[Pole] Do you want to see the summoner class reworked?

[MikeyLikesIt]

I haven't contributed to this conversation yet, but I did manage to read through all the posts thus far. I like many others feel the Summoner Job is lacking. I would be far happier if Bio II, Miasma and Bio were summons of things that did identical damage but as a summoned thing.

For example Bio II could be a chocomog that attacks your target. The visual would be this yellow bird head butting or pecking away, providing identical damage that Bio II would have. Having up 3 "summons" to represent the Bio II, Bio and Miasma damage would be really cool visually and make me feel like a summoner.

Changes like these, however cosmetic as they may be would go a long way towards making the job feel like i'm summoning things.

Regarding the garuda/contagion mess, moving contagion to SMN or removing it from the game entirely seem like what needs to be done. As pets are now, merely an auto attack bot that has next to no interactivity we might as well be able to swap pets for flavor. Or remove pets entirely and give us more "summons" to balance dps, which I prefer.

[Dyvid]

I haven't contributed to this conversation yet, but I did manage to read through all the posts thus far. I like many others feel the Summoner Job is lacking. I would be far happier if Bio II, Miasma and Bio were summons of things that did identical damage but as a summoned thing.

Hmm, this is actually a good idea and interesting concept. It would need to be changed around to fit SCH/ACN but still a good idea. Also I don't think you could have them hitting the mob for the duration but maybe a classic summon hit and release would work.

Madiun Egi - Bio
Siren Egi - Miasma
Catoblepas Egi - Bio II
Fenrir Egi - Miasma II
Diabolos Egi - Shadow Flare

[Delily]

.

So, you want the summons to be nothing more than casting animations and spell effects?

I never solidified my position, but I am perfectly happy with the SMN implemented as a "DoT caster + pet" class. I also like the SMN/SCH split, which I think (intentionally or unintentionally) brings the summoner's characteristic utility to this game's role based class design. That being said, the one area I wish was improved was using summons other than Garuda-igi. Right now, the pets suffer the same fate as the warlock minions did in WoW - once you got the feel hunter, there was little reason to use the other 3. I'm waiting to see how the other egis work out.

[Dyvid]

Snip.

Delily, I don't think you're understanding. You still have Ifrit, Garuda, and Titan Egi as pets. The only change is instead of a casting animation of Bio, Bio II, Miasma, Miasma, Shadow Flare is replaced with a summon doing a 2.5 second attack.

In a perfect world it would be lesser primal egi doing our standard DoT spells, pet are primal egi, and limit break is elder primal egi.

@Dwill while having egi attack something for 18 seconds sounds cool it would become a issue. 4 DoT means 4 egis on one thing. A full pt with 3 SMN means 12 Egis on one thing. Would become overwhelming.

[Dwill]

Delily, I don't think you're getting this. You still have Ifrit, Garuda, and Titan Egi as pets. The only change is instead of a casting animation of Bio, Bio II, Miasma, Miasma, Shadow Flare is replaced with a summon doing a 2.5 second attack.

In a perfect world it would be lesser primal egi doing our standard DoT spells, pet are primal egi, and limit break is elder primal egi

The way I got it is that duration and damage are unchanged, it would just be a graphical one and a rename of the DoTs. They could even introduce via a mini-quest à la Green Fire in WoW as in do a mini-quest line and your spell animation and name changes but power and and duration remains unchanged.

[Dyvid]

The way I got it is that duration and damage are unchanged, it would just be a graphical one and a rename of the DoTs. They could even introduce via a mini-quest à la Green Fire in WoW as in do a mini-quest line and your spell animation and name changes but power and and duration remains unchanged.

Right. Take Shadow Flare for example. Diabolos Egi comes out and does a move like this within the 3 second cast time window and places the shadow flare effect on the floor that last for 30 seconds with potency of 25 and slow effect.

[Dwill]

Right. Take Shadow Flare for example. Diabolos Egi comes out and does a move like this within the 3 second cast time window and places the shadow flare effect on the floor that last for 30 seconds with potency of 25 and slow effect.

Pretty much. A graphical change like this could add a lot of flavor to the job without touching its balance or gameplay. And for the overwhelming amount of egi, this could be change by reducing their size drastically. Like be the size of a minion or even a little less.

[Dwill]

Snip

I actually like the concept as well. Having a few mini-egis that acts as the DoT themselves in which they would be replacing Miasma, Bio and Bio II when a Summoner Crystal is equipped as to not screw over scholar and they keep the same total potency. They wouldn't be considered as pets so they would have no interaction with Rouse and Spur but could keep being buffed via Raging Strikes which means you get to keep the big egi so the summoner still stays as a "DoT" + Pet job.

This could as well be easily balanced and fit the lore even with Bane and Fester. For Bane, it could easily be explained that you consume a stack of Aetherflow to multiply your mini-egis and Fester could easily be renamed to something akin to Aetheric Burst in which you consume a stack of Aetherflow to command the mini-egis of your current target to burst it.

Nice concept there Mikey, I like it! It's a refreshing change to read something like this.

So, you want the summons to be nothing more than casting animations and spell effects?

I never solidified my position, but I am perfectly happy with the SMN implemented as a "DoT caster + pet" class. I also like the SMN/SCH split, which I think (intentionally or unintentionally) brings the summoner's characteristic utility to this game's role based class design. That being said, the one area I wish was improved was using summons other than Garuda-igi. Right now, the pets suffer the same fate as the warlock minions did in WoW - once you got the feel hunter, there was little reason to use the other 3. I'm waiting to see how the other egis work out.

The only thing this does is a graphical change and a rename of some abilities to increase the feel of actually summoning things. Technically speaking, the playstyle would remain totally unchanged as you'd still have DoTs but with a different name/graphic and you get to keep the big egis.

As for the WoW comparison, that is untrue. The damage difference between an Observer and a Fel Imp is <1% and people in Mythic raids will often take the imp due to his better target switching capacity and the fact that he increases the Warlock's self-sustain.