Do Relic, Mythic, and Empyrean staves lack utility?

[Byrth]

I added Situations 4 and 5, which I didn't consider at first because I don't normally make strategies for failure.

[Razushu]

1) Yes, it does give more MP, and
2) there is no "true" SMN playstyle. You're welcome to play however you want,

Most of what Dallas says is nonsense, but I'm sorry, SMN cannot recover the amount of MP Myrkr can give through refresh and Siphon alone. These are not "lies." I challenge you to recover 1500 MP in less than 2 minutes without using ethers. You can't do it.

Even if it didn't give more MP (it does), that's not the point. The point is it allows both you and your avatar to fight continously, without running out of MP, which is the whole point of the strategy.

1) I'm sorry, But I have already more than I can use from perp/refresh set and a sublimation /siphon. I can't recover that much in 2 minutes, but heres a challenge for you.... need that amount of MP. Full timing my perp/refresh set I save 240 MP a minute and gain an additional 40 which is a net gain of 280MP a minute so yes it would take me 5 minutes to gain back 1400MP. Sure melee gives back more MP than is needed, but if it's not needed what's the point. If the point is to maintain MP theres no real difference in more MP than i can use vs more MP than i can use.

2) There really, really is each job in this game is designed to have certain roles, I'm not denying that any job not designed to melee can gear up to improve it's melee. They all can, but whats the point if you're meleeing alongside the avatar the party loses your buffs and support job utility, if you're meleeing the goal is to maximise your personal damage so the best you can give a party is the buffs from the current avatar and if you're relliant on melee for MP then you can't really stop to support the party and keep the avatar out let alone keep up the BP damage.

For the over 9000th time, no one is trying to beat a WAR with his weapon. They are simply trying to improve over what they were capable of before.

Melee is more of a side grade than an improvement. Sure you do more damage personally but you lose out on the ability to buff properly and be a decent support role character.

[Korpg]

I don't see how having effective debuffs and safe pulls are considered a strategy for failure >.>

[Razushu]

Without a mage sub Smn can do nothing in between Bloodpacts which are mediocre at best (outside the 3 listed situations) while having one of the largest mp pools in the game as well.

Yes without a mage sub SMN can find itself riding timers, but our buffs are nowhere near mediocre

[Greatguardian]

Al, you're skipping over the entire point every single time you post. You keep saying that "It's not about how well SMN does compared to any other job", but it really, really is. Look, it's obvious it's not the best at anything. Only one job at a time is. If it was only about the #1 best, this would be a very lopsided discussion. No, we know SMN is nowhere near the best for anything aside from Byrth's 5 situations.

The thing is, you're trying to claim that it's "Viable" for more situations. Here's the thing, and I've said this already but it just did not seem to click, you have a different definition of "Viable". As far as what you are saying goes, "Viable" refers to being able to hit things, deal *Some sort of damage*, and not wipe. Will a SMN + WAR do more total damage than a WAR would solo? Yes. A + B is greater than A when B is a positive number. However, you're never comparing SMN + WAR to WAR only.

When you come SMN to something, you give up the opportunity to come another job to the same thing. That is your opportunity cost. If you are on SMN, and you have WAR, then you are comparing the damage of SMN + WAR to WAR + WAR. If you are on SMN and you have WHM, you are comparing the healing prowess of SMN + WHM to WHM + WHM. The difference in those is the opportunity cost you give up by coming on a weaker job.

Now, contrary to what Dallas says (lol), you don't need to compare SMN's healing prowess to the healing prowess of a WAR. Why? Because I'm assuming that the group in question is not functionally inept. If they need a healing role, they will be inviting you on WHM (which you switch to SMN, thus losing that effectiveness). If they are fine on healing and need a damage role, they will be inviting you on WAR (which you switch to SMN, thus losing that effectiveness). Groups do not look for Hybrid jobs to fill Hybrid roles. When a group invites a Hybrid job, they are asked to fill one primary role, and then perform their other hybrid roles as a secondary feature. If SMN is invited as a healer, they are a healer who can toss out BPs and keep an Avatar on as long as the player focus is on healing. If SMN is invited as a DD, they are a DD who can toss out cures as long as the player focus is on damage.

Example: How many CORs are invited as pure DDs? Probably very few. But COR is perfectly capable of giving the party buffs and then DD'ing as a secondary function. Likewise, when a Wildfire COR is invited as a DD, they are still perfectly capable of buffing their party while doing damage.

It is the bane of hybrid jobs to shout "BUT I CAN DO ALL OF THIS AT ONCE", when the FFXI group composition does not require people to do multiple things at once. Such a claim also severely stretches game theory outside the realm of possibility. SMN, BLU, RDM, they can't actually do everything at once. What they can do is do one thing and then switch to something else if need be. This is why it's so important to look at the individual roles that these jobs fill. At any given time, they will only be using one of them to its fullest effectiveness.

And herein lies the problem. SMN is a horrible healer. It is a subpar buffer with only a couple buffs that are even worth the time to put on the party (don't even start on hastega, any decent mage would have everyone hasted already). That leaves its only real potentially decent role as DD'ing. Here's the problem though. Where you say "It does plenty". I say, "It does less than literally everybody else aside from BLM, and SCH."

I do not call being 18th out of 20 jobs in the damage department "Plenty". Maybe you do. If that's the case, we'll have to agree to disagree.

[Alhanelem]

Its called Convert.

Convert has a 10 minute recast. Sorry, try again.

Convert isn't any faster than other sources of refresh overall, especailly when you consider the MP you spend recovering your HP. Let's say you have 1200 HP (Assuming you have more MP than HP). Convert gives you about 6MP/tick when you break it down.

you give up the opportunity to come another job to the same thing.

Oppertunity cost can go *#&^$ itself. Sometimes, it's not about who can do what the fastest. Jobs exist for variety. From an elitist technical level, they could remove 15 jobs from the game without compromising game balance or playability. You might be giving up a little bit of this or that by playing on this job instead of that one, but WHO CARES? JESUS, IT'S A GAME! HAVE FUN PLAYING IT AND STOP BEING SO SRS BSNSS!

Melee is more of a side grade than an improvement. Sure you do more damage personally but you lose out on the ability to buff properly and be a decent support role character.

You do NOT lose out on the ability to buff properly and support anyone. IT HELPS YOU! YOU ARE CLOSE TO EVERYONE, THEREFORE YOUR BUFFS WILL HIT EVERYONE! the whole point of Favor was an excuse to keep the avatar summoned. This synergizes perfectly with that! Your Blood Pact Wards will help everyone too, and do not hurt your damage as job abilities are quick. It's not a sidegrade. It's an improvement.

Full timing my perp/refresh set I save 240 MP a minute and gain an additional 40 which is a net gain of 280MP a minute so yes it would take me 5 minutes to gain back 1400MP.

You're only saving "240 MP a minute" over a naked summoner. Everyone has some perp and refresh, so really, it will take you even longer.

[Greatguardian]

Oh hey, "It's a game", I thought I pre-empted that like 5 pages ago by saying "Hey, I don't care if that's what you find fun, go do it then, but that's not the same as saying that it's good".

Is it fun for you? Yes.

Do I care if you do it? No.

Does that mean that it's anything better than 18th out of 20 jobs in the damage department, and generally bottom of the barrel? Nope. Doesn't change a thing.

What you like and what you choose to do are completely independent of how good the job is.

[Alhanelem]

What you like and what you choose to do are completely independent of how good the job is.

It is good, just not good enough for Mr. Pro Elitist. It's good enough that if you don't care about having the perfect setup, it's strong enough to be winnable. Strong enough to be useable. Strong enough period.

ANd whether you think it's pathetic or not, it brings you to the most that summoner is capable of. It's not my fault that the job can't put out the maximum numbers, Only SE can do something about that. All I can do is optimize it with the tools available to me.

[Byrth]

I don't see how having effective debuffs and safe pulls are considered a strategy for failure >.>

Sorry, you posted while I was posting. I was referring to something someone said on the previous page, mentioning how SMN is good at holding stuff. I also added that 6 summoners can kill almost anything that a party of 6 other jobs can kill, and safely. SE's proc system works against them, though. Also, /SMN is generally about as good as SMN main if you're just looking for pulling. You just need an avatar that lives long enough for everything nearby to link. It doesn't have to live for more than two hits.

Also, it's a little bit of a stretch to refer to yourself as one of the best soloists. You guys bore things to death and try desperately not to die. For solo kill speed, there are many better and more efficient options in a lot of situations. You're the best soloer in the same situation where you're the best source of damage, where you can't be in range (like WotG final fight).

The things you can solo that other people can't solo rely on the elemental resistance of your avatars or your ability to stay out of range while your avatar gets one-shotted. If they introduced something like BST's Snarl, you guys would be much more viable for melee soloing. As it is, you can't melee because your avatar's weak melee hits have to be able to pull hate off you after it dies, unless you go SMN/NIN (which I've done).

I considered trying to kill the Misareaux Tier 2 on SMN/NIN at 85 cap, because he's easy to run away, there's no point in stealing him, and he hits really hard, but I never got around to it before they raised the cap to 90. Went on Dancer and killed it in something like 3 minutes tops at 90, but maybe someday I'll go back just to check if SMN/NIN would work on it.


Point is, I do think that the Relic, Mythic, and Empyrean staves lack utility. The effort required to make Relic/Mythic/Empyrean staves is roughly equivalent to other Relics/Mythics/Empyreans, so it doesn't make sense that they're useful in only a fraction of the number of situations that the other weapons are. I think they need a buff. They all need Elemental Staff-style Affinity (MAB/MAcc/-Perp rolled into one) for all elements as high as the highest Magian staff at the absolute minimum, on top of the stats they already have.

If you compare the difference in damage/utility between other non-Big-Three weapons and Big Three weapons, this really isn't an unreasonable request.

[Korpg]

It is a subpar buffer with only a couple buffs that are even worth the time to put on the party (don't even start on hastega, any decent mage would have everyone hasted already).

I don't know, I think it will be kindof hard for 1 WHM to haste everyone in the alliance. Even 2 WHMs would be hard pressed.

Having a SMN in the party that does not have a WHM there would be a long way into making sure everyone in that alliance is buffed. Although they would be losing on Pro/Shell V, but they get Earthen Ward, Hastaga, and other buffs.