[POLL] Do you think SE should remove the Aetherflow/Aethertrail Lockouts on Summoner?

[giantslayer]

No, I don't think they should remove the lockout. I've played SMN since 2.x and there are good reasons why they made that change. (For the record, 3.x was my favorite but I haven't tried out 4.1 yet.)

Previously, the decision of spending your Aetherflow in DWT was a calculated risk. Spending one gets your 30s timer rolling. Spending a second left you with a very narrow margin of error for refreshing with your last Aetherflow. For most players, this was actually a losing game. Don't believe me? Let's look at some numbers:

Using Fester in DWT was a potency gain of 20 (200 * .10).
Losing Deathflare was a loss of 440.
Losing 5 Ruin III upgrades was a loss of 660 ([200-80]*5*1.10).
It would take 55 ([440+660]/20) successful uses of Fester in DTW without dropping Aethertrail stacks later on to break even with dropping stacks just once. The number goes up if you add in Tri-Disaster/Contagion.

Even for reasonably good players, it was actually hard to come out ahead by cramming Festers into DWT in 3.x.

In 4.x, the Dev Team's stated goal was to lower the skill ceiling and raise the skill floor. Concurrent with the lockout, they also removed the 30s expiration of Aethertrail, which dramatically raised the floor. People seem to have forgotten how big of an issue dropped stacks were in 3.x.


The main issue with removing the lockout is how it would change the flow/rotation. Let us stop and think how the rotation would change: Spending Aetherflow on Fester in DWT would become the correct way to play SMN. Now that Ruin III is instant cast in DWT, Fester has a 5s cool down, and Aethertrail doesn't drop, it would be very easy to fit in all three Festers into DWT. There would be no tradeoffs or risks involved like there were in 3.x.

You might think that sounds great and are wondering why I am against it. Here's why: Aetherflow stacks give the SMN flexibility with burst DPS. Pigeon-holing SMNs into spending Aetherflow during DWT takes away that flexibility. Now that we can't burn extra mana to crank up the DPS with Ruin III, we don't really have anything else that affords us flexibility like that.

You might say, "if a phase is coming up where you need to burst, then you can just save your stacks." Now we are talking about raising the skill ceiling to where a SMN has to know what will happen in the next 60 seconds of a fight to plan their Aetherflow usage correctly.

"I just want the flexibility to refresh my Aetherflow if I'm late starting DWT." Taking into account the new meta of spending Aetherflow in DWT that would be created by removing the lockout, you would actually have the exact same amount of leeway in the rotation that we have currently.

Current: Refresh Aetherflow. 45s to spend and start DWT.
Proposed: Save DWT. Refresh Aetherflow. 45s to start DWT and spend Aetherflow in DWT.

Basically what this would do is change the rotation from "Spend Aetherflow > use DWT" to "Spend Aetherflow > save DWT until next Aetherflow is available." The current flow is what the Devs intended and I think it is better than what it would become if they removed the lockout.


For those situations where you are late in getting your DWT in, the opportunity cost of ending your DWT early with Deathflare has decreased dramatically in 4.1. You are no longer losing 5 Ruin III upgrades. You are only losing the 10% buff on 5 filler GCDs. Mathematically, it is now MUCH better to hit Deathflare early than to delay your Aetherflow and it's not that big of a DPS loss.

I try to base my opinions on real numbers whenever possible, so here's the math:
Tied to your Aetherflow are: 3 Festers, 1 Deathflare, and 1/2 Bahamut. Let's assume 11 Wyrm Waves with Bahamut. Keep in mind Bahamut's true potency is lower than advertised, which I will account for.

3 Festers: 600 = (3 x 200)
1 Deathflare: 440 = (400 *1.1 DWT bonus)
2 Akh Morns: 1046 = [(680 * 2)/1.3]
11 Wyrm Waves: 1354 = [(160 * 11)/1.3]
- Opportunity cost of 5 Garuda auto-attacks: 592 = [(110 * 7)/1.3]
Aetherflow Potency per second: 32.4/s = [(600+440)/60s + (1046+1354-592)/120s].

Ruin III potency gained in DWT: 13 = (130 * .10)
Ruin III in DWT potency gained per second: 5.2/s = (13 / 2.5s)

So if you delay Aetherflow to cast more Ruin IIIs in DWT, you are sacrificing 32.4/s to gain 5.2/s. In 4.0, the opportunity cost of losing Ruin III was much higher, at 26/s. [(150 * 1.1) - 100 = 65; (65/2.5s) = 26/s]. Ending DWT early for the sake of Aetherflow should not be the difficult decision it was in 4.0 because the DPS loss is now negligible.


TLDR: Lockout should not be removed. Removal would change SMN Rotation to save DWT until next Aetherflow is available. SMN would lose burst DPS flexibility because using Aetherflow outside DWT would be a DPS loss.
If Aetherflow cooldown is ready before DWT is finished, it is now better to use Deathflare quickly and refresh Aetherflow because of the Ruin/Ruin III changes in 4.1.

[Grimoire-M]

Snip.

The votes were around 100 or so when the preliminary patch notes were revealed and have maintained roughly the same ratio before and after the patch. Not removing the poll when opinions haven't swayed it yet.

Snip.

1) I haven't forgotten how artificially hard it was to fit everything in DWT, or how you had to micromanage the Aethertrail timer (also not hard). That was because Ruin III still had a full cast time, and people accepted the forced GCD clipping cause the reward was improving your burst window with TA and other raid buffs. Swiftcast alleviated some of that burden by letting you fit in your last Fester, Ruin III, and Deathflare within that one window. Depending on spell speed it was worth it since it took out a clip you otherwise would have in there that subsequently let you fit in Deathflare. The extra 1s of DWT in 4.0 would make that 2 fester clipping easier, but at the cost of even harder 3 Fester clipping, which I don't think would have been feasible without a Fester CD buff or an increase in DWT's length if 4.1 hadn't given us instant-cast Ruin III.

2) I am not a fan of these Ruin III changes either. I would prefer it if SE gave us something to think about outside DWT, but with Lucid Dreaming we simply can't have mana as our tension for that. It doesn't solve the issue of Ruin III being the only button we press most of the time. Something like RuinI/II/III/IV combos would have to be the equivalent.


3) The fact that it's worth it to drop DWT at all is a problem imo. It was the core ability of SMN in HW and Bahamut could have been integrated into that easily. DWT without the lockouts is also a better flow for the class because it sets the universal precedent that you're waiting on lining up Aetherflow with your CDs to optimize your damage. Bahamut already requires you to pigeon hole it by delaying it for your next aetherflow. Even with the lockouts removed, that still holds true. Having to delay DWT to do the same when Bahamut isn't available is the exact same thing, only without the lockouts it fits better with the opener by a long shot, cause you don't have to drop DWT anymore, you'll still be ready for Bahamut in time cause you got to press Aetherflow ahead of it.

4) The main issue with the lockout removal is Devotion and our pet buff have essentially replaced Spur/Raging Strikes as must press buttons during the pre-DWT period, and they will be further delayed by server issues. This is part of why the old Contagion worked better, but that caused more balance problems than it solved. The other thing is by restoring this inherent flexibility, you are now forced to line up Devotion with your cooldowns. It is 90s, and it is feasible to have it line up with an Aetherflow DWT or Bahamut window. Another reason to nerf it's CD I suppose, something that should happen anyways given the frankly legitimate complaints from other DPS classes about it.

5) A really important factor in all of this is AoE. That would get restored with these 4.1 changes, and that does bother me in some ways and not in others. For one, Tri-Bind would be over-buffed with these changes on top of it, because DWT Triple Painflare + Tri-bind is just worth more than Bane by a long shot, which still feels wrong to me. Bane should be the focus of our AoE, not Tri-Bind, and if these changes were made, it would leave me hopeful that SMN would steer back in that direction to equalize their burst/sustained AoE.