Would you SMNs prefer more DPS or more sustain?

Would you prefer:

Energy Drain buff
Piety on casting gear
Increased damage of Pets
Increased Damage on Spells


http://strawpoll.me/3294589


I'd choose increased Pet damage to make the pets more of a focal point.

Energy Drain buff - What kind of buff? More damage or more mana? What ever it is it will affect SCH and they do not need any kind of buff.

Piety on casting gear - Piety on casting gear can be good at some point and depends on content, but if you have it too much it would mess our mana control at some point.

Increased damage of Pets - I personally think this is the best solution fix the job since that wont affect scholar in any way.

Increased Damage on Spells - most of our spells are shared with SCH and buffing our fester would give us pretty insane amount burst and it would mess our damage even more, if we will get the fights, that cost even more mana than current fights, because fester and energy drain is bonded together.

None of the above. Give a balanced MP resource in relation to every other class. Energy Drain is not a balanced resource unless it gives like triple the amount of mana it gives right now, worthy of using an Aetherflow stack on. They won't touch it either cause it's tied to scholar, so no direct buffs in potency of MP regeneration or Damage.

Damage will come naturally with simply giving us a renewable mp source so we can properly execute an optimal rotation. Considering SMN DPS over the course of a fight is entirely a negative correlation, the least they can do is help bring it closer to a curve where it eventually plateaus, actually becoming a sustainable DPS class.

Everything else at current is well balanced in terms of potency and should remain untouched. Adjusting potency for higher numbers would create an imbalance with BLM and will only make an artificial power creep we do not want.

Maybe if they adjust Energy Drain to restore the percentage of MP you are actually missing, instead of being a static 266 MP. I don't think that would affect SCH's too much. That's all I can think of right now (about to head to bed).

If Summoners want a new or added way for MP management, I would suggest something like Sublimination from FFXI's Scholar. It would slowly build a pool of MP while also slowly ticking away your health. You could offset the health loss with Regen or Stoneskin. Re-casting the ability would then restore your MP based on how much you had accumulated (it had a cap). After that it went on cooldown.

As for what I personally would want, I wouldn't like to see buffs, but rather have pets be more balanced with more useful and distinct abilities. With SMN being DoT focused, the pets should atleast have better interaction with them. Contagion is the only great damage ability for that reason. It would be nice if Ifrit, for instance, had an ability that set a debuff on the target increasing the potency of active DoTs. Or an additional DoT that could interact with Fester for more damage. Just throwing ideas out there.

I don't think a flat potency buff on anything is an answer.

Only way how changing energy drain would be good(imo) if they build energy drain 2 for summoners that not cost aetherflow stacks, cost global cooldown and doing zero damage. Then u would lose only 80 potency compared using ruin instead losing 150 potency compared using fester.

An idea I had was to maybe add an additional effect to Fester so it would have a chance that the next Energy Drain didn't cost an aetherflow stack. Would have to be a pretty high chance to have an effect(50%+) but it would add a decent amount of DPS as well as somewhat offset MP issues. Just a thought.

Out of preference, if I had to choose one... Increased Pet damage. But If I could choose a few and not all :

Increased Pet damage
Increased Piety on class
Slightly Increased Ruin damage (For higher single target dps)

Reducing Enkinndle's cool down to 60s will provide the extra 18-25 DPS which will make us on par with the Black Mage.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Skeith-Adeline

Would you prefer:

Energy Drain buff
Piety on casting gear
Increased damage of Pets
Increased Damage on Spells

---

Well, ED buff is out of the question due to being tied to SCH
Piety on Casting gear would be an unbelievable buff for BLM (So much extra time in Astral III ><)

--------------------------------------------------------

I would vote for Increased Damage on Spells. Something in the way of
- Bio - Potency 60 - 12s
- Miasma - Potency 50 - 18s
- Bio 2 - Potency 50 - 24s

Edited for wrong timer scale

Higher potency, less uptime and have Contagion attached to the Summoner instead of Garuda.
Edit: And have Contagion extend the dots longer (+18s vs 15s)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Judge_Xero

Well, ED buff is out of the question due to being tied to SCH
Piety on Casting gear would be an unbelievable buff for BLM (So much extra time in Astral III ><)

--------------------------------------------------------

I would vote for Increased Damage on Spells. Something in the way of
- Bio - Potency 60 - 12s
- Miasma - Potency 55 - 15s
- Bio 2 - Potency 55 - 18s

Higher potency, less uptime and have Contagion attached to the Summoner instead of Garuda.

---

That would make our DPS even worse Summoner's would lose around 20% damage. Besides buffing the DoTs would buff the Scholar and make the Summoner even more useless to progression statics.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Judge_Xero

Higher potency, less uptime and have Contagion attached to the Summoner instead of Garuda.

---

I agree. As long as Garuda is the only pet that has Contagion, I feel like no matter what pet they add people will always perfer Garuda because of Contagion. Unless they give us one bad ass Egi that does amazing DPS to make up for the loss of Contagion. But I doubt that.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by mdha02

I agree. As long as Garuda is the only pet that has Contagion, I feel like no matter what pet they add people will always perfer Garuda because of Contagion. Unless they give us one bad ass Egi that does amazing DPS to make up for the loss of Contagion. But I doubt that.

---

Ifrit is the preferred choice among top-end SMN's right now.

I would say put pie on casting gear. They can do like the healer set that some pieces have a little acc+ (like 10 or so) to add them to the casting gear with pie.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Myrhn

I would say put pie on casting gear. They can do like the healer set that some pieces have a little acc+ (like 10 or so) to add them to the casting gear with pie.

---

This could potentially break BLM's, do not like/want this idea. Either Piety on SMN's books or Piety on the soul crystal

I think they should have more base Piety on our soulstone (so we don't indirectly buff BLMs by having piety on caster gear), put Contagion on the SMN to allow more freedom choosing either Garuda or Ifrit (and soon to be Leviathan or Ramuh if they are both DD summons), take the Aetherflow cost off Energy Drain and give it an appropriate cooldown (you can even match it to invigorate's cooldown and have it recover the same % of MP as it would TP or balance it with Shroud for WHMs (since yes this will affect SCH)), and make Enkindle have the same cooldown as Dragonfire Dive.

I honestly think our damage is fine for the most part, just need some quality of life things to help us keep doing our regular rotation.

It takes ~70 Piety for BLM to see a small buff to damage (less than 3%), before factoring in all the lost crit/spsp/det from having piety in that slot. That is far from breaking BLM.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by StouterTaru

It takes ~70 Piety for BLM to see a small buff to damage (less than 3%), before factoring in all the lost crit/spsp/det from having piety in that slot. That is far from breaking BLM.

---

The Implication of the word could is very powerful here. Fact is BLM's don't need a buff now in any sort of way. Putting Piety on casting gear is a silly idea when there are other ways to apply Piety to ONLY Summoner.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Judge_Xero

I would vote for Increased Damage on Spells. Something in the way of

---

That suggestion would burn even more mana because need apply dots even more often. Bio2 mana cost is 159 mana miasma 133 and bio 106. Ruin cost only 79 mana. If we need use our globals for everything else than ruin more often, that will burn our mana even faster.

@for Akiza
That enkindle suggestion is not that bad. If I calculated right it increase around 10 - 12 our dps from the current one.

My point is that it wouldn't be a buff for BLM. Putting on that extra piety, your loss of other stats looks like 70 PIE = 100 DET = 140 Crit/SpSp on dungeon/tome gear. Losing 100 DET or 140 Crit or 140 SpSp is a lot more than a 3% drop in damage.

The only reason BLM piety build is viable currently is due to heavily melded crafted gear. For example, 110 Head/Hands/Boots can be melded to -7 INT, +12 PIE ~+14 secondary stats vs 130 gear in those slots, a negligible drop in damage per cast.

For tome/dungeon gear, you would be looking at losing 29 of a secondary stat for 13 piety.

New Egi with MP regeneration for whole party. Good utility, and would fix the MP issue, no boost to damage. The problem isn't poor DPS, it's sustained DPS.

An other options could be to give Fester a "raise time remaining of your dots by 6-9s".
Less dot casting, more ruining, less MP spent on the long run, while not raising our DPS in any way nor affecting any other jobs like sch or blm.

Have to be math'ed out, but I think it's a decent way.

Edit : oh, and also reduce a bit contagion's importance, to give a chance to the other egis.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Sunako

That suggestion would burn even more mana because need apply dots even more often. Bio2 mana cost is 159 mana miasma 133 and bio 106. Ruin cost only 79 mana. If we need use our globals for everything else than ruin more often, that will burn our mana even faster.

---

Here is why I went with that design.

- Bio - Potency 60 - 12s - 240 Potency VS 240 Potency in 18s
- Miasma - Potency 50 - 18s - 300 Potency VS 280 Potency in 24s
- Bio 2 - Potency 50 - 24s - 400 Potency VS 350 Potency in 30s

This will do slightly more damage in less time vs our current dots. So there is technically no reason to re-cast them as soon as the dots fall off if you are looking only to maintain MP and what SMN's current damage is.

- Higher potential single target DPS if used with Contagion
- Higher Multi-Dot DPS (more damage in less time to get more mileage out of the dots before mobs die) + more utility out of Bane

One of the arguments about MP consumption in SMN is - just have the Bard sing ballad if you need MP. But in longer fights you are only looking to maintain your DPS instead of using Energy Drain, or cutting down your rotation (no MII Contagion except with RS, limited SF) , which is a loss in DPS, so why would the Bard lose his own DPS to maintain your extra 25 DPS.

This design would make it worth while for the Bard to sing Ballad, because it would be a significant DPS gain for SMN to gain back MP and have MP to burn.

Simple example using Bio - 18s
Bio - 6X Ruin = 720 Potency (MP cost 580) - what we currently have, and/or without recasting Bio if the dot time was reduced.
Bio - 4 X Ruin, Bio, Ruin - 760 Potency (MP Cost 607)

With shorter DoT timers, you would end up casting Bio a lot more, which could reduce the number of Ruin II's you end up casting in order to use your OCD skills with no delay.

Reduce enkindle recast (maybe spur as well) and change the spellspeed crit buff to a MP regen. DONE

Again, it seems like SMNs want to be BLMs with SMN spells and abilities. That shouldn't be the case, which is why both sustain and damage buff seems silly. As another mentioned, piety on casting gear wouldn't change much for BLMs.

I'd be in line to see their pets see a HUGE dps increase if their DoTs are nerfed. Make the DoTs something to keep the player busy with, not the focal point of the class lol. Make pet abilities something you should focus over.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Skeith-Adeline

I'd be in line to see their pets see a HUGE dps increase if their DoTs are nerfed. Make the DoTs something to keep the player busy with, not the focal point of the class lol. Make pet abilities something you should focus over.

---

I'd be ok with this, as long they do something to increase pet survivability or reduce the cast timer to summon a pet. Not that it's bad as is, but if the pet itself is going to become the focus of our damage, we need to not be penalized so heavily when they get killed.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by ShaolinMike

I'd be ok with this, as long they do something to increase pet survivability or reduce the cast timer to summon a pet. Not that it's bad as is, but if the pet itself is going to become the focus of our damage, we need to not be penalized so heavily when they get killed.

---

Well, you have that one ability that heals your pet no? Also, micro managing pets by moving them would be cool too,

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Skeith-Adeline

Well, you have that one ability that heals your pet no? Also, micro managing pets by moving them would be cool too,

---

That one ability (sustain) is basically just a pet regen, not a direct heal. Pets do benefit from AOE heals when in range, but that also means they're in range to get smacked. I do micro manage my pet. That being said, sometimes the pet still dies. What I'm saying is if all of the damage was transferred to the pet with it's current survivability\summon cast time as-is, SMN DPS would plummet to insanely low levels in the event of one miscalculation in pet management.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by ShaolinMike

That one ability (sustain) is basically just a pet regen, not a direct heal. Pets do benefit from AOE heals when in range, but that also means they're in range to get smacked. I do micro manage my pet. That being said, sometimes the pet still dies. What I'm saying is if all of the damage was transferred to the pet with it's current survivability\summon cast time as-is, SMN DPS would plummet to insanely low levels in the event of one miscalculation in pet management.

---

That would be the fun in micromanaging. It'd make them focus more on pets than anything. The pets can take most hits without a death anyways. Perhaps a Arc traight that even further increases Sustain HPS

AlI we really need is to have:
-The restriction on Bane removed.
-Get thunder back
-Have Energy drain/Aether flow give back more Mana
then we can go back to our true mission. Spreading DOOM...doom...doom...doom.
http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs10/f/2006/099/b/0/Doom.gif

Energy drain slight damage buff(with a smn trait maybe so it doesn't affect the sch) AND a slight pet buff, not only through damage but through skills too

My theory is that I think machinist is going to play the way I think SMN should have been designed. Instead of having a pet full time, I think the turrets are going to essentially be long cooldown skills. You pop the turret and it does something for X amount of time and then it disappears. This would have fit perfectly for SMN as it would allow us to use all of our pets. Put them on a 2 minute cooldown. You summon garuda and she does some really awesome wind related abilities for 20-30 seconds, uses aerial blast and then she disappears. Next you summon ifrit and he uses some powerful fire/melee abilities, uses inferno and then disappears. This would be a good cross between old school summoners and summoners from the past few final fantasy games. Leviathan egi could do some powerful water abilties, and then at the end use tidal wave which would restore a small portion of MP for those standing in range.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Sequora

My theory is that I think machinist is going to play the way I think SMN should have been designed. Instead of having a pet full time, I think the turrets are going to essentially be long cooldown skills...This would have fit perfectly for SMN as it would allow us to use all of our pets. Put them on a 2 minute cooldown. You summon garuda and she does some wind related abilities for 20-30 seconds, uses aerial blast and then she disappears. Next you summon ifrit and he uses some powerful fire/melee abilities, uses inferno and then disappears. This would be a good cross between old school summoners and summoners from the past few final fantasy games. Leviathan egi could do some powerful water abilties....

---

I actually thought the same thing when I first heard about machinist. The only thing about each egi using powerful water/fire/whatever abilities is that there's no elemental affinity in this game, so how would Square distinguish one egi from another?

If only I could pick two.

I'd go for an energy drain buff and an increase to magic OR pet damage.

MP shouldn't altogether be infinite (as BLM) but should be something you manage, with energy drain being the slightly-less dps option over fester when you run low. That said I think it should provide enough MP, coupled with Aetherflow, to get you back on the high dps track for a while.

TL;DR Make Energy Drain situationally useful to help it compete with Fester.

SMNs need more DPS in the long run to stay close to BLM. Not much worried about sustain. Maybe they can buff Energy Drain only on SMNs that triple the recovery rather than double it that way it can keep their mana pool stable........just a lil bit maybe?

But if you think about it SMN lose around 10 dps from using energy drain. BLM can lose like 20 dps if they have bad luck with procs cause the class is bit rng. If SMN would do same damage as blm without that random generated option, would it be more safe go with SMN always and then nobody would choose BLM anymore? Around 20 dps behind from BLM is pretty much fine.

BLM can also gain a shit load of DPS is they are lucky with procs. Why don't you put that in your remark? For the Summoner is just goes downhill. The DPS is not sustained and it is by no means as high as the Black Mage. Summoner should have higher or equal ST damage. Dragoon, Monk and Ninja are also very close to each other with shitty AoE. I don't see why Summoner can't have that too in comparison to BLM. It's AoE is not that great as a Black Mage (in some situations it is better, though). So why not?

I hope dev reduce the CD for Enkindle skill to 120s instead of 300s. 300s is too long for skill that not give a higher damage or the CD still 300s but raise the skill potency to 500+ since its do higher damage. Then please cancel casting time to Bio 2 and Miasma 1 since that the only main dps skill that SMN has and it can distinguish the SMN from BLM in term of gameplay utilities since BLM is already have higher dps & good AOE skill. Besides, dev can remove the raise and psyhick skill since its mostly useless in raid/dungeon coz SMN have no time to use it because SMN usually tend to DPS rather than do healing/raise thing like SCH/WHM do. This 2 slot can be replace by damage buff/skill for SMN.

I also like the idea, that summoning pet will get permanent party buff like summon garuda will get 5% increase int & spell speed/skill speed etc. I also like the rework idea that, if summoning pet like garuda, SMN will get access to wind type spell and this elemental spell can replace with raise and physick spell. Last but not least, I really hope dev will rework the appearances of the egi's. At least create a true primal appearances in size of the player/minion and not the crystallize one. This will make SMN look like a true Final Fantasy summoner.