Summon Mastery 0.1.0

Summoned creatures grow stronger with the upgrade rank of the weapon that creates them. Nearby following summons can accompany you through portals without being replaced or healed.

Initial development release for Valheim 1.0.7. Build, offline rules/API checks and plugin initialization in Valheim have been verified. Combat balance, portal travel and multiplayer still need gameplay validation. See the verification report.

Scaling

Rank means the weapon's upgrade quality, not Blood Magic level or creature stars. Bonuses interpolate from unchanged stats at rank 1 to these configurable maximums:

For a weapon with four upgrade ranks:

The intention is strong same-biome support at maximum rank, especially Dead Raiser skeletons in the Mistlands. These are initial tuning defaults, not a verified balance claim. Existing Blood Magic, star, resistance and world-difficulty effects remain in place. Armor still allows damage: an isolated 100-damage slash hit becomes 65 after the added 35 armor, before considering other effects. Damage restarts the healing delay. No immunity, resurrection, attack-speed increase, or unlimited summon count is added.

Each creature records the casting weapon's rank and bonuses when summoned. Changing weapons or upgrading the staff afterward does not change existing summons. Configuration changes apply to newly summoned creatures. Recorded bonuses survive normal world reloads and network ownership changes without multiplying repeatedly.

Creature coverage

• Dead Raiser melee skeletons and archers use the game's SpawnAbility path covered here.
• The same hook covers other weapon-created creatures using SpawnAbility, including Trollstav's summoned troll when the weapon is passed through the normal projectile chain.
• Original factions and hostility are preserved: a hostile summoned troll becomes stronger too and is not converted into a friendly portal companion.
• Direct attacks, attack-generated projectiles/areas and independent owned area effects are covered. Attack-generated areas are not multiplied twice.
• Wild creatures, ordinary pets, enemy summons, and spawned effects without a creature are excluded. Third-party summoning implementations that bypass SpawnAbility or omit the casting weapon need an explicit integration; universal mod compatibility is not claimed.
• Existing summons from before installing the mod cannot reveal which weapon rank created them. Summon them once with this mod loaded to enable tracking and portal support.

Portal travel

Enabled by default. At departure, gather living, tamed summons within 30 meters that are actively following their original summoner. Waiting creatures and other players' summons stay behind. No extra eitr or health cost is charged.

The player's normal portal checks run first. When teleporting finishes, move each existing summon network record to the player's exit point. Preserve its identity, health, equipment, skill scaling and normal lifetime. Source-area unloading is handled through the existing network record; the mod never creates a substitute creature. A creature that dies during travel stays dead. Large summons/group collision at cramped or elevated exits need testing.

Distance dismissal and apparent-owner-logout dismissal are suspended for the gathered summons for at most 45 seconds during the journey. Failed travel leaves them behind; ordinary death and summon limits still apply, and normal distance/logout rules resume after the journey. If you want them to come along, keep them close and following. Portals do not make summons persist after logout.

The hook follows successful distantTeleport calls, also used by some portal mods and console teleport commands. It does not bypass item restrictions or add new destinations. Compatibility with TargetPortal remains untested.

Installation

Install Summon Mastery through r2modman or Thunderstore Mod Manager, then start modded. Keep the package enabled. If migrating from a manual copy, remove that copy first so the plugin does not load twice.

For manual installation:

1. Exit Valheim normally before changing plugin files.
2. Put SummonMastery.dll in the intended profile's BepInEx/plugins/SummonMastery folder. Only one copy should be active.
3. Start the intended profile through r2modman -> Start modded.
4. First launch creates BepInEx/config/local.summonmastery.cfg.

BepInEx 5 is required. Jotunn is not required. A manual DLL is not included in normal r2modman profile exports; send the DLL separately if sharing the profile.

For multiplayer, install this version on every client and the server. Damage and AI can run on different peers, so a client-only install is insufficient. Per-creature values are stored in its normal replicated/save data; use matching configuration on every client to give newly created summons consistent bonuses. There is no server-enforced configuration or version handshake in this development build. Multiplayer has not been verified.

To remove, close Valheim and remove only this DLL. Config and unrelated plugins can remain. Spawned creatures' saved maximum health can remain until the game recalculates it; for a clean return to vanilla, dismiss mod-created summons before uninstalling. No game assembly is patched on disk.

Source and issue reports: GitHub.

Changelog

0.1.2

• Add opt-in Scaling / Exclude Trollstav, off by default. New Trollstav summons keep normal stats but remain tracked for dismissal. Existing summons retain their recorded stats.

• Add opt-in Summoning / Spirit Caller wolves only, off by default.

• Restrict new Spirit Caller casts to its existing ghost wolf prefab while preserving normal costs, summon limits and Summon Mastery behavior.

• Preserve shared prefab pools and other weapons, restore selection after each coroutine step, and fall back to normal selection if the ghost wolf is unavailable.

• Verified the actual weapon-to-spawn-ability asset link and four-creature pool.

• Build, API checks and 59 rules/coroutine checks passed; live wolves-only casting and Trollstav exclusion unverified.

0.1.1

• Add configurable dismissal shortcut, default O, with optional modifiers or None to disable.
• Dismiss the requesting player's tracked summons across the world, including waiting, hostile and unloaded creatures; preserve other players' summons and ordinary pets.
• Block the shortcut during text entry, menus, inventory, map, death and teleportation.
• Validate ownership on the server and remove summons without death drops or skill rewards.
• All clients and servers must update to 0.1.1 to use dismissal. Live input and multiplayer dismissal remain unverified.

0.1.0

• Add weapon-rank scaling for summoned creature health, regeneration, armor, movement and damage.
• Preserve Blood Magic and normal summon limits, faction and lifetime rules.
• Add optional travel for nearby following summons using existing network identities.
• Add configurable maximum bonuses and regression/API checks.
• Initial development build; live gameplay and multiplayer validation pending.