I loved the skill since batch 2 (batch 1, i got to level 9 and stopped). Even the low leveled familiars are useful, especially to low leveld players. I doubt you need 50 combat to get 19 summoning, yet you can summon a familiar 50 combat to aid you in fights. The spirt wolf can scare away revs, the dreadfowl can boost farming until the compost mound and it aids you using magic. The spirt spider can help your herblore and can get a bit of cash for low levels. The thorny snail is a Beast of burden and any extra inventory helps. The rock crab is a free defence boost, even in single combat, that also helps you fish and can produce its own secondary ingredient (so as long as you gain 1 gold charm or its worth from it, you make a gain!). A snake that helps low level miners. And a scorpion that can add poision to your weapons. And thats only the first few levels! Summoning is amazing.

Spirit Wolf's special is hit and miss, and most multi-combat areas are dangerous for under fifties. The rock crab's defense boost scrolls are probably not worth the inventory space and does NOT collect it's secondary. The snake's special is worthless- it digs three ore's in the time it takes to mine four. The scorpion is worthless. The problem is, most low levels, particularly newbies, won't have either access or charms to train summoning. So, when you can finally summon these familiars, their sub par abilities become even more so.

I didn't care how bad Summoning started off as. It made the red 126 above my head go up, so I was happy. Also, because I no lifed so much at the start for a bigger red number, I got my first front page high score ever. For a while, I had envisioned that the 126 level cap would eventually pop like a soda cap. I was overjoyed on December 20, 2007 when I saw that it would indeed pop and go to 138. Got my 138 in October, but still a ways from 99. All in all a great skill that ties in nicely with my favorite skill, Slayer.

Summoning is probably one of the most useful skills in the game, even at 52! It's even relatively easy to train, if you do it right. Just 30k more exp and I can get a fruit bat- free money for NO effort!

 

 

 

And a fun fact- When summoning came out, I bought 100k empty pouches. I've used only 2,045 pouches!*,** I have about 300 Terrorbird pouches and 3000 of the scrolls, as well as 217 stranger plant pouches. So that ~8000 pouches right there! Most of the others were probably traded to Bog'rog. I can't wait till I get a godbird \

 

 

 

*hooray for penguins! Hooray for Juna! Hoory for genie!

 

**I could have used my 400K exp from WGS to skip an entire 6 levels, but NOOOOO, I was to [procreating] impatient/lazy/idiotic to wait another 2 levels; I blew it on HUNTER :wall: :wall: :wall:

 

Rofl, I did the exact same thing. I bought 150k pouches (to make sure my pouch stack is in white writing :lol: ), I think I've used 12k pouches since then.

 

 

 

Can anyone imagine what summoning would be like if they didn't change the renewal? This brought me to insanity within ~3 days (to anyone who doesn't remember, summons did not slowly drain your points back then, instead, all summons had a 2min timer and you had to renew them every 2mins, which used points, or they'd disappear). Would we even use summons in typical training anymore? Or would they remain there for powertrainers and boss hunters? I personally can say I wouldn't bother with Titans, Hydras, Bunyips or anything else in my slaying.

What's there to discuss? You just told us what we knew..

How about you flame less, and read the title more. Your bad additude is the reason of Global Warming as well tbh.

 

 

 

lol i geddit flames are hot :thumbup:

 

 

 

but on topic... i have to say i love summoning it may not be my higest stat... well okay its my lowest with con and farming but i still enjoy it i like having a familiar follow me around and i really really want the ent it looks awesom cep there a massive requirment for it so basically it sucks to be me.

 

 

 

great skill imo but more of a higer level rich guy one.

 

 

 

i got 100k pouches to :thumbsup: \ i wanted another object to be read in the k's and i figured summoning pouches were 1gp ea so why not???

summoning is....awsome.

 

i got lots of nice pets just to show off, and familiars to use every day.

 

1) fishing familiars (atm granite lobster) - great long fishing boost togheter with enought forge to refuound the cost and even profit from them :thumbsup:

 

2) spirit terrorbird&war tortoise - stb when i need to run alot, helped me alot in money make (And very cheap also) while war tortoise made me take alot of food to places as wyverns to kill the most i could :P

 

3) bunyip helped me in so many slayer tasks...no need to bank even once at task with just change of 2 pouches FTW?! needless to say how usefull he is.

 

4) pyrelord. some people says it lowers the fm rate, but it saved me maples...think on it in long way to 99 fm you get saved almost 10k maples, and i got him to almost fast speed wich is almost reg fm :shock:

 

5) fire titan. he's my next target i need less than 100 crimsons to achieve, prob this weedend. he's gonna help me in tormented demons. heals, so i can stay very long, and togheter with it hit him with magical attacks! more godswords hits? 8-)

 

 

 

theres still things i'm going to get in 2009, including the legendry unicorn stallion, pack yak and steel titan, everybody have nice year full of summoning :D

Yes I was initially shocked when Summoning first came out. Jagex has always been known to devote tons of effort to developing new skills. The best updates to runescape are new skill updates because jagex takes so much time perfecting them.

 

 

 

Some would argue farming was flawed, perhaps even boring when it first came out. I disagree; players at the time were not used to a patient skill, and I'm very glad jagex introduced something like that. Sometimes when things go by so fast in runescape, you just want to settle down and farm.

 

 

 

However Summoning looked liked it hadn't been thought out at all. I almost lost confidence in jagex; how could you trust them with regular updates if they could not even get a new skill update right? Luckily they realized their mistakes quickly and fixed them, instead of being the sometimes-stubborn blokes they are.

 

 

 

You know back in late 2008 I was a true jagex-hater. It appeared with the RWT updates jagex had destroyed both skilling and pking. What was worst of all, some RWT managed to survive. I was furious at jagex; I joined in on rant threads and flamed jagex for their wrongdoing. But now I see my mistake- I was just acting like a cranky old grampa who had had the world change around him in the blink of an eye. I settled now and tried to think: the new generation of players who joined after the RWT updates would have had no taste of the original runescape, and would therefore have nothing to miss. So I decided to join this new generation of players (for after all, I'm not a grampa IRL) and act like runescape just opened up Jan 2, 2008.

Overall for me, summoning is one of my favorite skills to train. Right now I'm 85, going for the elusive 88 for the legendary unicorn stallion, which will help me out during slayer, godwars, theiving and the list goes on. Before the summoning 2 update, I got to level 16 from the charms from the quest and then gave up. I absolutely hated summoning because of the lack of familiars and the fact that familiars were only around 2 minutes until you had to renew them.

 

 

 

I quit shortly after summoning came out and came back sometime in June and was delighted to find out that the summoning batch 2 had finally came out. I immediately checked out the runescape site and saw what the new update had to offer. I was simply amazed that at level 52, there was a bird that would carry 12 items for you, and recharge your energy offering unlimited running. Even better, at level 68 there was a "bunyip" that would heal you 2 hp every 15 seconds, almost deleting the need for food during slayer!

 

 

 

I started collecting charms and slowly but surely trained my levels up. I was thrilled when I achieved the bull ant, but really wanted the Spirit Terrobird. I kept training constantly and got to 52, but really wanted 68 for the bunyip. I still remember to this day getting 68 summoning at 113 combat, and thinking the bunyip was the coolest familiar in the world. THe next goal was obviously 79, although I wasn't too thrilled with the titans. Now I want 88 more than ever, and I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

 

 

 

Summoning can be pretty intimidating to train, since the price to get levels is pretty high. Most people under level 100 probably don't have much higher than 30 or 40, but take my word for it that summoning is worth every penny (gp). Another thing I was worried about was that my combat level would be inflated because of my extra summoning levels, but now I could honestly care less :mrgreen: With the addition of the split combat levels in PvP summoning hardly makes any difference now.

Oh my. Summoning version 2. Its brilliant :D. I have played this game for many years (around 6½) and I have never seen anything as usefull as summoning. I love using it (I used it more or less for everything I do in rs) and I love talking about it :P (just ask Mercifull)

 

 

 

When version 2 came out I was around 80 trying to get all my stats to 80+. I did not find summoning usless, but it could be VERY annoying to use as one have to concentrate on timer etc. But when version 2 came out I ended up powertraining it for 8-9 months at waterfiends. The thing about this is, I ALWAYS get bored with combat after a small period of time, so this was almost the hardest thing I ever did in rs. Using familiars for combat things like slayer was helpfull for me (being 114 when summoning came out) from around lvl 83 where the lava titan can hit 19 and has a quite nice magic special attack. I found that he did indeed speed up my tasks. Of couse it was not before Iron titan and up that summoning almost seemed to be overpowered in the combat part :P

 

 

 

I did not lose money on it, waterfiends was very nice to me, noted orbs (made millions on crafting those) Mithril arrows (millions here too) and clues. I did a clue each 50-100 waterfiends i killed, this is a lot of money when you go for 99, even if you have unlucky clues :). I am also sure that if I DID pk i would be able to use summoning very much for my own benefits :)(steel titan in multi combat, pack yak to hold food in single for instance)

 

 

 

Summoning is not perfect. The AI can be really bad when you use it in combat, but there are ways around it. Also when you get higher lvl combat familiars it seems a waste to use them to fight your monster when your familiar can hit up to 96. So I make sure a lot of monsters attack me at the same time and then let my titan fight his own monsters. This to me at least is a very usefull way to do it.

 

 

 

I agree that charms should be possible to get with skills to :) just have to be same speed/price as combat in my oppinion.

 

 

 

That potions are more or less useless is true. When fighting with a bunyip for 4 hours or so I only use 2 doses of a potion.

 

 

 

As for the combat lvl being increased I as a non pker really dont see the problem. When I fight in multi combat with my titan I kill things a hell of a lot faster then when I do not use them. When I fight in single combat areas I can stay a hell of a lot longer with summoning then without (from 8 max to 15+ mithril dragons using melee as an excample) And when I do duel from time to time, even in what many would call inferior armor me and my titan kills MOST people who attacks us (unless they use dragon claws, those are nasty :P).

 

 

 

Maybe if it does not work well in clan wars as someone mentioned there is something wrong with clan wars...and not summoning?

 

 

 

Well this is my personal oppinion and I enjoy using summoning.

 

 

 

/Thrawn

I had a really nifty idea for making combat familiars more useful, give them command lines in the summoning tab, Agressive(Runs around and always in combat), Defensive(as it currently is, defending your summoner) and Passive (doing nothing, exept scrolls when commanded).

I had a really nifty idea for making combat familiars more useful, give them command lines in the summoning tab, Agressive(Runs around and always in combat), Defensive(as it currently is, defending your summoner) and Passive (doing nothing, exept scrolls when commanded).

 

 

 

I like this.

I had a really nifty idea for making combat familiars more useful, give them command lines in the summoning tab, Agressive(Runs around and always in combat), Defensive(as it currently is, defending your summoner) and Passive (doing nothing, exept scrolls when commanded).

 

 

 

Yes it IS a good idea, I just think Jagex would dislike the idea of your familiar running around hitting on everything that other people are fighting? I think this is why they have not done this yet?

I would like an option Attack with familiar under Attack option ...

It was a very nice read, extended I would see it more as a tip.it article then a general discussion thread.

I had a really nifty idea for making combat familiars more useful, give them command lines in the summoning tab, Agressive(Runs around and always in combat), Defensive(as it currently is, defending your summoner) and Passive (doing nothing, exept scrolls when commanded).

 

 

 

Yes it IS a good idea, I just think Jagex would dislike the idea of your familiar running around hitting on everything that other people are fighting? I think this is why they have not done this yet?

 

It could avoid monsters that are attacked by others, and when there are no more it attacks some monster attacking you. The idea is that you will get a mob on to you, allowing you to get faster kills.

Nice review.

Nice review. I'm still level one summoning. I don't know why but I just don't train it :P

I had a really nifty idea for making combat familiars more useful, give them command lines in the summoning tab, Agressive(Runs around and always in combat), Defensive(as it currently is, defending your summoner) and Passive (doing nothing, exept scrolls when commanded).

 

 

 

Yes it IS a good idea, I just think Jagex would dislike the idea of your familiar running around hitting on everything that other people are fighting? I think this is why they have not done this yet?

 

It could avoid monsters that are attacked by others, and when there are no more it attacks some monster attacking you. The idea is that you will get a mob on to you, allowing you to get faster kills.

 

 

 

That might work ;) Great idea.

 

 

 

Thats what I do, get a bunch of them attacking me and then titan takes care of some of them himself. Would be nice if this was automated a bit :)

I had a really nifty idea for making combat familiars more useful, give them command lines in the summoning tab, Agressive(Runs around and always in combat), Defensive(as it currently is, defending your summoner) and Passive (doing nothing, exept scrolls when commanded).

 

 

 

Yes it IS a good idea, I just think Jagex would dislike the idea of your familiar running around hitting on everything that other people are fighting? I think this is why they have not done this yet?

 

It could avoid monsters that are attacked by others, and when there are no more it attacks some monster attacking you. The idea is that you will get a mob on to you, allowing you to get faster kills.

 

 

 

That might work ;) Great idea.

 

 

 

Thats what I do, get a bunch of them attacking me and then titan takes care of some of them himself. Would be nice if this was automated a bit :)

 

 

 

That'd be awesome. I hate calling the familiar for every monster i attack.

nice review- summoning is great, but i could name about 20 things that would make it better...

 

 

 

to start they could make the titans actualy attack and not dance for 20min while i get the kill

[hide=Quote Train]

I had a really nifty idea for making combat familiars more useful, give them command lines in the summoning tab, Agressive(Runs around and always in combat), Defensive(as it currently is, defending your summoner) and Passive (doing nothing, exept scrolls when commanded).

 

 

 

Yes it IS a good idea, I just think Jagex would dislike the idea of your familiar running around hitting on everything that other people are fighting? I think this is why they have not done this yet?

 

It could avoid monsters that are attacked by others, and when there are no more it attacks some monster attacking you. The idea is that you will get a mob on to you, allowing you to get faster kills.

 

 

 

That might work ;) Great idea.

 

 

 

Thats what I do, get a bunch of them attacking me and then titan takes care of some of them himself. Would be nice if this was automated a bit :)

[/hide]

 

 

 

I really want them to just make using combat familiars easier, and the ability to be more in-control of what your familiar does. This would be a great idea. An attack option to target a specific monster would also be great, along with an auto-retaliate option.

It's one of my favorite skills because of how useful it is. The extra healing and inventory slots makes it very compatible with both combat and skilling.

for the Epic Failure

 

 

 

 

 

this made me re-evaluate the post. I simply went back and reread this and realized this post wasn't really that good. Its entirely bias. And in my opinion stupid.

 

 

 

some points that were made do hold valid. However the majority of opinionated things seemed to be, said in almost a selfish manner. The way the first batch was criticized so harshly was not even needed. That was thing, after jagex introduced the stuff they understood things needed to be adjusted and, honestly. They probably made summoning the way it was so that it was not over powered or caused HUGE glitched/crashes in the: economy, pvp area's, and leveling up of the skill.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I don't know how Runescape was before Summoning. It's just helped so much this year, I don't know how it was possible to play without it.

 

 

 

 

 

honestly, it wasnt much different. If you ever watched low levels who go every where with armor and you see high levels running around in boots of lightness. Its because, personally it seems we have realized the armor slows you down and we have no need to be so overly prepared(i guess?)

 

 

 

it has made things easier, now i dont use guthans. And i used to for alot of thing. I used to bank more commonly when doing a farming run. Run energy potions where made and used occasionaly.

 

 

 

 

 

its not like summoning was the do all, end all skill. It just has affected the tiny spots immensely, like the running around. That stuff is awesome, i have loved the bull ant/terror bird since its release.

funny you didn't mention combat. it saved runescape from flooding with maxed lvled players.

wow its been a year alrdy ?!?! jeez.......i feel like im gettin old or nit playing much or my time is being took up..............god i fell like it jsut came out a few months ago....

 

 

 

i miss My lazy high school years >.<

 

gf summoning you truly made your title bold

 

 

 

now foe the new skill(z) of 2009!

I wonder what 2009 (the update year) will bring for summoning. Allthough the skill is great, it can use a few minor adjustments that make summoning just that little bit better.