I'm One Of The Filthiests Of Casuals And Even I Can See How Dumbdown FF14 Has Become!

I don’t think anyone denies that we were all excited for SMN initially, flashy animations, big attacks, 2 casters in one expansion with a gap closer, it looked to be good

Then we actually got it and we found out it has a depth that would make a roadside puddle in the middle of El Niño jealous and it all kinda fell apart

I don’t think content creators reaction to the media tour is a good yardstick here

Well, I'm more referring to my "brief history of Summoner" where I was talking about what people said did and didn't "feel" like a Summoner to them. How SB was really the first time it felt like a Summoner rather than a WoW Warlock, and EW got people excited because they thought it finally looked like a Summoner. And note there Laryzur saying that it felt like one to him with summons going off left and right rather than infrequently and how he said there's "really no filler" referring to old SMN having several filler phases where you were a DoT/Ruin Mage.

Fair?

The problem is new SMN is all filler phase, even the Demi’s don’t feel like a burst phase because you are still just spamming aspected ruin 3 but now all of that potency they could have put into an interesting burst phase they just dumped into enkindle

If anything the primals being reduced to colouring your ruin 3 cast makes it feel less like a summoner because the summons become the least important part of the class (to say nothing of the absolute slot of playing the class sub 80 where they don’t even change the base animation of ruin 2/3)

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Originally Posted by Supersnow845

If anything the primals being reduced to colouring your ruin 3 cast makes it feel less like a summoner because the summons become the least important part of the class (to say nothing of the absolute slot of playing the class sub 80 where they don’t even change the base animation of ruin 2/3)

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I'm not entirely sure how much it'd help with the 'boredom' aspect, but I'd imagine it'd be way more 'visually hype' if the summoning of a demiprimal gave you an aspect of their body for the duration of their 'trance', like you summon Garuda, you have Garuda's wings and claws, and those wings are why you can cast and move at the same time. Titan gives you Titan big hands and you clap those together for Mountain Buster instead of slapping the inside of your book. Ifrit gives you big Ifrit claws and you lunge with them for the 1-2 melee combo

Also instead of the summon being a GCD (that has massively delayed damage), it could be an OGCD, with Enkindle remaining as the 'big ultimate' kind of move. So instead of Garuda appearing, doing Aerial Blast and then sodding off, it'd be you the SMN, with Garuda's power fused to you temporarily, doing Aerial Blast. Guess then you'd have people going 'oh but then you don't 'summon' so it's not a 'summoner' is it' and the like, though

Also I've always felt like old SMN was trying to be Shadow Priest or vice versa, rather than Warlock. Especially given the DWT/Voidform comparison, and now Bahamut/Mindbender is kind of applicable

I said this before, but the "up side" to SMN's simplicity is in the next 10 years, it can only become more interesting. The original SMN had reached a point that there is nothing you can do more to it without messing it up even further. I feel AST and MNK are also at that point while DRG is getting there.

I think the popularity of the SMN's rework (data matter, not opinion) will probably encourage SE to try and do similar thing to other jobs. After all, you can't just leave a job mostly the same from expansion to expansion. And if it has become so convoluted to make new change, it's better to hit the reset button so you have room to grown in the future.

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Originally Posted by Raven2014

I said this before, but the "up side" to SMN's simplicity is in the next 10 years, it can only become more interesting. The original SMN had reached a point that there is nothing you can do more to it without messing it up even further. I feel AST and MNK are also at that point while DRG is getting there.

I think the popularity of the SMN's rework (data matter, not opinion) will probably encourage SE to try and do similar thing to other jobs. After all, you can't just leave a job mostly the same from expansion to expansion. And if it has become so convoluted to make new change, it's better to hit the reset button so you have room to grown in the future.

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MCH was also redone in 5.0 to give it a new foundation they could grow on

What did 6.0 MCH give us- an extra 10% damage down after we begged for half an expansion of MCH being in the toilet

They really don’t have a good track record of these “reset redesigns” actually going anywhere, new PLD being diet GNB is another example

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Originally Posted by Raven2014

I said this before, but the "up side" to SMN's simplicity is in the next 10 years, it can only become more interesting. The original SMN had reached a point that there is nothing you can do more to it without messing it up even further. I feel AST and MNK are also at that point while DRG is getting there.

I think the popularity of the SMN's rework (data matter, not opinion) will probably encourage SE to try and do similar thing to other jobs. After all, you can't just leave a job mostly the same from expansion to expansion. And if it has become so convoluted to make new change, it's better to hit the reset button so you have room to grown in the future.

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Given what has happened to DRK (Discount WAR), PLD (Discount GNB), MCH (Not expanded after being reset), the entire healer role (Massive mess all around), I think we should stop pretending that the dev team resets jobs to expand upon them in the future, the real reason they reset jobs and make them really similar to another job is to make them easy to work with for the tiny job design team, that's all it is.

I expect DRG to become a RPR clone and for AST to become much more like WHM in 7.0, all because that would be a lot simpler for the tiny team to balance.

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Originally Posted by Raven2014

I said this before, but the "up side" to SMN's simplicity is in the next 10 years, it can only become more interesting. The original SMN had reached a point that there is nothing you can do more to it without messing it up even further. I feel AST and MNK are also at that point while DRG is getting there.

I think the popularity of the SMN's rework (data matter, not opinion) will probably encourage SE to try and do similar thing to other jobs. After all, you can't just leave a job mostly the same from expansion to expansion. And if it has become so convoluted to make new change, it's better to hit the reset button so you have room to grown in the future.

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DRK, MCH and healers say hello. (I'm holding out comments about PLD until 7.0, but yeah as of right now..discount GNB with ranged attacks)

Trust me, this is what I thought initially too back at Shadowbringers launch. I wish that thought process was proven right instead of wrong

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Originally Posted by Supersnow845

MCH was also redone in 5.0 to give it a new foundation they could grow on

What did 6.0 MCH give us- an extra 10% damage down after we begged for half an expansion of MCH being in the toilet

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MCH was never the same situation. The original concept was overwhelming reject in 3.0, and 4.0 was an emergency remade, that was remade again in 5.0. MCH never had an solid identity or concept. They were all done so the job don't get scrab all together.

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Originally Posted by Aravell

Given what has happened to DRK (Discount WAR), PLD (Discount GNB), MCH (Not expanded after being reset), the entire healer role (Massive mess all around), I think we should stop pretending that the dev team resets jobs to expand upon them in the future, the real reason they reset jobs and make them really similar to another job is to make them easy to work with for the tiny job design team, that's all it is.

I expect DRG to become a RPR clone and for AST to become much more like WHM in 7.0, all because that would be a lot simpler for the tiny team to balance.

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Originally Posted by Zairava

DRK, MCH and healers say hello. (I'm holding out comments about PLD until 7.0, but yeah as of right now..discount GNB with ranged attacks)

Trust me, this is what I thought initially too back at Shadowbringers launch. I wish that thought process was proven right instead of wrong

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I feel all of these answers are missing the point I'm trying. Rather you guys are just leaning on what I said as a convenience way to beat on a dead horse that had been beaten to zombie. If anything, these replies further prove my point more than anything. None of the jobs mentioned had a complete tear down and re-imagination like SMN did. Had instead of remaking the old SMN, the new SMN was introduced as a new job I don't think anyone would have blink. The job was "fundamentally" changed. Whether all of the job "rework" are still just more or less adjusted/tackled on/patched up on the same foundation.

Again, the fact you all insist SE has been doing a bad job with these classes, that just re-enforce my point that maybe they all need a complete tear down like SMN.

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Originally Posted by Raven2014

MCH was never the same situation. The original concept was overwhelming reject in 3.0, and 4.0 was an emergency remade, that was remade again in 5.0. MCH never had an solid identity or concept. They were all done so the job don't get scrab all together.








I feel all of these answers are missing the point I'm trying. Rather you guys are just leaning on what I said as a convenience way to beat on a dead horse that had been beaten to zombie. If anything, these replies further prove my point more than anything. None of the jobs mentioned had a complete tear down and re-imagination like SMN did. Had instead of remaking the old SMN, the new SMN was introduced as a new job I don't think anyone would have blink. The job was "fundamentally" changed. Whether all of the job "rework" are still just more or less adjusted/tackled on/patched up on the same foundation.

Again, the fact you all insist SE has been doing a bad job with these classes, that just re-enforce my point that maybe they all need a complete tear down like SMN.

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I agree that they need a complete tear-down, it's just given their track record with even just reworks doesn't give me much faith that they'll actually do a good job with it or expand on it much mechanically.

I don't really like current summoner, it goes without saying that I think Shadowbringers or Stormblood were the best installments (outside of pets dying in combat), but it still feels fresh despite its glaring issues.

If say, despite my usual consistent bitching about DRK when possible, if it got a complete tear-down and was given its own combat identity, I'd be less frustrated and might have more ideas on how to expand upon that rather than looking at it now and just seeing that its old iteration with Shadowbringer QoL would be pretty solid and trying to find a middle ground.