Can someone give me an in-depth explanation why Summoner is arguably the worst DPS?

[Shizuna]

I've been reading up some of things that's been going on in this thread and I'm sure the people who are against SMN's getting a ST damage buff, like other people have said, haven't played a SMN in current end-game content. They're too afraid of change and they think BLM is going to be in the same spot as before. They wanna justify that BLM deserves to do higher damage all around cause of the utilities SMN's have which is battle ress, lesser CD on E4E, and better virus.

I agree with the people who pointed out that BLM is better at AoE, ST, and resource management than SMN. For utility, that's a somewhat different matter, but that still shouldn't be the sole reason for how BLM's should do everything good in FCOB and some other encouters than a SMN should. Having infinite mp resource is kinda dumb and that's one of the reasons, a major one nonetheless, why there are more BLM's brought into FCOB than SMN's; it's just so that BRD can play paeon for melees/tanks who need it. Now, I'm not trying to fish for BLM nerfs or anything, but that's just something I wanted to express here. I do play BLM in dungeons, trials, and in CT. I'm actually working on the zodiac weapon right now and I just have to say BLM is in a really good position for any end-game content and for competitive/highly progressed statics. They have the potential to compete with melees in a striking dummy-like fight (ie: T8), but even in a somewhat movement-orientated fight, BLM can be slightly behind or closest to melees' DPS.

As for SMN, disregarding utility comparison, we're at the low end, concluding the fight below or sometimes equal to a BRD. The longer the fights and the less jumps there are the more DPS we lose in comparison to everyone else. Ask yourself this: what's the whole reason of bringing SMN over BLM in a long fight, if no one dies? A lot of people who have play/played SMN in end-game content will laugh and tell you there is no reason to play SMN, when BLM have the potential to do a lot more damage without a care for how long it is. This is how it was in progression. Yeah, sure, as more people get geared, the fights are easier and shorter, and that's when you see a boost in SMN's DPS. I know it is the case for me and my static. I have finally hit 500 DPS on t10 and I'm getting close to doing that in t12 (and I don't even have my i135 weapon yet) because of my static doing more damage and making the fights shorter. In conclusion, SMN's are reliant on how everyone is doing more DPS and making the fights shorter. When a new raid comes out, that won't be the case anymore in the beginning and everyone will have to start progression all over again then SMN's will suffer, but that depends on what SE is gonna throw out. I'm sure Alexander will have fights that will be just as long as the fights were at the start of FCOB.

BUT that's if SE doesn't do anything and keeps things the way they are, which is why I can't wait for what SE is going to bring in the future for SMN, looking at that article. If only it was looked at sooner though; I wouldn't have mind if just a piety increase was added on patch 2.5 honestly.

Anyways, if none of this go through the thick skulls of people who don't believe SMN should get a buff/change then I don't know what will.

[Dyvid]

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So what is needed? MP or DPS buff? Which would make the biggest impact in SMN DPS? People aren't against buffs that help SMN in FCoB. We are against the claim that SMN is just a poor DPS all around and worthless in all forms of content. Sorry but that just isn't true.

[Shizuna]

So what is needed? MP or DPS buff? Which would make the biggest impact in SMN DPS? People aren't against buffs that help SMN in FCoB. We are against the claim that SMN is just a poor DPS all around and worthless in all forms of content. Sorry but that just isn't true.

I already said what is needed to be said and honestly, I'm not sure what is needed to make a bigger impact on SMN. I just wanted to talk about the reasons why SMN's need a buff for long fights (when I said other encounters, I really mean long fights that are over 7-8 minutes other than FCOB). I'm not here to support that SMN's aren't good in regular content; I never claimed that actually. All I did was talk about SMN's suffering in lengthy battles. I think SMN's are fine in "casual content," but I could care less about it, since I don't expend a lot of effort to do well in those fights.

[Odowla]

stuff

Either of them, singularily, will not be enough. So essentially it would need to be both.

I'm not talking in terms of DPS or anything. I'm talking in terms of just potencies. The potency-per-second of a Summoner is actually the lowest in the game as one of the DPS. Don't believe me? Go do some SCoB/FCoB with other competant DPS, and you will see what i'm talking about. The other DPS (namely, Melees and Bards) Do 220 to 250 PPS, with Bard being up to 300 (due to essentially "low damage" procs). Summoner? Does either less than 200, or BARELY 200 over a whole fight. That's a problem.

Then when the fight goes on past a certain number of minutes, or seconds, suddenly you lose an 80 potency per 2.5ish seconds (actually, it's closer to 2.3, lolspellspeed) spell so that you can freaking cast more dots. A dot might be 240 or 300 or whatever potency it is, but it does that over time; I mean, that's literally the definition of a DoT. No other class loses a large chunk of its damage that quickly, and if they do, someone will help them with that. A SMN doesnt have that.

[Romsca]

Actually Dyvid it is partially true. Black mage is a burst dps class. They switch between phases of high amounts of damage followed by a low damage phase (Fire/Ice). Their dps should be the middle between the low/high points. Summoners average dps is their actual peak on a graph. So once all their dots are up, that's their max. Of course this is single target numbers. Now, neither class should be strictly higher, they just achieve their average dps though different methods.A nice example would be in Thornmarch where we need to keep the moogles apart. Summoner is great in this fight because we can spread our dots around and keep pressure on. Black mages would need the moogles grouped together to AoE them because of how Fire 2/Blizz 2/Flare work.

Since summoners do not have infinite reserves of mana like black mage, our peak drops after a certain amount of time. Thus turning summoner into a burst class with a very long low peak. This hurts us. Fixing the amount of mana we get from piety will be the first step in balancing summoner. Not saying we couldn't use some extra potency on the dots but one step at a time.

Everyone in the last few pages have been arguing over what summoner and black mage bring to the table beyond damage. Summoner does have a traited E4E, traited Virus and battle revive. But several other classes also have access to versions of E4E and virus and with our current mana issues, using battle revive is a bad thing in top endgame content. If we had insane mana regen like black mage then yes, I would say the summoner should do the revives instead of the healers.

[Divine_Whisper]

Basically what needs to happen for summoner is that, they need to change shadow flare from a 30 sec DoT Slow to a 30 sec Dot Mana Drain with the amount of mana restored will be a percentage of the damage dealt per enemy caught in the circle. I figure if they did that then the summoner will be able to last longer in fights as they will be able to regain mana without sacraficing dps. Now what concerns me is that with energy drain, its almost as if that is the skill that is holding them back in terms of dps, while it does give back some mana it doesn't really give back enough. If a summoner dies in any raid, they basically have to spend the next 3 minutes doing a ruin and energy drain rotation, till they can get back to full mana. Certain things could be tweaked a little bit to make them more viable, but until the expansion we shouldn't speculate on what they may do, for all we know they may give us a summon that regains mana for us.

[VanilleFang]

snip.

This would be good for SMNs but it would make it so SCHs would have basically infinite MP. Besides, I like my slow. ]:

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I doubt it. Every point of Piety gives every class/job the same amount of MP (8 at level 50), they won't adjust it just for one job. Or at least I highly doubt they will.

[Romsca]

That may be, Vanille, but it would be the simplest fix to summoner without altering scholar by adjusting the mana cost of our skills. Unless the piety > mana conversion is done by the same coding across all classes, which would then require adding in new code. But, I would think the amount of time needed to change that coding would be far less than would be needed to balance out changes to the skill costs or creating new gear.

Can't adjust Aetherflow without affecting scholar. Can't adjust energy drain without affecting scholar. Can't add piety to gear without it giving black mage more mana to cast additional spells. Add in costs to balance test, I would go with SE just changing the piety conversion to save money and time.

[ShinryuReishiki]

I doubt it. Every point of Piety gives every class/job the same amount of MP (8 at level 50), they won't adjust it just for one job. Or at least I highly doubt they will.

Each class actually gets unique amounts of MP per Piety. SMN gets ~7.25, SCH ~7.5, WHM ~7.9, BLM ~8.25, and PLD ~3.9. These aren't exact numbers; I just tossed on some Piety pieces, found the difference in MP, then divided by the amount of Piety. A SCH with no Piety equipped actually has the same base amount as a BLM, but is a few hundred MP lower...

[Akiza]

Summoner is worthless in hardcore end game raiding. The reality is Summoner has equal to or lower DPS than the Bard but no utility to justify having all around poor DPS. DoT classes are meant to be crowd control but since cc's are spread across DPS they are no longer needed. Modern MMORPGS DoT classes are generally in the Healer role because they can multitask and provide party support. DCUO is the only MMO where DoT classes are designed as intended in the Controller Role. Also DoT DPS are easy to break. There are a few ways to fix the Summoner keep the job the same and design content around it which obviously SE doesn't want to do looking at FCOB and 2.5 dungeons. Buff the Summoner by 5-7% which will put them just below Monk. Rework the Summoner into a Pet Based Job.