Smoking is hazardous to your train of thought. *ahem*
That said, I believe there's a relation between Summoning and Luck. I appear to get a higher success rate at a higher Luck dominion, but since I usually always take luck 2 or 3 (because me likes), I might be subjectively biased.
I also like and use Shambler Thralls. They're quite good as a secondary attack force. Place your fodder to the front, and your Shamblers a few spaces behind with attack closest. The fodder takes the pain, the Shambler dish out. This is great against both tritons and barbarians.
Just keep them away from evil archers.
That's not to say I know anything about playing R'lyeh, but they were the first race I won Dom II against impossible AI with, completely without constructing anything.
