exception.
*Laughs in 2e player* only 8 side characters? And just minions? In AD&D one player can is entitled to that many extra full PCs at 16 charisma. Watch what happens when i bust out multible high level mages and clerics in a game without concentration or rules against buff stacking. ….the old days were terrible, let’s never go back.
A few things: 1) As noted, group initiative is raw 2) Also RAW is not “you control them” but rather “they obey any verbal commands you give them, no action required” this distinction actually makes a strong case for the idea that you can give orders, but you do not actually have fine tune control over what they do. While the orders may not take an action to do, they MAY require that order to be given on your turn, and then the creatures will follow that order on their turn. This also strongly implies that the enemy can overhear and react to the orders you give, possibly before your summons can. 3) While some might argue that there is some default manner in which the spell works, and that the lack of specific ruling actually explicitly implies that “default” ruling, my personal thought on this is that it was deliberately left vague with the idea that the player and DM would have to hash out what works best for their table/party. Some may want to give fine tune control as it can speed things up when the player knows what they are doing, but at the same time, conjure animals is actually incredibly OP for a 3rd level spell, so those caveats act as limitations on the power. So essentially, I 100% agree with your assertion that ambushing DM is a nono. 4) Given the fact that the summons are only issued verbal commands, I absolutely ADORE the suggestion you made that control of summons can be shared to other players. A party of 4 could easily be given control of 2 summons each which could drastically speed up the process of creating that separation between orders given and a creature with animal level intelligence attempting to execute that order.
my favorite summon is the velociraptor it has pack tactics and multiattack so eight velociraptors making three attacks each with advantage dealing a total of 8d6+16+16d4+16 if you’re a circle of the shepherd druid add bear spirit plus mighty summoner and now the raptors have extra hitpoints and deal magical damage
I have a fondness for flying snakes, with 60 feet and flyby they can move up and attack and them move back into “formation” so you can use them to wall enemies or provide you with half cover (in every game I’ve ever played half and 3 quarters cover is extremely underused or forgotten, use it!) they only have 4 hp but either the enemy attacks them or you get half cover and a wall that moves and attacks with poison.
Hey Kobold is there any chance of you posting a build or tips about arcane trickster rogue or Bladesinger wizard? I know you do not upload builds about classes that do not have spellcasting but since both AT and BS have… maybe you will? xd And thank you for the useful information btw I really did learn a lot from your articles and now when I create a new character I think how to optimise it for party play instead for raw dmg or solo play.
A significant amount of animals (such as the cows) are large so they can be ridden. A number of melee martials have the problem they can’t get into the fray as easily due to a lack of movement options, which Conjure Animals provides – and on the long term, it’s cheaper than buying a mount and doesn’t provide logistical problems bringing them to certain places. Some feats like Mounted Combatant and Polearm Master supplement this idea, too (the latter being a feat most melee martials should take). This isn’t me telling you to play those martials with a Conjure Animals user, but chances are high you’ll have one at your table. With regard to giving animals to players, extend this also to rolling initiative and tracking HP. 1 hour is plenty to cover overland travel (and chances are you can afford to give your party CR 1/2 mounts) and if you get the spell on a Sorcerer, you can extend the duration to 2 hours, even.
“I don’t like alternative rules” but also, forget how the spell is ruled and play alternatively. Look, I get what you’re saying here, and yes, it can be fine. But you should acknowledge that this optimizer use of conjure animals is basically homebrew. Now, that said I’m all for a character working to obtain the ability to choose what animals they summon, Web DM had a great talk about that as treasure.
Another thing i do when dealing with summoning creatures. A simple command you can give them is ‘help x’ x being my teamates. This means you only need to worry about moving the creatures. Cause now all your friendly pc’s are attacking with advantage if they stay close to the summons which puts the choice in your hands. And your fellow players will love you for it. You can also bait out reaction attacks with your summons allowing your teamates to move in and out of combat without consequence. Additionally they could instead try to grapple something. Even if they suck at it, cause sure the enemy will probably succeed. But will they succeed 8 times in a row by being dogpiled by zombies? (Or other summons)
Just let the DM choose. The DM has a sheet for possible creatures for environment and bang! Problem solved! But really, Conjure Animals is overall a pretty iffy spell. It’s pretty powerful, sure, but it can make things too bonkers when you can just opt for Velociraptors most of the time. I do prefer following RAI, but with a good average of creatures, you can have them be useful without relying only of velociraptors or the traditional beasts that are mostly used.
I use this one all the time. The GM has let me have the animals use the help action for the other players starting the next turn. Advantage for the whole party. When at the table I have enough dice to put them on the map and start rolling D20s to crank through combat. I try to be quick because combat can eat up so much time.
How I would do a conjure animals the DM gives you the Terrain your characters are currently in because it doesn’t make any sense if you summon 8 flying snakes in the Arctic region of that world. Flight snakes are the best thing you can summon because one there snakes that can fly and they have no save on there by the attack from Poison damage and if I remember correctly they have flyby
There is no arguing here for the Spell – and applying this said Mechanic to Polymorph is just plain proveable Bullshite and aims at intentional misuse of the Rules for having a “Uber-Powermove” at hand. It is specified on which Spells this is intended with – and Polymorph is none of them. First of all, it is limited to the conjuring-spells that summon something – and there also just some very specific ones. Also, Polymorph is not summoning something that then turns into something, it turns something into something. The same sense it would make to reverse this Argument into “A Player can decide what form a Polymorphed Creature takes, so when the Player is targeted he decided his new form as well. Same argumentative Bullshite. About the Spell and its Mechanics: – It is defined what you call (Fey Spirits) and what you can choose (Their DC/amount). – What is not defined is up to the GM to rule. – The GM has the Statistics and thus can pretty literally define what they look like – as they are *NPC*. – You can issue oreders to them and they have to obey – so the GM arguing “they won’t fight for you!” or such are invalid as you claiming to summon some specific Animal and not a chaotic Creature of the Feywild. So, conclusion: If you are nice to your GM, he will probaly allow you to “choose” a Form indirectly, especially when you bring that Forms Stats along and not do abusive Bullshite. On the other Hand, the Guy who asked for Wolves and end up wanting to summon Pseudodragons will end up with 8 Hamsters when I GM.
I think I’ve said this before but the biggest problem with conjure animals isn’t that “It takes too long to cast” it’s that it’s a trap spell, because it’s absolutely broken and trivializes most combat encounters. At level 3, you can conjure up to 4 creatures that can have multi attack and pack tactics and basically flip off every martial class, or how about instead of using an spell like entangle that is designed to be a control spell, you can just cast conjure animals and have the creatures grapple that enemy, now it’s a control spell. You see the problem, this spell is way too much power for a 3rd level spell, why would you want to use another spell over conjure animals. Which is why imo conjure animals should just be banned, I know it sounds extreme, but as someone who played a couple of campaigns as a druid and chose not to prepare conjure animals, it was a really fun because I was actively encouraged to utilize my other spells to their fullest instead of having to rely on conjure animals all the time. TL:DR just ban conjure animals. Edit: it’s a 3rd level spell, not a 2nd level spell, but I believe it’s still too powerful for being a level 3 spell.
Ok, but what if the Barbarian, Str Fighter, and Paladin are pissed because your cows are in EVERY melee space so they can’t reach, but also don’t want to play a stupid cow? Your cows have effectively taken 3 players out of combat so they can swarm the enemy. This spell is bad, no amount of cherrypicked arguments, graphs, and home game stories is going to change that. And for argument’s sake: -Maybe you have 3 javelins for range. That’s enough for 1 1/2 turns at level 5. Not to mention your swarm of useless is so large that it’s giving the enemies cover. -Paladin can’t Smite. And I don’t give af if you don’t like Smite, others do. And the Paladin Smiting isn’t going to get in your way, unlike a metric ton of cows or other animals. -Barbarian Rage bonus won’t apply to range. And honestly, if I’m playing a Barbarian, I don’t want to throw javelins. I want to get in there and tear shit up. -Some class features will only proc if you’re using melee attacks. Too bad there’s 9000 cows in your way. -Even if you’ve found a way to make it kinda go by quicker ONLINE, it does nothing for people at the table. -IT’S JUST NOT FUN. No one wants to sit and watch a group of animals fight the fight for you every encounter. Once would be funny, after that, just no. And if people are saying they don’t mind, it’s because they’re either too scared or nice to tell you otherwise.
Even when people try their best to be quick about Con Ani with 8 1/4 cr creatures, it’s been pretty unanimous at my tables that other players loath playing with this kind of character. I just removed the 1/4 and 1/2 cr creature option entirely and both my druid/ranger and the rest of my table were happier for it. Just understand your players and fix broken stuff in accordance to their expectations. Keep in mind, there are people who love this spell and will not be happy with changes that limit their character options so just talk to them beforehand. But you conjure animals is too strong and leads to staler combat.
I greatly dislike this spell much and ban it in every game I run. And when I don’t run I heavily lobby for the DM to ban it. It’s a problem spell, and that much is obvious to anyone with a pair of eyes and a brain. It’s obvious from the very fact that Kobold here advices you to talk to your DM before hand about using it so as not to “ambush” them with your spell selection. How many spells do you have to warn your DM about when you pick it? That alone should indicate that you’re not using a well-designed spell. Then comes the clutter. Even with all the methods Kobold showed here, it still clutters combat. Note the amount of preparations you have to make – write a macross for attacks and the like. Have to roll initiative separately (or roll it all in one block and risk rolling too high and roflstomp everything or too low for it not to mtter). Have to roll saves for all that bunch of creatures if they’re hit by AOE. Keeping track of all the hitpoints as they get injured. Move them individually. So on and so on. It becomes even worse when playing tabletop. Hell, it becomes practically unplayable there because all automation is absent. And you have to have experience with all this too – no way you’re not taking 5 minutes at the very least on your first try, even if you follow all this advice. Finally, it’s an unbalanced spell. You get it at lvl 5, and once you get it – you don’t need a fighter or a barbarian in your party. These things serve both as damage soakers and damage dealers far better than your ‘friends’.
I’m afraid you’re not going to find many RAWlords who are going to agree with you on the “the wording is similar to Polymorph” point, because Polymorph does use “chosen creature” at least once in its description. On top of that, the Sage Advice is that RAI the DM picks what you summon with Conjure Animals, and if they feel like screwing you over, they could have you summon 8 spiders or mice or something. This is a spell that you should work out with your DM beforehand. This is also a spell that will make or break a table for you. If there’s a lot of DM vs Player mentality going on, this spell simply is not viable. You’ll just waste a 3rd level spell slot summoning 8 useless fish. And if there’s a lot of DM vs Player mentality, you should probably leave the table anyway.
Rules as intended, Conjure Animals is beast of DMs choosing according to Sage Advice; media.wizards.com/2015/downloads/dnd/SA_Compendium_1.02.pdf. How I do it is – there are 33 beasts of CR 1/4 that are not a swarm – so I have the player roll a D33 and pick the one they rolled alphabetically (takes a couple of seconds), and then I have the beasts go right after the players turn (I suppose rolling initiative for them wouldn’t be THAT much of a hassle, but this simplifies it), and while I find an appropriate token, I ask the player to play them, effectively not stopping action for more than half a minute perhaps – with that exciting randomness of what beast will appear