Summons and Summoning

Summons as a system are altered from vanilla Third Edition sources in The Domains of Dread. Any spell or spell-like ability tagged as a summon are subject to the following, however companions granted to class archetypes which are explicitly not summons such as Artificer homunculi and golems or Hunter/Druid's animal companions are not governed by the below mechanics, existing outside of any summons that character may also have.

Summoning

At no time does a character ever summon a creature from another plane in the Realms of Terror using automatic mechanics such as those from spells, spell-like abilities or other class archetype features. It may be assumed these creatures are being taken from somewhere within the inhabited domain or across the demiplane without interfacing with anywhere beyond the Dread Material. As such true Outsiders may be summoned only through events as chaperoned by the Game Masters in response to prolonged and costly rituals, should the character or characters' call be answered at all let alone answered to their benefit.

Conjurations are summons, as well as acts of necromancy that coalesce spontaneous unlife. All summons in The Domains of Dread last until dismissed or destroyed. Summons are flavored to the inhabited domain ecology where feasible, potentially altering depending on whether the caster is in Barovia, Borca or Cordova.

Summoning Points

How many summons a character can have out at any one time depends on their current spellcasting ability, taking from the highest spell circle they are capable of casting at a 1:1 ratio before any other modifiers - for example, a Wizard who has 3rd Circle spells unlocked has 3 summoning points, or SP, to work with when using summoning spells. A summon takes a number of SP equal to the associated spell circle cast, so this hypothetical Wizard would empty their SP to 0 from casting summon monster III once, or summon monster I 3 times. SP is restored as would any other class archetype feature after successfully resting. Resting will unsummon any active summons.

SP is depleted from summoning using a spell slot, as a ritual, spell-like ability or from a scroll. Class archetypes that may be able to access spellcasting from scrolls using Handle Magical Device as might a Rogue will not be able to use scrolls of summoning unless they have the associated spellcasting levels to have the SP required to complete the summon.