Summoner

(BattleTech)

A 70-ton clan OmniMech. (Inner Sphere scum call this one Thor.)

Summoner is often seen as the pair of Timber Wolf. Like Timber Wolf, Summoner is an excellent 'Mech to deal damage with in many different situations.

Summoner is a relatively large 'mech. It's bipedal, and has sort of a "non-symmetrical" appearance. The cylindrical missile launcher on the shoulder makes it look a bit like the venerable Hunchback design.

In most of the configurations, Summoner has very good heat dissipation. Weapons sing, and you can barely feel the heat building up!

The most common configurations found in the battlefield are the Prime and A. The Prime configuration has LB 10-X Autocannon, LRM-15 and an ER PPC. The A configuration has a SRM-6, a Gauss rifle and a large pulse laser. Both are pretty deadly; Prime is pretty curious because it doesn't have any lasers.

B configuration, much rarer than Prime or A, is a missile-crazy star commander's best friend: Two LRM-20s, two SRM-4s, anti-missile system and a Narc beacon launcher. Does not sound like a good front-line choice due to total lack of weapons other than missiles and reload times may be somewhat bad...

C configuration carries an Ultra AC/20 (pretty nifty weapon - with a lucky shot, it not only blows the socks off, it can remove the whole damn leg...), a Streak SRM-6 and ER Large and small lasers.

D configuration is more suited for those who think ammunition resupply is for weaklings - lots of lasers, a machine gun, dual anti-missile system and targeting computer.

(Source: Technical Readout 3050)

Around the 13th century in Britain the church held most of the power. It possessed a huge amount of the land and wealth in Britain at that time. It also had its own court of law and it could try anyone it liked for committing any number of sins, heresies and the like. The person whose job it was to summon people into the ecclesiastical court was called the summoner.

Summoners were in a position where they could quite easily abuse their power, and more often than not they did. The summoner would often accept a cash payment or other bribe rather than taking the poor individual to court. The causes for this stem on the same beliefs that allowed the pardoners to go about their business - you could be freed of sins for a price. As they were reasonably high up members of the church hierarchy, they were free the bounds of normal law, the only laws applying to them were canon laws. This meant there was little people could do to stop or challenge the summoner. It did not take the summoners long to realise that they could order false summons on people and take the money from the bribe for themselves

Being of a similar disposition, summoners and pardoners would often go around in pairs, travelling from village to village. This is what the summoner and pardoner do in The Canterbury Tales, which contains one of the best descriptions of a summoner.

Sum"mon*er (?), n. [OE. somner, sompnour, OF. semoneor, F. semonneur. See Summon, v. t.]

One who summons; one who cites by authority; specifically, a petty officer formerly employed to summon persons to appear in court; an apparitor.

© Webster 1913.