Last week, we took a look at the lowest level spell to conjure monsters to fight on your behalf: conjure animals. Today, we are skipping to the opposite extreme and going to the highest level spell that lets you have help from beyond (other than gate): conjure celestial.

Conjure Celestial

7th-level conjuration
Casting Time: 1 minute
Range: 90 feet
Components: V, S
Duration: Concentration, up to 1 hour
You summon a celestial of challenge rating 4 or lower, which appears in an unoccupied space that you can see within range. The celestial disappears when it drops to 0 hit points or when the spell ends.
The celestial is friendly to you and your companions for the duration. Roll initiative for the celestial, which has its own turns. It obeys any verbal commands that you issue to it (no action required by you), as long as they don’t violate its alignment. If you don’t issue any commands to the celestial, it defends itself from hostile creatures but otherwise takes no actions.
The GM has the celestial’s statistics.
At Higher Levels: When you cast this spell using a 9th-level spell slot, you summon a celestial of challenge rating 5 or lower.

First point to notice about this spell versus conjure animals is that you can only bring one creature. With conjure animals, you can bring a greater number of lower level creatures, using them as cannon fodder if need be. This spell, however, you can only call in one creature. So you are going to want to make sure it is exactly the creature you want for the situation.

The next point to note is that you are limited to creatures of challenge 4 or below (5 if you cast it as a 9th level spell). As a 7th-level spell (which you have to be 13th level to cast in the first place), you can either call upon a single celestial for 1 hour that is of a difficulty that your group was defeating 9 levels prior. At a time when you can cast plane shift, regenerate, and resurrection, this spells seems under-powered. However, this can be countered be a large number of creatures with a wide variety of abilities that you can call upon. Which brings me to the most important point concerning with this spell…

There are not that many creatures that qualify for this spell. Like I mentioned you are limited to Challenge 4 and below (5 if you don’t need to use true resurrection today). In the MM, these are all the creatures this spell can conjure: couatl (Challenge 4), pegasus (Challenge 2), and a unicorn (Challenge 5). That’s it. If there were a spell called conjure fiend for an evil cleric (which, I assume there is), that cleric would have 11 creatures to summon (16 if cast as a 9th-level spell). That is more than 5 times as many. Sure the MM is designed with things to kill in mind, but there should be more options available.

That is a large oversight that needs corrected. Follow us at JonBrazer.com as we create some celestials just for you. Every Wednesday we showcase either a new monster or one from our adventures or monster books. We are working on some monsters for your to conjure (whether for this spell or the others that we are coming here).

Support our efforts to create monsters for you. Download Book of Beasts: Monsters of the Forbidden Woods today direct from us for your Fifth Edition game here at JonBrazer.com. You can also find it at DriveThruRPG/RPGNow, Paizo, and the Open Gaming Store.

Last week, we started a series on the summon monster spells for Pathfinder. Summoning works differently in Fifth Edition and I thought it would be a good idea to take a few moments to discuss the spells one by one. Today, let’s start with the lowest level one: conjure animals, a third level spell for druids and rangers. This spell reads:

Conjure Animals

3rd-level conjuration
Casting Time: 1 action
Range: 60 feet
Components: V, S
Duration: Concentration, up to 1 hour
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
• Two beasts of challenge rating 1 or lower
• Four beasts of challenge rating 1/2 or lower
• Eight beasts of challenge rating 1/4 or lower

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. Roll initiative for the summoned creatures as a group, which has its own turns. 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 GM has the creatures’ statistics.
At Higher Levels: When you cast this spell using certain higher-level spell slots, you choose one of the summoning options above, and more creatures appear: twice as many with a 5th-level slot, three times as many with a 7th-level slot, and four times as many with a 9th-level slot.

Alright, that’s all good, but what can you conjure up. Lets start with the creatures in the PHB (ignoring anything less than CR 1/4).

• CR 2: —
• CR 1: brown bear, dire wolf, giant eagle, giant spider, lion, tiger
• CR 1/2: black bear, crocodile, reef shark, war horse
• CR 1/4: boar, constrictor snake, panther, riding horse, wolf

You’ll notice there is nothing in the CR 2 range for this. That is not a mistake; there are no “beasts” in the PHB of CR 2. How about the MM (in order they appear in the book, ignoring any options in the PHB):

• CR 2: allosaurus (dinosaur), plesiosaurus (dinosaur), giant boar, giant constrictor snake, giant elk, hunter shark, polar bear, rhinoceros, saber-toothed tiger
• CR 1: giant hyena, giant octopus, giant toad, giant vulture
• CR 1/2: ape, giant goat, giant sea horse, giant wasp, reef shark
• CR 1/4: pteranodon (dinosaur), axe beak, draft horse, elk, giant badger, giant bat, giant centipede, giant frog, giant lizard, giant owl, giant poisonous snake, giant wolf spider

Total: CR 2 has nine creatures to conjure, CR 1 has ten, CR 1/2 has nine and CR 1/4 blows the rest away with seventeen.

Personally, I feel that for the first conjuring spell, there should be more options at the highest power level. Once I am done going through the conjure spells, I will be creating more creatures for you to summon.

When you conjure up a creature, make sure you are first playing an awesome race. Go beyond the ordinary and download Book of Heroic Races: Player Races 2 today at the Jon Brazer Enterprises Shop. Also find it at DriveThruRPG/RPGNow, Paizo, and the Open Gaming Store.