Starting the game as Arcanist is largely unplayable now

[Merryl]

Oh don't sugar coat it. Square enix said themselves they wished they had never made summoner/ scholar as a dual class. So they have slowly broken the summoner so people will stop playing it. Just give them what they want, abandon the arcanist already, so they can sweep their mistake under the rug.

[AvenoMatt]

Started a new character and got it to lv11 I believe, can't really remeber, but so far besides some issues with emerald pulling a few extra mobs I haven't found it difficult yet. There have been some close calls with 4-5 mobs on me at once but physic spammed 2-3 times to get me back to full and a Ruin inbetween was enough to keep me going. Will continue to play and test it out.

[Aomine1992]

We never needed a tank pet, I think the only time I used it was a job quest I believe 58 when you fight the huge egis on for Bahamuts power or whatever. But I repeat the tank pet was never a necessity to SMN or ARCs game play. Just gear up and move on

[Maero]

So your friend played one class (not even job at that point) and quit because did not like how it played?
Does not seem like he put much effort at all to quit that soon

[RivinStormfang]

Just to satisfy my own curiosity, I set aside some time and went ahead and made a new character as an arcanist to see how it works out at low levels right now. I've gotten it up to 15 and done all of the class and MSQ quests up to that level with a couple restrictions in place: 1) only using gear awarded from quests, i.e. no out-of-game rewards like the Aetheryte Earrings and no Hall of the Novice gear, and 2) no dots, only Ruin spam and Physick if needed.

The result was...still pretty easy. Ruin spam alone melts enemies up to level 10 or so, and even with it slowing down from 10-15 I could handle up to four to five enemies at a time (Thanks for overpulling, Carbuncle!) without feeling at risk of dying. Both the MSQ instanced battles and the arcanist class quests were easily done with just Ruin spam. That said, the level 15 arcanist quest was NOT the one I was thinking of where you have to stand in K'lyhia's shield, so that must come later, and could still prove a decent hurdle since that's the only one I remember actually being challenging until the level 50 summoner quest.

All that said, one thing I want to mention is that I did not make this new character on a preferred server, so I had no experience buffs of any kind. I could absolutely see a new player jumping on a preferred server and leveling to 15 long before the MSQ quests catch up, and then jumping into the level 15 class quest with level 5-8 gear. That could absolutely be a problem, and if anyone having trouble like in this thread is in this situation I highly recommend doing the Hall of the Novice training as soon as they hit 15, because the gear that rewards will be a huge help.

[Narangerel]

the SMN Quests were the actual problematic areas. those mobs would chunk me. And the fights against Tristan and his summons were the same.

[wereotter]

Honestly, I don't think any class is gonna be fun at level 15 now. All the basic kits are so spread out, your class won't feel complete till like mid-60s at least. MNK has its' basic combos at level 50, and that's the best one that I know of. DRK spends 40 levels training you to play the class wrong by giving you no reason to care about MP management until level 70.

Yes, but at level 50 monk still does crap damage when soloing since every mob in the field has a positional ring for some reason.... and you can't just use True North on every enemy in the field when you're just trying to get from point A to point B. Even at level 70 this is still a problem.

[odym82]

I imagine the OP was referring to the level 15 job quest which requires topaz carbuncle to tank and hold aggro as the main part of the quest. As someone who is also dealing with these sorts of quests I will say they can still be beaten, but not as intended and not in a fun or pleasant way. The main responses new people seem to be getting is from veteran players, which would normally be great, except the mechanics have changed dramatically

[Gaj85]

Did you tell your friend to get a Chocobo companion and use him as a tank? Easy solution.

[Mahoukenshi]

The recent adaption to Ruin/Ruin II did help in regards to leveling pre-50. The 30 ACN quest is the one, where you stand in the buff field with your ally. And as you don't need to dot single mobs up for max Ruin damage, that bit helped a bit in order to not make this quest more annoying by getting yourself or the NPC too mobbed up. Personally, after one very early terrible experience with Wind Carbuncle (where I had suddenly 5+ mobs at once clinging to me xD) with another character, I just skipped using it with Altina and waited directly for the yellow version. Their damage didn't feel too helpful either way to me.
The first time, the 50 SMN quest boss was a huge pita and I died quite fast. Thanks to google, I dotted enemy 1 up and ran around while spamming Ruin 2 and Energy Drain/Fester and managed to survive somehow better until the easier 2nd half of the fight started; with mostly the 45 job armor w/o chest part I think.

As for tanking pet and Earthen Armor: I only know the latter, but thought it was quite useful as it basically negated all damage as long as it was up. Again that's for pre-50 open world/job quest mobs. However as someone fond of actual pet classes in other MMOs, I'd have liked to play with the early carbuncle/egis to see it myself.