Customary "When are summoners getting new summons" thread

[TaranTatsuuchi]

Ok, and FFXI had six summons at launch, and summoners continued to get new summons throughout the game's life. The glamours are pointless without the abilities actually being different. For instant, Ramuh can have an AoE stun. Shiva can have an AoE bind. Leviathan can have an AoE knock back. Let's not excuse SE from being complacent because "people are realistic".

Oh god... Imagine the rage if a pet had an aoe knockback...
The enemies would go everywhere!

[Tolmos]

Oh god... Imagine the rage if a pet had an aoe knockback...
The enemies would go everywhere!

Whenever I'd tank, I'd probably have to stop using voice chat because I wouldn't want the party to hear my uncontrollable sobbing on the other end. It's bad enough when WHM try to help in dungeons and send my mobs flying =D

[LadyVal]

Ok, and FFXI had six summons at launch, and summoners continued to get new summons throughout the game's life. The glamours are pointless without the abilities actually being different. For instant, Ramuh can have an AoE stun. Shiva can have an AoE bind. Leviathan can have an AoE knock back. Let's not excuse SE from being complacent because "people are realistic".

Also keep in mind that if SMN just got tons of free new abilities from pets, every other job would raise a torch and pitchfork and scream "Well what about ME?!"

FFXI, as far as I've heard, was MUCH less worried about balancing and whatnot and the variety was so strong that every class had a niche that made them work. In this game, everything is so stringent and balanced and has progressed so far with the same balancing that suddenly giving one job such an advantage (especially over customization of pet skills), would seriously affect the rest of the game. For instance, if the new SMN pets had so many cool abilities, the community would start looking for "SMN with pet X, SMN with pet Y, SMN with pet A" instead of "BLM, SMN, and BRD." I always remember Ramuh EX, and when it was discovered that Titan-egi was virtually immune to Ramuh's attacks, PF was filled to the brim with "Ramuh farming- NO TANKS ALLOWED." So if SMN becomes too strong, people would rather fill DPS roles in a party with each variety of SMN instead of a variety of DPS.

I do wholly support SMN becoming more about the summons, and getting more options, but at the way things go (and have been going) in this game the same treatment/boost/option would need to be applied to all jobs, lest the community start shutting out others in the name of efficiency. Because the general mindset of MMO players now is "Why settle for unique when I can take the cookie-cutter best to save time and get what I want as fast as possible?"

[Shurrikhan]

Also keep in mind that if SMN just got tons of free new abilities from pets, every other job would raise a torch and pitchfork and scream "Well what about ME?!"

So if SMN becomes too strong, people would rather fill DPS roles in a party with each variety of SMN instead of a variety of DPS.

I do wholly support SMN becoming more about the summons, and getting more options, but at the way things go (and have been going) in this game the same treatment/boost/option would need to be applied to all jobs, lest the community start shutting out others in the name of efficiency. Because the general mindset of MMO players now is "Why settle for unique when I can take the cookie-cutter best to save time and get what I want as fast as possible?"

So you then give BLMs the element aspecting/stancing idea Yoshi shot down after internal discussion, deepen and make viable both WM and non-WM/GB gameplay for Bards, diversify Fists of " " gameplay for Monks, add more rotational and resource options for Dragoon, etc., increasing simultaneous or stanced lateral complexity and versatility for all jobs. I'd love to see that.

There's always a point of balance. Merely buffing certain aspects of a job is never necessarily going to start removing others in the line-up. Now, if the state of SMNs after really fleshing out their pets and consequent gameplay calls for buffs to other job's skill ceilings, multiplicity of playstyles, versatility, etc., then so be it. But even then I severely doubt that SMNs versatility, especially when pet-dependent (e.g. 'stanced', at at a slow swap at that), is going to start dominating party composition. Even if the SMN has more actions available to it, that rarely affects actual efficiency, especially if any other job can do the same thing, likely at less cost to raw dps. Ramuh Titan-tank parties were due to a massive and truly silly oversight, and it was fixed about as quickly as SE fixes anything of note. Beyond that, SMN was nice for its rez, mobility, and multi-DoTing during add phase — all significant, but rarely a reason to deny any other dps the spot (unless overly melee-packed, in which case Bard, BLM, or a third healer would have been acceptable as well). I imagine the state of SMN would be similar after such buffs: other jobs might ask for the identity and gameplay improvements that SMN received, but it'd be unlikely to overtake other jobs on its numbers or "efficiency" when it comes down to forming a party.

[Alistaire]

Curious what this image would look like with XV added.

[Alaltus]

Don't worry everyone =D Egi glamours are coming for the low low price of 60$.

[Tolmos]

I am definitely interested to see what their plans, if any, are for the summoner/scholar moving forward. While I would be somewhat disappointed to see them de-emphasize the pets on these two pet classes, others here seem sort of excited about it, so I can't really discount the possibility that it would also be enjoyable. Personally, I'd prefer MORE emphasis on the pet, but I also happen to be that person who always chooses the pet class in every game they play. =D

Side note, but serious business tho- if they let us swap which hand our character holds the book on, that would be super. It messes with me every time I see my character writing with his left hand. I know there are lots of left handed people out there, but I have a hard time imagining my character as one of them =D

[Remus]

I hope SE sticks with the whole trance thing it's more fun in my opinion. GJ SE. I prefer it how it is now pet assist me (bit of extra dmg) and I do majority of the dmg. If they made it so you just control the pet they would be a very lazy job in my opinion.

[Tolmos]

If they made it so you just control the pet they would be a very lazy job in my opinion.

Having played games that did "control the pet" classes right, I have to say that I disagree with this entirely. Here are a few examples:

Take Aion. Aion Spiritmaster has a pet that is the primary damage dealer. The spiritmaster itself has mostly DOTs and some utility skills to increase the damage of the pet. However, along with the pets own special abilities (sort of like our egi has now), the spiritmaster also has pet skills of their own; in fact, an entire bar's worth. When the spiritmaster casts that skill, the pet performs this (on top of the pet's own skills). What this results in is the spiritmaster being something of a puppet master, using the pet as their arm to attack and defend as necessary. The spiritmaster itself can drop DOTs and do utility, but their main strength comes from their summoned pet. A true summoner.

Another pair of examples that worked similarly were City of Villains/Diablo 2 zoo necro. In those games, you had multiple pets and the character itself was basically the buffer/healer/rezzer for that group. You were the utility to your pet army. You spent all your time dropping debuffs on the enemy, buffing your NPCs, and then doing some small amount of damage of your own to supplement what your pet army was doing.

The way you described above

I prefer it how it is now pet assist me (bit of extra dmg) and I do majority of the dmg.

is the exact mechanic of the WoW hunter. Now, that's all well and good but the issue is that the pet is nothing but a gimmick in this situation, as all it brings to the table is a tiny bit of extra damage. The class itself now becomes a DoT version of the black mage. WoW players got so fed up with this playstyle that they made calls for, and eventually got, the ability to just not need the pet at all and be able to reclaim that DPS into the main character, since it was more of a liability than a boon.

[LineageRazor]

One of the problems you have to deal with when making the pet the primary part of the role, is dealing with what happens when the pet dies. When a regular character dies, they're out of the fight until a healer can raise them, something which is resource intensive for a job that already needs to manage its resources very carefully. When a summoner's pet dies... the summoner summons a new pet. The only resources being spent are the summoner's own.

Additionally, since pets tend to be a lot harder to control than the player themselves is in terms of movement and positioning, they need to come up with a lot of built-in defenses that regular players lack. Having a pet that's nigh-indestructible as long as the tank holds hate and is as powerful a DPS as any other... well, it's a pretty serious job advantage, to say the least, especially if that pet can continue to pound away while all the poor melees are dancing around to avoid aoes and such.

There may be ways to balance this well, but I'd imagine they'd be tricky. Make the pet too potent and tough to kill, and why would anyone DPS with anything else? Make it too vulnerable, and it becomes a nightmare trying to maneuver it out of aoes, or other tricky "move here, then here, then here" mechanics common to endgame fights - all while trying to move YOURSELF out of those same danger zones. Make it too weak DPS-wise... and, well, you have what we have right now.