Can someone give me an in-depth explanation why Summoner is arguably the worst DPS?

[Sunako]

i agreed all your 3 issues. but i cant believe that blm easily get 500 dps lol. http://www.twitch.tv/saerysthia/c/5653653 a month ago video.
(and that holy shit WAR close to 400dps in t11 LOL)
This party cleard t10 just in 7:30 and this blm manage to touch 500 dps with 130wp and 125+ IL before i checked.
i am surprised at your awesome confidence. can u show me ur any parse or video as SMN pov ' o'/?
that's fine even dummy parse.

In that fight scholar is using selene all of the time and that give BLM pretty big boost over SMN. In harder fights like t13, scholars is gonna use more eos and that make lower gap between BLM and SMN. All SMN videos that I have seen from t13, BLM and SMN is doing pretty much same damage in the end of the battle.

[ViviAnimus]

No, the mana issue needs to be addressed as well. The Summoner is very low on damage ST and it should also receive a DPS increase in that department. Not a huge amount, but it should have higher ST than BLM, which it no means has.

[Havenchild]

SMNs can be used in FCOB, all classes can. However the effort to play a SMN well is not balanced with the reward in DPS.

Micromanagement of Pet
Micromanagement of Mana (Critical)
Micromanagement of Fester vs Energy Drain
Micromanagement of Bane usage.
Micromanagement of Aetherflow use and timing of use per fight (Critical)
Not canceling DoT recasts when, DoTs need to be up.

All of that to result in lower DPS then a BLM anyway, who has to worry simply about not canceling casts whenever possible /saving procs for movement or current MP left (critical)

Good BLM >>>>> Good SMN and it's reflected very strongly in DPS numbers.

DPS on a SMN also heavily depends on what your party has you doing in the fight.

In a composition for example on T12, which consists of both a SMN / BLM, if a SMN is able to Bane onto Black Fires (DPS increase) , versus a BLM who can one shot them with Flare ( Huge Increase), Flaring Bennus in Phase 3 vs Dotting Bennus in Phase 3.

Staying solely on the boss as a SMN or having to help with killing Bennus while BLM stays on boss (Superior single target) ,possibly to push the phase quicker.

Basically unless you cater every mechanic or so to the SMN exclusively (Rare in a BLM/SMN party composition, because BLM spikes much harder resulting in faster killing.), it's likely going to be out DPS'd by the BLM. As much as BLM benefits from Procs, more often then not they have single target DPS on lock on any fight lasting more then 2 minutes.

[Akiza]

The problem with the Summoner is their DPS is poorly optimized for fights longer then 2 min. Summoner's DPS slowly ramps up reaches it's maximum after 12.5s then steadily drops to its minimum and never recovers even with Fester and good mp management. SE should reduce the cool down on Enkindke to 30s because right now it does the same damage as Fester but on an ungodly long cool down.

[Ephier]

Basically:
1.) if SMNs do not use Energy Drain and use our stacks for strictly Festers,I think we can last 3 minutes and 30 seconds to about 4 minutes I believe without Mage's Ballad while other DPS jobs, excluding BLM, can go 4 minutes plus without the use of Army's Paeon.

God forbid you have to use a skill with lower potency to regain resources. Fights in FCOB have very little down time, meaning melee run dry around 4 minutes even with invigorate, no paeon means if we did not have to deal with a mechanic (in certain fights at least), we are going to be scraping for TP. I would gladly take a lower potency skill for to regain tp.

[Dinocat]

I posted this up about 2 months ago, but it outlines basics of what is wrong with the SMN class.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...N-Class-Issues

The currently debated arguments of SMN viability in downing content, is a whole other matter.

The way SMN DPS scales at the moment is highly reliant on DoT uptime vs. fight length, mechanics/phase timing, and raid DPS. Most of the SMN currently expressing their ability to keep a fairly high DPS parse in FCoB are guaranteed to have moderately high Raid DPS backing them up in addition to a significant amount of over-gearing (more gear than minimally required ilvl wise in comparison to the lowest ilvl possible for completion; MNK/MNK/BRD/BLM composition can complete FCoB in full 110 from pre-2.4 and i90 accessories, proven by FC Lucrezia).

As stated, due to SMN sustainability, the shorter the fight or phase, the higher the SMN can keep their numbers. The longer the fight or phase lasts, the SMN strength and viability suffer. Due to the nature of minimal item level across the raid equaling a higher raid encounter time, the SMN capacity/utility is significantly lower in such an environment.

Personal experience in FCoB: our static team cleared T13 with a MNK/BRD/SMN/BLM composition; but only after we had our 130 weapons. My personal and team skill is most definitely not on par with say the likes of Lucrezia or BG, so my assessment may not be entirely accurate. Skill cap does play a significant part in class and composition value; it is difficult to truly calculate the skill cap between a team unless comparing on a 1 to 1 same composition basis.

I can throw numbers out there stating I have gotten as high as 470 DPS in a merged parse of Phase 1/2/Final (Pure Boss enrage check DPS value), using 135 weapon and 2 i130 left side,2 i130 right side, Piety Melded Gloves and Ring. Monk doing 500+ in i130 weapon and about the same armor as myself, BLM doing about 450 in i130 weapon and 110 melded only and no i130 armor, and Bard doing about 450 with i135 weapon ilvl123 2x TP/MP songs in those phases. Could I do anything close to this if the other DPS were not pulling such high number? It is highly unlikely for me to even meet the necessary DPS check to even be considered a viable choice if not for my current gear and the raids DPS value.

So to answer the question of, “can a SMN clear the FCoB and do decent DPS?”

Most definitely, but only under the condition of overgearing and high raid DPS.

Now if one were to ask the question of “should I take a SMN to FCoB for endgame competition (World/Server First)?”

The answer would be “No, take a BLM as caster and run a 2x melee 1x bard composition.”

===

The SMN class has a hard DPS cap of DoT potency, Fester, and pet skills combined with the limitation on resources.

Roughly estimated, in a raid environment with Foe Req assisted openings, the SMN can sustain DPS required to compete with other classes for about 4 minutes. Due to resource limitations and CD length, DPS will decline rapidly past this point. This is where the SMN versus other class comparison comes in. In comparison to mnk/nin/drg (post buff) which has much higher damage to resource sustainment ratio, SMN is not optimal past the first few minutes of a phase/fight.

The SMN lacks sustainability of its damage over any lengthy period, to the point in which given a capacity comparison, translates to rough DPS difference 50+ DPS on a BLM and 100+ for melee.

Referencing pure dummy solo DPS, a MNK/NIN/DRG can push well past 530 DPS alone with no food/pot/party with a 130+ weapon; the SMN around 430. In equal gear so far at around ilvl120 armor/accs and i130+ weapon a DRG/MNK/NIN can do at least 100+ more DPS than a SMN; I imagine the gap increases with full i130 purely due to current stats on gear.

In any case, in an optimally matched or perhaps even a pure single target DPS cap comparison in 2.4 BiS, SMN has the lowest in the maximum output capacity department; perhaps only second to bard?

Due to a lack of BiS Bard to BiS SMN parse comparison availability, I cannot say for sure which has a lower max DPS Cap.

Bards have similar issues of poor SS (skillspeed) scaling and their gear stats being non-optimal for their class; though not as extreme as the SMN SS (Spellspeed) stat weight issue. If you take a look at the FCoB and Poetics 130 armor BiS, along with stat weights, SMN has the lowest scaling and gain of every class.

Refer to the stat weights here: https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...eight_updates/

To answer many of the questions about SMN at this current point in time, the 2.4 stat weight distribution in conjunction with the lack of mana resource availability/sustainability for SMN is a strong contributing factor to the class being considered “a poor choice for endgame.”

The major issue lies within the top end DPS capacity of DoM vs. DoW, referred to above and in the linked original thread, which contributes to SMN being considered a weak class. On most dungeon/trial/farm content, the SMN class can be full of utility and be minimally affected by many of these issues. The issues are most prominent though when comparing and analyzing in a min/max endgame environment.

There are a myriad of possible fixes ranging from pet buffs, stats rebalancing, to pure potency buffs of job specific skills. It may seem that something is in the works concerning adjustment to the way spellspeed works in 3.0 (hinted through live letters, etc.) Perhaps SS translating to faster dot ticks below the 3 second server time? A SMN can dream. Guess we will have to see how SE plays this one out.

[Sessurea]

The blm in my static about ilvl 116 or 117 with 125 relic can 500 t10. I haven't seen smns getting anywhere near this. Like the dragoon, se maybe felt drg was balanced by it's aoe ability? And maybe it's sub-par bard buff? well smn needs the same. Se gotta realise smns non-spike high multi target dps doesn't compensate their poor longterm sustain dps. It aint fair to expect smns to energy drain instead of fester imo. every raid will have a melee dps, and song priority will always be paeon>foe. raids wouldn't even consider ballad just for a smn since the loss of dps from using ED instead of fester happens to be smaller than the dps loss a bard will have casting ballad.

or in other words: Smn using ED+ un nerfed bard singing foe > festering smn +nerfed bard singing ballad. Ballad also nerfes the blm too, if there is one present.

yh I agree it seems wrong and it's all due to damn resources.

Why are smns getting ignored???

[scarebearz]

Everyone comparing SMN dps to BLM, when good Monks/Nin's out-dps both caster classes on most important fights.

SMN dps is not far behind BLM, but SMN does add more utility.

[OneWingedSora]

Everyone comparing SMN dps to BLM, when good Monks/Nin's out-dps both caster classes on most important fights.

SMN dps is not far behind BLM, but SMN does add more utility.

What does MNK/NIN out-dpsing casters have to do with this discussion ? The point is, all progression groups would prefer a BLM over a SMN as their main caster, that's just a fact and for good reasons.

Also, 50 DPS is a pretty noticeable difference which is the difference between BLM and SMN on most turns. And lol @ utility. SMNs mana management is bad enough already without Battle-res. If you are gonna Battle-res, you more than likely will need your bard to play ballad for you which would be a raid DPS loss. Virus ? SCHs already have that covered.

[scarebearz]

What does MNK/NIN out-dpsing casters have to do with this discussion ?

It's common sense to compare to the highest DPS classes, when discussing why SMN has weaker DPS. (something I'm not disagreeing with)

The gap between Monk/Nin and SMN is much more noticable.

And lol @ utility. SMNs mana management is bad enough already without Battle-res. If you are gonna Battle-res, you more than likely will need your bard to play ballad for you which would be a raid DPS loss.

It adds a lot of utility to the class, I for one would rather a raid DPS loss and a kill, than a wipe.