SMN Why don't we hear about egi glamours anymore?

[OvernightSiren]

I feel like the devs haven't even commented on the egi glamour system in what feels like forever. Maybe it's just me but I feel like it's a vital part to the aesthetic feel of SMN. Bahamut and Phoenix are really cool, but some of us chose SMN with the hope of one day being able to summon our favorite Final Fantasy espers/eidolons/etc.

With the way pets are now non-targettable I feel it's even more simple to set it up now.

Alternates for Ifrit (Melee egis):
- Shiva (Using the ice sword and shield)
- Ravana

Alternates for Garuda (Ranged egis):
- Leviathan (Garuda's big ground aoe can be replaced by a large blue watery aoe from Leviathan)
- Ramuh

Alternates for Titan (Tank egis):
- Bismarck

Honestly, you could even not include Ravana and Bismarck and just keep it to the 2.xx egis and I feel like so many more people would be happy. Would love it if a dev could touch base on this...I've asked in the last few Q&A live letters but my question's been missed since it's likely not a priority.

[Rika007]

Right now because their are a lot of issues with the job in just pure playability wise that the devs really can't be taking the time to worry about aesthetic changes. I would also say that it seems very likely that ego's may not even be a thing past this expansions. Demi's continue to take more and more center stage, and the egi system in general has been an overall massive frustration point for long time SMN players.

[OvernightSiren]

Right now because their are a lot of issues with the job in just pure playability wise that the devs really can't be taking the time to worry about aesthetic changes. I would also say that it seems very likely that ego's may not even be a thing past this expansions. Demi's continue to take more and more center stage, and the egi system in general has been an overall massive frustration point for long time SMN players.

I get that there are bigger issues with the job, but I feel like the same team that balances jobs isn't the same job that models and codes egis. Also the egi glamour has been something we've been waiting for a follow-up for for literally 2+ years, while the job issues have only been a big topic of discussion for like 4 months.

[OvernightSiren]

Right now because their are a lot of issues with the job in just pure playability wise that the devs really can't be taking the time to worry about aesthetic changes. I would also say that it seems very likely that ego's may not even be a thing past this expansions. Demi's continue to take more and more center stage, and the egi system in general has been an overall massive frustration point for long time SMN players.

I think another reason that egis will always be necessary is for leveling and level-synced content. You don't get access to Bahamut until level 70, and it's kind of ridiculous for a SUMMONER not to be able to summon until level 70.

[dinnertime]

I get that there are bigger issues with the job, but I feel like the same team that balances jobs isn't the same job that models and codes egis. Also the egi glamour has been something we've been waiting for a follow-up for for literally 2+ years, while the job issues have only been a big topic of discussion for like 4 months.

Yes they're not the same team...but they use the same overall resource. I assume the entire team plans on what's worth adding/updating and what doesn't and seems like Egi glamour is the latter.
I agree they should at least say something but it's really not high priority on their list it seems, which I agree with as well.

[Taranok]

I think another reason that egis will always be necessary is for leveling and level-synced content. You don't get access to Bahamut until level 70, and it's kind of ridiculous for a SUMMONER not to be able to summon until level 70.

Which is (also) why any overhaul to Summoner that sees the removal of Egis will also see a major rework of Summoner's entire leveling experience. Egis aren't mandatory for any content whatsoever unless the content is made that way, which allegedly is the case in some instances, but for the most part isn't, at all, and can much more easily be tweaked than continuing to use it as an excuse to perpetually cause headaches with the job's overall design.

So just like Machinist had its entire class design fundamentally altered all the way down to at least level 30, Summoner can reasonably be expected to get similar treatment if egis are removed.

I would personally hope that they're working to remove it, and just choosing to not sink more dev time into a feature that's being removed, but that's reading very far into a situation that the devs have habitually just not talked about much to begin with.

At the end of the day, the pet system causes problems. A lot of them. The devs as far as I am aware have brought it up on several occasions that they don't like it, and I imagine going forward that Demi and AQ is the theme they'll use for any pets or pet classes in the future, since even the current egi system causes problems as well. I can't wait to see how easy it is to break egis now that you can reasonably cast 4 pet actions within the span of 1.5 GCDs, doing EA1->Aetherpact->Enkindlee->EA2, which isn't exactly going to be a difficult sequence to accidentally find yourself in.

But whatever the future may hold, Egis have perpetually been a problem for Summoner, and it's high time to get rid of them if they want to move the class in a different direction, which SB and ShB more or less has shown us.

Yes they're not the same team...but they use the same overall resource. I assume the entire team plans on what's worth adding/updating and what doesn't and seems like Egi glamour is the latter.
I agree they should at least say something but it's really not high priority on their list it seems, which I agree with as well.

What you're looking for is Opportunity Cost. In order to add Egi Glamours, something else can't be added that would require the code team and art team to work on, such as new armor models or mob designs. So if you've decided as a team that egis are no longer going to be a thing in the future, then the raison d'être is no longer there to begin with moving forward, and it makes no sense allocating any time towards that whatsoever. That's not necessarily what is happening, but that would be a logical conclusion if that is actually happening.

[OvernightSiren]

Which is (also) why any overhaul to Summoner that sees the removal of Egis will also see a major rework of Summoner's entire leveling experience. Egis aren't mandatory for any content whatsoever unless the content is made that way, which allegedly is the case in some instances, but for the most part isn't, at all, and can much more easily be tweaked than continuing to use it as an excuse to perpetually cause headaches with the job's overall design.

So just like Machinist had its entire class design fundamentally altered all the way down to at least level 30, Summoner can reasonably be expected to get similar treatment if egis are removed.

I would personally hope that they're working to remove it, and just choosing to not sink more dev time into a feature that's being removed, but that's reading very far into a situation that the devs have habitually just not talked about much to begin with.

I think a smart way to re-do summoner while removing the egis would be to sort of change the aestehtics of all of Summoner's abilities and make them all more akin to how Yuna's abilities are themed in Dissidia/Dissidia NT.

So for example instead of "BIO" as a DoT and poison based abilities, Summoner's dots could be called "Hellfire" and have the animation for it be a quick flash of Ifrit-egi or like Ifrit's head/a shadow of Ifrit's head (like how SMN's Akh Morn was just a Bahamut head above them back in HW before they got Demi-Bahamut). They could do similar things for their other abilities. Their two DoTs could be one based on Ifrit as a burning over time effect and the other based on Shiva to be sort of a frostbite effect, etc. etc. Idk, food for thought for the devs. It's clear they don't want the job to be pet based as it steps further away from that, but I feel like doing it this way would be the only way to make the job not pet-based while also feeling like it has any connection to the summons in the game.

[Brightamethyst]

I still feel like they had the chance to address this back in HW, and blew it. Tri-Disaster could have been Acid Rain with a Levi animation. Painflare could have been Thundershock with a Ramuh animation. Ruin 3 could have been Ice Lance with a Shiva animation, etc. It would have been a super easy way to add the classic summoning feel while having no effect on gameplay or balance.

[OvernightSiren]

I still feel like they had the chance to address this back in HW, and blew it. Tri-Disaster could have been Acid Rain with a Levi animation. Painflare could have been Thundershock with a Ramuh animation. Ruin 3 could have been Ice Lance with a Shiva animation, etc. It would have been a super easy way to add the classic summoning feel while having no effect on gameplay or balance.

There's a lot they can do. Idk if they're just trying to salvage all the existing particles without having to design anything new or if they're just THAT committed to the idea of Summoners as "poison mage which summons Bahamut"

[Rufalus]

I've asked in the last few Q&A live letters but my question's been missed since it's likely not a priority.

Good question... the last time Yoshida was asked by a journalist it seemed like 5.1x was going to be the new target for egi glam, but we are almost there now and they've gone quiet on the subject again so I guess plans changed again. My assumption is they either had more important things to do (perpetual problem) or are reconsidering whether the future of smn will involve egis at all, but it would be nice to get an updated dev comment on that for clarity.