The (not really) Official Endgame Summon Thread!

[sector24]

Ziz is "the" giant bird at the end of the world in Christian mythology, to go along with Behemoth on land and Leviathan in the Mediterranean. God will slay these creatures so that the righteous will have food and clothing and tents, and possibly giant foam (leather) #1 fingers.

Actually, I believe Ziz comes from the Gnostic tradition and therefore it isn't in the Bible. But the more obscure the creature, the cooler it is to have in the game.

Cerberus allows the shades of mortals to enter Hades, but never to leave. I would imagine him as creature with 3 bite attacks that do 3x damage to undead, probably with 2 misc slots. Is there such a thing as undead-awe? That would be a great ability.

[JimMorrison]

Ahh, I am back, and fed!


- Balrog: Well I only labelled it as a demon, because I am under the impression it is often thought of as one. Honestly, it would be just as well to drop the tag and let it be its own thing.

- Gorgon: I will fight for this one to the end. There were many gorgon (gorgii..?) though only one was "famous".

- Ettin/Cockatrice: I've never had great success with crossbreeding, you can actually get such things? I'm at a loss here.

- Sasquatch: Well yes, it's the western hemisphere version of the same idea as the Yeti. I was thinking bigger, and meaner though, like giant sized, rather than "big man" sized.

- Shishi: It is in fact the creature embodied by those lion statues. In D&D (if you ever played), it was called a Foo Creature, very powerful air spirit, sometimes portrayed with a long flowing body like a furry Chinese dragon/lion thing. I was in such a hurry though, it should have Awe on it.

- You could look at Cerberus as "just a dog", but it would be "just a dog" with fire and death magic most likely, and probably size 4. I would have it protected by barghest or hellhounds in combat.

- The Four Horsemen: ... Sector24, I love you. Even if they weren't quite as tough as a Seraph (how could they not? 4 of them will destroy the world.....), they would be so cool to summon. Only sad part being, there's not really anywhere to put them but in Death, or Blood.

- Sandworm: Arakkian sandworms would be HILARIOUS. Give it flight and trampling, to simulate it bursting up from the ground and swallowing people, SO cool.

- Grendel: Forgive me my poor literary exposure, but I've not read Beowulf. However, if the film (it was silly, I know) has ANY grounding in the original work whatsoever, then we'd at least know that Grendel is a hulking and deformed brute, and his mother is some sort of a water demon? Grendel may be hard to conceptualize, but "water demon" leaves something to work with, especially if we go the same route as with the Balrog, and consider her demon-like, but not an actual demon, and summoned through water rather than blood.



Kirin - A/N(or N/S) - Chinese unicorn/dragon sort of thing, recuperate, healing

Chupacabre - ?? - Oh come ON, just say yes, don't overanalyze it.


Hmmm, I'm tapped for the moment, but I think later I will go through the pretender selections a little more exhaustively..... As far as having more humanoid summons, it's really VERY hard to find "myths" of supernatural beings that aren't ultimately described simply as some type of demon, or angel. At least, if they are to be "end game" type of power, else the lesser types have by and large already been covered, ie satyrs and dryads and such.

[sector24]

Concerning Gorgons, here's the short version from Wikipedia:

Around 700 BC, Hesiod (Theogony, Shield of Heracles) increases the number of Gorgons to three—Stheno (the mighty), Euryale (the far-springer), and Medusa (the queen), and makes them the daughters of the sea-god Phorcys and of Keto.

So it would have to be like the elemental kings where you only get a maximum of two; but Euryale and Stheno are immortal unlike Medusa.

Concerning Grendel, he was immune to weapons, so Beowulf grappled him and ripped his arm off. Grendel ran off to his mother to die from his wound. All we can divine from that is Grendel was humanoid (meaning most or all of his equipment slots!). Grendel's mother did live in a lake, and Beowulf's magical armor protected him from her attacks, so she tried to drown him by dragging him to the bottom. However, no description is given so she could literally be anything.

[HoneyBadger]

Othernesses are more like the Colour out of Space than shuggoths.

Shuggoths were basically as described-big blobs of extremely muscular bubbles-strong enough infact to be used consistently as living engines for millenia-so like a pet dog powerful enough to run an automotives factory for a million years by running on a treadmill. They also had the ability to mutate at will-growing eyes, hands, mouths, whatever, but were initially created with no free will-mindless, formless slaves. They only developed free will gradually through chaotic evolution.

So maybe they could be another kind of shapeshifter that eventually turns into a form that can go rogue like the Eater of the Dead.

Before my computer died I was working on a summons for my Fthaggua nation that was meant to invoke C'thulhu, and compete with Tartarians. They'd be size 6 giants with 3 lifedraining tentacle attacks, most slots, and an insanity gaze-a bit like the Void Lord, but with only 1 astral, so you'd have to empower them a lot, or they'd be very vulnerable.

The Wendigo would make a good endgame SC-in Inuit myth, the Wendigo is this gigantic bloody red skeleton that hunts the arctic and freezes people solid that it comes across, and is basically the essense of fear-so maybe a critter with natural soul-vortex, high chill aura, and high fear? It's always struck me as very Lovecraftian, so it would be perfect for late-age Atlanteans.


The Lesser Key of Solomon
(a really good article can be found on Wikipedia)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lesser_Key_of_Solomon

is filled with really bizarre demon princes and kings-nothing like the standard "Balrog" types.

I love the idea of the dragon egg above, hatching and then growing over time. The way I'd do it would be to make the egg itself a sort of "doomsday weapon. It would be very tough but immobile, with a good strong fear aura, so that it would be pretty invulnerable and would benefit a defending army built around it. The dragon, once hatched, would be a rogue-again like the second form of the Eater of the Dead-so that you wouldn't necessarily want that egg to get hatched. The dragon would quickly become very powerful, instill enormous unrest, and in general be the world's biggest headache for all concerned, just like dragons in real world myths are supposed to be-forcing your enemies to consider the consequences of *winning* a particular battle, sort of the Dominions version of the A-bomb.

I'd still like to see a Niefel Jarl on a wooley rhinocerous-that's gotta be pretty hardcore SC.

Speaking of Niefels-how about giving them Surtr as a unique summon? Make him the fire version of a Niefel Jarl and arm him with a Jotun-sized fire brand.

Later versions of Jotunheim could get the giant Bolverk-blind in both eyes, with a limp, and quite old, but very impressive Forging bonus and otherwise decent stats. Comes with a hammer that curses whatever it hits.

Hel would make a good unique summon for Helheim-giant sized immortal necromancer/valkyrie with natural Awe and Fear, half beautiful goddess, half undead hag.

The egyptians had this god of the underworld that was this gigantic snake which had growing out of it's shoulders (snakes have shoulders? *shrug*) two *other* mummified humanoid gods, from the torso up. Seems perfect for a C'tis unique summon.

Also, just because something isn't humanoid doesn't mean it can't have slots-animals in particular can wear barding, for instance. And monsters can be ridden as mounts, also. Look at Dune-if you can ride a 400 meter long sandworm, what *can't* you ride?

By the way, H.P. Lovecraft wasn't the only writer who came up with a unique environment of monsterous/godly creations. Jack Vance's Dying Earth, William Hope Hodgeson's Night Lands, Michael Moorcock's Eternal Warrior, Fritz Leiber's Lankhmar, even Clive Barker's Imajica and Terry Pratchet's Discworld are all excellent sources for artificial mythology. Lovecraft, himself, credited being influenced by Lord Dunsany, M.R. James, Arthur Machen, and Algernon Blackwood. And just about every author of the period: Lovecraft, Tolkien, Robert E Howard, etc. etc. etc. was influenced by H. Ryder Haggard.

And one that wasn't, particularly, Mervyn Peake, who it seems to me drew more on Lewis Carroll-another fine source of myth, is one of the best.

So there's a lot of stuff out there to draw from, that can get us past the idea of "more of the same, only bigger"

And with Construction, we have the ability to create summonable units that fight smarter, instead of just harder. Easily summonable engines of war, as well as field defender units, become possibilities. Imagine a unique massive, mindless, mechanical spider-mech, ala Wild Wild West, which produces-instead of being destroyed by-flying mechanical hornets that move extremely fast and deal out death poison that can drop an elephant? Or a unique Watcher-themed unit that is GoR? Or a unique Electric Monk (ala Douglas Adams' Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency) that automatically casts Banishment, and doubles itself every combat round. Or submersibles that produce tough high seige bonus, high patrol bonus defenders, to take the place of PD when you're under water. Steamcannons could have unheard-of seige capabilities, move easily through any given terrain, and transform into artillery in combat, ala Starcraft. Maybe instead of larger mechanical men, they're size 1 instead, but have 4 attacks per round? Or a size 6 unit that does nothing but churn out a constant stream of longdead that have armour and weapons bolted directly to their bones? Or an "iron cobra" unit with high stealth and patrol bonus that can't fly but can reach any land province in a single turn, because of it's extremely high movement-rationaled in-game as "dimension-shifting".
No unstoppable juggernauts, no real SCs infact, but good solid units that fulfill a late-game need.

[JimMorrison]

Some really really cool ideas there, definitely some creative interesting stuff in the last paragraph particularly.

I'd mention though that the reason I was espousing the "more of the same, only bigger" concept, as well as the "just let us summon pretenders" concept, was to avoid arguments about design issues. Graphics aren't a problem with those more basic approaches, and balancing isn't SO hard when you are working with a formula that already works, just increasing some variables to plug it into a later position in the game.

Personally I'm all for really wacky, fun, distinctive summons, I just want to see things make it to the game, and preferably in an official capacity, as well.


Which reminds me, is Sombre's new avatar a prototype for a chupacabre?

[llamabeast]

Sombre's new Avatar is a Warhammer Skink, I believe.

Very nice post HB. I just read the Wikipedia article about wendigos. Very creepy!

[TheMenacer]

I really wish that the elemental kings/queens were better. I mean, they currently have like four paths in whatever their element is. There are recruitable mages that are better at casting elemental spells than the kings of those elements. It just doesn't sound right to me.

If it were me, I'd bump them up the conjuration tree and give them like seven or eight levels in their respective magics. Jack up their stats, and give them some cool #onebattlespell effects. Instead of the king of elemental fire being a sort of tough fire mage that nobody really gives a crap about, he could stroll into combat whipping out crazy high level fire magic without communions or boosters and auto-casting Heat From Hell via #onebattlespell to simulate the fact that the second he shows up everything for miles around starts lighting on fire.

I'm not really sure offhand how one could upgrade the others, particularly given that they should all have their own thing that sets them apart from one another. Offhand, one of the earth kings could #onebattlespell that earth magic that makes everyone take fatigue as they sink into the ground (I think it's earth grip, although thath might not be the whole battlefield version) and the Queen of Storms should probably autocast Storm.

The elemental royalty should be imposing as hell on their own, instead of just the one amphibious water queen and the earth kings being respectable SCs while the others make for desirable casters and not much else.

[MaxWilson]

Agreed about the wimpiness (as mages) of the elemental kings compared to recruitables. I'd like to see them boosted up to Conj-9 and given more magic, as you describe.

Earth could do #onebattlespell "Curse of Stones" and the other could do "Iron Bane".

-Max

[TheMenacer]

Well if you want to get right down to it, Grendel (and his mother) were descendants of the biblical Cain, so it could conceivably be awesome as hell to have Cain himself show up as a unique summon. Just imagine it, some guy with immortality strolling around beating the holy hell out of things much, much bigger than himself by virtue of his Blood Vengance +7 ability because of course, any harm inflicted upon his head will avenged sevenfold thanks to a curse placed upon him by God for murdering his brother.

Grendel himself of course was just a big nasty monster that couldn't be harmed by weaponry and lived in an underwater grotto, which suggests something big (size 3 or 4) amphibian monster with full human slots, high strength and high protection. Certainly summoning it through water would be doable considering that it was a natural, albeit magical, monster rather than a demon.

Also yes to chupacabre, I think it'd be pretty fantastic to dip into more modern supernatural myths rather than keeping strictly to epic fantasy. Imagine your herds of chuacabre causing unrest by virtue of the fact that they get bored hanging around in the garrisons all day and wander off to eat some goats, imagine a summon based on the Jersey Devil or some of the mythology surrounding the salem witch trial and 16-17th century superstitions surrounding witchcraft. Imagine a summon based on Spring-Heeled Jack (seriously, look him up on wikipedia, he's awesome).

[Endoperez]

Water/Earth, Construction 9 or Enchantment 8. Something equal to Machaka-only pretender Colossal Fetisch in stats, but it regenerates like the Claymen.


Or just size 4 Mechanical Man with 40 hp. Enc 0, full immunities, mindless, inanimate, mr at least 12. Weaknesses include being inanimate (Smasher) and magic being (Elf Bane) as well as armor-negating non-elemental damage. It also has no magic, so it can't self-buff, but with full immunities from the start I'm not sure if it needs anything.


Seasonal spirits. Every element can summon one. I think they'd be most easily covered by huge monsters. There's Winter Wolves, and then there's Son of Fenrer. They aren't limited by number, only by cost. Conjuration 9, level 6 in the path, 100 gems. Come with several suitable lesser creatures, like winter wolves, summer lions, green lions, spring hawks/rocs/ziz, whatever. I might do a quick mod, this is pretty simple stuff.


Nature: Look at Kithaironic Lion. 6 gems for 48 hp, prot 18, enc 1, mr 13, att 14, base def probably 12. Give it human slots, Caveman sprite and rename it Kithaironic Man and double the cost. It comes armed with a Great Club, has a bonus Great Fist attack that does few points of armor-piercing stun damage (str no added), and starts with Kithaironic Pelt, prot 10 no-slot armor, and has 50% cold and fire resist. Conjuration 8, probably, and Nature 5 I think. It's like Awaken Sleeper, but the sleeper is much older.
The Sleeper should be boosted slightly, as well. 36 hp instead of 26, enc 1 instead of 3, mapmove 4 instead of 2, and add forestsurvival, rejuvenation and sailing. Perhaps change the armor and shield into something slightly magical, like Silver Hauberk and Shield of Valor, and give him #onebattlespell Air Shield.

Or something like that.

EDIT:

If a size 6 Tartarian Monstrum can wear a helm than many other monster-types can be given head slot(s). Monster-types can also be given up to 4 misc slots, magical paths and good base equipment/stats/abilities at an attractive price. There are plenty of variables to adjust so they can compete.

Yeah, I had something like that in mind for the seasonal spirits. 3 misc slots, no head slots, come with lots of lesser creatures, and have 7 to 9 picks in magic, total.