Good direction with SMN!

[Palladiamors]

No. That's a terrible idea and you and anyone who supports it should be ashamed of yourselves. A lot of us are coming off of Final Fantasy XI's summons, and this FINALLY takes us a step in that direction. Quit trying to screw that up with stupid suggestions.

[Flana]

No. That's a terrible idea and you and anyone who supports it should be ashamed of yourselves. A lot of us are coming off of Final Fantasy XI's summons, and this FINALLY takes us a step in that direction. Quit trying to screw that up with stupid suggestions.

Then go play FFXI. Some people actually like XIV's incarnation. Wow its almost like people have different opinions. That's amazing. Who could have ever known?

[Rika007]

No. That's a terrible idea and you and anyone who supports it should be ashamed of yourselves. A lot of us are coming off of Final Fantasy XI's summons, and this FINALLY takes us a step in that direction. Quit trying to screw that up with stupid suggestions.

Yeah check yourself dude. Their are plenty of viable reasons of why certain mechanics need to be pulled away from summoners, and egis being the biggest pain point of the class and massively over shadowed by Demi's makes them a prime target to either be a) removed entirely or b) become a low level only ability. The fact of the matter is that summoner needs to have the fat trimmed from some areas and then added to present mechanics and linked so that their kit feels more cohesive and builds upon itself. This doesn't mean egi's need to be the one to go. It could be the Demi's, it could be the dots, it could be the aetherflow mechanics, it could be the oGCD's, it could be the utility. It could be a combination of several. But it has to happen, SMN in it's current state has the most disjointed kit of any Damage Dealer in the game. Half of it's mechanics literally have nothing that actively works together and builds upon each other. The jobs is trying to cram the very different identities of 4 separate expansions into one and it is suffering because of it. 5.1 has certainly made the job playable, but of all the DPS no other job is in as desperate need of a top down rework.

[Vulcann]

No. That's a terrible idea and you and anyone who supports it should be ashamed of yourselves. A lot of us are coming off of Final Fantasy XI's summons, and this FINALLY takes us a step in that direction. Quit trying to screw that up with stupid suggestions.

uh this isn't FFXI

[Jandor]

I used to be pretty in favour of keeping the egi, but I could get on board with replacing them with trance/demi combos:

Inferno/Vortex/Crag trance, share a cooldown timer. Channel Ifrit while demi-Ifrit does his thing. (or Garuda, or Titan.)
into
Firebird trance.
into
Dreadwyrm trance.

Sorry guys, you're never going to convince me Phoenix is an upgrade from Bahamut.

[Brandedblade]

Is it bad that I'd rather the aetherflow mechanics be removed? Or at least changed into more pet centric mechanics? At this point Aetherflow feels more like a SCH thing then a SMN thing.

[Shiroe]

Smn is at its best its ever been, gameplay, eggi & command responsiveness, overall Dps etc..

sure, every class can be improved on, but atm (aside of Bahamut / Phönix moving and not shooting), Smn feels good and strong

[Duelle]

I don't think it is possible to remove egis, as that would require rewriting and remaking some of the SMN quests that involve or explain egis. If you change egis to temp summons, that means the 62+ quests that involve those SMN trainees and their egis would need to be redone to fit the new concept/mechanics.

Since I am a fan of redesigns when things don't quite fit and like to fantasize, I'll give some suggestions for a SMN design:

- Core of the design being SMN + Carbuncle: Carbuncle persists and acts as a source of supplemental damage and a way the SMN can protect themselves (for example, they'd get an ability to temporarily dismiss Carby to gain a substantial damage resistance buff, not unlike how SCH can dismiss the fairy to get a boost to healing output).
- Egis are connected to specific abilities: Much like the summons in the console FFs, egis appear only to perform a specific task and then vanish. Unlike the console FF summons, the abilities are not high-damage AoEs, but instead vary in effect and utility. For example, SMN might get a skill called Searing Wind that summons Ifrit-egi to cast it on a mob, applying a less powerful version of the mechanic from Ifrit EX (debuff that deals AoE damage over time). Likewise they might have an ability called Icebrand that summons Shiva-egi to deal frontal cone damage (unless we want to give SMN Icicle Impact with its vulnerability debuff). These skills could have their own separate cooldowns, or could share cooldowns depending on how they're tuned. They could also cost Aetherflow stacks if that is a better way to control their use. In this regard, SMN would function more like how Ultima Weapon uses primal abilities.
- Egi "abilities" could be upgrades to existing ACN/SMN skills: You could have something like Fester be replaced by Thunderspark (Ramuh-egi) after a certain point in the questline, which much like Fester gets a bonus on targets affected by Bio and Miasma and deals higher single-target damage. My approach would be 3 egi abilities as upgrades to existing ACN skills, and 3 egi abilities that are something brand new.

This would be designed in tandem with the trances currently in place, helping delineate the "tiers" in summoning. That said, it would take a colossal amount of work to make something like this happen.

[AbelArchaniEA]

Love SMN. Good job SE!