Shadowbringer: Summoner Changes Discussion

[Taranok]

Yup, that would be the quick and easy fix, though im not entirely sure if just cutting out ED/ES is enough which is why I suggested lowering Fester/Painflares uses per minute back to just 3 (cutting a total of 4 oGCDs per minute).
Ultimately though this change stands and falls with SE's ability to even put Skills on shared charges (don't see why not, but then again it's SE...).



Hmm, I can see where you're coming from. (The Idealist in me wants to say thats what EAs should be for, but the Realist tells me SE might need another expansion to make that work, so...)
On one hand I think divorcing Fester and the DoTs might make it a bit too easy, on the other hand though proper play is already rewarded through stronger Ruins now; and Painflare has nothing to do with your DoTs either so... why not? Alternatively, should they choose to lower Fester usages per minutes they could just redistribute the lost Potency into Festers base potency, so it has 200 base + 100 per DoT for a total of 400, giving you 300 Potency after using just Bio III for a 1 GCD burst.

Realistically the devs could literally delete EA1 and 2, shove Ruin 4 procs onto ED/ES (1 at 62, 2 at 74), give ED a charge of 2 to prevent annoying cooldown clipping, and increase the potency of ruin spells to compensate for the loss of a mere 400 potency per minute, and the class would be 100% functional without the bad busywork.

They can also increase Outward's aoe to be 100 by default to account for Garuda's loss of aoe ability or just buff Garuda to closer to 80 potency per GCD or what have you. It wouldn't be hard to do as a mid-patch change to make the class not feel bad, since the class is mostly there already.

[ArcaneCarbuncle]

Realistically the devs could literally delete EA1 and 2, shove Ruin 4 procs onto ED/ES (1 at 62, 2 at 74), give ED a charge of 2 to prevent annoying cooldown clipping, and increase the potency of ruin spells to compensate for the loss of a mere 400 potency per minute, and the class would be 100% functional without the bad busywork.

They can also increase Outward's aoe to be 100 by default to account for Garuda's loss of aoe ability or just buff Garuda to closer to 80 potency per GCD or what have you. It wouldn't be hard to do as a mid-patch change to make the class not feel bad, since the class is mostly there already.

Yeah, I'll pass. I've waited years for them to finally make Summoner feel like a Summoner, and actually getting to command my Egis is a big part of that. From where I stand, Flavour is just as important to a job than functionality is - especially in this game where every role tends to be homogenized to a point. I'd rather they try to make changes that keep the class fantasy than turn Summoners into mere Ruin Mages again.
Besides, Aetherflow is a worse offender when it comes to "busywork" than EA is, so if any cuts should happen, I'd prefer they start there.

[Gallus]

Add in as much flavour as you want, but you can't have this amount of bloat with the egis giving spell queue errors.

[ArcaneCarbuncle]

Add in as much flavour as you want, but you can't have this amount of bloat with the egis giving spell queue errors.

Only had one of those once, and that was when I was trying to get it. In practice they are fairly easy to avoid by simply spacing EA Double Weaves out properly, which cutting back on other bloat would make easier, effectively turning it into a non-issue as far as I am concerned.
And I'll say it again: I'm all for cutting some of the bloat, I'd just prefer for it to not be EA that gets the cut. But in the end it's SE's decision anyway. Simply stating my opinion here.

[Dyvid]

Add in as much flavour as you want, but you can't have this amount of bloat with the egis giving spell queue errors.

Question, are you weaving the EA between ruin cast or trying to do them all at once?

One thing the might help would be changing Energy Drain to 200 potency with 60s recast time, giving you 4 aetherflow stacks per minute instead of 2 per 30s.

[Taranok]

Yeah, I'll pass. I've waited years for them to finally make Summoner feel like a Summoner, and actually getting to command my Egis is a big part of that. From where I stand, Flavour is just as important to a job than functionality is - especially in this game where every role tends to be homogenized to a point. I'd rather they try to make changes that keep the class fantasy than turn Summoners into mere Ruin Mages again.
Besides, Aetherflow is a worse offender when it comes to "busywork" than EA is, so if any cuts should happen, I'd prefer they start there.

Considering that the Egis are the least summoner aspect of summoner, I fail to see your point. I'd seriously delete the Egis and all their associated abilities and completely rework how low level summoner works. To the point where the carbuncles are your low level summons, weak and frail. Then by 50 you would instead summon Demi-Ifrit and Demi-'Ruda, possibly Demi-Titan, and by 80 you'd do Bahamut and Phoenix, and possibly a third summon.

I would then take abilities like enkindle or Egi-Assault and turn those into "Let's summon old summons to attack either for a singular attack or for longer priods of time, but we purely summon them." So you could have demi-bahamut and Phoenix as your primary summons, and when you enkindle you summon Ifrit/Garuda/Titan, either individually (random rotation) or all 3.

That would make me feel more like a summoner than having to tell the carbuncle to do a left-handed attack instead of a right handed attack every 30 seconds, and DB/DP make me feel more like a summoner than the egis ever can or ever will.

Like I think SE is moving on the right path but I think they missed their mark.
I like being so active, it's not that I have too much to do, it's that I have too many (separate) things/timers to keep track of that my brainmeats get so cluttered.
It's like I'm frantically playing catch-up with my cooldowns @@

It does eventually start to move into a flow, but my issue is that in addition to tunnel visioning, I spend so much time trying to get out all of the oGCDs that I literally don't have time for something as basic as casting outburst, our filler aoe spell, except during DWT specifically where everything's instant cast. The class is just not set up to handle this many oGCDs this often and this quickly, and pretty much no class likes repeatedly and consistently double weaving.

If this were Red Mage, it would at least make some sense because RDM has every other GCD being instant cast as a guarantee, but SMN is not and it can't handle the sheer bulk of abilities flying out, so it clashes heavily with the actual abilities of the class.

[SchrodingersWaffle]

It does eventually start to move into a flow, but my issue is that in addition to tunnel visioning, I spend so much time trying to get out all of the oGCDs that I literally don't have time for something as basic as casting outburst, our filler aoe spell, except during DWT specifically where everything's instant cast. The class is just not set up to handle this many oGCDs this often and this quickly, and pretty much no class likes repeatedly and consistently double weaving.

If this were Red Mage, it would at least make some sense because RDM has every other GCD being instant cast as a guarantee, but SMN is not and it can't handle the sheer bulk of abilities flying out, so it clashes heavily with the actual abilities of the class.

I pointed this out in the other thread, but it feels like the intent is for us use Ruin II to weave oGCDs and to use the instant Ruin IIIs provided by the initial DWT to dump as many of our charged oGCDs as we can, e.g. try and get Energy Drain, Fester, and both Egi Assaults on complete CD before the end of DWT, so we can be casting Ruin III more often, only using Ruin II/IV as necessary to cast an oGCD.

[Taranok]

I pointed this out in the other thread, but it feels like the intent is for us use Ruin II to weave oGCDs and to use the instant Ruin IIIs provided by the initial DWT to dump as many of our charged oGCDs as we can, e.g. try and get Energy Drain, Fester, and both Egi Assaults on complete CD before the end of DWT, so we can be casting Ruin III more often, only using Ruin II/IV as necessary to cast an oGCD.

I mean, that's what I'm doing, and that causes the class to error like mad for the egi and the sheer raw density of everything is insane, in addition to keeping track of encounter mechanics. The fact that every 30 seconds is a guaranteed 5 oGCDs, you have 5 on one minute, and 3 on the next, the class is just absolute insanity. Then you have devotion (3m) and enkindle (even more for DWT). And, who can forget, TD, which you need to pump out every 30 seconds except once per 2 minutes.

There's something around 19 separate oGCDs you have to get out in the opener, and you average close to one oGCD per every other GCD on a class that's supposed to actually be hardcasting spells. It doesn't play nicely if you have inconsistent ping and the sheer volume of crap you need to take care of, regardless of how it's intended to be used, is way too high for any class to reasonably justify.

I can't think of a single class in the history of the game that has had to pump out as many oGCDs as Summoner has to in ShB, it blows MCH and Bard, the Multitasking champions of SB and HW, out of the water on density. This type of playstyle would be fine on a class intended to handle it, like Bard, Machinist, or Dancer. But it's not fine on caster DPS.

[Elgeron]

I can't think of a single class in the history of the game that has had to pump out as many oGCDs as Summoner has to in ShB, it blows MCH and Bard, the Multitasking champions of SB and HW, out of the water on density. This type of playstyle would be fine on a class intended to handle it, like Bard, Machinist, or Dancer. But it's not fine on caster DPS.

But why not? What is wrong with a creating a busy caster? Seriously asking, as I'm not that knowledgeable. To me, this iteration of SMN is being very fun. While it is true I was having issues at the beginning, but I can already feel myself improving and becoming better, with less and less tunnel vision. I feel like SMN gives me a goal to work towards, and I'm each possible moment seeking to practice and improve in real combat situation. The fast pace of the class is mind blowing, it feel almost every second there is something to do, and I find this stimulating. The recast time seem to go very well with each other, usually is very easy to make different abilities synch with each other without putting too much though, letting you focus more on execution rather that planning. Is different from the other two casters and its a play style I'm enjoying greatly. Changing from summon to summon fast to adapt has been also quite enjoyable for me.

Said this, some of the changes proposed in this thread seemed interesting, some of yours too, but I would be lying if I said I want for the class to become less "busy". Still, have to reach max level, so perhaps my perception will change then.

the class is just absolute insanity

Funny enough, is the reason I love it. To me it feels like I'm melting the enemy on a barrage of spells and Egis attacks.

[Gallus]

At least half the SMNs I have come across so far couldn't even figure out that Garuda is meant for trash pulls and Ifrit for bosses. Doing incredibly good DPS with current SMN while handling mechanics perfectly? I can see the 0.1% of the SMN playerbase achieving it.