I would agree that summons are overpowered and too useful and need to be toned down. This seems like a pretty good solution, both flavor and gameplay wise.
If a summon took 2 hits before it died, that was worth it IMO. By then, it's my turn again and I should be starting to lock down, charm, or outright kill at least half of the enemies. I really like the idea of giving summons the Stench ability.
