Summoning

[Huqhox]

Monster summoning is one of those things that crops up from time to time. Some people thing summoners should only summon lower level monsters (because how could they order a higher level monster to come and fight), while the ability to summon higher level monsters is entirely justified by it being seen as a 'call for help'.

Recent discussions around how Ringwraiths summon, and now the changes in the latest feature/monster branch where some summoned monsters vanish when the summoner is killed and the concept of bodyguards lead me to thinking: Why do we have (essentially) one summon mechanic. Why not have more? This would make monsters more interesting and different as well as being useful from a thematic point of view.

So you could have some different ones like (names are pretty random)

Summon minions: Summons only lesser monsters which act like bodyguards
Summon assistance: As current summon, so may attract higher level monsters
Conjure monster: Summoned monsters (usually constructs etc) vanish when the summoner is killed
Call for help: Summons a monster but not adjacent to the summoner but somewhere else on the level, awake and heading for the position of the summoner. This one is really for Ringwraiths but could find other uses I'm sure

This is just a suggestion while we are looking at the monster list. It might be worth discussing and seeing if this will work or not