In order to summon, you must acquire a summoning contract with a type of animal. This can be any animal, so feel free to be creative in choosing your animal and his/her name.
Once you have a rank upgrade for summoning, you can then take a feat to summon an animal. Costs for the animal are either 20 CP or 40 CP. The cost of summoning an animal depends on: 1.) your chakra control levels, 2.) the number of feats allocated to each summon, and 3.) what you intend to do with your summon.
A summon can last only so long as they have enough CP of their own, and their CP degrades each turn. A small summons (20 CP) loses CP at a rate of 5 CP/round of combat, whereas a large summons (40 CP) loses CP at a rate of 10 CP/round of combat.
You may set up multiple summons for your character, however each summon requires it's own feat(s).
Stats
A 20 CP summons has 40 SP and a 40 CP has 80 SP. These SP follow conventional rules but are spread across the following stats: strength, speed, chakra control, and endurance. The amount of chakra (CP) is determined by how much is spent to summon the animal, as well as if additional feats have been invested to boost the summon's CP.
Note that unlike with characters, a summon will not suffer negative consequences if it's CC is 0, but it does need appropriate CC if it is going to use jutsu!
A second feat can be used to add another 40 SP to a summons, and an additional size buff feat grants +5 str and +5 endurance.
Jutsu and special abilities
Feats can be used to give your summons additional abilities and more CP.
A feat can be used to give your summon the ability to use jutsu that would fall under a rank upgrade (water release, fire release, genjutsu, poison techniques). If you allocate one feat to the purpose of granting jutsu use to your summon, you receive 4 “points” that can be used to “purchase” jutsu. Basic jutsu costs 1 point, intermediate costs 2 points, and taxing techniques cost 4 points. Normal rules for jutsu costs apply, as do CC requirements for using basic, intermediate, and taxing jutsu.
A feat could also be used to grant your summons more CP, so they can use more jutsu during a mission. An animal that has been summoned receives CP + 1 for their use in battle. A 20 CP summon therefore would have 21 CP at their disposal, whereas a 40 CP summon would have 41 CP to use. An additional feat can be allocated to double the summon’s base CP, i.e. a feat allocated to a 20 CP summon grants them 41 CP.
Restrictions
There is a rank restricted cap on the number of feats that can be allocated to a single summon animal, with 1 feat per rank. Genin = 1 (this is the feat invested to summon the creature), chunin = 2 (summon + one additional feat), jonin = 3 (summon + 2 augments), s-rank = 4 (summon + 3 augments), kage = 5 (summon + 4 augments).
Furthermore, summons are limited to 20 CP versions until the rank of jonin.
Summons cost a minimum of 20 CP (and require a CC of at least 9). 40 CP summons require a CC of at least 13.
Summons that have 2 or more feats added to them must cost 40 CP to summon (and the user must have a CC of at least 13). This comes more into play at jonin level when you can have a summon and two additional feats augmenting it.
Winged summons will need to take a feat to use flight abilities in combat, though this will not eat into the summons CP. This feat will also not count towards the usual limits of summons feats.
Summons do not have their own equipment. However, you may take equipment and allocate it for your summon and/or transfer it to them.
Reverse summoning is not allowed as a feat.
Example
User takes the rank upgrade summoning contract: crows
User then takes a feat: Crakaw the Crow [20 CP] and configures the 40 SP as he sees fit.
On its own, Crakaw can fight in battle with you and has 21 CP, which allows for him to fight for 4 rounds.
If the user is a chunin, he/she can then add as a feat: Summon CP Boost
Crakaw now has 41 CP and can fight for 8 rounds.
When the user gains another rank and advances to jonin, he/she can add another feat, such as: Summon Fire Release to grant the ability to use a limited (and specified) set of fire release jutsu. Another alternative would be Summon Strength Boost, to increase the amount of damage that summon could do. Since 2 feats have now been invested in the summons, the user will need to use 40 CP to summon Crakaw. Crakaw will have 82 CP, can fight for up to 8 rounds (10 CP/round maintenance cost), and if granted fire release abilities, can use that CP to cast jutsu against opponents.
Legendary items for summons
A summons animal can acquire legendary weapons for use in combat. This is subject to additional restrictions:
- Legendary weapons must be acquired via mission.
- Only the summons gifted with the legendary weapon may use the item; the summoner cannot, nor can it be shared with other summons.
- Limited to 1 summon per summoner.
- This is S-rank restricted.
- 1 feat is required for having the weapon.
- 1 feat is required for the weapon's single passive ability. This must be cleared with the ephors. If it requires CP, then the summon must have sufficient CC and it always draws from the summon's CP pool.
- Both feats dedicated to the weapon count towards the feat limits of summons.
- Summons that acquire a legendary weapon are limited in that they cannot take a CP boosting feat as well