Given a lot of the perk trees and dialogue I think the reason for the lack of Daedra to summon is the lack of them present in the game.

I.e they started out thinking "Well we focused on Daedra last time, so don't spend too long on them, in fact given the plot of the last game they'd probably be summoned less."

Then they got to conjuration/summoners: "Right, atronachs are the classic summon, get them in so conjurers have a weapon, and we can probably balance them easily"

It won't have been til they decided to put the two Dremora outside Dagon's Shrine that they decided to make them summonable; basically they weren't gonna put creatures as summons unless they roamed elsewhere (Atronachs, being the classic summon were the exception) and having them roam was weird after the lore, so making them is more effort than it's worth, so don't add in the summons and we don't need to waste time modelling them.

It's a shame but that's how games are designed often :/

Conjuration is without a doubt the most powerful magic school in Skyrim (Illusion is also a contender for most powerful though hindered against dragons). I like the direction they went with the focus of either conjurer or a necromancer. I think it got the best face lift over all the other schools.

However, I will agree that the removal of certain spells was a downer. The lack of a bound: dagger(among the other weapons) and bound: armor is a let down. I play a mage assassin so I now have to carry a dagger and light armor around which, after having played Oblivion, is a disappointment and less engaging. You would think it would be easier to implement such spells considering Skyrim doesn't have as many armor pieces as Oblivion did. Although the removal of the long list of summons that was present in Oblivion is somewhat bland I can see why they did it. Getting a new summon every few levels is somewhat hectic and unless the player checks back constantly at a vendor they are liable to pass up the summon and never use it to begin with.

Of course I wouldn't mind seeing more summoning creatures but I would favor a greater selection of bound: weapons/armor first. Bound: sword/bow/battleaxe leaves much to be desired when considering the spells we had in Oblivion.

WHERE IS MY CONJURED MOUNT?

What type of conjurer can't summon forth a Hellstead? Big time fail on that one.

The main bad thing in Skyrim is lack of Daedra in General.

They should've added Scamps, Daedroths, Clannfears, etc.

Maybe in a future DLC? Hmm..

As for Conjuration itself... As long I have a Summon Dremora Lord spell, I am happy.

~Edit~

Here's a fun thing I noticed. The Summoned Dremora Lords in Skyrim actually uses the same Daedric claymores as the ones in Oblivion did. The same enchanted ones..

Have you ever got lucky and summoned two Dremora Lords with the Paralyze Enchantment? (Paralyzes for like 3 seconds; the claymore was in Oblivion)

P.S: i wouldn't say it has been nerfed, that would mean it is weaker which it certainly is not. It is stronger then the last few TES's, it just lacks alot of spells =(

If they'd included a lot of daedra, people would be whining about them breaking lore.

It isn't breaking the lore. Summoning Daedra always been around BEFORE Oblivion. Actually, Sul (Dunmer in the Books) summoned a Daedroth at one point and the books takes place around 4E Y40 (Or was it Y60?)

So you can't say summoning Daedra is breaking the lore.

It is in the province of Skyrim after Oblivion was closed off permanently. Less daedra roaming around in a province that already outlaws the practice means that there'd be no exposure to the daedra you want to summon. And I imagine that you have to have at least an idea of what it is you're summoning before casting a spell.

The thing with your argument is tho, if it were true, then Daedra should not be able to enter the realm BEFORE the Oblivion crisis either, since the dragonfires were still lit. If that is true, then you should not be able to summon Dremora Lords.

As Jusey1 said, 'you can't say summoning Daedra is breaking the lore.'

All the Oblivion crisis stopped was allowing the Daedra to WANDER FREELY, UN-CONJURED AND UN-CONTROLLED.

You do realize, don't you, that atronachs are a type of Daedra? So why can you summon them but not other types?

Summoning Daedra isn't outlaw in Skyrim. Same thing with Necromancing (Talk to Phinis at the college). The Nords just hate it a lot... Actually, the nords hate Magic in General.

It the developers had put in 20 more summonables, you'd just be here complaing that X isn't as strong as Y, and there's no reason at all for Z to be in the game.

I suppose you could say that their status of being made up of a pure element somehow makes them easier to pull into the physical realm? Admittedly this is rather weak...

It also appears that Dremora now only exist close to their masters or are pulled in by very powerful magic, suggesting that it is overall harder to summon daedra than before

My understanding of the end of Oblivion is that it really didn't actually change anything. The barrier that kept the Daedra from entering the world was already there. It just required the dragon fires to be maintained. All Martin's sacrifice really did was make that barrier permanent.

Either way, what it really comes down to is this: there is no lore reason for them to not be in the game. You can make up any reason or excuses you want to explain why you can't summon them, but there is nothing to support them or make them valid.

Agreed, they just about took 90% of the spells out.

Out of curiosity, out of all the spells in Oblivion, how many did people actually hotkey and use regularly. With my magic users in Skyrim, I am forever ditching spells from my quick inventory simply because I don't use them.

The other aspect is that who knows what DLC content there will be...I'm anticipating that there will be increased magick content.

I completely agree. I was levelling up my conjuration skill the other day (going for 100 in all skills) and it was dreadfully hard to do it with so few spells.

All of the magic needs to be expanded upon. You should be able to break the boundaries of all physical laws with magic, not just a few here and there (I understand why levitation is gone though)

This is all well and good...if you are a PC user

Good point, I never much used conjuration but when I did it tended to be either Atronachs or the nastiest thing I could get, I guess that's all we have now

On pure mage 8, other 6 spells, you had others who was used regularly. Oblivion had to many spells and spellmaking with no ability to delete spells.
This turned out to be an luxury problem as in do I drive my Lamborghini or my Ferrari.

This is also why I put out dark brotherhood contracts on everybody asking for nerfs.
Yes run into real life nerfs, in the army we got to much food on field exercises, after someone complained we get to little.

I think the biggest thing about the whole "Skyrim's nerfed magic [in general] is due to the Nords hating magic" concept is that there are a whole bunch of Thalmor running around and the Aldmeri Dominion should be containing the most powerful magic on Nirn so they aren't going to nerf their own abilities for humans of any type.

Well we went from balanced variety to being able to summon one of the most offensively powerful summoned pets in the Dremora Lord. Add in the fact that with perks, I can summon two of them that will last over 4 minutes each and it gets insane.

But I'd rather trade that for the variety. I don't use my other summons now. Dead thrall with pathing an AI problems pales in comparison to just putting two lords out there. It's so powerful.

Just a question for you guys who say that conjuration will become like mysticism: did you actually think mysticism was useful?

What? Skyrim's the first game in the series that truly allows you to actively play as a necromancer. 2 dead thralls that won't leave you until they die.
No, Oblivion's staff of worms and shivering isle's power does not count.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xHrlXE2PhBE

I am of two minds on this, as a huge Conjuration fan.

On one hand, I do miss many of the different types of summons that were available in past games.

On the other hand, I am having a lot more fun playing Necromancer style characters by actually being able to reanimate fallen victims this time around.

Overall, I'm happy with magic and Conjuration, though yes, having our missing summons back would make it even better.