Black Mage Raise Ability

[Lambdafish]

Huge is a fairly vast overstatement, there's a smattering of support summons is more accurate.

"Summoners use special magic that allows them to call forth summoned monsters. Summons usually cost more MP than the average spell, but are much more powerful. In some games, summoners also have the ability to cast either Black Magic or White Magic as well as to summon, thus making them more versatile." - http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Summoner_(job)

As for support summons themselves, we have (from FFVI alone):

Carbuncle (reflect on party)
Kirin (regen on party)
Phantom (invisible on party)
Unicorn (removes many debuffs)
Golem (blocks attacks)
Zona Seeker (shell on party)
Seraph (heals party)
Fenrir (grant "image" status)
Lakshmi (restores HP)
Phoenix (revives players)

Which I think is a bit more than a "smattering" (These are just the support summons that buff the player, there are more still that debuff the enemy without dealing damage such as Siren, Catoblepas, Cait Sith etc.)

[PrismaticDaybreak]

"Summoners use special magic that allows them to call forth summoned monsters. Summons usually cost more MP than the average spell, but are much more powerful. In some games, summoners also have the ability to cast either Black Magic or White Magic as well as to summon, thus making them more versatile."
...Which I think is a bit more than a "smattering" (These are just the support summons that buff the player, there are more still that debuff the enemy without dealing damage such as Siren, Catoblepas, Cait Sith etc.)

For your bolded quote, once you examine the actual evidence of Summoners innately using White or Black Magic, again 3 games with to 9 or so without and let me direct your attention to the beginning of that sentence "In some games" which as I just told you and went through and examined above is 3. I didn't mention the debuff ones since the summons XIV SMN already has do have debuffs attached and again has no bearing on how skilled at White Magic and/or Raising they would be. If we want to actually go off of former in game mechanics, SMN wouldn't be skilled in the slightest at White Magic since their pre requisite sub class was Thaumaturge.

Interesting that you would qualify that list "From VI alone" which is a misleading statement once you compare the number of support summons only from that game to the amount of support summons in the other games, the pool is small and one game is hardly enough to justify Summoners being a support machine. Not to mention summoning anything was available to any character in VI as well as any type of magic.

[Ceallach]

Perhaps next time you won't cherry pick

I'm sorry, did you even read my list? I didn't even include FINAL FANTASY VI (thanks to Lambdafish for his post), and in FINAL FANTASY XI summoners could order Blood Pact: Ward abilities that were literally all support.

Perhaps next time you won't cherry pick and just admit you're flat-out wrong.

And on the historical implications of past job combinations, why does it even matter in the context of XIV?

Because the lore of the entire series is a huge part of how jobs work in XIV. Let's say we get the beastmaster as a new job for XIV, but it has absolutely nothing to do with animals or monsters. It's literally just a reskinned warrior with fluffy armor. No one would be happy with that because that's not really a beastmaster. But if the beastmaster had a pet of its own or could turn enemies against one another, that would be more appropriate (and that's what they did in XI). In fact, Tactics Advance had a nu mou-exclusive job called the morpher that would capture enemy monsters in order to temporarily become them in battle. I could see that being attributed to the beastmaster job, even though it isn't technically correct.

For the thread's topic, it would be wholly incorrect to give a revival spell to black mages because it goes against everything black mages are and have been in the entire series. XIV is essentially a love letter to all FINAL FANTASY fans and players, and giving black mages revival spells inherent to them would be much more like a slap in the face.

Interesting that you would qualify that list "From VI alone" which is a misleading statement once you compare the number of support summons only from that game to the amount of support summons in the other games, the pool is small and one game is hardly enough to justify Summoners being a support machine.

This is wholly incorrect. For all your so-called "research," you failed to see many things. In FINAL FANTASY XIII, an eidolon will automatically and always cast Arise if the summoner falls in battle if you're not using its Gestalt Mode. In FINAL FANTASY XII, espers had several healing and support magicks, including but not limited to Belias' Cura. Summoners in FINAL FANTASY XI had a great deal of support abilities. Guardian Forces in FINAL FANTASY VIII included Carbuncle (grants Reflect to the party) and Cerberus (grants Double and Triple to the party), not to mention Phoenix and the way GFs worked as a whole. In FINAL FANTASY IV, one of Rydia's eidolons is Asura, who always heals or buffs the party; she also has Sylph, who does wind damage to enemies and heals the party. In FINAL FANTASY IX, Eiko's Carbuncle buffs the party.

You want to talk about how summoners aren't related to white or black magic, yet nearly every summoner named or otherwise throughout the entire series has at least one support function. These facts and examples, in addition to posts already made, demonstrate that you simply do not know what you're talking about.

[PrismaticDaybreak]

words

I didn't use XII, or XIII since the mechanics of summoning were vastly different than that of the archetypal Summoner from the rest of the games and more importantly doable by any character in the main cast and not limited to a select "job. Maybe instead of making a deliberate effort to be pompous you could realize I never said they were only offensive. I never said there were absolutely no support summons in the game. My point, again, is that any support/raising capabilities they have by virtue of summoning are completely independent from White or Black Magic which again, is the case in all the games I listed except for 3 or 4 you and Mr. Fish over there just can't seem to read and understand simple sentences. And wow, I didn't mention Carbuncle the one staple support summon since V my bad, don't fly off the handle about it.

As for XII's espers and their "numerous supportive magicks" (a flat out lie beyond the one healing spell each one of them has so that the summoner doesn't die and the summon isn't wasted) there's only one summon with any support spell and that's Zodiark with Hastega.

As for XIII's eidolons, them casting Arise is not damning evidence of how amazingly powerful Summoners are at Raising, that's beyond doubt a QoL feature since you trade the eidolon for two other party members, one of which was likely the one that healed you, otherwise literally every other ability that eidolons used while not in Gestalt mode is offensive or for tanking (Hecatoncheir and Alexander).

It's clear that you don't know what you're talking about.

Your list is paltry compared to the sheer amount of damage summons, as was Lambdas which again, only came from VI. But again that's not what my point was, since you guys keep missing it.

Yeah you guys keep cherry picking and ignoring the entire picture, which is that SMN is far more focused on damage than support and/or raising and, again, aren't going to be as good at it as RDM. And how many times do I have to remind you that Phoenix is not a White Magic spell? Not to mention anything like Phoenix doesn't stand a chance of being developed since its effect is Healer LB3 level.

[Ceallach]

(insert flying off the handle because I'm wrong here)

Yeah, I'm done taking you seriously.

On the topic, black mages should not get a revival ability, period.

[PrismaticDaybreak]

(Insert undeserved snark and denial).

Same to you.

[Ceallach]

I'll be fair and review black mages throughout the series as well.

• FINAL FANTASY's black mage had Haste and Temper.
• FINAL FANTASY XI's black mage had Blaze Spikes, Ice Spikes, and Shock Spikes.
• FINAL FANTASY XII: The Zodiac Age's black mage, represented by the Capricorn license board, could cast Bubble.

For support, that's really it, and that was my point all along. Summoners throughout the series are very capable of supporting the party. Black mages throughout the series are mostly not capable of supporting the party. That doesn't mean summoners aren't offensive mages, only that they're both offensive and support mages.

Maybe if certain people paid attention, they'd realize I was right all along.