Why is Summoner the most ignored, misunderstood and broken job?

[Dallas]

Your best damage is your BP, which costs MP. Your best melee buffs cost MP. Your avatar, if you choose to leave it out, will either lock down 10 item slots or cost MP. Want to pretend to be a WHM? You need MP.

You need MP, so choose your poison:
1) rest for MP
2) gear to reduce MP lost and depend on the subjob for MP
3) melee for MP and depend on subjob for TP
3a) Spirit Taker (WS in INT/MND gear)
3b) Myrkr (WS in MP gear)

Those are your only choices. One of these options actually increases damage by a very LARGE factor. The same option recovers more MP than you could ever use. The same option gives SMN something to do between BPs.

Just because you CAN gear yourself to do more is a perfect reason to do so.

[Malamasala]

Name one other thing that makes us a hybrid. Our only source of reliable 100% of the time damage mitigation is being out of range of attacks we are the softest job in the game, I fail to see how anyone can justify us being near the monster for more time than it takes to BP. On anything worth fighting we have enough life for 3 maybe 4 hits and even this is being generous. And if we're meleeing we'd be /SAM so we'd lose blink/SS further endangering us.

Instant cast "spells". We are the only "mage" job that can fire off magic/physical attacks from our pet without getting a casting animation lasting several seconds. If SE wanted us to be mage only, we'd see our SMN stand in a pose for 8 seconds preparing the pact.

And I see nothing that says BST, PUP or DRG should be up front meleeing since they have no stoneskin or self cures (well, they might have). As a melee SMN you are naturally expected to play under the same rules as a DRG, BST or PUP. You can't say some melee jobs need to heal themselves and others can be healed by white mages.

Do you really know how these buffs works? EA is 2 times stronger than Scherzo, can lasts longer and you can put it back before it wears off...

No, because the information about these are terrible. All I know is "prevents death from extreme damage". I'm not sure how you can say the Ward "prevents death" more than the song. Do you half-die from songs and play as a zombie? I'll take your word for it, but again it is pretty terrible to compare a free 0 MP song for 30 minutes fight, or 1000 MP spent from Wards for the same thing.

Mala says that SE has never given SMN the tools to DD. Unlimited MP is the only tool needed to DD as SMN. Mala, as you can see from later posts, is not 100% averse to melee.

Of course when I talk tools, I mean accuracy and haste gear. I have no problems keeping my pet perpetuation covered, but I'm far behind all other jobs in DoT and TP gain.

The funny thing I remember about being summoner was an avatars ability to gain access to tier elemental spells BEFORE blackmages. I don't remember the exact range but avatars got tier II and tier IV before a BLM and was able to magic burst them first as well.

In name only. We do get T2 spells at level 20 (or was it 10?) but they are of the same potency as T1 BLM spells. Same with T4 at 60, which are same potency as T3 nukes.

Strong (if short-duration) AoE buffs, high-damage Rages, high degree of personal safety, pets that don't cost money or have a long recast on death. Which of those is that "one trick" or "one spell or JA" that's working?

Strong? 15% haste is EQUAL, not strong. -15 phalanx effect is WEAK. Shock Spikes that have 1% chance to give 0.1 seconds stun effect is WEAK. 10 MAB during MIDNIGHT is just AVERAGE. No screw this, you list the good wards and their effects instead of me listing all the bad ones.

Personal safety is also not really the first thing a party needs. "Hey guys, lets invite a SMN. Their amazing ability is that they can run while we die."

And forgive me for not seeing what easily resummoned pets mean for pros. All it means is that we excel at killing your own pet while others have to try and keep theirs alive. Great thing to advertise to others. "Invite a SMN, and watch us let our pet die over and over again. This can not be done by any other job. Invite us!"

[Malamasala]

PUP has B+ H2H now, actually. SE realized they set it too low initially.

You are just proving my point. "Misunderstood" and "Ignored" would be the reason PUP has B+ H2H and SMN is stuck with B staff. If SE had cared one ounce the amount they did for PUP, we wouldn't be in this mess.

I don't see how SMN having a B in staff as opposed to a B- means that they're meant to be meleeing

So B compared to B- is not worth mentioning, but B+ compared to B means you are a melee? You sure run a very strict business.

Someone else already covered your Scherzo example, but I'd like to also add that using Scherzo is sacrificing another of BRD's buffs that the party could be using. I'd hardly call it "a million times better" than SMN for it, and I'd hesitate strongly before even calling it four times better. Helps that the two stack.

And using your global ward timer does not sacrifice any SMN buff? For all intents and purposes, SMN and BRD have the same choice when it comes to this buff. But only SMN has to pay a high MP price for it. I don't know how you did bird parties in the past, but that period taught me that if you can give a MP-free buff, it is vastly superior to the MP version. Especially if you intend on keeping it active over a long period of time.

I actually used the ward the other day for fun during panktrator battle. I got hit for 800 damage while applying it. Rather split on if it is worth applying a BP that "may" be useful, and have to take a WHMs cure V recast timer to get my HP back and increase the risk the tank dies.

(Also, while I do agree that MAB isn't useful for SMN, it gets mage armors because storywise, it's a mage.)

And a PUP is an artist, why not give it only ugly armors with def stats on? They aren't meant to DD, just entertain! (If you catch the hint, I don't agree with armor designs based on silly story elements that stray off the roles of the jobs)

SMN without global timers would largely obsolete BRD and COR as jobs, since they'd be able to repeatedly use AoE Phalanx, Stoneskin, Blink, Warcry, Ice Spikes, Haste, Acc/Eva/Attributes Boost and whatever else they want (let's not even start on Avatar's Favor), as well as alternating high damage bloodpacts every few seconds, thus also outdamaging many DDs. Also, most "less useful" spells for other jobs are useless too, since MP and time spent on them is MP and time not spent casting something better.

Explain this to me again. Due to having hastega, we'd replace march because...`? Last I checked haste and hastega do not stack, so BRD would still be a great job even if SMN could cast 500 hastega per minute. Further not a single of the Wards are even competing with BRD except possibly accuracy. Same with COR. We'd at most steal their PLD roll slot in the party, with our thunder armor over their flame spikes.

Think it through before you spout nonsense. We are more likely to steal the job of SCH by having good phalanxga, stoneskinga, AOE heals, AOE enfire etc. than any other job. And I'd personally claim SCH stole the SMN spot first.

Another fun part of SMN: it has options.

Which is the whole point of this thread. A lot of lackluster options.

- We can use spirits... just don't expect anything out of it.
- We can melee... just don't expect there to be armor for it.
- We can cast tier II nukes from subjob... just don't expect them to hit hard.
- We can main heal... but not on NMs.
- We can give you defensive buffs... for a high cost and short period of time.

I don't think I demand much at all. Just balance the stuff out. Give WHM and all other mages 3 min duration shells and lets see how valid they think that concept is. Nobody, except masochist SMNs, think 3 min buffs that cost MP is a good idea.

[RAIST]

Just a quick note about the T2/T4 magic spells that hit me when reading the last few posts. Avatars magic gets calculated completely differently from a BLM casting. They have considerably lower INT (though they may have roughly the same BASE MAB) than a BLM does at the same level. In order to compensate, you have to keep the avatar out smacking things around for TP. It's been documented that at 75, avatars have MAB4 trait and only around 82 INT--and virtually no gear readily available to enhance it like BLM, so you have to let them build TP to compensate. It takes 100TP just to get the .25 boost from TP or it's crap. Case in point, to hit 1k on a tier4, a my 90 SMN needs about +12 PET MAB and around 130TP in the calculation.

This isn't hypothetical either, I just completed a pet MAB staff and tested it with Thunder4 on firesday (no weather) last week. I am still rigged for physical on merits, but I was curious just how much the 5 pet MAB merits would affect my magic, but didn't want to dump and rebuild them only to have to reset them if I didn't like it--so I made the Pet MAB staff real quick (only took 2 afternoons to make it). I'm only 3/5 on callers +1 atm, so only had 396 skill with my neck off and have the 25% TP bonus from the legs. I fired off mana cede to give avatar a flat 100TP (no regain from neck) and it was consistently landing for 984 damage (bear in mind that is with a +25% TP bonus from legs to make it 125TP in the calculation) on bees right outside Jueno in Rolanberry. Output simply pales in comparison to any decently geared AH BLM.

[Razushu]

Your best damage is your BP, which costs MP. Your best melee buffs cost MP. Your avatar, if you choose to leave it out, will either lock down 10 item slots or cost MP. Want to pretend to be a WHM? You need MP.

You need MP, so choose your poison:
1) rest for MP
2) gear to reduce MP lost and depend on the subjob for MP
3) melee for MP and depend on subjob for TP
3a) Spirit Taker (WS in INT/MND gear)
3b) Myrkr (WS in MP gear)

Those are your only choices. One of these options actually increases damage by a very LARGE factor. The same option recovers more MP than you could ever use. The same option gives SMN something to do between BPs.

Just because you CAN gear yourself to do more is a perfect reason to do so.

So we should start building nuke sets too? So now our need for MP is a melee tool as well? I haven't meleed on SMN on anything above a DC in forever and I haven't rested for MP since 75 cap -perp/refresh gear has me a +2 per tick MP with Garuda out soon to be +4 per tickcoupled wit ~500mp elemental siphons an 200mp sublimations every 5 minutes WITHOUT putting myself in the danger zone as it stands I have more mp than I can use while safe.
subbing a job for TP would lose far too much in utility from /SCH or /WHM as it stands /SCH is imo the best all round subjob for SMN and I can't see myself ever ditching it for a subjob so I can melee to add a little damage and have to melee to keep avatar out. I don't need the extra mp from myrkr when I already have more than enough mp as is and my gear is good but by no means far above average.
I have enough to do between BPs as is without pretending to be a physical DD or a hybrid job.
Again i can build INT, MND, MAB I can even build a CHR set but why should I? SMN is a pet job in fact it's the only job that's PURE pet in this game the other 3 are DDs with pet's in terms of thier own durablity and DD capabilty

[Razushu]

Instant cast "spells". We are the only "mage" job that can fire off magic/physical attacks from our pet without getting a casting animation lasting several seconds. If SE wanted us to be mage only, we'd see our SMN stand in a pose for 8 seconds preparing the pact.

And I see nothing that says BST, PUP or DRG should be up front meleeing since they have no stoneskin or self cures (well, they might have). As a melee SMN you are naturally expected to play under the same rules as a DRG, BST or PUP. You can't say some melee jobs need to heal themselves and others can be healed by white mages.

Our cast time is just as long it takes 7 seconds to call an avatar, then there's the amount of time it takes to position the avatar and 4 seconds for the BP to fire


aside from the fact they can survive more than a sneeze from a mob that can stare a SMN to death?

they get:

The high level weapon skills from their given class natively

They have Higher melee stats

They have job traits/abilities for melee, front line survivablity as well as dumping their emnity on thier pet

Sure melee jobs can rely on the healer to cure them I never mentioned healing, i just said that to be upfront you need to have some sort of innate survival traits SMN's best means of survival is distance. For a healer to successfully keep a party alive all front liners need to be able to survive long enough to be healed if they start taking damage. I can't see a WHM being any happier healing a melee SMN than they would be healing a NIN with gimp evasion skill/gear who won't use shadows and even they would have easily better survivability than a SMN.

[Papesse]

Using his MP for buffing is pretty much irrelevant these day with all the auto-refresh gear existing, Siphon, Convert etc...

Speaking of usefulness, if I'm not DDing in my party then I gives them a +24% Double Attack (Ifrit's Favor), 5:30 Hastega, 20-40 dmg Enfire (even on VT mobs not particulary weak against fire) and a 3:30 Atk+9% while I can keep the role of main healer (600+ HP cure IV) Even without a form of refresh/ballad I never run out of mp (even outside Abyssea) and I don't feel useless at all for my group.

I agree that Smn need a big help for lower levels but not at HL if you take the time to equip it right, capping Skill etc...

[Karbuncle]

No, because the information about these are terrible. All I know is "prevents death from extreme damage". I'm not sure how you can say the Ward "prevents death" more than the song. Do you half-die from songs and play as a zombie? I'll take your word for it, but again it is pretty terrible to compare a free 0 MP song for 30 minutes fight, or 1000 MP spent from Wards for the same thing.

Seriously? You're complaining about a job when you don't even bother to learn everything about it? I play SMN like once a month and even i make a habit to know the basics of it.

Earthern Armor reduces the damage from Severely Damaging attack. It reduces the Damage from those attacks by a certain percentage. It also doesn't activate unless a certain % of your HP is done.

I.E, If you have 1,200 HP, and get hit with 1000 needles, It'll reduce that damage by say, 50%, So instead of taking 1k you take 500. In the same way, the BRD song would only be like 35%~. (These aren't exact numbers FYI).

The SMN one is more potent, Lasts longer, and the best thing is they stack. Really it costs absolutely no where near 1000MP to do Earthern Armor, at least be realistic with your fake numbers.

Really, I don't think the job is misunderstood or Ignored. The job has its uses. A lot of people use SMNs outside of Abyssea simply for Safe-DD, Their Avatars are disposeable, they do good Damage, and they (The Summoners) are technically ranged DD. The problem with SMN is that the BP Timer is too restricting to the point its damage output is laughably low compared to conventional DD, even if you count Avatars melee damage.

SE Probably figures the job is balanced because of its "Safety" Factor. Hateless, Long-ranged Damage that has minimal risk to the Summoner in a group setting. Inside abyssea it sucks because our terrible slow damage and the near immortality of DD makes us less than desirable, but outside Abyssea we aren't AS terrible.

The job needs improvements, don't get me wrong, but I think we'll get them. TBH the job holds its own outside Abyssea nicely, it has its uses as i listed above, hateless, Safe, good Damage. We just need a Reduction in the BP Timer (Maybe lower cap from 45 to 30) and a bit more power behind our punches.

[Dallas]

So we should start building nuke sets too?

I do have a dark magic build for Aspir/Drain because I was one of the first adopters of /SCH. You should have "Impact" by now as well, but I don't suppose you had anything competent in mind.

That brings us to the interesting question, what ARE you doing for 45 seconds? Mala, he may have the answer as to why SMN is ignored.

[Razushu]

I do have a dark magic build for Aspir/Drain because I was one of the first adopters of /SCH. You should have "Impact" by now as well, but I don't suppose you had anything competent in mind.

That brings us to the interesting question, what ARE you doing for 45 seconds? Mala, he may have the answer as to why SMN is ignored.

Why should I have Impact? Is it that really useful to justify 1/3 my MP pool?(Honest question haven't heard that much about it)
My point of the nuke set was because if we're gearing for weak melee why not weak nukes, I have one or two pieces for Drain/Aspir and Sleep. But that's it and I Find I don't use Sleep that much unless something goes wrong Aspir on mobs with mp(which isn't that often idk I just don't find myself fighting mobs with mp for some reason) Drain I use alot to refill my hp after sublimation for cheap. none of this really warrants stretching my already quite full backpack with a nuking set to squeeze an extra 50 damage on spaming my tier II /SCH nukes just like meleeing for mp doesn't really justify building a set for it when i can manage my mp in ways that don't put me in danger of repeated KOs.

I wouldn't call it 45 secs, if I'm in a party i'm spamming a 70 or 75 pact keeping hastega up full time and ATLEAST one other party buff so with pet swapping/positioning and doing my best to be ready to support the party in any way that pops up be it sub heals or an extra sleep etc. I manage to keep quite busy in a party making my 45 downtime a fair bit less.