Endgame Summoner -- Aurum Vale

There's a debate going on about how good/bad Summoner is for Endgame. I'm firmly planted on the good side. SMN is highly versitile and can do things no other class can do by taking all the chaos and guess work out of parties. Just follow me through Aurum Vale and I'll show you why you would want SMNs in your endgame parties.


At the beginning, it's not that impressive. In the dungeon you have a lot of trash that you should be sleeping/assisting the tank. This is where SMN is the least useful. The Summoner should be using his Ifrit DPS Egi and should not be using Bane because it wakes up the sleeping mobs and makes hate management a pain for the tank while at the same time slowing down your DPS meter. Do not want. Use Fester if you have a chance. If you really want to use Bane, use it when there's only one mob left to go and the other mob is 90 percent dead. That's an easy way to pass on your DoT without recasting the spells which is a waste of time and lowers your DPS to agonizingly slow levels.

The only time you want to use Bane is actually when your DoTs are most useful and that is with the Diremites who cannot be slept and hit hard. Piling DoTs onto one diremite and passing that DPS to the rest of the group really helps your healer and DPS because it gets the mobs down quickly by whittling their HP over a good stretch of time.

In the Locksmith Room, put your Ifrit away. It's too squishy for this. Use Titan and use it wisely. Don't be a pain for the tank by letting your Titan pull hate off. Use Steady until your tank is good and hated and then let your Titan go fight. Use Sustain, but Titan's shield is enough to stave of 8 stacks of DoTs. Also, cure your own pet. Please don't make things more difficult for the healer.

Choose Ifrit for the dungeon trash again.

Next is Coincounter. Again, put your Ifrit away. Coincounter kills Egis at close ranges. Use Emerald Carbuncle. Coincounter will target party members with a strong "Glower" attack so you want to "Place" your carbuncle away from PT members and yourself. Your Carbuncle will then nuke non-stop, making very short work of Coincounter.

Choose Ifrit for dungeon trash....

Finally, Miser's Mistress, where your Titan Egi really has some fun! Use Steady at the outset and keep your Titan next to you so it doesn't accidently get nailed by the AoEs and die. When the Miser starts getting low, she uses Sow. "Place" your Titan among the Seeds and "Sic" the Titan on them. Voila! Instant off tank!

This makes getting rid of the sprouts so easy. Your Titan is freeing up attention for the Tank to focus on Miser, for the DPS to focus on the adds and for the WHM keeping everyone alive. And it frees you to use your AoE attacks.

Miser's Mistress goes from being a stressful pain in the rear to super fun in a matter of seconds. Go Egis Go!

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Originally Posted by HiirNoivl

At the beginning, it's not that impressive. In the dungeon you have a lot of trash that you should be sleeping/assisting the tank. This is where SMN is the least useful. The Summoner should be using his Ifrit DPS Egi and should not be using Bane because it wakes up the sleeping mobs and makes hate management a pain for the tank while at the same time slowing down your DPS meter. Do not want. !

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Spreading the dots don´t wake up sleeping mobs. I noticed this during dungeons, mobs where asleep and with the dots ticking.

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Originally Posted by Beliel

Spreading the dots don´t wake up sleeping mobs. I noticed this during dungeons, mobs where asleep and with the dots ticking.

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that's probably bad design. Dots generally wake up or "break" CCs when they tic. it is likely it will be fixed in the future.

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Originally Posted by Koldhara

that's probably bad design. Dots generally wake up or "break" CCs when they tic. it is likely it will be fixed in the future.

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That's not bad design at all. Every class has DoTs, many of them AoE, and most of them have an initial damage component (which DOES break sleep/bind).

If you're worried about people using DoTs + Sleep to kill enemies super easily, don't be. Sleep's sharp DRs prevent that from happening, not to mention anything people should be having trouble with (read: bosses) is immune to sleep in the first place.

OK i confirmed this.
If the mob is assleep and you spread the dots they will wake up, however if they have the dots and get sleep after, they wont woke up from the ticks.

Aurum Vale is not endgame.

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Originally Posted by Crescent_Dusk

Aurum Vale is not endgame.

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It's the first real endgame-like-sort of-ish dungeon and is important step for new Summoners to learn their endgame skills. So... close enough. :3

Good Luck with Amdapor Keep as a Summoner, that is end game ish dungeon, not AV...

As a Summoner, we do not deal enough damage (or DoT) to run this dungeon without wiping a lot. This Dungeon is pretty much a DPS dungeon where you need high DPS in order to efficiently run through it effectively.

As a Summoner I always have trouble finding groups to Dungeon with due to the lack of DPS as a Summoner, it is well known already.

GG

>.> Not sure what you mean Mountain Dew. I have no problems with AK. I'll update this post later.

What I'm trying to point out is that Summoners are pretty broken at the moment, our DPS/DoTs tickle the mobs in dungeons.

I've had quite a few groups in Duty Finder where the group would just leave the dungeon right after seeing a Summoner pop up because we don't do enough damage for this dungeon, we bring nothing to the table in terms of Damage if compared to other DPS classes.

It is doable sure, but it just takes ALOT more effort to down bosses, generally people would want anything else but a Summoner.

I'm sorry you've had that bad experience. I've both run AK as a summoner and tanked for an AK party with two Summoners. There are two things people need to keep in mind.


Summoners, like all casters, are squishy. They need tanks to keep the mobs away from them. This poses a challenge to tanks that some people don't want to bother with. But that's not SMN fault. I'm sure that the tanks who let their SMNs aggro and die to adds would also do the same for a BLM or a WHM.

That out of the way, there's the issue of DPS. So long as the tank is steady and reliable (Not losing hate or running around in a confusion) SMN can deal just as much damage as anyone else.

There's the usual rotation of Bio and miasma and Bio II then Fester, but added to that now is Miasma II and Shadow Flare.

In the first boss, Place Garuda in a spot that is both away from the boss and out of the range of the room-wide AoE. She'll DPS non-stop. Bio to Fester combo is more than enough to down the Priest. Place Shadowflare on the tank and pile DoTs on the main boss. The Tank should grab the adds and bring them into Shadowflare. Then use Bane to spread all the DoTs from the Boss to the Adds.

They die so quick it's amazing. The constant DoTs and the constant DPS from Garuda is more than enough to bring down the Flayer.

Next is the Demon Wall. Use your Titan Egi to Off tank the gnats that spawn. Use Shadowflare and Bane to spread the pile of DoT from the Wall to the gnats. And Use Limit Break too if you really want to be fast about it.

Next is... Ana... Anabato... Big ugly undead lizard thing. This one's even easier Because the tank stays in one place. Just keep your Egi behind one of the pillars. It might not be exactly right and die, but no matter, if you keep Shadow Flare on the boss and kill the adds with DoT damage and Fester.

It's really that easy.

***The key to unlocking the full potential of SMN DPS is strategy and cunning***

While soloing practice casting Shadowflare, then pulling mobs into the place and binding them with Tridisaster. Practice placing your Egi where it will do the most damage. Get a feel for your timers so you don't "snip" the last few seconds of your DoTs. Learn to be quick at it.

The main problem with SMN is not the class, it's that it's new. The Job is new to everyone. No one is playing it exactly perfect yet. Just give it time.

Why would you lose DPS on demon wall, which is a DPS check, summoning Titan? Just use a limit break on the right gnat and burst him down, then kill the left one.

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Originally Posted by Beliel

OK i confirmed this.
If the mob is assleep and you spread the dots they will wake up, however if they have the dots and get sleep after, they wont woke up from the ticks.

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I can't log in to test it (Got to love paying a subscription fee for a game that is full 99% of the time) but I am pretty sure you can spread DoTs without waking up mobs if the DoT you are applying/spread doesn't do an initial damage. I believe Bio has an initial damage hit and that will wake up a mob but if it applies the DoT without an initial hit, I don't think it will. I was playing around with it earlier.

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Originally Posted by Crescent_Dusk

Why would you lose DPS on demon wall, which is a DPS check, summoning Titan? Just use a limit break on the right gnat and burst him down, then kill the left one.

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Yes that will work too. Mine is just the safer route, assuming that the tank will not be able to get a hold of the gnats efficiently.

The better your tank, the higher you can DPS.


That's why. Demon Wall is a Weak-sauce DPS check. You can do it with Titan.

Summoners , are week ! Your just being carried by the rest of the group. Your job could of been done better by another class. There is nothing you bring that matters.

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Originally Posted by Snap

Summoners , are week ! Your just being carried by the rest of the group. Your job could of been done better by another class. There is nothing you bring that matters.

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Yet I have stolen aggro from the tank and most times when the tank dies, I get aggro. Yes, I am a summoner. Yes, there was a BLM in the party also.

Btw, it is weak, not week.

For the second boss of AK. You really don't have to kill the adds. We just focus the boss and ask the tank to tank the gnats at the right side while we are switching from mid to left. I killed the boss with me (summoner), a white mage, a paladin and a dragoon WITHOUT limit break. And we have not the best item for our class.

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Originally Posted by TraeSnow

Yet I have stolen aggro from the tank and most times when the tank dies, I get aggro. Yes, I am a summoner. Yes, their was a BLM in the party also.

Btw, it is weak, not week.

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If you're going to correct someone on grammar, it's "there was a BLM" not "their was a BLM."

I've found my DPS to be just fine to run Amdapor while one shotting every boss. My group make up is BLM, WHM, PLD and me. Using Garuda on single target is key - and so is keeping shadow flare down. We have high ramp up - sure. But with raging strikes, pretty good weapons I'm competing with the BLM on the meters my tank runs. Now, that might not be accurate but in general if you are saying it's a DPS race we are pushing hard through the game.

I think Summoner right now has a high skill cap? I'm not entirely sure but I do know that If I go on one target and my BLM goes on another we are racing to see who wins - and neither of us pop CDs for it. ( I don't think ).

Longer fights Summoners have very good damage. The one thing I really agree with in this thread is pushing the distance on bane out a little bit, I have quite a few times been confused as to why mobs didn't get dots on them when they should have.

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Originally Posted by Beliel

OK i confirmed this.
If the mob is assleep and you spread the dots they will wake up, however if they have the dots and get sleep after, they wont woke up from the ticks.

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Sorry but no you did not confirm it. One of my favorite things to do is spread my DoTs to the sleeping mobs because they DO NOT wake up. If they were waking up there was another reason. Spreading with Bane doesn't wake the mobs up. The reason it doesn't is because there is no initial damage when using Bane. Again after running several dungeons at both SMN and SCH I simply have not seen Bane waking things up. But since you are not the only one say it does wake them up I am going to have to look again.

I think the OP's choice of dungeon to go through is a great example of why groups DON'T want summoners/scholars. As a Scholar I can't get past Locksmith, because Eos dies by the third stack (at best). So, I'm basically stuck using sub-par AoE healing in a fight that's heavy AoE damage with no pet support.

I'm assuming the same happens with Garuda/Ifrit, and thus our DPS will suffer because of it. The argument can be made that Summoner isn't behind or too far behind other dps classes, but you take out our pets and we fall hard (and btw any time re-summoning is lost dps, and thus still nerfs us for the fights). Honestly Locksmith is the biggest issue, as I can usually move the pet to/from most AoE attacks, but it doesn't help when it's a global AoE.

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Originally Posted by SlopOrion

So, I'm basically stuck using sub-par AoE healing in a fight that's heavy AoE damage with no pet support.

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Or, y'know, you could Swiftcast -> Summon. . .

Haven't leveled THM far enough to get swiftcast (working on getting to 50); however it is still a mechanic that needs to be worked on. Even when the pet doesn't die, it still takes a lot of damage and sometimes focuses on healing itself rather than another party member.

Swift cast is an 180s CD. And is usually saved for instant resurrects. That is hardly a viable solution when your pet will probably die in 180s.

Apparently it is a 60s CD the wiki is wrong. ^^ Sorry don't actually have THM lvld to have it yet. But sure people shouldn't be dieing but everyone makes a mistake or gets caught in the wrong spot at the wrong time and the instant cast res is needed.

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Originally Posted by Maku

Swift cast is an 180s CD. And is usually saved for instant resurrects. That is hardly a viable solution when your pet will probably die in 180s.

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It's a 60s cooldown, and people shouldn't be dying in that fight anyway.

http://xivdb.com/?skill/164/Bio
http://xivdb.com/?skill/178/Bio-II
http://xivdb.com/?skill/168/Miasma
http://xivdb.com/?skill/174/Bane

As you can see, Miasma has initial damage before applying its DoT. Bio and Bio II just put a debuff followed by DoTs. This is why I think there are mixed results in people saying that Bane wakes up sleeping targets. If enemies are waking up, it's because Miasma is refreshing to each monster, including the initial zing for 10/20 potency, right? Seems to me that the right course of action then is to Bio II > Bio > Bane > Miasma main target if you're worried about sleeps.

Also, the tooltip only mentions the first 3 spells, so I assume Miasma II doesn't affect Bane or Fester (will need to test).

Don't know about you noobs, but we defeat Garuda Hard mode way faster with 2 summoners than without. She dies before the 2nd "clockwise run around phase"

This is what I am talking about. People who knows how to play SMN class knows how strong it is. Your Dots are always on Garuda even if she teleports and you hide, DoTs are doing damage. Feathers are easy. Like I mentioned in other threads, just make sure to have 3 DoTs (you have enough time to get out behind rock and cast) and cast bane when feathers come. No need to even chase them, they died after 2 tics.
First people complain about how SMN does not do damage since they don't know how to play. Then they complain because it's DoT and it is not like FFXI Online SMN. Well this is FFXIV ARR. Learn to play the class and learn to adjust if SE make changes.