Avatar Behavior Issues and Requests

[Camate]

Hey everyone!

We’ve received a couple reports of issues and requests about avatar behavior and I would like to pass on some comments regarding this.

The recast timer is activated when an enemy dies right before a Blood Pact is executed
We will look into whether we can make it so the recast timer does not activate similar to how it would when a target moves out of range after executing a Blood Pact.
　
Ramuh and Titan Blood Pact animations are not displayed
When performing another action or regular attack just before finishing the Blood Pact animation it is possible that the animation is not properly displayed. This is difficult to address because the way animations are displayed can be different depending on the client and the animation may be interrupted at different timings.
　
Enhancing effects that were dispelled with Lunar Roar are not displayed
We definitely understand that it would be beneficial to display this so that you could check whether you removed the effects you were aiming for or not, however, work-load wise this will be a bit difficult to address right away due to the need to create two separate log messages for each type of enhancing effect in each of our supported languages.
　
After summoning an avatar there is a short period of time where actions cannot be performed
This isn’t just limited to avatars and can be seen with other pets as well, but the system was set so that actions cannot be performed for a period of time directly after summoning an avatar to prevent erroneous actions for taking place.
　
There are times when alliance members can be targeted for Healing Ruby
As a result of our investigation, we have determined that this phenomenon will occur under certain circumstances and are currently working to resolve the issue. Out of all Blood Pacts and pet commands, this phenomenon only occurs with Healing Ruby.

There are a lot of items which are difficult to address and require some confirming, but we will continue to look into the above and update you as we make progress.

[Kaisha]

How about the issue where your pet dying, or you releasing it in a situation where there are multiple monsters, where some of which who have yet to procure emnity on anyone, make a beeline directly for the Summoner?

It's pretty easy to see the problem in action when fighting Jailer of Love when it summons a wave of three mobs. Release your pet while they are out and untouched, and they'll go directly for you even with you performing no action on them.


There is also the quirk where using Assault with an Elemental Spirit resets its recast timer, which are long enough as is.

[Zubis]

After summoning an avatar there is a short period of time where actions cannot be performed

Heh, good times. Gotta love a mage sleeping an entire group of mobs, then having a Summoner call an avatar and watch it go off and poke an enemy awake despite repeated Retreat commands.

Hence why my LS repeatedly tell me to PUT AWAY THE ******* AVATAR anytime we do stuff that requires sleep.

[Helel]

How about the issue where your pet dying, or you releasing it in a situation where there are multiple monsters, where some of which who have yet to procure emnity on anyone, make a beeline directly for the Summoner?

It's pretty easy to see the problem in action when fighting Jailer of Love when it summons a wave of three mobs. Release your pet while they are out and untouched, and they'll go directly for you even with you performing no action on them.


There is also the quirk where using Assault with an Elemental Spirit resets its recast timer, which are long enough as is.

This... why would the dev team not address this... This is the biggest issue for SMN right now, along with any other pet job.

[Rezeak]

How about Lowering the capp of Blood rage timer to 30 sec (at least) ??

As for pact DMG it's well below what imo it should be
@75 it was equal to a good WS from a heavy DD or heavy nuke.
@99 it's equal to 30%-50% from a heavy DD/heavy nuke.

Kinda bored how SE gave use alot of useless buffs and increased our DMG marginally either way i do miss playing SMN back at lvl 75 and i just wish it would be relative to what it was back then.

[Camiie]

Here's one I have on occasion. If I use Assault and my pet is not where it is supposed to be due to poor pathing then my Assault timer is reset and my command has no effect. Why can't I simply get an error message instead? The Assault recast time isn't lengthy, but sometimes every second counts.

Also, why is the pathing so poor for Avatars and other pets? Why do they see a slight bump in the terrain that doesn't impede progress at all as an obstacle to path around? It's not as though this sort of non-static terrain was added after pets were implemented. They should have been coded with it in mind should they not?

[Kaisha]

Also, why is the pathing so poor for Avatars and other pets? Why do they see a slight bump in the terrain that doesn't impede progress at all as an obstacle to path around? It's not as though this sort of non-static terrain was added after pets were implemented. They should have been coded with it in mind should they not?
Pets follow the same pathfinding nodes the mobs do, it's just the way the server was programmed.

[Camiie]

Pets follow the same pathfinding nodes the mobs do, it's just the way the server was programmed.

They should at least fix Assault being wasted when the Avatar is out of range if they can't correct pathing. Just have it say <Pet> is out of range.

[Ophannus]

The recast timer is activated when an enemy dies right before a Blood Pact is executed
We will look into whether we can make it so the recast timer does not activate similar to how it would when a target moves out of range after executing a Blood Pact.

Do the same for Restoring Breath and Smiting Breath too PLEASE!

[Raksha]

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

[Jerbob]

While it's really, really nice to see that Summoner's myriad of bugs is being looked into (actually quite excited about that), this list barely scratches the surfaces of the issues that Summoners have. A list of some (some!) of these issues is here:

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/threads/12700-Compendium-of-Summoner-Job-Issues

I'm sure other pet jobs would appreciate these things being fixed as well!

[Vivivivi]

This is of course super super low on the nice-to-have wish list, but any chance we'll ever see Avatar emotes? At least for Cait Sith? I realize many of the avatars may not have emote animations programmed, but I'm sure Cait Sith has a myriad that could be used from cut-sceens.

[Daniel_Hatcher]

Hey everyone!

We’ve received a couple reports of issues and requests about avatar behavior and I would like to pass on some comments regarding this.

The recast timer is activated when an enemy dies right before a Blood Pact is executed
We will look into whether we can make it so the recast timer does not activate similar to how it would when a target moves out of range after executing a Blood Pact.

While you're at it, this happens for BST too.

[Jerbob]

Automaton spells and Wyvern breaths as well, I think.

[Kaisha]

Automaton spells and Wyvern breaths as well, I think.
Just don't fix it for Wyvern. I like it when my pet just glows inconspicuously for a whole minute.

[Crimson_Slasher]

Oh where to begin. Well my biggest gripe for smn is comparing to bst. I may make some bsts mad saying this, but it makes no sense to me why their pets can take more hits than avatars. Not raging so much, i know the score that we can use PDT gear for pets too (atleast some PDT gear) and we have super-short recasts compared to beastmasters. I just find it so strange that a sheep has more hp than titan. Also a recalculation for the auto-attack damage would be nice. I just feel like smn's pets need to be stronger across the board. I always look at pet jobs as two parts, the pet and the master.

Puppetmaster and the Automaton are fairly close in strength in relation to one another.
Dragoon is stronger than its wyvern for the most part.
Beastmaster is weaker than its pet.
Summoner is weaker than its pet by a large margin.

But when comparing the pets to eachother and the jobs to eachother for most considerations, i find it looking like this;
Drg is the strongest core pet job, weakest pet (argueably). Though in fairness drg is more of an honorary pet job.
Beastmaster is strong on its own with strongest pet.
Puppetmaster is stong on its own with an equally strong pet.
Summoner is weak on its own with a strong pet.

A Drg without a pet can fight very well. A Bst or a Pup without a pet can fight pretty well. But a summoner without a pet is like a silenced blackmage and can do little.

Just my rant but i feel that because summoners have so little strength on their own, their pets should stand out much more than they do and being otherworldly beings, should actually measure up more against vana'diel's native creatures rather than be outclassed largely by them.

Thats not to say all avatars must outclass bst pets 100% of the time, cause i find it reasonable for an adamatoise (Crude Raphie?) to stack up against Titan in taking some lumps. Just my gripe and i know its not 100% needed to make avatars into demigod pets, i know theres a degree of balance in ffxi already between pets in game. But thats my thoughts on the matter. On paper, it makes me scratch my head.

[Infidi]

I forget... Is it both BST pets and avatars that get auto -50% pdt? I thought it was just avatars .

[Daniel_Hatcher]

I forget... Is it both BST pets and avatars that get auto -50% pdt? I thought it was just avatars .

Only SMN and (I think) PUP gets native reduction:

Avatars -50%
Pupper -10%

The trait now gives BST -11% DT with trousers.

[Crimson_Slasher]

Even with -50%(55% with stout servant i believe?) it turns a 1200HP avatar into a 2500ish hp avarat, which isnt even HALF of nursery nazuna's 6000ish hp. so at 99 avatars can still take less than HALF the damage a level 76-86 jugpet can. Additionally its harder for a summoner to stack more -PDT gear for their pet. Im not saying bst shouldnt be a great pet job and im not asking for nerfs to bst, im asking for upgrades to smn. Theres also the fact we have no native ways to heal our pets, though thats something that i can live with since the recast time is so short for them.

Also dont mistake my wanting avatars to have more hp as me ignoring other things smn actually has over bst. Time for a bulleted list.

-Party buffs and heals provided by pacts, or favors.
-Short recasts
-High Physical damage and magical damage blood pact rages.
-50% less physical damage taken
-Pets that do not need to be purchaced or crafted.

Now as for beastmaster over summoner.

-Pets with monstrous hp.
-Passable melee ability.
-High autoattack damage (varies).
-Decent Sic damage (varies).
-No need to maintain mp to maintain pet.
-Built in utility to maintain pet HP (reward).
-Variable pets with variable traits (we have limited diversity among pets).
-Massive selection of pet gear options from defense, to haste, to damage, to -pdt (where as smn has little to none of this, especially -pdt which only exists in magian staff form or other potential augmented gear).
-Hate management ability.

Other than being scorned in group play for whatever reason, bst isnt so bad off. Which is why i want some fixes for smn.

[Lilia]

High Physical damage and magical damage blood pact rages.

lol 2-3k dmg in 45 sec. on easy mobs or 750-1500 on nms- that is not high.
i can do more dmg with my melee whm T.T not to say a good dd can do in 45 sec. much much much more.

i rly hope new 99 rage bp come.

[Crimson_Slasher]

I do closer to 3.5k pacts, to maybe occasional 4k pacts as summoner (when lucky) to ash and trash, and aside from super-high tier VWNM, closer to 2.4k rages. Which sure, lots of DD can outdo that with or without emp weapons, but compared to beastmaster and their pet's Sic commands for the most part, avatar pacts tend to hit much higher. Which is what i was comparing.

[Lilia]

Sure the bp dmg is higher, but .... the dotdmg wins bst or pup 100%.

Highbp + low autoattack <<>> medium Sic + high autoattack

what i rly hate is the most pl see bp and think wow-nice > smn dont need higher rage bp or more dmg.
But why need smn so much more time for kill a mob? when bst can kill in 1/2 time or pup in 1/3 time.

I dont say nerf bst or pup- i rly like the dmg :)
Please more dot dmg for smn, bp-timer 30 sec. or autoenspell, or rage99 bp, or idk.

[Crimson_Slasher]

I wholeheartedly agree that neither bst nor pup should be nerfed. Both are respectible jobs that are shunned often in group play, where, only marginally summoner is more readily accepted. But as its been said, puppetmaster can fall back on its own skills in the event their pet died, as can beastmaster, and while neither is invincible, they certainly are a lot more frontline ready than summoner.

So the question comes down to this i guess. Will summoner recieve better front line capabilities? Or conversely, will their pet be made to overcompensate for the weakness as it is expected to do.

Im sure theres plenty summoners that would like to have more options and abilities to utilize say...Shattersoul, but I truly believe all summoners would willingly welcome more longevity to their pets, or harder hitting autoattacks, or perhaps both.

Pacts are great, and frankly if the avatar could match the average bst pet in longevity and damage, then it would be a pretty good position methinks. Especially when even though the avatar would become superior to the bst pet (argueably. In my head, the same toughness of the pet vs the jugpet and same relitive attack damages would put avatars ahead when comparing sic to bloodpact rages.) The beastmaster would still remain superior to the summoner and more evenly balance the job playing field between the two.

This ofcourse excludes things like beastmaster's pet traits, JA, gear selection, and native physical damage.

Ultimately I doubt this will be entertained by the development team, but id think the iconic powerhouses of finalfantasy being made to look foolish when measured up against a ladybug should rightly raise some eyebrows.

I mean... who here remembers all the times of using Ifrit, Shiva, Titan, Ramuh, Odin, and others in games like... FF3, Tactics, and still others and remembering how insanely powerful they were?!

Ah...Nostalgia.

Ahem! Now i suppose for ways to handle the auto-attack damage increase, if you dont want to have beastmasters barking up your tree about summoner getting such an enhancement, why not apply a double/triple attack or haste effect to the avatar rather than raise its base damage. Doing so would mean more TP feed for monsters, causing greater risk, not unlike comparing Ninja and Thief's autoattacking differences.

Or perhaps have the avatar's Attack/DMG scale with Summoning Magic skill, similer to hand to hand skill, where in a highly skilled up summoner would benefit more from the raised damage than one without. I think that would be fair atleast when you consider a beastmaster does not need a special skill leveled for their pets to output such impressive damage.

Conversely, the attack rate, or HP or whatnot could be managed in the same way. Though admittedly those summoners with low skill would suffer...

[Razushu]

Not really a behaviour issue but are our Avatars ever going to get a new BP: Rage? It's been 24 levels since they got a Magic BP and 29 levels since they've gotten a physical Rage pact. Addressing this issue would go a long way to solving what is probably the biggest problem with Summoner. Seeing as Blood Pact: Rages account for the bulk of our damage using the 70/75 pacts for Damage is like a 99 BST having to use Courier Carrie as a serious DD pet. Our tools for DD are seriously outdated compared to other jobs. I mean they didn't even get the Tier V nukes of their elements, the got the tier IVs at 60 so surely they should have gotten the Vs at 80 or 90. Even this would have been something.


Also Avatar's favor is almost completely useless in it's current form. It's an Aura buff that weakens our pet and requires said pet to be out for extended periods to reach a useful level, and then it goes and resets to half potency when the pet BPs. Nothing about that fits with an Avatar or Summoner as a job.

First off our pets are disposable, they tend to die frequently. They die we need to re-summon Favour hits level 0. This would be different if we had pets like BST with direct ways to heal it and a huge HP pool.

Second our ability to buff/DD/sometimes-heal our party relies either completely or very heavily on our BPs. Having our Rages weakened and the favour reset on using these makes no sense when this is taken into account.

Thirdly we have 9 Avatars all with different wards for buffing our party. If we were in a support role in a group trying to keep a DD group buffed, we need to switch pets quite often unless we just want to give them the favour effect. This goes counter to how buffing on SMN was designed, leaving us with a choice of wasting time using favour or actively trying to buff a group.

Is there any way Avatar's Favour could be changed from it's current form into something else?

Perhaps:

Avatar's Favour

duration 2:00 (possibly extended by SMN mag skill)

recast :30

cost:?? could possibly cost MP 50~100 maybe, or perhaps dismisses current Avatar automatically(possibly with extended recast as a balance).

All party members in AoE of Pet gain a Summoner specific Buff based on Avatar used with Favour.

Namely the same buffs as already given by Favour.

Buffs have a Base value(equal to current min. value) which is enhanced to current max. value but based on Summoner's magic skill level as opposed to Avatar's time on the battlefield.

Each player can have a maximum of 2(maybe 4 if not OP) Favour buffs up, same avatar buffs do not stack i.e Diabolos followed by Diabolos would still only give a max of +6MP per tick.

[Badieh]

Not really a behaviour issue but are our Avatars ever going to get a new BP: Rage? It's been 24 levels since they got a Magic BP and 29 levels since they've gotten a physical Rage pact. Addressing this issue would go a long way to solving what is probably the biggest problem with Summoner. Seeing as Blood Pact: Rages account for the bulk of our damage using the 70/75 pacts for Damage is like a 99 BST having to use Courier Carrie as a serious DD pet. Our tools for DD are seriously outdated compared to other jobs. I mean they didn't even get the Tier V nukes of their elements, the got the tier IVs at 60 so surely they should have gotten the Vs at 80 or 90. Even this would have been something.


Also Avatar's favor is almost completely useless in it's current form. It's an Aura buff that weakens our pet and requires said pet to be out for extended periods to reach a useful level, and then it goes and resets to half potency when the pet BPs. Nothing about that fits with an Avatar or Summoner as a job.

First off our pets are disposable, they tend to die frequently. They die we need to re-summon Favour hits level 0. This would be different if we had pets like BST with direct ways to heal it and a huge HP pool.

Second our ability to buff/DD/sometimes-heal our party relies either completely or very heavily on our BPs. Having our Rages weakened and the favour reset on using these makes no sense when this is taken into account.

Thirdly we have 9 Avatars all with different wards for buffing our party. If we were in a support role in a group trying to keep a DD group buffed, we need to switch pets quite often unless we just want to give them the favour effect. This goes counter to how buffing on SMN was designed, leaving us with a choice of wasting time using favour or actively trying to buff a group.

Is there any way Avatar's Favour could be changed from it's current form into something else?

Perhaps:

Avatar's Favour

duration 2:00 (possibly extended by SMN mag skill)

recast :30

cost:?? could possibly cost MP 50~100 maybe, or perhaps dismisses current Avatar automatically(possibly with extended recast as a balance).

All party members in AoE of Pet gain a Summoner specific Buff based on Avatar used with Favour.

Namely the same buffs as already given by Favour.

Buffs have a Base value(equal to current min. value) which is enhanced to current max. value but based on Summoner's magic skill level as opposed to Avatar's time on the battlefield.

Each player can have a maximum of 2(maybe 4 if not OP) Favour buffs up, same avatar buffs do not stack i.e Diabolos followed by Diabolos would still only give a max of +6MP per tick.

I suggested something similar in the following Topic forum.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/threads/20628-Request-Update-Summoner-Bloodpacts-To-be-more-useful-at-this-new-cap

[Babekeke]

How about the issue where your pet dying, or you releasing it in a situation where there are multiple monsters, where some of which who have yet to procure emnity on anyone, make a beeline directly for the Summoner?

It's pretty easy to see the problem in action when fighting Jailer of Love when it summons a wave of three mobs. Release your pet while they are out and untouched, and they'll go directly for you even with you performing no action on them.

Good News! Not sure if you're seen this (http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/threads/25712-Resolving-Pet-Hate-Issues?p=340712#post340712) yet?

[Clou777]

How about the issue where your pet dying, or you releasing it in a situation where there are multiple monsters, where some of which who have yet to procure emnity on anyone, make a beeline directly for the Summoner?

It's pretty easy to see the problem in action when fighting Jailer of Love when it summons a wave of three mobs. Release your pet while they are out and untouched, and they'll go directly for you even with you performing no action on them.


There is also the quirk where using Assault with an Elemental Spirit resets its recast timer, which are long enough as is.

way to fix this would be to give summoner 2 new job abilities (since other jobs were given extra job abilities like solace/misery) which should be...

Avatar Idle : Duration 2 hours, Recast 1 minute, Avatar wont attack enemies with hate on the summoner.
Avatar Protector : Duration 2 hours, Recast 1 minute, Avatar will attack enemies with hate on the summoner.

easy fix

[Badieh]

This may be a little off topic, but I think they avatar should have a "Provoke" ability and/or a "Cover" ability for the summoner.

[Artimecion]

In regards to the July 23rd version update, SMN was left behind for the protect effect band-wagon. They missed out on increasing Carbuncle's Shining Ruby defense effect, and Titan's Favor. Oversight? Maybe. But I'm glad I decided to put SMN down and play a new job, being the red headed step child of classes was getting old.

[Dreamin]

In regards to the July 23rd version update, SMN was left behind for the protect effect band-wagon. They missed out on increasing Carbuncle's Shining Ruby defense effect, and Titan's Favor. Oversight? Maybe. But I'm glad I decided to put SMN down and play a new job, being the red headed step child of classes was getting old.

RDM said Hi. I at least can break out SMN when I go WoE but RDM has been gathering major dust for me. Last time I used it was for VW way back when I needed RDM to cover the tier 2 proc magic.

[Babekeke]

In regards to the July 23rd version update, SMN was left behind for the protect effect band-wagon. They missed out on increasing Carbuncle's Shining Ruby defense effect, and Titan's Favor. Oversight? Maybe. But I'm glad I decided to put SMN down and play a new job, being the red headed step child of classes was getting old.

As far as I'm aware, shining ruby doesn't have a cap. Therefore, where pro V went from 60 to ~200 def, the bonus provided by shining ruby went from AN EXTRA 6 def to AN EXTRA 20 def (not much but still an increase. A turtled up PLD can get over 200 def from shining ruby). Titan's favor has always sucked and I doubt it is ever going to be worth it.