SMN changed to full trance + demi summons when

[Myon88]

The change would likely come with other changes

You could lower the recast to like 30s so that even with downtime, chances are you're close to your next summon anyway. The thing is though you can't have it all, shorter cooldowns will inherently be weaker because it's the same amount of damage being spread around more demis or what have you. Take PvP SMN, now that you mention it. Burst damage wins fights in the feast, and it has pathetic burst compared to PvP BLM due to its design. You have a 2000p deathflare and average phoenix gcds attached to DWT and FBT. What does BLM have? 3200p xenoglossy that is most importantly a 'charge' that you can hold onto making it way more flexible.

Anytime, anywhere, PvP BLM can pick off weakened targets with that xenoglossy in their pocket. You don't need to pray that DWT coming off cooldown aligns with a moment of opportunity. Likewise in PvE with good planning you can go into perfect alex with an extra bahamut in your pocket and smash the enrage. This is why having ammo or charge based burst that you have control over will always beat passive damage windows.

SMN damage output right now is like a really tall sine wave that peaks every time you summon bahamut or phoenix. Having the ability to move your damage around to put more 'peaks' together where they count gives the job depth, which is something sorely lacking in the game right now. At its peak, when we had DWT and aetherflow, it felt like you were loading a revolver with bullets every time you reloaded your cooldowns. You could fire some now, hold on to the rest for later, it was up to you. In contrast, trances with forced summons attached feel like holding up one of those garden sprinklers that just spin around automatically. You'd better hope it's pointing at your target when you need it to. Numbers aside, having no control over the tempo of your damage output is just no fun.

All this isn't some kinda ultimate-only nerdy elitist concern either too. The ability to use your cooldowns separately is even more important in overworld content or places like potd, where fights are nothing but short encounters split up by downtime. Or what about dungeons, what happens if FBT comes off cooldown right as you kill a group of trash? Now you're facing two bad options, press it on cooldown and totally waste it (obviously not), or be forced to hold it for the 10-15 seconds it takes to run down the hallway to the next group. Both feel really bad, if it were DWT, you could press it to finish off the mobs with deathflare, and then hold on to that bahamut until the next encounter begins. This is a big reason why summoner feels like garbage in dungeons this expansion.

[Cabalabob]

You could lower the recast to like 30s so that even with downtime, chances are you're close to your next summon anyway. The thing is though you can't have it all, shorter cooldowns will inherently be weaker because it's the same amount of damage being spread around more demis or what have you. Take PvP SMN, now that you mention it. Burst damage wins fights in the feast, and it has pathetic burst compared to PvP BLM due to its design. You have a 2000p deathflare and average phoenix gcds attached to DWT and FBT. What does BLM have? 3200p xenoglossy that is most importantly a 'charge' that you can hold onto making it way more flexible.

Anytime, anywhere, PvP BLM can pick off weakened targets with that xenoglossy in their pocket. You don't need to pray that DWT coming off cooldown aligns with a moment of opportunity. Likewise in PvE with good planning you can go into perfect alex with an extra bahamut in your pocket and smash the enrage. This is why having ammo or charge based burst that you have control over will always beat passive damage windows.

SMN damage output right now is like a really tall sine wave that peaks every time you summon bahamut or phoenix. Having the ability to move your damage around to put more 'peaks' together where they count gives the job depth, which is something sorely lacking in the game right now. At its peak, when we had DWT and aetherflow, it felt like you were loading a revolver with bullets every time you reloaded your cooldowns. You could fire some now, hold on to the rest for later, it was up to you. In contrast, trances with forced summons attached feel like holding up one of those garden sprinklers that just spin around automatically. You'd better hope it's pointing at your target when you need it to. Numbers aside, having no control over the tempo of your damage output is just no fun.

All this isn't some kinda ultimate-only nerdy elitist concern either too. The ability to use your cooldowns separately is even more important in overworld content or places like potd, where fights are nothing but short encounters split up by downtime. Or what about dungeons, what happens if FBT comes off cooldown right as you kill a group of trash? Now you're facing two bad options, press it on cooldown and totally waste it (obviously not), or be forced to hold it for the 10-15 seconds it takes to run down the hallway to the next group. Both feel really bad, if it were DWT, you could press it to finish off the mobs with deathflare, and then hold on to that bahamut until the next encounter begins. This is a big reason why summoner feels like garbage in dungeons this expansion.

This is more a problem with the design of the game as a whole than SMN, pretty much everyone has to decide wether to sit on resources or waste them on a dying pack. When a RDM hits 80/80 do they moulinet the almost dead mobs? Overcap mana? Lose dps using reprise to keep their mana down? Does a MCH use a hypercharge to use 2 auto crossbows throwing 3 down the drain as they run to the next fight?

Personally I’d like to see more duration based moves changed to a charge system more like HW ammo or aetherflow, when a MCH uses hypercharge they get 5 heat canisters to spend on heat blast or auto crossbow (maybe in MCHs case have some clause that using any other action cancels remaining charges). SMN demi summons could remain for a certain number of actions rather than a duration so summoning them is never wasted, maybe have the gauge instead of tic down with duration have it so the attacks consume gauge and each action has a specific cost. This would also alleviate ping issues like trying to use that last Brand of purgatory but Phoenix leaves the field and you miss it and end up using outburst on a single target

[Myon88]

Well, summoner did not face this dilemma in Stormblood and earlier due to the self-casted nature of aetherflow. It didn't matter if there were targets around or you were in combat or not, as you had the freedom to use aetherflow and then leisurely look for targets in the next 1 minute. Likewise, DWT and bahamut worked the same way they do now. This was actually one of the big perks of the job that it was able to exploit in fights like ucob/uwu with a lot of downtime, and the loss of it is one of the bigger tragedies to befall the job this expansion.

Machinist I feel actually got a much better deal than we (and most jobs really) did in this regard. Overheat and their robot cost 50 gauge units, but their gauge goes up to 100. This is a critical difference because that 'overflow buffer' is effectively your protection against downtime. This removes a lot of stress and feelsbad moments because you're not pressured to use these abilities exactly on cooldown, you can safely overcap without being punished.

Maybe you're at 50 heat but you know the boss is going to disappear soon, or the fight is ending like in your example. If this were firebird trance coming off cooldown there, you'd just have to settle for holding it with no way to be compensated for the lost time. On MCH, you can continue building gauge to 70 or whatever, hypercharge later on and pay 50 units to go back down to 20. Now if their gauge was capped at 50 it would be a different story - that would be a bad situation as you say, and that's exactly what's wrong with summoner. Your own resource system shouldn't be able to checkmate you in a lose/lose situation.

I do agree more skills shifted to a charge system would be a boon for job design overall. Charges, like machinist gauges having room for overflow, are buffers against having to use things on cooldown as they let you 'save' them up instead. To their credit, SE is starting to recognize the importance of building flexibility like this into core job toolkits, and charges are one of their solutions to that. It's just a shame they didn't apply it to the right skills on SMN. With black mages, xenoglossy is an excellent candidate for having charges due to the way it interacts with their rotation. In contrast, egi assault is nowhere near as important for summoners, and having charges on energy drain and trances would've been far more useful. In fact, if DWT/FBT interacted with the charge system, I think I would have no objections to merging DWT and summon bahamut as the key issue with the merger - the loss of flexibility - would be resolved.

[purgatori]

The DoT + fester spam phase always feel weird/awkwardly placed, and is something I haven't been able to optimise properly in my short time playing the job. Since you can move between demis & trances with very little delay, both the DoTs and the pet abilities just feel like thumb twiddling.